“Bri, listen.” I raked a hand through my hair, sitting on the bed beside her. “I have to apologize to you—”

“No.” She surged forward. Her hand rested on my arm, stopping me. “What I did, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. He…” she broke off. Her fingers curled around my arm and held on tightly. “He,” her voice was guttural and full of emotion, “I shouldn’t have gotten into that car, but I did. I shouldn’t have done what he told me to do, but I did. I shouldn’t have hidden it from you, but I did. I did so many things that I can’t undo.”

Tears formed in her eyes, and they slid down, one by one, as she talked. She ignored them, and I recognized the look in her eyes. She was back there, remembering every detail. The urge to crush her against my body and make her forget everything crawled up inside me until my hands were digging into the blankets. She needed to talk about this. I could see that. I had to let her, and if I stopped her, I knew that same demon would keep coming back and haunting her.

“I was a coward.” Her head looked down. “I—”

I couldn’t listen anymore. My hand reached for her chin, and I lifted it, making her look at me again. All of those tears were still there, just pooling on top of each other. She looked broken. Cursing inside, I knew some of that was because of me. “I’m sorry.”

“What?”

“I’m. Sorry. Me.” This was half my fault. “What I said to you, when you finally told me, was wrong. I was an asshole. I was hurt, but I was wrong. You don’t have to apologize to me. I have to apologize to you.”

She shook her head. “What are you doing? No, you don’t. I do.”

“No, you don’t.” I cupped the side of her face, my fingers sliding through her hair. “You already apologized, Bri. You did the night I kicked you out of the band. I’m sorry for what I did. What I did—I gave us another year apart—I have to apologize to you for that.” I pointed at the fourth bird on my shoulder. “This is me. Because I left you, and I never should’ve done that. I’m so sorry, Bri.”

“Luke—”

“Stop.” I held her face with both of my hands and leaned forward, my eyes locking with hers. “You were a little girl. I remember your dad. He was an abusive bastard. Bri, how many times did I crawl into your room and sleep in the closet with you and Braden? How many times did you put Band-Aids on my bruises from my own dad? Both our dads were horrible. I get it. I do. You can’t blame yourself for doing what your dad told you to do. What would he have done if you hadn’t listened to him? That’s what has haunted me for the last year.”

“Luke?”

She wasn’t getting it. She blamed herself for everything. I wanted to crush her to me, but I’d be so wrong, so fucking wrong. “Bri.” I waited until her eyes focused on me again. They were still watering, and she had looked away. When they came back to me, I started, “You saved me. In a fucked-up way, you did. He left that night. He thought he killed me, and he left me. You gave me freedom, and I’ve never thanked you for that. If I knew that would’ve happened, even with the beating, I would’ve done it again. And again. And again. As long as I knew he was going to leave, I’d have done almost anything. Yes, it hurt me when you didn’t come to see me in the hospital. Yes, it killed me when I found out you were dating Elijah, but now knowing why, thank you.”

As the words were coming from me, I realized I had been so wrong about so many others things. Tears and emotions swirled in my gut. I was struggling from letting everything spill out. “Bri, I’m the one who is sorry. I’m sorry I got mad at you. I’m sorry I didn’t push to find out why you were dating Elijah. I’m sorry I accepted it, and I didn’t fight for you. I’m sorry that when you finally told me, I was stupid and blind. I’m sorry. Not you. You don’t have anything to be sorry about.”

Her entire face was coated with tears, and I couldn’t stop myself anymore. I began kissing them, absorbing them one at a time. She gasped, her hands lifting to touch the sides of my face. I moved from one tear to another. I loved this woman. I loved her with every cell of my body, and I needed to show her.

“Ahem.” Someone cleared their throat from the other side of the door.

Bri shrank down in the bed, but I turned toward the sound. An interruption, at this moment, had my blood starting to boil. When I opened the door and saw it was Elijah, looking smug in jeans and a sweatshirt, I growled. “Not the time.”

He jumped back, holding his hands in the air between us. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m getting that. I…” His eyes danced back to Bri, and he cringed. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Bri. I thought,” an uneasy laugh erupted from him, “I probably shouldn’t say what I thought either.”

“Elijah.” His name was dipped low in a warning. “I don’t care that you can handle yourself in a fight. I don’t care what the magazines will say about my face. If you don’t disappear in two seconds, I will be pounding that face of yours.”

“Okay, but seriously, I wouldn’t have interrupted if it wasn’t life or death.” He dropped his hands and shoved them into his pockets. “It’s life or death, man. For real.”

“Whose?” Bri asked from behind me.

He shifted to look at her. Fuck no. I moved, too, blocking him. When he looked at me, my lip curled up. Yeah, right. He wasn’t going to see her like that, ever again. And, as if reading that message in my eyes, he held his hands up again and took one more step back.

“Bri,” I called over my shoulder. “I have a shirt by the bed. Want to get dressed?”

“Oh, yeah.”

I stared straight at Elijah as we both heard her moving around behind me. When she zipped up her pants, he continued to look at me and only me when he said, “It’s Emerson. He’s in trouble.”

Bri let out a series of curses. We heard her hopping around behind us, and her voice was muffled before it became clearer. “Why am I not surprised? Emerson? Really? What did my cousin do, because it had better be good to interrupt this moment with us?!”

“He…” Elijah started to look over my shoulder at her, but stopped himself. He said to me, “He’s wearing a wire, and Brute’s about to find out.”