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Her jaw dropped. “You? Did you make all of this?”
He felt something he hadn’t felt in a long, long time as her eyes moved wonderingly over the finished and half-finished projects he’d worked on before his arrest. Pride. “All of it,” he admitted.
“Oh, Knox,” she murmured, gesturing to the chair. “May I?”
“Please.”
Tenley sitting in the chair he made with his own two hands while she ran her hands over the armrests in a gentle caress was strangely erotic. But he did his best to put that out of his mind, because that train of thought was not going in the direction he wanted at the moment.
“This is amazing, Knox. I think it’s even better than the stuff your mom made. You could sell these things and make a fortune. This is why the trust money is so important, right? You want to produce your own furniture line?”
He nodded. “That’s the dream. It was a buyer’s market years ago when I bought this place, so I got it for a song. But building furniture isn’t typically a low overhead business. I might eventually be able to do it without the trust, but everything will be easier with it.”
“I can’t think of a better use for that money,” she said quietly. “But why are you showing me all this?”
Knox took a deep breath. This was either going to go swimmingly, or be a fiery train wreck. He knelt in front of her so she didn’t have to tip her head back to look him in the eyes. “Because this—” he gestured to the dusty building and furniture around them, “—is me. I want you to know the real me, because I really want to know the real you, Tenley.”
For a woman who had the absolute best poker face Knox had ever seen, the look she gave him was so open and shocked, he almost laughed. She blinked a few times in rapid succession before asking, “Why?” on a breathy sigh.
He couldn’t hold back a laugh. “Because I like you. Is that so hard to believe?”
She glanced down and tucked her clasped hands between her knees. “Well, after the way we met and everything we’ve been through so far, I just assumed…I mean…why?”
Seeing the bravest woman he’d ever known in a moment of insecurity because of him was a gut punch he hadn’t anticipated. Knox reached out and tipped her chin up with his index finger and held eye contact as he said, “Look, I know I haven’t done anything in our time together to make you feel like you can trust me—and vice versa, if we’re being honest—but I’d like for that to change. Because everything I do know about you, everything I’ve learned so far, makes me think you’re worth knowing much, much better. You’re smart and gorgeous and fucking diabolical, and I love that about you.”
“You mean you want, like…a relationship?”
“Absolutely.”
She swallowed hard. “I’m not sure I know how to do that.”
He shrugged. “I don’t have much experience myself. I’ve only had one real relationship, and to say it ended badly would be a huge understatement. But we can figure it out together. I feel like I can figure out anything when I’m with you.”
“And this relationship would happen separately from our deal to get your trust back?”
Knox smiled at her. “I know your policy about not doing anyone any favors for free. That 10% is yours, even if you shoot me down today. Hell, at this point, if it makes you feel safer with me, you can have the whole trust. I don’t even care anymore. I can figure out how to make the business work without the trust. But my gut’s telling me I can’t make anything work without you.”
Her eyes misted over as she muttered, “Well…shit.”
And just like that, his heart and stomach started battling for a hiding spot in his throat. “Is that a yes or…?” He trailed off because the or in this instance was unthinkable.
Tenley sighed. “I was all prepared to let you down gently and tell you I’m not built for relationships. Then you went and ruined everything by being all sweet and sincere and saying all the right things. And now it looks like I’m about to start a relationship with a guy who kidnapped me.”
His entire body unclenched and he nearly passed out from relief. “I think you actually kidnapped me,” he reminded her.
She threw her hands up, exasperated. “Not that it matters now. You realize this is going to be messy, right?”
He nodded. “The messiest.”
“Most people would call me a psycho, you know. You’ll be in a relationship with a psycho.”
He grinned. “The most adorable psycho I’ve ever seen in my life.”
“And I’ll probably screw up. Hell, you’ll probably screw up, too.”
“Undoubtedly.”
Tenley bit her bottom lip. “We might end up hating each other when it’s all over.”
