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“I told you. I can’t live without you. You know I love you and the baby.”
“Don’t say that.” Those words from him are my kryptonite. I step back, turning away because I’m too close to caving in.
“But it’s true. When I said them before, I was sure I’d die, and I wanted you to know. I wanted you to be able to tell the baby something good about me.”
I can’t speak. And when he steps up behind me, laying his hands on my shoulders, I can’t find the strength to shrug him off.
“I know I’ve been an asshole. I know I don’t deserve you. And I know that to be with me, you’ll have to give up what you’ve been fighting for. Are Niko and Elena and Lucy wrong when they say you love me?”
“Liam.” God, please make him stop.
“Tell me to go, and I will.”
I close my eyes. “I can’t.”
He turns me, his hands cradling my cheeks. “You’re right to want me out of your life.”
“Then why are you here?”
“I told you,” he says with a small smile. “I can’t live without you.”
“Do you even know love, Liam?”
His thumb brushes a tear from my cheek I didn’t realize I'd shed. “Until you, no. Well, that’s not true. When I was a kid, I had the perfect family. My mother was beautiful and she showered me with love. And my dad loved her. I know it. But then they died. And my uncle died. I feel like what I love dies, and I don’t want that for you, which is why I’ve tried so fucking hard to protect you from me.”
My heart breaks for him.
“I can’t do it anymore, Kate. I can’t protect you from me. I want you so fucking bad I can’t breathe.”
“What do you expect from me?”
He lowers his forehead against mine. “In a word? Your love.”
“You’ve always had that.” I don’t want to give him my feelings and at the same time, I feel like I owe it to him for sharing so much of himself.
“But it’s not enough? Or not enough to uproot your life and live on the other side of the law?”
“It’s not that. Or not only that. You feel like this now, but in ten minutes, you’ll walk out that door and leave me again.”
He lifts his head. “I won’t. I can’t.”
“What assurances do I have?”
“Marry me.”
My jaw drops. “What?”
“Marry me. The commitment doesn’t get any bigger than that. We can fly to Vegas… right now?—”
“Are you nuts?”
He laughs. “No, baby. I’m in love.”
My lips twitch up without permission. But how can I keep this man back when he’s so earnest?
“How do you see this working?” Now, I’m just trying to delay the inevitable.
“One, we get married. Two, you move into my place… or better yet, I’ll build us a spectacular home near Woodstock. You liked it those days we were there, didn’t you?”
