Page 137 of Dark Night of the Soul

His fingers curved around mine, tightening. And I had to remind myself he was here because he wanted to be. He’d wait, patient as ever, while I struggled with what I knew was to come.

I took a deep breath. Let it out.

“You’re afraid of what can happen,” he said.

“Yes.”

“Only if you let it.”

He was right. I knew he was right. I’d stopped it before. I’d stop it again.

He cupped my face, his thumb tracing the scar on my left cheek. Soft. A whisper of a touch.

“I watched you beat it before,” he said.

I closed my eyes. Let his words settle.

He’d watched me. Seen me at my worst. Trembling, fighting, having to stop and start and breathe through spikes that burned. And he was still here. Still touching me like I was something precious instead of something damaged.

His hands slipped into my hair, pressing a kiss against my temple.

“There’s nothing wrong with you.”

I opened my eyes. Met his gaze.

“Then watch me beat it again,” I said.

And that was all I needed to move forward.

I kissed him.

What came next was fumbling and breathless. Clothes shed without ceremony, hands learning what made the other gasp, mouths finding sensitive places that drove thought away.

The programming spiked twice. Both times I breathed through it. Both times he stilled and waited and let me find my way back.

He let me lead. I let him respond. Learned which touches helped and which burned.

And when I came apart in his arms, shaking and breathless and whole, I understood something I hadn’t before.

The programming didn’t have to win. I had to keep fighting it.

And I would. For as many nights as it took.

For him. For us. For me.

Later, we lay side by side in the dark. Him on his back, holding my hand while I curled on my side. And I listened to his even breathing, the rhythm of his essence.

“It hurts you, doesn’t it?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said without hesitation.

And though he said nothing, he made no movement, I saw the faint flick of a jaw muscle. I didn’t have to hear his thoughts to know what he was thinking.

“Then why—”

“You know why,” I said, cutting him off. And then, I whispered, so soft I wasn’t sure he heard, “I love you.”

Silence. Long enough that I thought he hadn’t heard.