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Bayer cupped my face in his massive hands, his touch gentle despite his strength. "I know, Danny. I understand fear. I understand lashing out."

"Still doesn't make it okay," I insisted.

He shrugged. “I love you.”

I swallowed hard, blinking back the ridiculous tears that threatened. Damn hormones. "I don't deserve you." And I hadn't said it back. I couldn't. Not yet. I took a shaky breath, knowing I needed to tell him. After everything, after pushing him away and nearly destroying us, he deserved the truth. "Can we sit?"

Bayer nodded, guiding me to the bed. We sat side by side, his hand still holding mine like he was afraid I might bolt.

"I switched majors in college," I started, my voice barely above a whisper. "I struggled with ADHD. I’d always wanted to teach kindergarten, but I gave up after my second year."

Bayer just waited patiently.

“It was my dream, Bayer. The one thing I was absolutely certain about." I pulled my hand from his, needing to wrap my arms around myself. "But there was this professor. Dr. Robert Whitfield. He taught developmental psychology, and I thought..." I swallowed hard. "I thought he saw me. Really saw me, you know? Not the kid who forgot where he put his coffee or lost his keys twice a week. He saw potential."

Bayer was very still beside me, listening with that focused intensity he brought to everything important.

"It started small. Extra meetings to discuss my career path. Coffee to talk about research opportunities. He made me feel special, like I was chosen somehow." My voice cracked. "I was twenty years old and someone I respected was telling me I was brilliant. Do you have any idea how intoxicating that was for someone like me?"

"Danny—"

"Let me finish," I said quickly. "I need to get this out."

He nodded, and I felt his hand settle on my back, warm and grounding.

"By my junior year, we were sleeping together. And he was... he was in my head about everything. What classes to take, who to spend time with. He convinced me my friends were holding me back, that my mom didn't understand my potential. That even my dream of teaching kindergarten was limiting myself."

I stood up, needing to move, to pace. "He said I was wasting my gifts on lesson plans and finger painting.”

"But that wasn't why he wanted you to switch," Bayer said quietly.

I glanced up at him. "No. No, it wasn't. He wanted me dependent on him. He convinced me that someone with ADHD who couldn't remember where I left my coffee wasn't built for managing lesson plans and observation logs and twenty-five five-year-olds." My hands were shaking now. "He made me believe I was fundamentally broken. That the only way I could succeed was if he took care of me."

Bayer's eyes had gone molten gold.

"He didn't even want me to work full-time," I continued, the words pouring out now "He wanted to set me up in an apartment. Keep me. Like some kind of... pet." I laughed bitterly. "I threw away everything—my dream, my relationships, my self-respect—for a man who was married."

"Married," Bayer repeated, his voice dangerously soft.

"I found out by accident. Overheard him on the phone with his wife, discussing their anniversary dinner." I turned to face Bayer, needing him to understand. "I'd given him everything. Changed my entire life path. Isolated myself from everyone who cared about me. And he was going home to his wife every night while I waited for him like some pathetic—"

"Don't," Bayer cut me off, standing and crossing to me in two strides. "Don't talk about yourself like that."

"But that's what I was," I insisted, tears streaming down my face now. "I was pathetic. And when I confronted him, he just...laughed. Said I should be grateful he'd invested so much time in me. That without him, I'd never amount to anything."

Bayer's arms came around me, pulling me against his chest. I felt him trembling with barely contained rage.

"So when you asked me to stay here, to give up my job, my apartment, my independence..." I pulled back enough to look up at him. "All I could hear was Whitfield's voice telling me I needed him. That I couldn't make it on my own."

"I'm not him," Bayer said fiercely. "Danny, I would never—"

"I know," I interrupted. "I know that now. Intellectually, I've always known. But that fear..." I touched my chest where the bond hummed. "It's been eating at me. Making me lash out at you when all you've done is try to protect me."

Bayer cupped my face, forcing me to meet his eyes. "I don't want to control you, and I’m sorry for barking out orders."

"I don’t deserve you," I whispered. "The school, the way you've given me space about the pregnancy, how you've never once pressured me to be anything other than what I am." I swallowed hard. "You're nothing like him. And I'm sorry it took me so long to trust that."

"You don't have to apologize for trauma someone else inflicted," Bayer said gently. "But I need you to promise me something."