caused me a moment’s pause.”
“Then what does?” she asked, and he had the most uncomfortable feeling, once again, that she could read him. Much too easily, and far too closely. “Because,” she continued, “it is clear that something weighs on you, Lucas. Heavily.”
“It’s only myself,” he answered, with unflinching honesty. “When Jacob left, the role of guardian fell to me.” His smile felt like acid. “I was unfit for the position, to put it mildly. I abandoned them, too. Deserted them. That is the kind of man I am.”
The room was quiet. The enticing scents of the food set out on the room service tray perfumed the air, and the wind rattled the windowpanes.
“How old were you?” Grace asked after a moment, her gaze unreadable, her face calm.
“Eighteen.” He made a bitter sound. “A man.”
“Or, perhaps, a boy who had been brutally treated the whole of his life,” she said quietly, holding his gaze. “A boy who knew nothing at all about how a parent should act. I think you expected far too much of yourself. Unfairly.”
He looked at her for a long moment, his history shimmering between them, his failures and flaws lying out there with nothing to cover them. Not his charm, his wit, his face—none of the usual tools he’d used his whole life to prevent a moment like this from ever occurring.
And what was most unreal was that he had done all this himself. He had thrown all of this at her feet. And he still could not allow himself to think about why he had done it. He did not dare.
“This is what I was talking about earlier,” he said, reaching over to cup her jaw in his hand, his body thrilling to the feel of her soft skin, the way her lips parted slightly. “No one has ever expected anything of me, Grace. Least of all me. Why should you?” He stroked his thumb along her soft cheek. “Why do you?”
Her eyes were luminous. Deep and unwavering as she stared back at him.
She shrugged slightly, though her gaze never left his. “Perhaps it’s time you started.”
And then she turned her head, pressing her lips into the palm of his hand, and that simply ruined him.
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