A Deep and Dark December(91)

God, she was stubborn. She wasn’t going to let up on him. The sooner he complied with what she wanted him to do, the sooner she’d actually get the rest she needed.

“Fine.” He imagined her telling him to f*ck off, pictured her kicking him out of her hospital room, telling him she never wanted to see him again. Everything he deserved to hear. Instead all he got was a serene smile and a smug eyebrow wiggle. He frowned.

“It works,” she said. “You can’t use your ability on me.”

“What about everyone else? They don’t have the defenses you have.”

“Keep practicing. You’ll get better.”

“I don’t want to get better. I want it to go away.”

“Well, that’s not going to happen, is it? Do you want to accidentally use your ability or have control over it? Because those are your only two options.”

He grumbled under his breath at her, knowing she was right.

Her expression softened. “How’s your mom?”

Her abrupt change of subject threw him for a moment. He pulled in a tight breath. “She doesn’t know yet.”

“I wish I could be there with you when you tell her.”

“How in the hell am I going to tell her that her son shot her husband? It’ll be all over town. About him shooting you, me shooting him.” Squeezing his eyes closed, he tipped his head back. “Ah, Jesus.”

She took his hand in hers. “I’m so sorry.”

“You don’t have anything to be sorry about.”

“It was because of me that your father came to the bluff.”

“Don’t call him that.”

Erin could feel the twin chains of grief and guilt wrapped around him, squeezing and shackling him, pulling him away from her.

“It was my idea to bait him. All of it was my fault. Not yours. I wish I’d listened to you. If I had—”

“If you had, more people might have been hurt or died because of him. Donald and Cerie would still be suffering. None of this is your fault.”

“Then it’s not your fault either.”

He looked away and she could tell her words had no effect.

“It was my gun,” he said so low and miserable she almost didn’t hear him.

She wished to God she hadn’t. His words hit like a punch in the gut, knocking the wind out of her. She could hardly catch her breath. So this was it. This would be the thing that would tear them apart. She couldn’t fight through the blame he cloaked himself in.

Just like Patricia.

Was he here now out of some kind of penance? If they managed to stay together, would she ever really know if it was what he wanted or if he was trying to atone for the wrongs he thought he’d inflicted on her? She could imagine it. Every day like the lash of a whip, marking off his punishment. When would it end for him? What would happen to them if she let him go on carrying the burden for what his father had done and his accidental role in it?

“I’m going to tell you something you’re not going to believe. You’re not going to believe it because you’re one of the most responsible, honest people I’ve ever met. And you’re stubborn, so freaking stubborn.” She had his attention, however reluctant. Fat lot of good it would do her. “So here it is… It’s not your fault. Ham picking up your gun and shooting me… Not your fault. It’s Ham’s. He started this whole tragedy and wouldn’t have given up until it played out the way he wanted. He left you no choice. You ended his reign of terror and horror. You saved me. You saved who knows how many other people. As far as I’m concerned you’re a hero.”

His wince at the word ‘hero’ made her want to grab him and shake him, but she knew it wouldn’t do any good. She could tell him a thousand times in a thousand ways that none of this was his fault. Her words would only bounce off him, deflected by his self-imposed torment. He’d been as swept up into the current of Ham’s manipulations and evilness as the rest of them. But her telling him such wouldn’t do any good. He had to discover it for himself.

She itched to look into the future to see if he would ever realize it or to find the one thing that would bring him around. But that wouldn’t be right and above all else she wanted her relationship with Graham to be honest. So she’d do the hard thing. She wouldn’t look into the future, she wouldn’t manipulate him, and she’d tear her own heart out before she ever let him look at her again the way he was looking at her now.

“I won’t be an…obligation to you,” she stuttered out. “I want you, but not with you thinking you owe me or trying to make up for what your father did. You can’t fix it and you can’t undo it. It’s done.”

“You’re not an obligation.”

“What then? What am I to you other than a living symbol of all the ways you think you’ve failed?”

“I have no idea what you mean.” He denied it, but she could see him scrambling inside, looking for a way to make things right.

“I’ve become Patricia to you.”

“What in the hell are you talking about?”

“You know what I’m talking about. I can absolve you eight ways to Sunday, but until you forgive yourself we have nowhere to go.”

“So you’re what? Breaking up with me?”