Atone (Recovered Innocence #2)(64)

He takes another step, making me take one back. If it’s possible, his smile gets even bigger. “You’ve always been so much smarter than me.” He advances again.

I put a hand up to stop him. “No, Beau. We can’t do this. You don’t know everything about me.”

“I know everything I need and want to know.” He takes my hand in his and drops to one knee. “Vera—”

I yank my hand from his and back away, needing some distance and perspective. “Don’t. Please, don’t.”

“Marry me.”

“No.”

He gets to his feet. “Why not?”

“What about Cora?”

“She’ll understand.”

“You won’t ever get to see her again.”

“I know.” The way he says it makes me realize he’s thought about this. Actually thought it all the way through.

“What about your parents?”

“Cora will explain it to them.”

“You want to leave that for her to do?”

“What is this really about?”

I wave him back. “Don’t ask questions you don’t really want the answers to.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I can’t give you what you want.”

“You’re not already married, are you?”

“No.”

He props his hands on his hips. “Then what’s the problem? Don’t you want to marry me?”

“Yes,” I say on a sob. “I want to f*cking marry you more than anything.”

“Ah, Vera, come here.” He holds his arms out to me. “Whatever it is, we’ll fix it.”

“It can’t be fixed. That’s the problem.”

I forget to move back when he moves forward. This time he catches me, wrapping his arms around me. “Tell me what it is. I bet it’s not as bad as you think.”

The words leave me in a rush. “I can’t ever get pregnant.”

I’m too miserable and afraid to gauge his reaction past how utterly still he goes. His arms stop moving up and down my back. He might even have stopped breathing. I can practically hear him thinking, weighing things between us all over again. I want to believe it won’t matter to him, and I know him well enough to know that he’ll think that initially. And then the reality of it will set in. It’s funny how you never thought about wanting something until there’s absolutely no possibility of ever having it. Then you want it more than anything. He’s going to say it doesn’t matter and I’ll try to believe him because I want to. Resentment will build over the years. Little things here and there, piling up until there’s a wall between us we can’t see over. I need to stop him from trying to conjure up any hope.

“It’s irreversible,” I say, pulling away. “We were all sterilized. After he sold our virginity, he took us to a doctor who gave us a morning-after pill just in case, and then he implanted these things in our fallopian tubes. I went to a doctor a few years ago who confirmed it. I can’t get pregnant. Remember me telling you not to worry about it that night we got drunk? That’s why. And that’s why I can’t marry you. We can’t ever be a family. I can’t give you what you want.”

“How the f*ck do you know what I want?”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“I’m not being ridiculous. You are.”

“Don’t tell me you never thought about having children.”

His lack of response is answer enough.

“That’s what I thought.” I put my palm on his cheek. “Thank you for your sweet proposal. But the answer’s no.”





Chapter 33


Beau


“Vera, don’t.” I catch her wrist. “Don’t do this. Please. We can work it out. In vitro, adoption, or that dog you talked about. We have options.”

God. How could she not know that I don’t give a shit about this? Not really. It’s such a minor thing compared to everything else we’ve been through and all the shit that’s still to come. As long as we have each other, that’s all that matters.

“I thought about all of the options,” she says. “I even looked into them a little bit. I have to believe there’s a reason things worked out the way they did. That maybe I’m not meant to be a parent.”

“That’s bullshit. You can be anything you want to be.”

“But Beau, I can’t be the person who takes you away from your family and keeps you from fulfilling your dreams. Don’t you see that?”

“But you can be the person who takes you away from me. God, Vera.” This is the first time in a while that I’ve needed to hit something. “Listen to yourself. I’m fighting for us here and all you’re doing is throwing excuses at me.”

“They’re not excuses, they’re reasons, and very valid ones. I don’t want you to ever wake up one day and resent me.”

“If you make me wake up tomorrow without you I will resent you.”

“You don’t mean that. You can’t mean that.”

“I got down on my knee and asked you to marry me. What do you think?”