Page 15 of Dead Man's Alibi

He didn’t so much as move an eyelash for a horrible, completely silent moment.“And why the fuck would I do that?”

She knew he was mad, even if his tone was even.Temper flashed in those dark eyes, and he only held himself that tense when he was pissed off.

Usually temper set off her own, but his, in this moment, only made her feel about one centimeter tall.She closed her eyes, hated that a tear tripped over onto her cheek.

“Never mind,” she muttered, trying to move past him before he saw herreallycry.

Since she couldn’t seem to control herself in that department.In the shower this morning.In the breakroom over coffee.Everything that usually held her together felt like it had evaporated.

He took her by the arm to stop her forward movement.Gently, because Nate Bennet wasgentleandgoodandkind, and he hadn’t killed any damn one, but that never seemed to matter.

“No, I want you to say it.”Not much kind or gentle about his tone, but his hand on her arm still was.“Why should I take that ring back?”

Temper stirred, not just because he didn’t understand, but because herefusedto.And it was either be pissed off or sob.

So she looked right at him, chin up and leaning into all that stubborn that had gotten her through so much of life.“Because maybe it’s just a fucking curse.To be happy.”

Everything about him softened into something far too close to pity to bear.“Sam.”

“How else do you explain it?”she demanded.“Life doesn’t always go this way for everyone else.It isn’t blow after blow after blow.It isn’t horrible news after every little sliver of good.Itisn’t.”Her breath hitched when she tried to inhale.

His hand smoothed up her arm, to her back, and then drew her into the hard, warm give of his body.“I’m not taking the ring back,” he said quietly, one hand rubbing up and down her back.As if to prove his point, he took the ring she still held with his free hand, uncurled her fingers, and shoved it right back where he’d put it last night.“And we’re not cursed.”He said it so emphatically.

She wished she could hold onto that as something real and true.She wished she could feel like this was just a shitty fluke.

“I know you think that because you didn’t do it, nothing bad can happen,” she managed to say through a too-tight throat, her hand curled around the ring on her finger because,damn it, she didn’t want to give it back to him.She didn’twantto believe happiness was a curse.“But I have lived the bad that can happen, Nate.”

“I know you have, and I know that it scares you.Life isn’t fair, and sometimes awful things happen.I get that we’re both really well-versed in that.But I think that means you hold on tighter to the stuff that’s good rather than toss it away in the hopes nothing ever hurts.”

She didn’t disagree with him.She, in fact, wasn’t doing that.Trying to give him the ring back wasn’t hoping to never hurt.It was hoping to somehow reverse this horrible sequence of events.

And yeah, that was insane, but she was feeling a little insane.

They stood in their living room like that, his hand rubbing up and down her spine.And she felt so… exposed.Like all those walls and foundations that had kept her going all this time—that wall she’d built betweenthenandnow—were gone.And without them, she couldn’t hold onto her tears.She couldn’t find strength to move forward.

All she had left was the tiniest shred of self-respect to not fall to her knees and beg him to promise her this wasn’t history repeating itself because she did not deserve to have anyone she loved in her life.

She just didn’t think he understood.He’d run away from Marietta at sixteen, with her help.She was more than glad he had, but he hadn’t lived in the aftermath of his mother’s death.He hadn’t been here when her father had been arrested, when she’d made an enemy out of anyone with the last nameBennet, when her entire life had been proving her father was innocent.

And the continual failure of that.

So he just didn’tunderstand.

“We can’t just trust Hayes and the cops,” she managed to say, desperate to find some angle to get him to see.“The justice system is a farce.I have been working against it half my life.”

“I know.”His gaze was soft, his hold on her tight.He spoke with a gravity she appreciated.

But even if heknew, he still didn’t understand.“It can go wrong.So wrong.”

He sighed.“I know.”

“I just…” She looked at him.

The dark eyes and the crooked nose, and she hadn’tmeantto fall in love with him.She hadn’tmeantto find happiness and a future.It had just been the strangest, most natural slide into something wonderful.

And he didn’tunderstand.

“I just love you so much.”Her voice broke on that one, and she couldn’t stop the tide of tears anymore.