Page 37 of What Maple Heard

“Because there’s a lot I regret,” he said. “A lot I would do differently. A lot I wish you’d give me a second chance to make right.”

I looked at River’s back. The brush moving across the wall, steady and sure.

“Cade, I heard you call me nothing more than a great fuck.” I stopped. Kept my voice low. “You said I was good under the sheets and that’s where I belonged. You were stringing me along for three months while I was getting serious about you.” I turned to look at him. “That was just three weeks ago. What changed? And I’m supposed to believe that you had a complete turn around in that time?”

“Being without you and River,” he said immediately. “I may have been slow to catch up with what I had done. But my heart figured it out the moment I sent you that first text and saw you read it and not respond.” He paused. “In that split second, Maple. My heart sank. I didn’t even fully understand what had happened yet but I could already feel the loss.”

I kept my eyes on River.

“That first week without you was the longest week of my life,” he said. “I’d come to the studio after work every evening and stand outside and look at the closed door and the lights on in the empty studio and feel — I was angry at you for not answering and scared at the same time that you were slipping away from me. And in that one week, I realized I didn’t care about my parents’ perception. I didn’t care about the Sonnenberg world and what it would or wouldn’t accept.” He paused. “I just cared about you.”

I didn’t say anything.

“The words you heard,” he said. “They were my words. I was a colossal dick for saying them and I’m not going to make excuses about being drunk or being pushed into it. But I think — I know — that every word came from fear. Fear that you wouldn’t fit into my parents’ world. Fear of what they’d say, what they’d think.” He shook his head. “And then you were gone, and I realized I didn’t care about any of that.”

He took a long breath.

“I realized that I love you. It was like someone literally pulled the veil of societal pressures and expectations off my face in a split second and I could see clearly for the very first time. I freaked out when you didn’t answer my calls, Maple, and I realized I cannot live without you and River. He looked at me. “You. And River. That’s what mattered. That was the whole list.”

I was quiet.

“Cade,” I said finally. “Do you understand where I stand? Do you understand how difficult it is for me to trust you again after what you said? Do you realize that it’s not easy for me to even believe what you’re saying right now?

“Yes,” he said. “I do.”

“And just because you’re saying you’ve realized your mistake doesn’t mean I can forget how to hurt me and forgive you—“

“I know, Maple.” He said gently. “I’m not asking you to do anything immediately. I’m not asking you to forgive me at all if you decide you can’t. All I’m asking is that you give me the chance to show you. However long that takes.” He paused. “I want to know River better. I want to be around you both. I want to earn your trust back.

A Sonnenberg doesn’t marry a pole dancer.

“Just give me one chance, Maple.” He paused.

“Before I fucked it all up, did you have feelings for me?”

I didn’t want to answer that. Because we both knew the answer. And the answer was yes. I was falling in love. The first time in my life — the first real time, and he had been the one. Until he wasn’t. And the terrible, inconvenient truth was that I was still not over it. I had been suppressing whatever I still felt for him every single day since I heard him say those words. But with time, I could get over anything. I knew that too.

He took a step closer.

“If I could redo one moment in my life,” he said, “it would be that conversation. If I could reach back and take away every one of those words, I would. But I can’t.” He looked at me steadily. “What I can do is spend the rest of my life asking for your forgiveness. I want to spend my life with you, Maple. Or I want to spend it apologizing to you. Either way, I’m not going anywhere.”

When I started working as a pole dancer, I realized that every man who looked at me only saw a body, a convenience, a means to an end. Cade had been the first man who looked at me like I was a person. Who asked questions and waited for the answers and showed up for me and River, without asking for anything in return. He had been the first one.

And maybe those words I heard were from his worst moment, not his truest one.

Or maybe they were both.

I didn’t know. That was the problem. I genuinely did not know.

“I need more time,” I said. “What you said hurt me very badly. And every choice I make, I make with River in mind first. You’re the only male role model he’s ever known and if you leave again — I can’t think about what that’d do to his ability to trust people.” I looked at him. “I need to think this through, Cade.”

“Take all the time you need,” he said. “Years, if that’s what it takes. You’ll still find me by your and River’s side.”

I looked at his eyes, trying to find a hint of deceit. I couldn’t find any of that. His eyes are sharp and clear and he was looking right at me without flinching, as if he had nothing to hide.

“MAPLE.”

We both turned.