He felt the deep connection immediately, his own body relaxing. This was where he wanted to be. “It’s okay. Just tell me the story.”
She was quiet for a moment. “Bryce came into town a few years after I finished college. We still had a little money then. Trev would send us some. It would be huge checks when he was sober enough to think about it. He got me through college before the money dried up. But we still had bills. Mom had fought off cancer while I was in school. She seemed healthy, and she got the job as Bryce’s office manager. He asked me out a few times, but I said no. I was going to move to Houston. I had a friend there, and we were going to set up an interior design business. I didn’t want to get involved with any man.”
Leo felt his stomach turn. This wasn’t going to go well. He knew for a fact that once she’d returned to Deer Run, she hadn’t left it again until she’d moved to Dallas. “Why didn’t you go?”
She sniffled. “You have to promise me you won’t ever tell Trev. I told him this was all my fault. I didn’t want him to feel guilty about this so I lied. Trev has enough guilt and mom is gone now so it seemed the kindest thing to do.”
Trev’s guilt could fill a lake. Leo could understand why Shelley would protect her brother. “I won’t ever say a word, sweetheart.”
She nodded and continued her story. “My mom was accused of stealing some money. Quite a bit actually. She was going to be fired and prosecuted. Bryce gave me one way out.”
God, if Bryce Hughes had been standing in front of him, Leo would have choked the life out of him. “Shelley, you have to know that Trev could have hired a lawyer.”
“Did I? I could barely get him on the phone at that point in time. He was so far gone. He’d stopped sending money. He needed it for drugs and those parties he would throw. God, Leo, you can’t ever tell him this story. Let him think I was a wide-eyed idiot. He can’t know. It would kill him.”
She sounded panicked. Leo forced her head back down on his shoulder. He stroked her hair until she calmed down. “There’s no need to tell Trev anything. It would just hurt him at this point.”
She’d tried to protect her mother. She was still protecting Trev. His heart hurt. No one had protected her. Not even him. Jack had been right. If he’d been the man he claimed to be, he wouldn’t have left. He would have watched over her from afar if he needed to.
“I married Bryce. I think he thought having a connection to Trev would help him. At the time, I thought he just wanted to be able to put Trev’s face on his billboards, but now I think he believed that Trev could help him make connections so he could become, I don’t know, drug dealer to the stars or something. You can imagine that he was deeply upset when Trev walked away from football. But even though he was mad about Trev, Bryce was okay with me. In the beginning I actually thought it might work out. He seemed to genuinely care about me. He helped me set up my business. He helped get me clients. He told everyone how smart and talented I was. Of course, he had his reasons for doing that.”
“Was he violent?” He wasn’t sure he could handle it if she’d been brutalized. Guilt was gnawing at him. He’d left her.
She shook her head. “He hit me, but it was only once, and it was right before he died. I walked out after that. He threatened to kill you if I left with you. I told him I would come home and be a good girl, but I didn’t. I talked to Trev after you left, and he wouldn’t let me go home.”
At least Trev had some sense. Leo had left her alone. He’d known Bryce was bad for her, but he’d left her alone. The very day he’d driven away from her had been the day Bryce’s crimes had come to light. She, her sister-in-law, and Bo O’Malley had been taken hostage by a man Bryce owed drugs to. She’d barely survived, and she’d been forced to watch as Bryce was killed. “You were in that house with a gun to your head while I was driving back to Dallas like a toddler who’d had a fit.”
She sighed, seemingly more relaxed after she’d told him the worst of it. At least he hoped that had been the worst. “I made it through, Leo. I had nightmares. Sometimes I still do, but I didn’t believe for one second that I was really going to die.”
“Really?”
“No. The drug cartel guy assured me that he was taking me with him because I would make an excellent addition to a brothel.”
“What?” He fairly screamed the word, the picture assaulting his mind.
She put a hand over his. “Stop. It’s over, and I’m fine. I survived. I knew I would.”
He’d dealt with so many people with PTSD. How was she so calm? It seemed like he had been more traumatized than she’d been. “Why? How did you know you would survive? Did you just have that much faith in the universe?”
“No, I had faith in you.”
He stilled and then forced himself to move. He gently pushed her off and brought her chin up so she looked him in the eyes. She’d been crying, crystal tears streaming down her face. “I walked away.”
“And when you found out I was gone? Would you have looked for me? I thought so then. I knew it deep in my heart.” Her eyes turned down. “I was sure of it at the time. I probably wouldn’t be now.”
He needed to make one thing plain to her. “I would have moved heaven and earth to find you.”
She nodded, but he could see she didn’t really believe. “Because you’re a good man. Leo, I have something I want to say to you. I want to thank you. I know I screwed everything up, but you can’t imagine what you’ve meant to me. You saved Trev. He would be dead if you hadn’t taken him in hand. I believe that deep in my soul. My brother would be in the ground. When my mother died, she believed he was changing because of the things you said to her. My mother died a peaceful death because of you. And me. God, Leo, I can’t tell you what you’ve meant to me. You were the dream I had for so many years and then, when you tried to get me to go away with you, then you were this beautiful reality. I know I ruined it, but I think about that moment every day. I think that if I could change one thing in my life, it would be to take your hand and walk away.”
“Shelley,” he began, his heart aching.
She put a single finger to his lips, silencing him. “Don’t. I want to have my say, just once and then never again. I love you. I love the man you are. I love the funny, stalwart, infinitely compassionate man who lives deep inside you, and I am begging for that man to come back to life. I know I should be the bigger person and walk away and let you find someone else to make you happy, but damn it, I’m the one, Leo. I’m the one for you and I’m the one for Wolf, and that’s the way it is. I will screw up. I’ll do it a lot, and you know what, I’ll happily let you beat my ass when I do. But I won’t let you walk away, and I won’t let you go into your shell. I screwed up. Mea culpa, but I’m done with hiding in a corner and loving you from afar. You can tell me no, but I’ll just say this over and over again. I love you. I love you. You can send me off, but I’m keeping your brother, and you’re going to have to watch us, and every time I feel your eyes on me, I’ll say I love you. So you better get ready, Leo.”
He had the choice. He could embrace the future and try or he could fight it. Why would he fight it? Yes, he was afraid he couldn’t share her long term. Yes, he was terrified it would all end the way it had with Janine. He was worried that he would screw up somehow, someway and leave her alone.
He stared at her. “I don’t know if I really want kids.”
She stared right back. “You don’t like them?”
“I don’t know how good I’ll be at raising them.” He hadn’t had a dad. He’d only known how wonderful and loving and alone his mother had been. Life was so fragile. He would never leave his children, but anything could happen.