Page 86 of Iron Heart
“I would never live through it if you got hurt, or worse, because of me., Tori. The only thing I could think of is that I needed to keep you away from danger. Fromme. And I thought it would be easier if you thought I was an asshole.”
I think back to that night. How furious and hurt I was. “Mission accomplished,” I murmur.
That gets a reluctant laugh. “God, I’ve missed you.” He shakes his head, his eyes caressing my face, my hair. “You’re so fucking beautiful, Tori. Beautiful, sarcastic, tough, irritating…”
“Um… maybe you should quit while you’re ahead,” I interrupt him. But I’m smiling when I say it.
“Ha. But it’s true,” he tells me. “You’re all that stuff. You’re also fucking perfect. I don’t know how I managed to stay away from you as long as I have, except I had myself convinced it was the right thing to do. Even though I was fucking miserable. Hell, even Mal told me I was full of it. I dunno. To be honest, part of me still feels like I should keep staying away from you. I wonder whether you might be better off.”
I’m stunned. I start to open my mouth, but then I just close it again. I’m just trying to absorb the weight of his words. My God. Dante didn’t mean them. The horrible, hateful things he said that night — he didn’t mean them. He was just saying them to protect me. Dante did that forme.
“You stupid man,” I half-whisper, a wobbly smile curving my lips as my eyes fill with tears. “I’m not better off without you. Not at all.”
My throat constricts. For some reason, Dante’s words make me think about my dad. How he let my mom blame him all these years for my illness, so she had somewhere to put her anger and pain.
Before I know it, it’s all too much, and I start to cry. Dante’s face morphs into an expression of shock.
“Tori,” he murmurs. “It killed me to say all that shit. I didn’t mean any of it. Shit, I never meant to hurt you. You understand that, right?”
“It’s okay,” I sniffle. “It’s not that. It’s… never mind. I’ll tell you about it, sometime. I’m not sad-crying.”
“Oh.” Dante looks confused. “Okay. Good. But still, I know I hurt you that night. It killed me to see the look on your face. God, Tori, I’ve been fighting falling in love with you practically ever since I met you.”
I’m stunned. “What?”
He grins at me and shakes his head in disbelief. “Don’t tell me you didn’t know that. How could you not? I’m in love with you, Tori. Crazy, stupid in love. Why do you think I got so mad at you that time your heart started acting up?”
“Because I didn’t tell you about it,” I answer automatically. “And I should have. I know that now. It was stupid of me.”
“Sure, but that was part of it. But that’s not why I got as mad as I did. I was mad at myself.” He jabs a thumb at his chest.”
Dante takes my hand in his. It’s warm, and strong, and rough. The familiarity of his touch brings tears to my eyes.
“Before I met you, I always felt like love was a weakness,” he murmurs. “Something I didn’t have time for. Something that would only put me at risk. Make me make stupid decisions. I thought I was above that shit. But now I know better. A lot better. And you know what did it? You know what taught me?Your heart.” He shakes his head and laughs softly. “That day when you had that attack, and I got so mad at you for not telling me? I was scared out of my mind, Tori. I’d never been so scared in my fucking life, when I thought you might die on me there. I got mad because I was pissed off I could have hurt you, sure. But I was also pissed off at myself for caring so much.
“I knew I was getting too close to you — hell, I knew I should have seen it coming and backed off, before it was too late. But that night, how helpless I felt — all of a sudden I realized I didn’t know what I would do with myself if anything ever happened to you. I was in love with you. I didn’t know it yet, but I was.”
Dante draws me in for a long, dizzying kiss. When we break apart, I’m breathless.
“Your fucked-up heart melted my heart of iron, Tori,” he rumbles. “At the time, I thought it was probably the worst fucking thing that ever could have happened to me. But I know better now. I don’t want to live without you. I want to be with you.” He reaches up to caress my hair. “To make sure you take your meds, to be your person, in case you have an attack. But I also want to be around because my heart doesn’t work without yours anymore. Even though there’s part of me that still thinks maybe I should just leave you alone, for your own good.”
“I don’t think you should leave me alone,” I whisper.
“Good thing. Because I can’t. I’ve tried, and it’s no use. I want to make you mine, Tori. This back and forth shit with us, it needs to end.” He grows serious. “But I need you to be clear on what you’re getting with me, because it ain’t all pretty.”
“You mean, because you’re rude, and domineering, and cocky, and infuriating?” I risk.
He rolls his eyes. “Okay, touché. But I’m not kidding. You’re walking into a situation here. I just want you to do it with your eyes open. This life ain’t for the faint of heart.”
Dante stops, realizing what he’s just said, and then bursts into a low rumble of a laugh.
“Okay, bad choice of words.” He frowns. “What I mean is… well, I think you know what I mean.” His eyes go to the patches on his cut. “You’ve seen more of it than most people, already. You know this isn’t a white picket fence kind of life.”
“It can be, if we build a white picket fence,” I say. “I already have the house for it to go around.”
“A house you never wanted,” he challenges. “You told me that. A house you called a prison. I don’t want to be another kind of prison for you, Tori. Prettying up a life that you don’t want doesn’t change the life. It just makes the surface look better.”
I look around the room. I’m in my house. Inmytown. With the man I love.