He cupped my cheeks and I locked his palms in place, tightening my grip. I never wanted him to let go. He dipped his head down, tilting his forehead against mine. I knew he was right. Knew that I’d already forgiven him. Probably before I even knew what he did, when we were still living together. Hell, probably on that dance floor, when I was nine.

My capturer.

My monster.

My savior.

“I’m an *, was an *, and have every intention of staying an *. It’s the makeup of my f*cking DNA. But I want to be your *. To you, I can be good. Maybe even great. For you, I’ll stop the rain from falling and the thunder from cracking and the wind from f*cking blowing. And yes, I sure as hell knew you’d come back. You came straight back into my arms, flew back to your nest, lovebird. Now why would you do that if you didn’t love the shit out of me?”

My eyes roamed his face. His hands felt delicious on my skin. It was like he was pumping life into me with his fingertips. Like he made me whole before I even knew parts of me were missing.

It was wrong. All of it. To know what he did. To keep it from the police, from my friends, from Pops. To carry his burden for him in my gut.

It was wrong…but it was ours.

Troy waited for me to say something. His eyes didn’t plead—he would never beg—but hell, they were curious, and full of beautiful, ugly, raw feelings.

“You’re still an *,” I concluded.

He laughed. His laugh sounded like the best song I hadn’t heard yet, something I wanted to loop in my earbuds.

I laughed, too. For the first time in months, it felt genuine on my lips. “A brutal *. Not a lot of women can handle something like that. But I think I just might.”

“I f*cking love you, Red.”

“I f*cking love you, Brennan.”

His lips found mine hungrily, demanding to be back where they belonged. His tongue parted my mouth, hot and familiar and addictive. His arms moving down my body, he placed one hand over my heart. His kiss not only told me I was doing the right thing—that I was meant and built to forgive this man—but also that this was it. It wouldn’t get any better than this. There was nothing I’d rather do, nowhere I’d rather be, than right here with him.

His kiss was possessive, the warmth of his breath both comforting and thrilling. I tilted my neck sideways, inhaling his scent, letting it seep back into my hungry body. His skin on mine was bliss, and a rare, raw moment of happiness washed over me. I was so happy I wanted to scream. So happy it hurt. So giddy I couldn’t even contain it anymore.

In theory, this should have ended in disaster.

In theory, stepping out of this mess with the upper hand meant that I had to rat on Troy Brennan to the authorities. Let my dad know what his family did to him, to us.

In theory, things were very complicated. Everybody had to pay for their sins, I had to grieve for the woman who gave birth to me, Troy had to turn himself in, and more lives had to be ruined.

Reality, though, was really quite simple.

I was his, he was mine, and everything else we did and didn’t do to each other was just that.

Our past.

TROY

SAM GRABS ONE of my toes, yanking it from the white sand it’s buried in, victory written all over his face. Brock’s face. I wiggle my toe like it’s some kind of a small animal trying to break free. Sam’s laughter drifts over me, drowning the noise of the waves crashing on the beach, the music from a nearby bar and the chit-chat of the beach-goers.

“I got it! I got it!”

“Good.” Sparrow squares her shoulders, staring straight ahead to the ocean with hands on her waist and a small, navy blue bikini covering her little tight body. Her voice is smooth and serious. “Now let’s feed it to the sharks.”

“Aw…” Sam’s eyebrows nosedive. He is frowning, worried and alarmed all of a sudden. “No, thanks. I’d rather…I dunno, build a castle or something. I don’t want to hurt Uncle Troy. I will never hurt him.”

It’s amazing how forgiving kids can be. Nine months ago, I barely acknowledged his existence. Today, he is vacationing with us in Miami. Well, not just with me and Sparrow. Maria’s here, too.

“Okay.” Sparrow feigns disappointment. “But I will feed his toes to the sharks at some point.”

Sam’s still smiling, looking at her like she is life itself. “No, you won’t,” he declares as Maria approaches with sandwiches for them and a beer for me. “You looooove Uncle Troy.”

I laugh, because I can’t help not to. Maria grabs Sam by the hand and walks him over to a cart with an umbrella to get something cold to drink. I recently found out that he is pretty picky about what he likes to drink. No water for him. Just the fizzy stuff.

It was Red’s idea to break the cycle. Sons killing fathers. Sons avenging fathers.

One night, when she was in my arms, just as I inhaled her cherry hair, she said, “You need to be in Sam’s life. You owe it to him. You’ll never be his dad, but he does deserve someone. Someone other than Maria and Catalina.”

What she didn’t add was that if I didn’t want to end up like my dad, like David Kavanagh, and like Brock, I needed to mend the pieces I broke in Sam’s life when I killed his father.

He doesn’t know what happened, not yet, but it isn’t a secret either. When the time comes, he’ll know who pulled the trigger on Brock. And I don’t want him to live with the hate that rattled in my gut, the hate that drove his father to lose everything. It eats you alive, consumes you from the inside, burns a hole in your chest, a void you fill with dark desires, with revenge that haunts you. The kid doesn’t deserve it. One day, this kid will be a man. That version of him doesn’t deserve it either.