"Don't." He stopped me. "Don't say anything. I'm not telling you this because I expect anything. I'm telling you because you asked, and I'm tired of lying to you."
"You've been lying to me?"
"By omission. For eight years." He stood abruptly, moving to the window, putting distance between us. "I should go."
"Knox." I stood too. Crossed the room until I was standing behind him, close enough to touch. "Don't run away from me. Not again."
He turned and we were inches apart. I could see the rise and fall of his chest, the tension in his shoulders and the way his hands were clenched at his sides like he was fighting to keep them there.
"You don't want this," he said. "You don't want me."
"Don't tell me what I want."
"Daisy." My name in his mouth nearly was my undoing. "I'm trying to do the right thing here."
One second I was standing there, angry and confused and aching with eight years of unresolved want. The next, my hands were fisted in Cal's flannel shirt and my mouth was on his.
He went rigid and for one horrible second, I thought he was going to push me away.
Then he broke.
His hands came up to cup my face, tilting my head back, and he kissed me like he was drowning and I was air. Deep and desperate and consuming, as his tongue slid against mine, his body pressing me backward until my shoulders hit the wall.
I gasped as he swallowed the sound, one hand sliding into my hair, the other gripping my hip hard enough to bruise. The kiss was nothing like I remembered. It was better. Hotter. Eight years of want compressed into a single point of contact that burned through every rational thought I had.
"Daisy." He pulled back enough to breathe, his forehead against mine, his chest heaving. "We need to stop."
"No."
"I haven't told you everything. There are things you don't know."
"Then tell me."
He pulled back further. In the candlelight, he looked wrecked.
"Not tonight," he said. "You deserve the truth, but you deserve it when you're not looking at me like that."
"Like what?"
"Like you might forgive me." He stepped back and ran a hand through his hair. "I should go."
"The storm..."
"Is the least dangerous thing in this room right now." He grabbed his wet jacket from the chair and looked at me one last time. "I'm sorry. For all of it. I'll explain everything. I promise."
Then he was gone, disappearing into the rain, leaving me standing in the candlelit cabin with my lips swollen and my heart in pieces on the floor.
I touched my mouth. I still felt him there.
Eight years. Eight years of telling myself I was over him. Eight years of building walls and moving on and pretending the boy I'd loved was dead and buried.
One kiss and every wall came crashing down.
I sank onto the couch and stayed there until the storm passed and the sun came up, replaying every word, every touch, every devastating confession.
You're the reason I stopped fighting and started building.
I wanted to be someone you could be proud of.