“Not even a little bit.”
He glanced my way. “I've had more sympathetic apologies thrown my way than I can tell you about. I know how those two words make a person feel when everything in your life is going to hell and back.”
“Want to talk about it?” I asked, throwing his own question back at him.
“No.” He huffed out a humourless laugh as he turned to face me, those hands of his tucked away in the safety of his pockets again. “But for you, I’ll go there I suppose.”
I blinked up at him, waiting.
“I lost my parents when I was young—too young—but still old enough to know that someone telling you they're sorry does nothing but piss you off even more than you already are. Like it can somehow take away the grief tearing you up in two. ‘I’m sorry your world is imploding, but hey, mine isn’t, so these two measly words are all I’ve got for you’, you know?”
I stared into this strong man's eyes, letting his words sink in. He'd lost his parents young, but how young? Was that why he was made up of hard edges now, charred and dark inside,yet somehow still flaming brightly on the outside without even knowing it?
Ironically, I opened my mouth to say the two words he hated the most, only for me to close it again and shake my head at him, not knowing how he wanted me to react.
“It's an automatic response, isn't it?” he said, a half-smile tugging at one corner of his mouth. “It's the only thing a person thinks they can say in those situations when the reality is, all you want is someone to throw their arms around you and tell you they have no idea how the hell you're feeling, but they're there for you when you're ready.”
The idea of throwing my arms around Henry had never been more desirable than in that moment. I imagined him throwing his arms around me, too, but we weren't quite there yet. I doubted we ever would be, despite the daydreams creeping in on an hourly basis.
“How young were you?” I asked instead.
He turned and started to stroll along the sand again, and I followed. “Seventeen. Both Mum and Dad's families were small. I have a few aunts and uncles living abroad in Australia, America, one in Vietnam. My grandparents weren't around, which left me standing at the side of my parents’ graves wondering where the hell I was supposed to go.”
The image of Henry, much younger than this version of him, standing over his parents as they were lowered into the ground sent a pang of empathy straight to my chest I couldn’t tell him about. I had a feeling sympathy and Henry were not a well-matched duo.
“That's when Andy's parents stepped in. Nina and James were...” He sighed, lifting his face to the sun. “They were sent to me by someone, that's for sure.”
“They took you in?”
“I became an honorary Hyde from the first moment I stepped through their front door. They never asked me for a penny of the overwhelming inheritance I’d been left, even though I insisted they take some of it once I turned eighteen. They wanted none of it. They simply showed up, fed me, clothed me, provided a safe space for me like I’d always been one of their own.”
“That's why you and Andy are so close now?”
“We used to be closer.” A small scowl took over. It reminded me of what he'd said about how he wasn't allowed to talk to me because of three things: himself, the universe, and Andy.
“What's going on between the two of you?”
Henry glanced my way again, and I saw a world of emotions flicker over him. Things he probably thought he shouldn't say.
“You don't have to tell me, but if you felt you needed to offload, I'll listen without judgement.”
He came to a slow stop again, only this time in front of a huge, shaded rock on the sand, and when Henry took a step towards me, I instinctively took one back, and my spine fell against it, trapping me in.
Not that it seemed to bother him, with the heat pouring onto his shoulders and the perfect, cloudless blue sky framing his dark features like he’d been sent to testallmy morals and limitations.
“Do you know…” he said quietly, his hands still tucked into the pockets of his shorts. “I've told you more in the last few days than I've told Andy in the last year.”
My chest rose and fell harder as my breathing quickened. “Why?”
“I have no idea. There’s just something about you that makes me say shit like this without even thinking about it, and I know that's more dangerous than anything physical I could ever do with you.”
“Physical.” I breathed the word out as a thousand naked scenarios ran through my mind. “Such as?”
Henry's gaze drifted down to my chest, where my suddenly hard nipples poked against the thin material of my bikini top, laying all my secrets out right in front of him whether I wanted them set free or not. His jaw twitched as he worked the muscles there, his eyes narrowing, making him look pained. He made a low, sensual groan in the back of his throat that made me want to swallow the very sound of it, before his gaze slowly travelled up my neck, then finally met my eyes again.
“There's a reason I keep my hands in my pockets every time I'm around you, Phoebe,” he said softly. “If I take them out when we’re this close, I’ll end up doing something we'll both regret.”
His admission nearly brought me to my knees.
