I closed my eyes and dropped my head.

“Found her, Cassie.”

At this new tone, my eyes flew open, and my head shot up to see he was looking at me.

“Found her. And, baby, you need it all, I’ll give it all to you. But I’ll tell you now I do not want to give you that. I do not want you to know that shit that extreme and ugly exists in this world. I want you to let me protect you from that. I will tell you she got in deep, switched from coke to heroin, got to a point she couldn’t live without it so she’d do anything to get it, and to keep her fix, she hit the underbelly of the underbelly. I tried to pull her out. Got my ass kicked, nearly died in an alley.”

I drew in a sharp breath.

“I kept trying. Got shot at.”

Oh my God!

“Deacon,” I breathed.

“Kept trying. She overdosed. She died. They dumped her body and her parents had one to bury. But I was gone. What I saw, what I’d done, who I’d met, made deals with, greased palms, I was lost to that world, belonged to it, and she died, Cassie, but I never left that world.”

“You weren’t lost to it.”

“Baby, I was until about three hours ago.”

I leaned toward him. “You weren’t lost to it, Deacon. She dragged you down into it.”

His eyes held mine and he nodded.

Then he said, “She did. I didn’t get that until Raid pissed me off by shovin’ it in my face. I didn’t process it and get past it until I heard that song I gave you. But, and it’s important you get this part, Cassie, she may have dragged me down, but it was me who stayed there.”

“On a scale of one to ten, how bad was it when you found her?”

“Seven million, six hundred thousand, and twenty-three.”

I swallowed and knew from his face he wasn’t joking.

Not even close.

My God.

I drew in a breath and launched in.

“Your wife that you loved and wanted to build a life and family with had a drug problem since before you were married, never told you about it, started using again, and didn’t tell you that either. She had sex for money to pay for her habit while still living with you, married to you, and supposedly trying to make a baby with you, all while you were away from her to earn money to buy a house for your coming family, something she agreed with you doing. Then she left you, choosing drugs over you. Is that right? She didn’t go missing. She left.”

“She left,” he confirmed.

“No note, not even smoke signals?” I asked.

He shook his head. “Nothing.”

“And even with all that, you put your life on hold to find her and fix her, this ending with you being in extreme danger and nearly losing your life twice to do that.”

He looked back to the trees. “Not my brightest idea.”

“That’s so beautiful, I wanna cry again,” I declared and he cut his eyes to me. “But I won’t let myself because my cheeks are cold and I don’t want them to freeze.”

“Cassidy—”

“And now I can’t make you cookies, which sucks. I like cookies.” My voice was rising and Bossy lifted her head because of it, so I reined it in.

“Cass—”

“If she was alive, I’d kill her,” I announced.

His head jerked and he started, “Woman—”

“I’m serious, Deacon.”

“I see that, Cassidy. But you’re not gettin’ me. I lived in that world. I did things. Things that—”

“I do not give that first fuck,” I snapped and his brows shot together as his head jerked. “You had your whole life planned out. You met a pretty girl at a bar who made you happy and you started it right away, because you knew what you wanted, just like me. And she fucked it up. And you gave up everything to get it back, give it to her, give it to yourself. What we have, that’s beautiful war, Deacon. What you had with Jeannie was ugly war. And in ugly war, things get ugly.”

“We’re talkin’ serious shit, Cassie.”

“You said you believe in what you do,” I reminded him.

“I did.”

My body tensed again.

“Did?”

“I’m out.”

I blinked. “Out?”

“Out.”

I stared at him.

“Last thing I did before comin’ to you was cut ties,” he told me.

Everything inside me, everything that was me, expanded so huge, it was a wonder I didn’t explode the porch.

“You’re never leaving,” I whispered.

“No. Never,” he replied firmly. “Even if it dawns on you the man I became and the company I kept, I’m gonna make it so you understand, believe in me again, and never want me to leave.”

“I already don’t ever want you to leave.”

He closed his eyes, raw washing through his features bathed in the lights from the kitchen window.

It was a beautiful sight to see.

Then he opened them. “Did shit, baby.”

“I don’t care.”

“Wanna give that to you. Need to so you understand the man in your bed and why that man was me.”

I leaned toward him over the arm of my chair. “Don’t you get it, Deacon? I already understand. And I believe. The only time I quit believing was when you didn’t give me what I needed in order to keep doing it. I have that now. All I need. I don’t need any more.”

“Here,” he growled, his expression changed again.

Fierce.

Fierce with his love for me.

That was way more beautiful.

Totally.

I didn’t go there because I was relishing the look on his face, letting it settle down deep, memorizing every inch. Not to mention, I had his here back, and as annoying as that was, I’d missed that too.

Deacon got impatient and grabbed my hand, yanking it hard so his tug took my chair closer to his. Bossy gave a soft bark, and in order not to drop my cocoa, I set it aside and got out of the chair. The throw fell to the deck as I moved to him and he moved his boots from the railing. When he had them to the deck, I put a knee to the seat by his hip and swung the other leg over, settling my booty in his lap.

Both his hands slid up my back, pulling me to him as I put my hands to his shoulders.

“Was a bounty hunter,” he said when he got me close.

“Deacon, you don’t have to—”

“Didn’t find folks who jumped bond. Found bad guys and returned them to worse guys who could pay me in cash.”