“Where were you when your mother was being killed?”

“Why do you have to ask so many fucking questions? Are you some kind of morbid freak that gets off on shit like this? A masochist for emotional pain?”

Instead of cowering back at my verbal assault, Alex stood firm. “Where were you?” she repeated.

“Why do you need to know? What could you possibly get by fucking knowing?”

“It isn’t for me that I’m asking. It’s for you.”

I tossed the cigarette onto the ashtray on the table, then lunged at Alex. Taking her by the throat with one hand, I glared into her eyes with enough venom that she should have cowered in fear. “If you were a man, I’d take you down for fucking with me like this.”

“If hitting me makes you feel better, frees you of the pain, then hit me.”

“Don’t tempt me.”

“Answer my question.”

“You got a death wish, woman?”

“He tied you up, didn’t he?” When my nostrils flared with anger, she said, “He didn’t just leave you in the car or another room. He made you watch what he did, but you couldn’t do anything to help her.”

Squeezing tighter on her throat, I willed her to shut up. She was too close. She knew too much. She could see me too well.

Her fingers came to my hand, her nails digging into my skin. But as I stared into her eyes, there was no panic or fear in them. Easing back, I dropped the hand from her throat. I eyed it with contempt before dropping it beside me. What the hell had I been thinking to manhandle her like that? “I’m sorry,” I croaked.

“No. I’m the one who is sorry.”

“You damn well ought to be after pulling the shit you just did.”

“I’m not sorry for that.”

“Excuse me?”

“I’m sorry for the helpless seven-year-old little boy who has been forced to carry around such a burden, such guilt, for something he couldn’t control.”

I practically leaped off the bed to get away from her. “Don’t you fucking dare start that pity shit with me!”

“I’m sorry that you’ve never been able to open up to anyone before for fear that they won’t love your darker parts.”

“Shut the fuck up!” I stormed out of the bedroom, slamming the door behind me. Although I wanted to march straight for the bar and down a few shots, my boots remained rooted to the hallway floor.

God, the things I’d said to her—the deepest, darkest parts of myself. No woman had ever gotten that much from me. Not Mama Beth, not Lacey. Fear had always bound me from revealing too much. That if they knew the real me, they couldn’t love me. Sure, they may have had their ideas about what I got up to in my business, but they never questioned me about it. Hell, no one had grilled me like Alexandra had.

For reasons I couldn’t fucking understand, I didn’t escape down the hall to throw some back with my brothers. Instead, I opened the fucking bedroom door and slipped back inside.

Alexandra sat on the edge of the bed, the sheet pulled up to her chest. Her brows rose at the sight of me. “Me coming back in here doesn’t mean I agree with what you said.”

“Okay,” she said softly.

I crossed the room to the bed. “You’re a fucking pain in my ass, Miss Evans.”

“I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be.”

Jerking my chin at her, I said, “Go on and lie back down.”

“You don’t want me to go?”

“No, I don’t.”

Surprise flooded her face. “I just expected that—”

“Don’t you ever shut up?”

Her eyes narrowed slightly before she flounced back in the bed, burrowing under the covers. Of course, while she was doing that, I got another flash of her bra-covered tits and those damn boy shorts. While her behavior still had me fuming, just the sight of that petite yet strong body of hers fueled other reactions in me. Damn, that woman.

Once she was covered, I walked around the side of the bed. I eased down on the mattress to honor her request of staying until she fell asleep. Of course, I kept my ass on top of the covers and as far away as I could from her. When I thought she had finally settled down, I reached over and hit the light.

“Deacon?” she implored.

“Alex, if you know what is good for you right now, you’ll close your fucking eyes and go to sleep.”

“I just wanted to say thank you.”

“What the hell for?”

“For talking with me tonight. It means a lot.”

While I would never admit it to her, it meant a lot to me, too. The smallest sliver of peace ran through me. Regardless of how small it was, I would gladly take it. “Yeah, whatever,” I grumbled.

Then I allowed myself to fall asleep next to a woman without sex for the first time in my life.

Sunlight streamed across the bed, warming me from beneath the sheets. The moment my eyelids fluttered open, panic set in. Where was I? My eyes frantically spun around the room. And then it all came rushing back to me along with the feeling of a brass band pounding out a rhythm in my aching head. I groaned as the memories of getting drunk off my ass and begging Deacon to stay with me flooded my mind. It also didn’t escape me that I was in just my bra and panties. Of course, I was glad to remember that it had been me who’d taken my clothes off and not Deacon.

Holy shit. I’d slept with Deacon.

Glancing over, I found the bed empty. For some reason, it bothered me more than it should have. When I rolled over, I felt the indentation Deacon had made in the bed. I guess he really had stayed just until I’d fallen asleep.

When I thought of what I’d told him and what he’d told me, I flopped onto my back and rubbed my head. I’d never imagined he would be so open and honest with me. Even though he’d done it kicking and screaming, it meant so much to me. I don’t know what it was within me that needed for him to entrust something so dark to me. Even though he wouldn’t acknowledge it, I could see him so much better than he could have ever imagined. He had locked himself down so tight emotionally that the only way he could fully accept and love Willow would be to let go of the ghosts of the past and the pain they still inflicted on him.

While I should have been horrified that he had murdered his father, I wasn’t. After the lifetime of hell he had faced, coupled with his mother’s death, he had been justified in doing what he did. I didn’t know what it said about me as a person that I could overlook something so terrible in his past. Maybe it was what I had been through myself.