“It’s no excuse, Linc. If you had told me, I could have prevented that from happening. I could have gotten us out of there. Why didn’t you trust me enough to do that?” I ask him sadly.
“I was scared,” Lincoln says quietly. “I’m sorry. I do trust you, with my life, but you were…” He shuts his mouth, knowing that whatever he was going to say would not help his cause.
“I was drowning in a pit of lies and deceit,” I spit at him. “Sebastian violated my mind, for weeks he coerced me. How am I supposed to trust you again after this?”
“Aefre, don’t do that,” Lincoln says, stepping closer. “Do not lose your faith in me. I love you and I would never cause you any harm. It’s not that I didn’t trust you, I just didn’t know if I had the power to bring you back to yourself and if I didn’t and Sebastian found out…” There is a long pause. “They all tried, Aefre. The only one who managed to bring you back was Fraser. Christ, not even Fraser, but Other Fraser. Don’t you see? It was a risk I was hesitant to take. But you have to know that I would have taken it. I just needed time to work up the courage in case I lost you.”
He looks at me imploringly and I falter in my anger. I do understand where he is coming from, but I can’t get over the fact that he could have helped me and didn’t.
“I am so, so sorry,” he whispers. “I should have been the man you needed me to be.” He drops to his knees. “Please forgive me.”
“For fuck’s sake. Get up,” I grumble at him. “I forgive you.”
“Thank you,” he says, rising to his feet and giving me that smile that makes me want him desperately.
“Sorry, not going to happen,” I say to him with a shake of my head and his face falls. “It’s not a punishment,” I complain. “I am just not in the mood.”
Lincoln’s eyebrows skyrocket but he wisely keeps his mouth shut.
“Remiel and Delinda should be here by now,” I say, changing the subject. “We need to pack up and go back to Earth.”
“Good,” he says with a nod. “I am done with this place. I need sunlight and proper fucking woods to run around in.”
I let him take my hand as we walk back to the house.
“We aren’t going back to England,” I say. “Tiamat burned that house to the ground.”
“What?” Lincoln asks. “When?”
“Sometime around the time when Remiel re-turned me,” I say with a shrug. “Not really sure. Did you know that Devon was going to ask me to re-turn him?”
“Is that a trick question?” he asks cautiously.
I laugh gently. “No, I won’t be mad. I am just curious as to why he changed his mind.”
“Did you ask him?”
“Obviously. I got a ‘Devon’ response,” I say.
“Ah,” Lincoln says, knowing what I mean. “Yes, I knew. It was my idea, actually.”
“Wow,” I say in surprise, looking at him, but he keeps facing forward. “That’s brutally honest.”
“No more secrets,” he says shortly.
“Okay, care to share why you wanted me to re-turn him?” I crinkle up my nose as that doesn’t really make sense.
“Because you said you were going to choose Constantine,” he says, stopping and turning fully to face me. “You insinuated that if you had Devon as a charge it would make a difference. I wanted it to make a difference.” He gives me a bold look.
“Why?” I ask slowly, narrowing my eyes at him.
“If you choose Constantine, he will push me out. Devon won’t. I did what I had to do to protect our relationship,” he says.
“Don’t be so sure,” I mutter, and he gives me a curious look, probably thinking I mean Devon, but I actually mean Constantine. “I promised you that would never happen,” I add sternly. “Again, you seem not to trust me. This is becoming an issue, Lincoln.”
“There is no issue,” Lincoln says, holding my steady gaze. “I took the matter into my own hands. I am not good with letting others control my destiny. Lance did enough of that.”
Oh, low fucking blow, Wolf-boy. I glare at him, but he looks back at me innocently. “You meddled. What if Devon agreed but ends up regretting his choice because it wasn’t his idea?”