The porch was small but covered. He knew he should go inside and get dry, set them up for what might be a long night, but he couldn’t wait another second. The years weighed on him, all the long years that would have been easier to bear if she’d been by his side.

“I let you go the first time. I don’t know that I can do it again.” He had to give her a chance.

She frowned up at him, but even as he moved into her space, she didn’t back down. Her chin tilted up. “Let me go?”

Tension made his whole body feel like a bow string, taut and ready to go off at any moment. He needed for her to understand why he’d walked away all those years ago. “In college. I let you go.”

Her eyes narrowed, obvious irritation in her gaze. “You told me it was a mistake. You said you shouldn’t have touched me. That’s not letting me go, Rene. That was pushing me away.”

Finally, finally they were getting to the heart of the matter, and once they did, she would either accept him or he would know she couldn’t.

And he would try again. He’d realized she wasn’t something he could toss away because it was hard to deal with. She was important. This marriage was important to him.

“You have no idea how hard it was to walk away from you.”

She was the aggressive one now, her eyes flashing more brilliantly than the lightning in the sky. “You didn’t have to. I never asked you to walk away, and if this is going to turn into some ‘I was too innocent for you’ thing, then maybe you should walk away this time, too. I wasn’t a child back then. I was a woman fully capable of making my own decisions.”

She’d been a woman, but not fully grown. Neither of them had been. They still might not be, but now seemed like the time for them to grow together. “You hadn’t even gotten through your first year of college, and I was leaving for Chicago.”

“Then be honest.” She was close to him, and yet she was still practically shouting over the storm. “You didn’t want some pathetic freshman hanging on to you.”

A thrum of anger pulsed inside him, but he had to admit it felt good. He always, always shoved his emotions down. He couldn’t scare his mother. When his father had been alive, he’d been the one with the burden, so Rene hadn’t bothered him. He couldn’t let his cousins see his rage. He couldn’t show how weak he felt at times.