He stood there and took it. Offered a lifeline and waited for her to grab on.

The last of the air left her lungs. A crushing sensation pushed down on her. “You don’t know that.”

“If you did things—”

No, no, no. “I didn’t.”

“Hypothetically, if you were stuck in a terrible situation or in danger or panicked.” His voice grew softer, sweeter, the more he talked. “None of it matters to me.”

Temptation swirled through her. He offered hope and forgiveness—a sort of catharsis she didn’t deserve. And once he realized how misplaced his trust in her had been . . . “What if, hypothetically, you can’t handle what I say?”

“I can.” A small smile formed on his lips. It appeared then left again in a flash. “And don’t get defensive and start talking about my sister. You don’t need to derail the conversation to get through it.”

“When do we talk about you?” She ignored everything he said about shifting topics and derailing and tried one last time to do both.

“This is about you.” He broke the invisible barrier between them. His hands brushed up and down her arms.

The simple touch calmed the churning in her stomach. “I want all of this to be over.”

“I know.” He nodded. “Just say it.”

He couldn’t know. No one could know. “You . . . this . . .”

“Maddie.”

His voice swept over her like a soft caress and shifted something in her. The dam holding back the memories broke and the words came spilling out. “I should have gone to the police. Instead, I went to Allison. That led to Grant’s death.”

“You didn’t kill him.” Connor repeated the phrase more than once.

The absolute sincerity he forged into every word humbled her. She wanted to believe when the smoke cleared and her ego lay shattered on the floor that he would still comfort her like this. That he wouldn’t run to Ben, then get the first ferry off the island.

“That’s not how guilt works.” She whispered the words more to herself than to him.

“What happened in that office, Maddie?” His hands continued to sweep over her, reassure her. “You can say it.”

The gentle words shattered the last of her resistance. She leaned in, letting him take some of her weight as the pain tumbled out. “I didn’t mean for it to happen.”

“Tell me.”

“I picked up the gun just in case.” She wiped away the start of tears and swallowed through the clog in her throat. “Grant kept it in the office safe and it would have been in the safe if I hadn’t moved it.”

She waited for Connor to tense and back away. For that bright light in his eyes to dim.

But he stayed right there. Touching her. Wiping a finger across her cheek. “You had it when you confronted him.”