“
He was in love with her. Of all the foolish, horrific things he'd ever accomplished, falling in love with a woman he so completely didn't deserve made the top of his list. But he did love her. It wasn't a question or even a sudden realization. Hed known, hadn't he? He'd known from the moment shed called him pretty. It was like a tether between them, wrapped directly around his heart, that she had the power to push and pull at her leisure. Evangelina Celia Sage was woven into his being; in the blink of his eyes, in the crinkle of his smile, in his rusty unused laughter, she was there. From the moment he'd met her, he thought of her like the sun. Bright and vibrant, untouchable. But he was wrong. She wasn't light; she was color. Every single one, dancing otherworldly and bright over his unworthy eyes. She was the explosion of the vivid gleams and glows of the world around him, like a constant rainbow, shining not after the rain, but during. She was everything he never deserved but longed for anyway. He remembered the blood on her clothes, the employer who had hurt her before, the unjust way shed been treated, and the final nail in the proverbial coffin was that echoing, agonizing word. He was ruined. But he loved her anyway.
”
”