It had been some time since she last saw Barry, not sense that night when those men came to kill her. Since she learned the truth about why he first came into her life. Time, she needed that from him. Now she was standing before him. “My life has been so full of heartbreak and hearing that you wanted me dead... I thought it would kill me. It hurt.” She moved, putting her hands on his face. “Idon’t want to lose you but I need the truth Barry... do you love me?” Did he care for her? Want her?
He’d been careful to keep his distance since then; it seemed smarter, let her have some space so she could think things over. Sure, it made him nervous, and on edge, because he didn’t know where things were going to land, what she was going to do with the knowledge. Whether she’d take things at face value or whether she’d go to the cops, and that thought in and of itself was enough to put him even more on edge, but he wanted to trust she’d understand.
He’d expected her to avoid him forever, honestly, not that he would have blamed her. But now, she stood in front of him, his face in her hands, asking a question that promised to change things moving forward. A question that was heavy, so much behind it, so much resting on the answer, and for a moment he couldn’t look at her. It was too heavy for that.
“I never wanted you dead,” he countered, picking through the words carefully. Weighing each one. “It was just a job, just a paycheck, and then... And then I met you, and I got to know you, and I just. I couldn’t go through with it. Everything was real. I never said anything I didn’t mean.”