Even now, all Sean has to do is think about the prospect of losing her to doubt that he's really changed all that much, but she believes otherwise, and that's enough. He trusts her implicitly, and it's impossible right now for him to see the things she says as anything other than the pure, unadorned truth.

"Ye know me," he echoes, eyes closing for just a second before he looks back up, and the fleeting ghost of a smile that flits across his features is barely recognizable as such underneath all the layers of guilt, pain, and stress. For the first time since he's known her, though, he believes it, and he never thought he'd be so relieved for that to be the case. "Ye know me, an' ye still..." he trails off with a tiny shake of his head, unable to finish. Maybe life's not fair, but at least now he knows it's possible for that to work out in a his favour, even if just the once.