It was downright territorial and predatory. “Ask me again.”
“What do you want, Maddox?”
“You,” he said. “Never, ever doubt my feelings for you again, little dragon. Next time, I’ll whip your ass.”
I gasped, and my ass clenched at the threat. “You wouldn’t dare.”
“Try me,” he challenged, with a dark look.
“I don’t doubt you, Maddox. But I need you to promise me something.”
Maddox waited patiently for me to continue. Damn him, for being so sweet… so understanding… so patient with my overthinking self.
“You’ll never lie to me. You’ll never keep secrets from me.” I brought my hand up and showed him my pinky. “Promise?”
Maddox’s face darkened, flashing with an unreadable expression, but it was gone too quickly for me to consider it. He wrapped his pinky around mine. “Promise.”
I leaned forward and pressed my lips against his. His chest rumbled with a deep sound in response.
Maddox was the person my dad told me about. “Always choose the person who makes your heart beat a thousand miles an hour,” he had said to me. I remembered telling Maddox that I didn’t want to ever fall in love.
Because I wasn’t strong enough to lose yet another person in my life.
That was four years ago.
And now…
Daddy, I found him. Wherever you are, if you’re watching over me… I found my person like you found mom.
8
Lila
I took the pumpkin pie out of the oven, fresh and hot, as Gran set the table. The pie, with its walnut crust, was Maddox’s favorite, and I always made sure it was for dessert, as often as I could.
You’d think Gran was feeding an army with all the food, but there were only four of us. She placed her famous pulled pork, made in her newly acquire instant pot, in the middle of the table, as Pops and Maddox joined us. My chest filled with warmth at the sight of the two of them together.
The two most important men in my life. I was just glad they got along so well.
Maddox met my gaze, and the pit of my stomach fluttered. It was some cosmic reaction I couldn’t explain because we didn’t need words; we just looked at each other and smiled.
This was my favorite time of the year. Only because I got to go back home to visit my grandparents since it was Gran’s birthday. It also happened to be Maddox’s favorite too because of two things: food, and, even though he’d never admit it, he loved the feeling of being part of our little family.
Maddox took a seat beside me, and a smile hovered over my lips, when he grasped my hand under the table. After Pops said grace, and before we could dig into our food, Maddox cleared his throat. “Lila and I have something to say.”
My head snapped up, and I dropped my fork onto my plate with a loud clank. The room went utterly silent as my grandparents watched us with wide, curious expressions.
This wasn’t part of the plan! We had agreed to tell my grandparents after, just so we could spend this night in peace. I squeezed Maddox’s hand in warning, but it was too late.
Pops placed his elbows on the table and leaned forward, giving both of us his undivided attention. He was giving us his famous military look; hard, unflinching, and frighteningly serious. “Go on.”
My knees bounced, and I was suddenly glad Maddox had waited until we were sitting down. My gaze flickered around the room, looking for my grandpa’s hunting rifle that was on the wall next to the fireplace. Maybe I should have hid it when I got back home. Oh God!
Gran looked around nervously, as if sensing the growing tension around us.
“Maybe we should eat first,” I stuttered. “We have all the time to talk after dinner, right?”
Pops barely spared me a glance. His hard gaze was fixated on the man beside me – my boyfriend. My soon-to-be-dead boyfriend.
My hands grew clammy, as coldness seeped through my bones. My stomach started cramping, and it was almost worse than period pains.
Maybe if Maddox and I made a run for it–
“Lila and I are dating, Sir.”
Nope. Never mind, we don’t have time to run for it.
“Oh. Is that true, Lila?” Pops asked, still staring Maddox down. Could the ground open up and swallow me, please?
I felt faint and ended up nodding silently, a small, shy nod. Gran came to my rescue. “That’s wonderful news. You two complement each other very well.” She cleared her throat, when Pops didn’t back her up. “How long have you two been dating for?”
“About three months,” Maddox confirmed, his voice steady. How was he not shitting his pants with my grandpa staring daggers into him?
“Lila?” Pops finally leveled me with a look, the same one he’d give me when I was little, and I did something bad, as he waited for me to confess.
But I wasn’t a little girl anymore.
Although I still respected my grandpa, I was a grown woman who was happy with her boyfriend. I straightened my spine and swallowed past the lump in my throat.
He raised me to be confident and strong, whatever the situation was. Sure, my legs still felt weak, like mush, and my lungs were squeezing so tightly I wondered if I was really breathing, but I returned my grandpa’s look with an unflinching one of my own.
“What Maddox said is true. We’ve been dating for about three months,” I said. “Pops, I’m really, very…happy.”
His demeanor changed the moment the word spilled from my lips. He settled back in his chair, and the corner of his lips twitched. Pops gave Maddox and I both a look, one I couldn’t exactly read, before he glanced at Gran. “Took them long enough, don’t you think?”
“Shit,” Maddox muttered under his breath, and he squeezed my hand so hard I thought he was going to break my bones. I grimaced, and it was then I realized he was just as nervous and scared as me.
Gran smiled. “I honestly thought you two were dating for a very long time. We were just waiting for you to tell us.”
My breath expelled from my chest in a loud whoosh, and I went slack against my chair. The tension around the table eased up, and the air became less suffocating. “Wait, so you guys… knew?”
Pops shrugged. “It was a guess before. You confirmed it now.”
“So, you’re okay with this?” I questioned slowly.
“Are you asking for our blessing?” Pops cocked an eyebrow at me, but he was… smiling. “You have it. As long as you’re happy.” I sat there, slack-mouthed. Holy shit, my grandpa, who was a very hard man to impress, was smiling at the fact that I was dating Maddox Coulter. Yeah, I must have fallen into another universe.
He turned to Maddox, his dark eyes hardening. “I don’t have to warn you because you already know what will happen if you ever hurt my little girl. You might be young, healthy and probably stronger, but I can still whoop your ass, Son.”
Maddox laced our fingers together and gave me a gentle squeeze. He returned my grandpa’s stare with one of his own: confident and self-assured, so Maddox. If it wasn’t for how sweaty and clammy his hand was, with a slight twitching in his fingers, I wouldn’t have been able to tell if he was nervous or not.