I smoothed my hand up her back, loving the way she felt pressed up against my side.
“You want to move to Florida for a bit?” I offered. “I have the room.”
She looked up at my place through the windshield.
“Who was that guy?” she asked, her voice husky and sexy.
I grimaced.
“That guy was a little pecker weasel by the name of Justin Beard. He didn’t like that I came in here with my ‘big dick swinging’ and took over everything from him. The thing is, he’s not leadership material. Everyone knew it. Even him. But to save face, he’s tried to get a rise out of me every time we’re in the same space,” I told her.
She hummed something then said, “You should’ve pounded him into the ground a long time ago.”
I laughed. “I should have, but I was trying to appear professional.”
“Will you get in trouble for today?” she asked. “For fighting?”
I shrugged. “No clue. Maybe. Maybe not. I don’t really give a fuck.”
She looped her arms around my neck and squeezed it lightly, all the while pressing her lips to my cheek. “It’ll be okay.”
It would or it wouldn’t.
But this time, Justin had gone too far.
And there I went, getting angry all over again.
To get my mind off of going back into town and finding out where Justin lived, I instead started to talk to get my mind back into some place that wouldn’t get me arrested.
“You didn’t say anything about the car,” I said quietly, turning the key to the off position, the motor rumbled to a stop and everything around us went silent.
She looked at me, her heart in her eyes, and grinned. “I knew you would get the car, Troup. And I also knew that you would love it. I love it, too.”
I’d texted her about two years ago and told her that a car had come up for sale.
She’d immediately known what kind of car and had told me to get it.
When I’d mentioned that it was going to cost me forty-grand to do it, she’d told me to live a little.
I had lived.
I’d bought the 1971 Plymouth Cuda with every single cent I had in my bank account.
And it was one of the best decisions I’d ever made.
“Let’s go inside,” I urged.
She scrambled off of my lap when I threw open the door, and her eyes went absolutely huge when she took in my place.
“You planted flowers,” she said softly, wandering over to the flower bed and coming to a stop.
The floodlight that I’d installed a couple of months ago flipped on, and she gasped, finally able to see the flowers clearly.
When she turned just her face to look at me, I knew she knew.
“These are ours,” she murmured, turning back and dropping down to her haunches so she could see them better.
I was not a flower man.
Not at all.
So when I’d gone to the home improvement store a few weeks ago and gotten these, I knew that everyone would be looking at me.
I’d left the store with an entire cart full of daisies.
They weren’t the Brown-Eyed Susans that grew wild in Texas in our field, but they were close.
And I knew that she knew they were.
“I buy them every year, and plant them wherever I happen to be,” I admitted as I looked down at the flowers. “They remind me of home. They remind me of you.”
She reached forward and pressed the tip of one finger carefully on top of one petal, then stood up.
“Take me inside, Troup,” she ordered.
I walked to the front door, also painted her favorite color—red—and pushed it open.
I gestured for her to go in front of me, and she did, stopping to press her hand to the front door and look over her shoulder at me before walking inside.
I flipped on the lights when she paused about halfway into the living room, and she gasped.
I knew what she was seeing.
The entire place was bare.
Sure, there was furniture, but there was no real ‘life’ to the space.
When you moved around a lot, you didn’t really like to gather a lot of extra ‘crap.’
Extra crap just meant that you would have to pack it and move it.
But there were a few personal items over my mantle, right underneath where I’d mounted the television.
Sometimes, during commercials, or hell, even during my shows, I’d find myself looking at the photos and not the television.
She walked to the photos and stopped in front of the most recent one that we had taken together.
The photo of us on Easton’s graduation night.
Easton had taken it for us outside the restaurant that we’d gone to with his mother.
Even after an awkward as hell dinner, we still managed to have a good time.
And I knew that the woman that was the love of my life was the reason for that.
She could make any situation, good or bad, better just by being there.
That particular night it’d been windy.
Beckham’s hair had been flying all over the place.
The photo was of her hair flying, and her hands at her hair to try to hold it in place. Her eyes were shut, and there was a huge smile on her face as she laughed openly.
Then there was me, staring down at her in awe.
Love was plain to see on my face, and it was more than obvious that she was it for me.
She was my one and only.
I knew it then. I knew it now.
Today, I’d seen her for the first time in eight years.
Eight long, really sucky years.
But the moment that we’d walked back into each other’s lives? It was like nothing had changed. It was like only a night had passed instead of nearly three thousand days.
We’d dropped back into our roles so seamlessly that there was only one reason that we could do it so easily—we loved each other. No matter what.
No matter how much time had passed.
“This is blown up and has a place of honor on the wall in my bedroom,” she said. “I had it in my living room, but I spend most of my time in my bedroom. I get to see it way more in there.”
I came up behind her and wrapped my arms around her.
She leaned her head back into my chest and we both stared at that photo.
“We need a newer, more updated one,” I declared. “I’m not saying that you’re not beautiful right there, but Jesus Christ. When I first saw you today? It took my breath away. You’ve turned into a stunningly beautiful woman, and I’m really kind of fuckin’ sad that I wasn’t there to see it.”
She turned in my arms, and I loosened my hold on her long enough for her to move.
When she came to a halt, it was with her head leaning back on my arms, and the front of her body pressed to the front of mine.
Like always, my dick was hard when I was around her.
But this time, it was really hard because it knew what it was about to get.
Her.
Her sucking me off in my buddy’s office had definitely taken the edge off of years of deprivation, but it wanted the real deal. Her pussy.
And it wouldn’t take a hand or a mouth for a substitute.
Not when it knew what it was missing.
“I need to take you to bed,” I told her bluntly.
She grinned wickedly at me.
“Show me to your room, Troup.”
It was so weird having someone call me by my given name.