Like I could give her.
I reach for her again, and this time, I don’t let her pull away.
I pull her into my chest and try to send the warmth of my soul into hers. I try to repair some of the damage to her heart with the beats of mine.
She balls my shirt up in her hands and lets me hold her. I rest my chin on top of her head and just let us be.
This is the feeling Holt was talking about when he went after Blaire. This is the reason Larissa cried so incessantly when she and Hollis split up. This is why Coy was freaking out when Bellamy told him goodbye.
They were all afraid they’d never have this again.
I get it now.
I lower my head to her ear. Before I go through with what I’m about to say, I close my eyes and hope for the best.
“Jaxi?” I whisper.
“Yeah?”
“I want to buy a dog.”
She pulls back and extricates herself from my arms. “What do you mean?”
“I mean that I want to buy a dog, and that’s a commitment. They live a long time.”
Her forehead wrinkles. “Okay. Then go buy a dog, Boone.”
This is not how I thought this conversation would go, and I’m not sure why I led with buying a dog.
But here we are.
“I …” I regroup. “Forget the dog thing, okay?”
She looks confused, and I can’t blame her.
“What I’m trying to say is that I like you. I want you, Jaxi. If you’re scarred or bruised or scared—whatever it is, however it is, I’m in.”
A lump is evident in her throat as she looks around the room. At everything but me.
“Jaxi?”
“I couldn’t look at a week, a month, a year from now and know that I fell short in your eyes just like I did Pete’s and Shawn’s.”
“Fuck them both.”
“Yes, fuck them both. But that doesn’t change the way things work for me, Boone. You aren’t a Pete or a Shawn. You’re an amazing man who feels entirely out of my league.”
I laugh. “You have that backward.”
She looks unconvinced, so I dig in.
“Sweetheart, I could have cleaned out that workout room every day that you've been here, and I keep putting it off. Why? Because I hope one day I won’t need to.”
Her eyes grow wide.
“I was just talking to my brothers about this—”
“You talked to your brothers about this?”
“Yes. They’re a nosy bunch. You know this.” I roll my eyes and grin for good measure. “They’re also sometimes full of useful information. Holt was telling me that how I feel is not crazy because he felt the same way with Blaire. That when you know, you know and ...”
My palms sweat in anticipation of her response. If she shoots me down, this is going to make things a whole lot more complicated. But if she doesn't …
“I get you’re scared. I’m scared. This might not work out,” I say. “But I believe you were put in my life for a reason. I feel it. There’s something about this little family that we’ve created …” I laugh in disbelief that those words apply to me. “I don’t want it to end. We’re good together, Jaxi. We’re really fucking good. And I think the fucking would be really good too. I know because I’ve thought about it a lot. Daily.”
She laughs, wiping her eyes with her fingertips.
“But what about Rosie?” she asks. “She deserves stability. If this thing between us doesn’t work out, she’ll be crushed. It feels irresponsible of me to put her in that position.”
My jaw clenches. “It’s a theoretical position in the first place. Second, I feel like it’s irresponsible of you to push me out of your lives because of some bullshit two other dudes put in your head.”
She considers this. She shifts on the bed. “So, what are you saying, exactly?”
“I’m saying that I’ve never had to work this hard to get a girl to want to be with me.”
She laughs.
“So back to where we started—I like you,” I tell her. “A lot.”
“I like you too. A lot.”
I smile. “So can we like each other in the sense that we can openly kiss each other? Because I really want to fucking kiss you.”
Her cheeks flush. “I guess it’s not a terrible idea.”
I lean in. Her eyes grow wide, and a breath hiccups in her chest.
She squirms on the mattress until we’re only inches apart. The anxiety in her features is still there but noticeably less.
I’ll kiss the rest of it off you.
I place my hand on the back of her head, lacing my fingers in her hair. Her head rests in my palm and turns to give me full, easy access of her mouth.
It’s supposed to be easy, gentle—something to absorb the rush of energy that I know is going to fire through every synapses as soon as our lips touch. But instead of merely brushing against each other, the electricity between us pulls us together.
Her lips are soft, her breath sweet—the heat of the exchange pushes through my veins.
She moans into my mouth as if she’s dreamed about this moment as many times as I have.
I deepen the exchange, letting my tongue part her lips and explore her hot and wet mouth. She gives little resistance—fully trusting me to lead.
My skin tingles, my balls ache, and I can’t think about anything other than what I need from her.
And what I want to give her.
I move her slowly back onto the mattress. And then I hover over her.
I lower my face to hers again, pausing to take in the naughty grin on her face, when a little voice breaks the moment.
“Boone!”
Jaxi starts to giggle.
All of the wind is knocked out of me. I fall back to the mattress and look at the ceiling.
“In here,” I call out.
The tile clicks with the sound of feet. Then it stops.
“Oh, there you are. I thought you were gone,” Rosie says.
I look up to see her standing in the doorway with her Glo Worm under her arm. And just like every other time I look at her sweet, little face, my heart melts. She always calls for me. And I want her to always do that too.
“Still here,” I say before letting my head fall back to the mattress. I roll my head to face Jaxi. “We need to get a babysitter.”
She giggles. “Come here, Rosie.”
Rosie springs across the floor and launches herself onto the bed. I cover my groin until she’s settled next to me.
Jaxi curls up on my right. Rosie twists herself into a pretzel around my left arm.
This is not how I saw, or hoped, this night would end. But as I take in the feeling in my stomach and the way my heart feels full, I have to reconsider.
Maybe this is what I hoped for.
Maybe it’s just one better.
Eighteen
Boone
“I want one of those,” Rosie says, reaching for my menu.
I hand her a plastic-coated listing of dinner options from Hillary's House. She squirms in the booth, clutching the menu in her hands for dear life. She gets settled practically on top of Jaxi.
Wade and Oliver had me in the office longer than normal tonight. The Greyshell report came in. We sat around and strategized on the best way to secure the property. When I looked up, it was past six, so I had Jaxi and Rosie take Libby’s car and meet me for dinner.