Surprised doesn’t cover half of it. I’m still not certain I’m not hallucinating. Gracie has been teething, so sleep has become a thing of the past. Hallucinations wouldn’t be outside the realm of possibility. “W-what are you doing here? You’re supposed to be halfway to Colorado by now. Is everything okay?”
“Everything’s fine.” He pulls me down into the chair next to him. Well, I felt his hands on mine. They felt real enough. So he’s not a sleep-deprived hallucination, but still, I’m left with more questions than answers.
“Then what are you doing here?” My brain can’t quite catch up with reality. Much like the day after the storm when he’d appeared out of nowhere, my thoughts seem to keep misfiring. “Was your flight canceled?”
At this he smiles again, which doesn’t help my cognition one bit. “No, it wasn’t canceled. I didn’t get on it.”
“You’re not making any sense. Explain it to me in small words because I’m afraid I may be having comprehension issues. I thought it was what you wanted. Why wouldn’t you get on the plane? You said yourself you worked for it your whole life. It’s everything you ever wanted.” I don’t know why I’m arguing—having him back is all I’ve been thinking about since he left. After what I put him through, though, I can’t fathom the thought of being the reason he walks away from something he loves so much.
“It’s just a job. If it was everything I ever wanted, it wouldn’t have felt so wrong taking it. Besides, before I left the fire department here offered me a position. Hell, they’re hurting for bodies now they practically begged me to take it.”
“I don’t understand,” I admit with a shake of my head. “Working at a small-town fire department isn’t the same as jumping out of planes into wildfires. Would that even make you happy?”
He lifts a hand to cup my nape and warmth spreads all over me. I didn’t think I’d ever feel that safe, protective warmth again. When I can meet his eyes again it’s through a haze of tears in mine. “It took the time without you to realize I don’t want to be anywhere if you and Gracie aren’t there.”
I can’t help the smile that spreads over my lips. Then I frown, demanding through a voice laced think with tears, “Don’t play with me unless you mean it.”
“I’m not messing with you. I mean it. Following my dreams doesn’t mean anything if I do it alone. It’s just going through the motions. I’m staying here in Battleboro. I want to be with you and Gracie.”
“Wait. Wait. You don’t have to do this because you think you have to. I told you I’d make your relationship with Gracie work. You don’t have to give up everything for me.”
“I’m not giving up anything. Having a life with you and Gracie—that’s everything. That means more to me than any job.”
“Are you sure?”
He leans forward, kisses my objections away. “I’ve never been surer of anything in my life.”
Later after the longest shift of my life, Walker pulls me into the house and shuts the front door behind me. Grandma Rosie is long since asleep and Gracie is knocked out after the ride back from daycare, so they aren’t disturbed when I giggle as he pushes me against the door and takes my mouth in a hot, sweet kiss.
“This is what I was hoping you’d do the night we met,” he says against my lips as fire burns me up from the inside out. “It was killing me not getting to taste you.”
His lips travel down my throat, making my reply breathless and desperate. “I wanted to so bad, but I chickened out.” His mouth finds mine again and I pant when he breaks free. “What else did you want to do?” I ask, wanting to torture us both a little. It’s been a long time…too long, but I want to make it last.
Walker grins wickedly. “Why don’t I show you instead?”
My throat goes bone dry. All I can do is nod my assent.
He leads me back to my room on the back side of the house where he patiently, competently strips me of my clothes. Spreading me out before him, he crouches between my legs like a man at a feast. My fingers fist in the comforter as his mouth explores the delicate flesh. My thighs begin to shake at his careful ministrations. When I attempt to vise his head with my legs, his strong fingers clamp down on the trembling muscles and hold me wide for his attention.
“Please,” I beg.
But if he hears me, he pays no mind. Clearly, he also wants to torture us both a little…or a lot.
I toss and turn as he brings me to the edge and back again several times. It’s the most exquisite kind of torture. When I’m coated in a fine sheen of sweat, he finally pulls away to yank off his shirt and tug off his pants. Gloriously naked and hard, he climbs on top of me, fitting between my legs like he was made to be there.
When he slides inside me, it feels like coming home, like I’d been waiting for this moment since the morning when I’d left him asleep in that bed.
His fingers comb through my hair to grip my scalp and he says, “Look at me. I want you to look at me for this.” I think he means to look at him when I come, because God I’m close, but then he says, “I love you, Avery. I think I have since the night I met you.”
My heart stumbles and I grip him closer to me. “You what?”
“You want to hear it again?” he says, his mouth teasing my ear. “Greedy.”
“It wouldn’t hurt,” I admit.
His smile strikes me in all the soft, tender places inside me. “You tell me first and I will.”
“You’ve already said it!” He slides deep and I groan. “Okay. You’re right. I love you, too. I think that’s why I ran the first time. You scared the shit out of me.” Then he kisses me hard and when I have a moment to breathe, I gasp. “We’ll talk later.”
And then he smiles and it’s blinding, and I realize we’ll have forever now for I love yous. For our family. For us.
Forever with him sounds like the best sort of beginning I could imagine.
Like a rainbow after a hurricane.
My Ruin by Jacob Chance
Prologue
Emmett
Have you ever wondered where you went wrong? What was the one moment that changed the course of your carefully planned future?
Which simple decision set you on a path of self-destruction you never imagined you’d be going down?
For me it was a day four years ago. I can’t forget, no matter how hard I’ve tried. And believe me, I’ve fucking tried. I still remember every moment as if it happened only yesterday…
Four years ago
There was a change in the air that morning when my eyes lazily fluttered open. Blinking repeatedly, the dark blue constellation-covered ceiling came into sharper focus as my sleep-filled vision cleared. Lying still, a low thrum of excitement coursed through my veins, and though I sensed the noticeable shift in the energy surrounding me, I didn’t think anything of it.
Casting the premonition aside like any teenager would, I turned my thoughts to more important things, like my best friend Liz and the fast approaching end of high school.