I heard a sniffle, then felt her shift against me. She stacked her hands on my chest and propped her chin on top of them so she could look up at me. Even in the dark, her clear-as-sky eyes sparkled. They were still full of sadness, but there was something else in them that had every muscle in my body tensing.
“You’re doing it, baby,” she said quietly. “Right now, being here for me the way you are. I couldn’t have made it through tonight without you.”
Christ, that was nice to hear. But I still wished I could do more. Reaching up, I tucked a long strand of hair behind her ear so I could see all of her gorgeous face as best I could in the moonlight filtering through the blinds. “I want to take away your pain. I don’t want you to be sad, not even for a second. And it kills me that I’m not able to do that for you.”
“Stone,” she said on a barely-there breath. “I don’t need you to take my pain away. When you hold me, you make everything bearable. When you make love to me, I feel like I can handle anything. You told me weeks ago that you want to make every day better than the last for me. Well, you’ve done it. We aren’t good, honey. We’re great,” she said, throwing back my words from earlier that night. God, it felt like a lifetime had passed since I said that to her.
“I know this may be early, and I don’t expect you to say it back, so please don’t feel like you have to. I just need you to know that I love you. I loved you when you sat beside me in Big Red while I shredded her gears, but never once lost patience with me.”
At the flare of my eyes, Willow giggle-snorted. “Shane told me what that truck means to you, which only proves how special it was that you let me drive her. And I love you for that too. I love you for being so incredibly loyal, and I love you for wanting to protect me from the world, even though you can’t. You’re the best man I’ve ever known, Gavin.” At her use of my given name, I sucked in a breath and a wave of warmth filled my chest, spidering outward like a crack in a windshield to every part of my body. “You wish you could have done more for me tonight, but I’m telling you right now, what you have done has been everything to me, baby. And that’s why I love you.”
“Christ,” I grunted, my throat feeling painfully tight.
“I don’t want you to think that just because I said it, I expect you—oh!”
Her words died on a yelp when I whipped her over onto her back and wedged her thighs open with my hips so they could rest between them.
“I love you,” I grunted, the emotion I was feeling right then making it hard to keep my voice steady. “You’re the only woman I’ve ever loved. The only one I ever will love. I thought my life was as good as it was going to get until I met you. And even while I was fighting it, you still managed to somehow make it better. When I say you’re mine and I’m yours, I mean forever, mouse. There’s nothing in the world strong enough to change that. You’re my forever.”
Tears welled in her eyes before slipping down her temples into that beautiful silky hair.
“You love me,” she repeated in a whisper, almost like she couldn’t believe it.
“With everything in me. I’ll love you even more tomorrow, and the day after that, and every day going forward. Then I’ll love you even more when we eventually get married and you give me our babies.”
Her eyes flared wide. “You-you want to have kids?”
“If they’re with you, hell yeah.”
She sniffled, then smiled so brightly it nearly blinded me.
“See?” she said softly. “That right there.”
My brow furrowed in confusion. “What, baby?”
“With that right there, you just made everything better.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Stone
It had been three days since the fire, and this was the first time since Jon had been admitted to the hospital that he’d been in his right mind enough for his daughters to be able to see him. Not that it kept them from coming up to the hospital every day as soon as they woke up and sitting in that waiting room until after the sun went down just to be close to him.
I could see my woman hurting, the pain was written on her face and swimming in her eyes, and I fucking hated how helpless I felt to take that pain away. Watching her suffer was killing me, but my woman was strong. She was the strongest person I’d ever had the privilege of knowing. And even with all that pain in her eyes, she was holding her head high and giving her sisters as much support as possible. Since she was pouring all of her support into her sisters, I was doing my damnedest to give her all that I had, to be her rock.
But as I stood in the background and listened to the doctor giving them the hard truth, I could see it was weighing heavier and heavier on her with every word he said.
“I’m sorry,” the doctor continued, “but I think it’s time you consider placing your father somewhere where he can have permanent supervision. I know families don’t like to hear these kinds of things, but there are very some good facilities right around here.”
“Thank you, doctor,” Elaina said, bringing the conversation to a close.
“I want to keep him for one more night to monitor those burns, but I feel confident he’ll be ready to leave tomorrow. For now, you can go back two at a time and see him whenever you’re ready.”
He left the waiting room, and I immediately moved to Willow just as she lifted her hands to massage her temples. I pressed in behind her, wrapping my arms around her to hold her up mentally and physically. She fell against me like everything she’d just heard was too much of a strain to keep her standing on her own.
“I can’t—” Crissy started but stopped to shake her head in sadness as a tear streaked down her face. “I know he can’t go back to that house—not that it’s even an option after the fire. I understand he can’t be alone, but if we put him in a home, it would just wreck him.”
“He can come live with me,” Willow said without missing a beat. “It’ll be hard on all of us, letting go of the family house, but it’ll be even worse for him. He needs us, so he can come live with me.”
Her sister Crissy reached out to take her hand as another tear fell. “Sweetie, you can’t. You work full time.”
My mouth opened, and the words fell out without a single thought. “I’ll help her. We can do it together. Maybe we can alternate schedules or something so one of us is always off.” Even as I said them, I didn’t regret the words I’d spoken one damn bit. I meant them, down to my very center. Especially if it meant helping my woman and her father, who I’d come to really like.
Willow’s head whipped around so fast her hair slapped me in the chest, love swimming in her watery eyes as she stared up at me. “I love you,” she mouthed, and my arm clenched tighter around her. I didn’t know how we’d do it, but we’d make it work.
“You’ve done enough,” Elaina spoke, pulling everyone’s attention to her. She looked up at her husband, and he gave her a reassuring nod before she continued, turning to look back at her youngest sister. “James and I have been talking about this since the night of the fire. We knew Dad wouldn’t be able to live alone anymore, and we knew you’d jump at the first opportunity to take up the torch when it came to taking care of him. But you’ve already done so much. It’s time I step up.” Willow reached out to take her oldest sister by the hand. “I’m a stay-at-home mom with two kids in school all day. We want Dad to come live with us.”