“I’ll think more about it.”
“Good.” It was a start, so I nodded enthusiastically.
“I’ll want to talk to the girls first,” he mused, eyes narrowing like he was already rehearsing the conversation. “Charlotte will be a yes, but Madeline isn’t the most on flying. I might be able to sweeten the deal with an art museum or theater.”
“I bet such a thing is already on the itinerary, but even if it’s not, I’ll make it happen for you.” I’d enjoyed the movies with the girls far more than I would have predicted. I could sit through a play if it came to that. “I’ll likely have training shortly after the trip, so it would be nice to spend the time with all three of you for that reason too.”
Mouth pursing, Felix slid out of my grasp. “About that training...”
“I’m not doing it for you.” I needed to be clear about this, especially since Felix wrinkled his nose, disbelief clear in his eyes.
“No?”
“That wouldn’t be fair to either of us, that sort of pressure. I decided last night that I’d take the training option regardless of what your answer was as to dating.”
“Why?” Leaning forward, he balanced his elbows on his knees.
“I want a more balanced life.” Somewhere in the middle of all the chaos and Max’s messages, I’d come to see that I’d done both of us a disservice by trying to link my decision to a relationship with him. It was time for me to own the direction I wanted for my life, let myself want things like a family, and be willing to risk not getting those things. “Seeing what I truly want out of life did have something to do with spending time with you, being happy around you and the kids.”
“But you love being on the sub,” he protested. “I’m still having a hard time picturing you giving it up.”
“Career-wise, the pressure to make this sort of move has been building since before you. I resisted because, like you, I couldn’t see myself enjoying the shift.”
“And now you can?”
“Yeah. Being on the sub was an awesome phase of my life, but now I see that I can have other phases. And the work itself would be the sort of challenge I thrive on—increased supervisory responsibility. More spreadsheets.” I added that last bit to get a laugh from him. All this heaviness was making my chest hurt. I felt raw, like speaking this many hard truths was scraping off all the armor I’d carried around for years now.
And perhaps he realized that because he did chuckle and squeeze my knee. “You are good at those.”
“Thanks. And I mean it. I’m doing this for me. I do want to make it work with you. So much.” My voice wavered and I had to swallow hard. “But this choice is for me.”
“I want to make it work too.” He scooted back closer to me.
I exhaled hard, his nearness making it easier to admit where I’d gone wrong. “You were right to be concerned about my motives. I shouldn’t have framed this as a win-win. Life isn’t a game. You’re not my prize for making this choice, and I don’t want you to feel like that.”
“I believe you.” He wrapped an arm around me, smiling ruefully. “Besides, I’m not sure I’m a very fun prize.”
“Oh, you still make me feel like I won the lottery.” I let my eyes rove over him more deliberately before sobering again. “Watching you with the girls, I realized that life is about more than fun. More than winning. I want a life that matters.”
“You already have that.” He tipped my face toward him so that I couldn’t look away.
“Yeah, I do. But now I can see it and can let myself want more than simply the next win.”
“You are more than your win record.” Continuing to hold my gaze, he gave me a swift kiss. I wanted to believe him. I didn’t entirely, not yet. But for the first time, I wanted to try to work on a version of myself that didn’t need the winner label.
“Thanks. And you get a choice here too. I was serious earlier. If I’m not the best thing for you and the girls, I understand.” I grimaced, clenching my jaw to get the rest of what I had to say out. “Maybe you don’t want to be involved with someone with a few more years of military service to go. And I’m a single dude with no clue about kids.”
“I think you sell yourself way short,” he said firmly. “You’re fabulous with the girls. And you were right about one thing last night. You’re not Tim. You’re not going to run. And I’m not either. I want to give us a chance.”
“Good.” Relief flooding my senses, I kissed him hard enough to send us both tumbling backward onto the bed. It wasn’t a hot and heavy, going-to-get-lucky sort of kiss, but rather the best way I had to express my gratitude and all the other things I lacked words for. Our mouths were gentle, as if this thing between us was that fragile and new. Tenderness even more than desire seemed to tinge every kiss and touch. Rolling slightly, I peered down at him. “I give us pretty good odds.”
“Me too.”
As I kissed him again, I hoped with my whole soul that we were right. I didn’t know the future with any degree of certainty, but I was more than willing to gamble on him.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Felix
Calder had warned me that the Euler family was an experience. But I wasn’t sure anyone could truly be prepared for this level of family togetherness. They’d taken over a block of rooms at a modest place north of downtown Chicago notable for its large indoor pool and kid-friendly accommodations. The pool had been a deciding factor for Madeline. That and Calder had idly admitted one evening that he too didn’t much like flying.
“Oh, well, maybe I do,” Miss Contrary had declared, and that was that and here we were in Chicago having dinner with the Euler family experience, which really needed to be trademarked. Multiple tables in the hotel restaurant were occupied by relatives who kept stopping to hug new arrivals. Calder had started out with us, but been pulled away by cousins needing details for that evening’s card game-slash-bachelor party.
At our table, Madeline was rather down and that was occupying my attention more than the chatty relatives.
“Why so sad?” Calder’s mom, Jane, came to sit with us.
“I forgot my dress,” Madeline reported glumly. She’d insisted on packing herself but forgotten the dress she’d planned for the theater the next afternoon. “Not the wedding one. The one for the play.”
“Ah. That is a problem.” Raising a hand, Jane summoned another female, a friend of Arthur’s who’d been on our flight from Seattle. She’d been seated a few rows ahead of us and made the girls lifetime fans with cherry-flavored gum and video suggestions.