With a returning kiss, he gave it to me. And when our lips parted, the rest of us didn’t. We wound together again, our faces buried in each other, our arms clasped tight and hands splayed.
For the first time in a very long time, I felt whole.
Overwhelmed by the feeling, I held on to him. And when I found myself, I eased my grip, wanting to see him.
He was as I knew him to be—strong, stoic, dark. But there was something alive in him, like the bright edge of an eclipse that promised the sun would shine again.
I smiled, and he smiled.
“Tell me we can do that again, but slower?” I asked.
When he laughed, his head kicked back a little, exposing his Adam’s apple. And when he met my eyes again, his were bright with joy.
“If I wasn’t secure in my manhood, I’d take offense.”
“If it’s been as long for you as it was for me, I’m impressed.”
At the mention, his expression softened. Again I worried he’d turn away, but instead he held my jaw, thumbed my cheek. “Next time it’ll be slower. Painfully slow. Might take all night.”
“I’ll go ahead and clear my schedule,” I answered with a smile.
He picked me up, held me by my thighs like I was weightless, kissed me like I was the only thing he needed.
And god, how I wanted to be.
16
BECOMING
KEATON
The storm passed as quickly as it had appeared, the rain slowing to a drizzle as we righted ourselves, talking and laughing. I couldn’t stop touching her, whether it be her arm, her hands, her fingertips. The wet mass of her hair that I gathered at her back, loosening the wet strands stuck to her neck and shoulders.
Her smile, the one I’d admired for so long, was different now—I instantly knew it was mine alone.
On inspection of the weather and the thinning clouds behind the front, we mounted up and I followed her back to the house. I kept my eyes on her every yard we covered, the sight of her leaving me dumbstruck.
She was a force of nature, speeding through the woods with raven hair whipping behind her in whorls. Her soaked clothes clung to her skin, her skirt licked by the wind with every gallop, her thighs pinned to her horse’s ribs and a bundle of chocolate mane in her fists. She rode that horse with no saddle as if she was born to, with the unnatural ease of a queen born of fables—her torso barely moved, tuned to her mount in a connection so close, it was unearthly.
Neither of us had remembered our phones in our haste, so when we approached, Mrs. Blum ran outside, flushed with relief. A few minutes later, Jo bolted into the clearing on her horse and Poppy from the opposite direction, her brute of a mount stamping his general disapproval. And when the celebration of safety had passed, she drove me to my truck where we said goodbye, if only for a few hours.
The long, languid kiss we shared leaning against my truck replayed in my mind as I drove away, replaced by the memory of her body. It was all I could think of as I showered, the evocation driving me to madness relieved only with my palm on the cool tile and my cock in my fist. Not as I told my brothers as little as possible while letting them know to make themselves scarce tonight, which they owed me, and more. I thought of that kiss as I prepared a simple dinner, smoking steaks, asparagus, and potatoes, my stomach in knots with anticipation of her arrival.
Had I ever felt this way before? I searched my memories and thought maybe, once upon a time I’d felt this with Mandy. But it was different at sixteen than it was at thirty-three. At sixteen, my motives were very different, short-sighted, not for lack of imagination but lack of experience. After that initial burst of uncertainty, Mandy was comfortable, without mystery.
Daisy was unknown to me, and I was hungry for the knowledge that would change that.
The feeling zinged through me all day, firing nerves from head to toe, to keep one corner of my lips raised all the way down to putting a jaunt in my step.
Was this how it felt to be happy?
Why didn’t I remember the feeling until now?
A flash of guilt reminded me I wasn’t allowed to be happy. I’d never thought to ask myself why. Why couldn’t I have something, someone, strictly for the joy of it? Why was I punishing myself? What had I done to deserve it?
When I did, that little voice in the back of my mind had nothing to say.
Maybe this was my chance. And I wasn’t going to waste it.
The house was quiet when she knocked on the door, and I opened it to find her just as brilliant as she ever was, fresh as the flower of her name, bright as the sun in June. And throughout the end of cooking dinner and then enjoying it together, I watched her with fascination. The way she cut her steak. The way she covered her mouth with the back of her hand when she laughed with a full mouth. The way the dim light of the dining room kissed the tip of her nose, the top of her cheeks, the bare curves of her shoulders.
My memory had been wiped clean like a chalkboard, leaving only the quiet reminder of what once was.
It was presence, an absolute being, the absence of future or past. Just Daisy laughing at my terrible jokes with earnest appreciation. Just the light in her eyes and that changed smile, the one that was freshly mine.
After living so long in the emptiness of my past, it felt like an awakening.
Our dinner was done, our plates empty. She sat back in her chair at the head of the table, and I leaned back in mine, at her right hand.
She was in the midst of telling me about her sisters’ reactions to the news.
“Jo,” she continued, “took a victory lap around the house yelling We did it! I’m not sure when my love life became a team sport. We’re a little too involved in each other’s business, but they really went above and beyond the call of duty.”
“It’s me who was the problem. I mean, you flat-out asked me to date you at dinner, and I said no like a fool. I didn’t even mean it.”
“You didn’t?”
I shook my head. “All I did between leaving the restaurant and kissing you in the barn was beat the shit out of myself over it.”
“You did a good job convincing me you weren’t interested.”
“To be fair, I didn’t know if your heart was in it. You seemed unbothered when I turned you down. Figured you really did just want to be friends.”
“Guess I’m a decent actor too.” She wore that sweet smile, touched with mirth at the corners. “If you’d told me that night I’d be sitting here right now after the day we had, I’d have called you a liar.”
“I should have taken you on a date first. But I couldn’t stop myself.”
“Keaton, that kiss was the most right thing that’s happened to me in a very long time.” I met her eyes as she continued. “Dinner would have made it less right. All that ceremony, who’s it for? I don’t need it. I get the sense you don’t either.”
I considered it, thinking through what would likely have been a quiet, stunted dinner conversation and a kiss at the end. Today, I’d been stripped bare by circumstance, with no armor to protect me from myself. That kiss was honest, more honest than anything I’d said or done in so long that I didn’t remember how it felt to show someone the truth of what you wanted and have it returned.