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In the cabin, we devour each other’s bodies and then lie in bed, his hands moving through my hair, tickling me as we talk or sometimes just lay there in silence.
But the silence isn’t really silence, because it says so much for us, the little tics, the quirks of closeness that let us talk without really talking.
The L-word lingers between us and on several occasions I almost scream it, but then college and Dad and the whole twisted mess comes barreling back into my mind, and I let the word drift away and instead just focus on the moment, the gorgeous moment in which I’m with my man – my man – and the world can’t interfere.
One evening, we sit up on the cabin porch, the stars blazing, our bodies just the same as we recover from yet another carnal unleashing of all the pent-up longing inside of us.
“I’m still so shocked,” I mutter.
“Shocked?” he says, real confusion punctuating his voice.
“That you’d choose me—”
He cuts me off with a kiss, leaning down and crushing my lips with his, roughly dragging them so that tingles danced right to my soul.
Cheesy, a voice whispers in my head.
My soul?
And yet that’s how it feels.
“You never have to doubt yourself with me,” he says firmly. “If anything, I’m the one who has to prove to you every day that I deserve you. You’re an incredible woman, Kelly. You’re smart, funny, kind, beautiful. You’re mine. And I …”
He bites down, trailing off, and then hugs me close to him and turns to the watching stars.
I love you.
I can almost see the constellations reforming to make those words, the glittering declaration claiming the heavens.
The four of us make an unlikely group in my parents backyard, sitting on the table and chairs where I spent so much of my early childhood, reading books in the summer sun or eating dinner in the Aslado evening.
The table is a pale green, contrasting with the deep lush green of the grass, kept alive by sprinklers that glitter in the light.
Now, Mom leans back, curling a string of her blonde hair around a painted fingernail. Dad sits beside her, leaning forward, leather clad elbows on the table.
Kane and I sit side by side, which normally feels like the most natural thing in the word, but under the suspicious glare of Dad’s curled lips, it suddenly feels as if we’re doing something wrong. He scratches at the small scar high up on his forehead, near his hairline, the one he got when he fell over drunk when I was ten.
Kane sits up calmly, staring at Dad, wearing a dark blue shirt unbuttoned at the neck and trousers, his salt and pepper hair glinting in the late afternoon light.
“What’s this about?” Dad grumbles.
“Because,” he goes on, before anybody could possibly fill the space with an answer. “I’m sure we can agree this is pretty fucking strange, can’t we? Well?”
“Please, Jason,” Mom murmurs. “Do you have to cuss?”
“Cuss, cuss.”
Dad stands up and throws his arms in the air, pacing up and down the garden, and then wheels on the three of us.
“Listen, Kane, you’ve got some nerve coming in here like this. First you try and blame me for the Cartel shit – and, oh, look, it was your club who had the rat – and now you’re, you’re …”
He stops, fish-mouthing, something dawning in his eyes as he looks between me and Kane.
“No,” he says. “Please tell me no, Kelly.”
I feel a blush creeping up my neck, and find myself looking at Mom as though I’m a toddler again and she’s going to ride in and make everything better.
Mom has a subtle smile on her lips and she gives me a quiet look of support.
“I’m with Kane, Dad,” I say, and then the words just hang there like a shot ringing out over a battlefield.
Dad walks to the table and leans down, aiming a finger at Kane’s face.
Something inside of me seizes when I remember how Kane handled those Cartel men in the alleyway, and Lance – Lance, that monster – how he dispatched them like they were nothing more than mail.
But Kane sits calmly, staring down the barrel of Dad’s finger into his eyes.
“Are you fucking my daughter, Kane?” he growls.
“I wouldn’t put it so crudely,” Kane murmurs. “This isn’t some fling. This isn’t me picking her up and using her. This is something else. This is me wanting to be with her forever. This is me claiming her, protecting her, having my children with her. This is the biggest and most important thing that’s ever happened to me, and it’s just bad luck that the woman of my dreams happens to be your daughter.”
I let out a gasp, emotions rioting through me, my cheeks blazing with affection as the words make their impact on my heart.
