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“I can pretend to cry, if it’ll restore your sense of justice.”
I run my hand down his face, then lean in and kiss him. A sigh escapes him, so I kiss him again. Two times. Three.
“I haven’t cried since before my father died,” he admits after a beat.
I gasp. “That’s not—”
“No, it’s probably not good, and the therapist my mother sent me to after Dad died had plenty to say about it. So did the school counselor. But I’ve never done well in therapy. It always feels like the person’s either talking at me or agreeing with everything I say.”
“I figured you’d like that part.”
“Very funny,” he says with a smile, still rubbing my back.
I consider my next words carefully, because I know this man buries emotion like he’s a dog hiding a bone he won’t come back to. “Shane, it seems like there’s still a lot you haven’t processed from losing your dad.”
“I know,” he says. “But maybe there are things that happen to us that we can never fully accept or process. Things that defy the mind. This might be mine.”
Maybe, or maybe he just needs to realize that his father did leave an impact—and that impact was good.
“I need to ask you what happened with Danny,” I say quietly.
“He’s thrilled by our news.” He sighs again. “He doesn’t want to talk to me again until I can tell him that I’m in love with you, that I want our marriage to be real.”
“Oh,” I breathe out, stricken. Obviously, it’s too early to decide any of those things, but that little light of hope inside of me, which has been flaring all day long, is eager for those things. It wants to know, at least, that they’re possible.
His hand keeps rubbing my back as he looks into my eyes. “I understand his position, Ruthie. He thinks I’m a man who can’t give you want you want, and you’re his sister. He wants you to have everything you deserve.”
“Leave it to two men to decide what I want,” I say, sounding braver than I feel. “Again.”
His lips tip upward. “Are you saying you’re using me for sex?”
“Maybe.”
“That’s too bad,” he says, his hand moving to my waist and tracing my side. “Because I want more for us. I just… We need time to figure it out. I never really wanted to get married. To me, it always seemed like something the law shouldn’t touch.”
“You’re blowing my mind right now. You think there’s something the law shouldn’t touch?”
“I know, right?” he says, looking into my eyes as he tucks a stray lock of hair behind my ear. It seems like he’s always doing that lately. Cleaning up my messes. “But I think you’re forgetting something important. Josie the Great told you that everything was going to be okay for you. We should hinge all of our decisions on that assurance.”
I smile, because it’s funny, but I feel like he’s trying to bury what he just said: he doesn’t believe in marriage, and he’s not sure he’ll change his mind.
“She also told me I’d be getting married a third time.”
“Not going to happen. I’d steal you from the altar.”
I raise my eyebrows. “You don’t get to steal me, Shane, I’m a person, not a candy bar.”
“That’s not what Mira seemed to think earlier. I know code words when I hear them.”
A surprised laugh bubbles out of me. “You were the candy bar, not me.”
“Are you going to take a bite?” he asks, his eyes sparkling. But it’s still there, all the heaviness, all the baggage. All the emotion, packed down deep with six feet of dirt over it. He’s hidden so much of himself, and not just from other people. I’m guessing he doesn’t even know what’s down there.
I pretend to go in for a bite, then kiss his jaw, but when he goes for my mouth, I pull back slightly. “If you don’t believe in marriage, do you believe every relationship has an expiration date?”
He holds my gaze for a moment, one of his hands still settled at my lower back as I sit in his lap, my legs around him. The position is strangely natural, like we’ve been doing this for years instead of dancing around it. “I used to,” he finally says. “I don’t know anymore.” His brow knits, and I don’t have to ask why. Not knowing something will always send him into a tailspin. “But I want us to spend more time together. I want to try.”
And I kiss him, because I worshipped the boy he was. Because I’m drawn to the man I sense inside of him, beneath his ambition and unreasonable expectations for himself. The man he is at his core. Maybe I can reach him there if I kiss him deeply enough, long enough.
