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She looks at me, eyebrows raised in question.
“You’re like that river. At least in the way you’ve affected me,” I say.
“How? Easy to cross?” she says morosely.
“Stop pouting.” I chuck her under the chin. “I mean that you started like that for me. A pin prick sized drop of water on the very still waters of my life. And the minute you touched me, you caused a ripple that blurred everything I thought I was certain of. The way I saw myself, my obligations, my future. And now, just like that river you love so much does, it winds its way south, you rush through me, and I’m drowning in you.” I kiss her quickly.
“I’m all for you loving me, but it’s not worth your life.” She uses the very same joke I made that night in the hot tub and I laugh.
“Actually, I can breathe deeply for the first time in a long time. I know we’re from totally different worlds, but I feel like we’re also from the very same one. We love our family—not just the ones who were born of our blood. My brothers, Stone and Beau, aren’t biologically related to me at all,” I tell her. “You’re not the daughter of a sadistic drunk and the sister of a killer. I’m not the scion of a line of philanthropic, but short-sighted men and faithless women. Our legacies—what we choose to leave of ourselves in this world—is up to us.”
She sighs…
“Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” I ask her.
She purses her lips and then she blows out a breath. “I don’t talk about it. No one in Amorel does. It’s our collective secret. We all like to pretend that Merle—that’s my dad—never existed and that Fortune is already dead,” she says quietly.
“And I’m ashamed of what they did and how I deny them. But to acknowledge them is to remind everyone not just that my brother killed my father, but about the blood that runs in my veins. It means something that it’s part of my history. And, in a way, that’s more than just a random moment. That it shaped me. Reduced me. Just like the river. Just like I thought Nigel had done. Just like I was afraid you’d do if I gave you another chance,” she says. I grasp her chin, a little more forcefully than I need to and turn her face toward mine.
“There is nothing that could reduce you. You wear your name like a crown, and it’s one of the truest things about you,” I tell her.
She sniffs dismissively. “It feels like a joke. And I’m afraid sometimes that it is. My brother Fortune is going to die on a table with a state-sanctioned, poison-filled needle in his arm. My brother, Happiness, ran away before he was thirteen. I can’t imagine that his life has brought him much of his name’s meaning.” She shakes her head.
“Well, first, I think you’re giving your parents a lot of credit. Your mother, I will say, seems lovely. But fortune teller didn’t seem to be one of her skills. They gave you a name they liked. You’ve made it your own. You can decide that what you’ve done with your life is worth less than some whim by your parents twenty-seven years ago. But you would be lying to yourself,” I tell her.
She looks up at me through her long lashes and smiles.
“You believe in yourself. Enough to see beyond your current situation and reach for more. That’s more than I can say for myself. I didn’t consider that your interest in me could be more than all of the things that I’ve used to define myself. But, I swear, by the time we left Italy, I knew I didn’t care what it said, and I knew that I could trust you,” I say. And then I add the part that has been a more recent revelation. “I know that one of the reasons that people think of my money when they look at me is because that’s what I show them. I started changing that after your visit. If I wanted more from people, I had to give more,” I say. “You asked me that about wanting more from my experiences than money could buy.”
“Oh Hayes,” she says wistfully.
“What?”
“Thank you for speaking so my heart could hear. I don’t want to be bought. I don’t want to be wooed with flowers or nice trips. I want to be wowed by you living your best life. Because I want to live mine, too,” she says.
“Let’s do it together.” I pull her off the window seat and carry her toward the bed.
“What are you doing?” she cries. “I’m still talking …”
“Well, when you’re done, you’re going to put your pussy on my dick and make it dance,” I say. “I just want to get you in position.”
“Aren’t you mad that I didn’t tell you sooner? How do you not have any more reaction than this?” she asks.
“I already knew,” I admit and then brace for her reaction. Her body tenses and I just hold on tighter.
“You knew?”
“Yeah. After you left that day, I read it. I wanted to know what spooked you so badly,” I say.
She glares at me.
I smile at her.
Her glare falls apart and her mouth trembles before she covers it with her hands.
“You have the heart, spirit, and courage of a queen. I’m proud to know you. Proud that you love me. You’ve taken something and made it into nothing,” I say.
She rolls her eyes. “You’ve got it backward,” she says exasperatedly.
