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“You haunt me. It guts me that I hurt you when you were just a kid with big dreams and I was so damn jealous I was choking on my own insecurities.” I shake my head, focusing on the here and now and the things I can change. “I can’t believe how open we were with one another in those messages, when you were Rachel and I was Mark. And that kiss?” I look at her lips, wanting desperately to touch them, taste them, but I haven’t earned them yet. “I can’t live with myself if I don’t at least try. We deserve that much. Do you understand?”
She’s not smiling. She hasn’t smiled once while I’ve rambled on frantically. She looks shell-shocked, her mouth open in a little ‘O’ of surprise and her eyebrows high on her forehead. I can even see the whites around her blue eyes.
I think she might have blown a fuse. Just when I’m about to start checking for signs of a stroke, she nods slowly and clears her throat. “Okay. Okay, wow. That’s . . . wow.” She fans herself, and I’m still not quite sure she’s okay because she’s repeating words and she’s kinda known for being adept with them.
And then she laughs, loud and bright and happily, and I think my heart finally beats again.
“Oh, my gosh, that was amazing!” she shouts, letting a wiggle worm its way through her body. I think she just let my words wash over and through her. And they worked, or at least, they’re working.
I smile at how adorable she is. I genuinely smile at her utter joy at being told how much I want her, want this. She believes me, thankfully, because I can honestly say that I don’t know if I would be as forgiving of me if she’d said to me what I said to her all those years ago. At some point, I should thank River for covering for me back then so that it didn’t fester inside Riley the way it could’ve. I owe him for that, at least.
“Now what?” Riley says, nearly vibrating with excitement.
“Now, we eat cheesecake to celebrate,” I tell her.
“You don’t want to go out or something?” she says in surprise.
I shake my head, reaching out and finally touching her, taking her hand in mine. “I’d go anywhere with you any fucking time you want, but let’s stay in. I want you all to myself right now, just you and me. Riley and Noah. I have plans for you, though, Sunshine. Tomorrow night.”
It’s not a question. It’s not a demand either. It’s a promise.
“Oh? Is that so?” she sasses back, tilting her head and looking up at me through her lashes.
I pull her in tightly, pressing my body against hers and holding her hand behind her, locked at the small of her back. One nod from me has her melting into me.
“And tonight?” she practically purrs.
I point toward the kitchen with my chin and lift the bag of dog treats in my free hand. “Tonight, we eat cheesecake while Raffy snacks like a king.”
He must’ve heard the magic word ‘snack’ because Raffy lets out a sharp bark from his dog bed in the corner. His ears are perked up and his eyes are locked on me.
The little joke and Raffy’s reaction get her to smile, the last bit of what I needed to feel her sunshine flood into my chest. I’ve got a foothold in the door to Riley’s heart . . . and I’m not going to give up until I have the door all the way open.
But I’ll never, ever hurt her. Not again.
Riley grabs the cheesecake while I break up a trio of the small muffin-flavored biscuits for Raffy, who’s wagging his nub and doing circles on command for me in return for a tiny piece of a treat. “Good boy, Raffy. You’re scarfing those down like no one ever feeds you, but I know you’ve probably had at least two bowls of kibble today.”
"Two? More like three,” Riley mutters.
“Let me fill up your water bowl. Those things might be dry,” I tell Raffy as though he can understand me. Actually, he might. He runs right over to his water bowl and knocks at it with his paw like he’s telling me, ‘It’s right here, and make it snappy.’
I help myself to the sink, and Riley gives me a warm look, holding up the cheesecake and a spoon. I notice she only has one, and I have no problems with that. I set Raffy’s now-filled water bowl down, and we take the cheesecake to the couch, settling in closely with the cheesecake in between us.
“So, how’d you know?” Riley asks as I push the spoon through the first bite of cheesecake and offer it to her.
