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“I have a bottle of my father’s favorite whiskey that we can finish off, and believe me when I say my father only drank the good stuff.”
He snickered. “It’s only eleven in the morning.”
“Oh. Right. Well, I also have my mother’s favorite coffee beans, so we can drink the coffee this morning and tap into the whiskey tonight.”
“You want to spend the whole day with me?” he asked, surprised.
“The whole day, and the whole night.”
We did exactly that, too. We headed inside and drank numerous coffee beverages. I did most of the talking, which mimicked much of what our childhood was like, and Jax listened with ease. I told him more stories about my parents and Daisy and more stories about my past, and whenever I’d laugh out loud, he’d smile and look at me as if I were the sun.
We talked about our careers, and he told me how he’d planned to buy every book I’ve published so far.
He told me about his father’s land and how he planned to make the property everything his mother dreamed of once it was passed down to him. “She was never able to achieve her dreams. I want to see them through for her,” he said.
I could tell it was hard for him to talk about his mother, but I was glad he was speaking about her. If I’d learned anything over the past few weeks, it was that talking about your loved ones kept them alive, and I needed that. I was certain Jax needed that, too.
When we broke out the whiskey that night, we headed out to my parents’ convertible to drink underneath the stars and the moon.
My favorite thing about sitting beside Jax was that even when it was quiet, when the conversations faded and we were left with nothing but the silence, the stillness felt healing. Being quiet with him was one of my favorite things about the moments we shared that day.
After we had a little too much to drink, Jax placed his hands behind his head and looked up toward the sky. “I don’t want to be like him,” he confessed. “Like my father. Amanda said that earlier, and she said it a few weeks back, too. I’m sure people in this town think I’m like him, but I don’t want to be. He was a monster.”
“You’re not your father.”
He shook his head. “You haven’t known me for years. You can’t really say that.”
“Yes, I can.”
“How so?”
“Because your character hasn’t changed throughout the years. You are the same gentle boy you were before. This town, these people don’t see it, though, because they are too stuck on their prejudices and judgmental ways based on a tragedy that happened years ago. What they don’t see is the kindness in your eyes, the way you help people when they aren’t looking, the way you give yourself to those who are in need, the way you care so quietly. You’re the same beautiful soul I loved all those years before, Jax, and you are nothing like your father.”
He closed his eyes. “Promise?”
I placed my hand on his thigh. “Promise.”
His eyes opened quickly and fell to my hand. “Every time you do that, I feel as if I’m waking up again.”
“Do what?”
“Touch me.”
I swallowed hard at his words, and I wasn’t sure if it was the whiskey or the swirl of emotions inside me that was making my mind spin. “I missed you, Moon,” I confessed.
“I missed you more. I missed your light so damn much. I’d been living in darkness for so long…I missed you…”
“What did you mean before when you said you tried to hate me?”
“Because you stopped writing,” he explained. “I felt like when your letters stopped coming, I didn’t want to care about you anymore. After I lost my mother, I needed your letters, and when they stopped, I wanted to hate you. I hated myself more, though, because I was certain you stopped writing because of what I told you about what happened to my mom. I figured you thought I was a murderer.”
I gasped and my eyes narrowed. “I never received those letters from you.”
“What?”
“Jax, you stopped writing me. I never received any letters about what happened to your mother, or what happened to you. I mean, hell, I kept writing you for a whole year after your letters stopped coming. I showed up to summer camp, hoping you’d be waiting there for me with answers. I would’ve never stopped writing you, and I would’ve never thought those awful things about you.”
Confusion lined his features. “You wrote me?”
