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My stomach sinks. The nausea dissipates, but guilt replaces it, marred by confusion.
“You see, Sunny, I am completely and totally in love with you.” My hand smashes my heart. It pounds beneath my palm. “When I was a teenager, it probably didn’t qualify as real love. But every single woman I have been with, I have compared to you. And she has always come up short. For me, it’s always been you.” He walks along, his head bobbing as he reviews the facts and considers them. “I know I’m in love with you, because since you walked out of my life, I have felt like someone ripped out my vital organs. And physiologically, bear in mind, that sensation is nonsensical. And, normally, I would’ve been at your door. Begging. I would’ve looked into job opportunities in Austin. But I called time of death on us, because you, Sunny, are in love with my brother, and if after eighteen years, you aren’t over him, you never will be.”
Dizziness returns, a lightheaded, uncontrolled sensation, and I back up to my car, resting against it, letting everything he said wash over me. “You’re in love with me?”
He exhales, and it almost sounds like a laugh. “That’s what Lola says. When I told her our story and how I felt, she said that’s what falling in love feels like.” He exhales and wanders back to the steps.
“Who is Lola?”
“Someone.” He sits on the steps and scrubs his face with his palms. “This sucks. Rationally, I know the pain will go away. The ache. But what I also know is that you’re going to have to deal with the rumors. And we can tell people whatever you want. I can’t force you to be in a relationship with me, but I want a relationship with my son.”
Tears burn my eyes, and I sniffle.
“That’s not what we agreed to, and I apologize for that. But I can’t imagine not being a part of my son’s life.”
“It might not be a boy.” It’s not really a particularly important point, but it’s what falls out of my mouth.
“Our child.” He sounds resigned.
I flatten my palm over my forehead and clutch my middle with my arm. As the dizziness subsides, I come back to the one thing. “You love me?”
His gaze remains on the ground as he paces. “Obviously.”
“Maybe you should’ve started with that.”
“Like it would’ve made a difference.” He returns to the steps and sits, elbows resting above his knees, rumpled head of hair in his hands.
I chew on the corner of my lip, waiting for a good response to fall into my brain. It’s difficult with him sitting on the steps looking like a broken man. “I believe if you shared your feelings before Anguilla, it could’ve led to a different outcome.” He lifts his head, and I stare straight into those chocolate brown eyes I’ve missed so much. “Because I’m completely and totally in love with you, Ian. I just didn’t tell you because I didn’t think that’s what you wanted. That wasn’t part of our arrangement. And…I really don’t want to be an uncomfortable presence within your family.” His family is all the family I really have, other than Aunt Nora, who lives practically across the country.
Call it pregnancy hormones, but those pesky tears well up and stream down my cheeks. My lower lip trembles, and I wrap my arms around myself, waiting.
He stands and approaches slowly, hands in his pockets, thoughtful as always. “You love me like a friend, someone you’ve known your whole life? Or you’re in love with me?”
“In.” I sniffle and wipe my nose with the back of my hand. “I’m in love with you.”
Brown leather shoes cover the gravel next to my sandals. His body heat warms my cool skin. He caresses my cheek and brushes his lips over my forehead. His index finger rubs beneath my chin, and he applies gentle pressure, encouraging me to lift my gaze.
“Sunny, I’m in love with you, too.”
“But…” A watershed of tears coats my cheeks. “You’re moving. You don’t want a…” The wordwifegets stuck on my tongue because he doesn’t even want a girlfriend.
“I want you.”
“But your family.” It comes out as a whine.
“My family loves you.”
“But–”
“Sam doesn’t have an issue with us. Neither does Olivia.”
I shake my head, thinking back to Olivia.
“Sunny, she didn’t know who you were at first. Whatever you thought you saw…she and Sam don’t have an issue with us.” His lips brush my forehead. “And even if they did, I wouldn’t care. But they don’t. I talked to Sam.”
“But…” Two Duke brothers. Some will say all three. God, I can’t even say that out loud.
“I don’t care what anyone else thinks.” It’s like he can read my mind. “No one else out there can possibly understand. They haven’t been us. They weren’t there. If they’re friends, they’ll support us. If they don’t support us, they don’t matter.”
