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I smile as I kiss her forehead and roll onto my back. She turns on her side and lays her head on my chest, running her fingertips over my abdomen.
“I love this tattoo,” she whispers.
I look down at the one she is tracing. It is a Celtic cross with a Gaelic phrase wrapped around it. Each of my brothers have one too. “It means ‘Always Remember.’”
“I know,” she whispers. “I googled it. It’s beautiful.”
“We should get you one, too,” I laugh, only half-joking.
“I don’t like needles,” she says with a shiver. “But you’re welcome to get one of my face or something?”
“Your face?”
“Yes,” she giggles.
“And where on my person would I get such a work of art?”
“Hmm?” she chews on her lip. “Your ass?”
I laugh out loud at that and she does too before she falls quiet again.
“You know what I realized in that horrible basement this morning?”
“What’s that, sweetheart?”
“How much faith you have in me,” she breathes.
“You did?”
“Yes. I don’t know if I could have said those things I did to Conor or the twins without breaking their hearts, even if it was only for a few moments, but I knew that you would get it. Even though I was looking at you, I knew that you would understand who I was really saying those things to.”
I press a kiss on her forehead. There was a second when she called me a liar that I worried she was starting to believe my uncle’s bullshit, but when she spoke of hatred and disgust, I realized that wasn’t for me. I have experienced the love of this incredible woman and I know that it’s true as sure as I know that grass is green.
“That means so much to me after everything we’ve been through, Shane,” she whispers.
I close my eyes and pull her tighter. “It means a lot to me too, sweetheart.”
Chapter 40
Jessie
Ilie in Shane’s arms, listening to the sound of his heartbeat. It usually soothes me, but now my mind races with questions and not enough answers. I wonder where the twins are and when they’ll come home. I hope they can forgive Shane for keeping the truth from them so we can get back to our happy little unit. But mostly I think about the ghost of the Wolf. Even though he’s gone, he still haunts me.
“Tell me what’s going on in that beautiful head of yours, sweetheart,” Shane says as he brushes the hair from my face.
I shrug. “Today has been so… I don’t even know how to put it into words.”
“I know it has,” he presses a soft kiss on my forehead. “But there’s something else going on in there. Tell me what it is.”
I look up into his beautiful green eyes. “Does anything that Paul said… Does it change the way you see me?”
“No.” He frowns at me. “Why would it?”
“I don’t know. I just… Those things he said … about me and him.”
He cups my chin with his hand, tilting my face up towards his. “I already knew what he did to you, sweetheart. And even if I didn’t, why would that change anything between you and me?”
“Well, because it was him who taught me to enjoy pain. And that’s kind of fucked up. And also, that’s kind of our thing.”
