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“I just wanted to make sure you were okay. To see how you turned out in the end, I guess.” I couldn’t bring myself to look at him. “To see if you were happy. Were you happy?”
“No,” he whispered, shaking his head. “Were you?”
“I tried to be. I think you ruined me for other men. No one else could ever compare,” I said with a chuckle. His hand gripped mine even tighter.
“Good,” he said, the possessiveness in his voice making my heart slam faster. I was his. I had always been his.
We both knew this wouldn’t change anything. When I left that truck, he would go back to being the man who could never have what he truly wanted. We were like sand on the shore of our lake. Every wave—each rush of water—carrying pieces of us off until all that was left were two empty husks, longing for something that had already been stolen by the tide.
“Kent,” he said.
“Gray,” I said.
He leaned in, lips slightly parted, his eyes full of purpose.
Oh, God. This was it.
With only inches separating us, his phone rang, and I cursed whoever had chosen that moment to call him. Gray sucked in sharply, his eyes blowing wide as our noses touched. He looked terrified.
I nodded, darting my eyes down to his pocket. “It’s okay. Take it.”
The phone rang two more times before he finally pulled it out of his pocket and stared at the screen. He flashed it in my direction, showing me a picture of his father’s smiling face. Besides Gray, Marty had always been my favorite of the Collins crew. While my father was distant, and every conversation with him always returned to religion, Marty was the polar opposite. Warmth and affection radiated from him. I’d always felt like our parents had gotten God’s plan crisscrossed. Marty and my mother were like twin spirits. Both calm and rational, affection pouring out of them. Esther Collins and my father were always more distant. Frosty by nature.
Gray didn’t tell Marty I was with him, and I would have been lying if I said it didn’t sting. I felt like his dirty little secret.
After two or three minutes of mindless chit-chat, Gray turned to me and smiled. “I got somebody here that wants to say hi to you, Daddy.” On the screen, Marty cocked his head to the side, probably wondering who the hell Gray was driving around at ten o’clock at night. Gray held the phone out for me to take, and I took a deep breath. The realization that he wasn’t hiding me away—that he was simply easing me back into his life, right where I belonged—was almost too much to bear.
I lifted the phone and stared at the man on the other end. Marty’s eyes widened, and his jaw went slack. We stayed that way for a while; neither of us speaking, both unable to find or form words.
“Are you two just gonna sit there staring at each other all night?” Gray said with a laugh.
“Kent?” His eyebrows rose, and then his lips curled up into a smile.
“Hey Marty,” I said, feeling like I was twelve years old all over again.
“Gosh. It’s really you. I’m sorry. I just wasn’t expecting to …” He leaned forward, shaking his head incredulously as if he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. “You grew up, kiddo.”
“I grew up,” I agreed.
“Are you back for good?”
I glanced over at Gray. His eyes were still fixed on the garage door ahead of us. He looked fearful. I wasn’t sure if he was scared of me slipping up and saying the wrong thing, potentially outing him to his father, or if he was scared of what my answer might be. I’d made him a promise at the lake. I’d told him I wouldn’t leave again.
I grabbed Gray’s knee and smiled at him. “I’m home.”
Gray closed his eyes and let out a gentle sigh.
“Good,” Marty said. “That’s good to hear. We’ll have to have you over for Sunday supper when we get home.”
“I’d love that.”
Marty went quiet for a moment, both of us spilling over with words we wanted to say, neither actually saying anything. It wasn’t awkward, that silence. It never had been with Marty. He took a deep breath and said, “I’m sorry I never got to say goodbye to you. If I’d known you were leaving, I would have …” He shook his head. “I just wish Gray made it in time that day.”
“Made it in time for what?”
Gray sucked in a sharp breath.
“To stop you from getting on that bus. It all worked out in the end, I guess. You became a big success, just like I always knew you would. I want you to know that I’m proud of you, son. Everything you accomplished, making a life for yourself without anyone’s help. That takes courage.”
