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“Please don’t ever say that again.” I laugh, letting him wrap his hands around my waist, and I press my face into his chest, breathing him in. Breathing this in. After a moment, he pulls back, looking at the office around us. “I distinctly remember,” he starts, and his eyes twinkle, “that the last time we were in here, you were showing off some samples-"
“I wasn’tshowing offanything,” I cry, pinching lightly at his arm, my voice high in mock surprise. “I was trying to find…well I don’t remember what I was trying to find, but I’m sure I wasn’t showing you my brand new vibrator.”
“Sure, that’s what they all say.” I tilt my head back, meeting his eyes.
“They all?” My lips come up on one side, and his hand tightens on my waist.
“Only you, Delmonico.” I roll my eyes.
“Sure, Fitzwilliam.” He huffs a laugh, and I wrap my arms around his neck, pulling him close. “Kingdom come?” Fitz’s eyes narrow at me.
“Well I was thinking entirely wholesome thoughts, but now that you say that-"
I cut him off with a kiss, knowing that it says everything my racing brain wants to scream. Every thought of him, every moment over the last few months, getting us here, back here.
When he breaks away, pressing his forehead to mine, his breathing is ragged. It's a sight I would have told you was impossible, all those weeks ago, standing in these same spots - Fitz Westfall, breathless from kissing Piper Delmonico.
Widowed. Recovering alcoholic. Stuck designing for a manager who wouldn’t know silk from satin.
Still widowed, but very much in love with a redheaded man that sometimes makes me want to beat my head into my steering wheel. Still a recovering alcoholic, but no longer stuck designing for a manager who wouldn’t know silk from satin. Instead, settling into a new position, a new life, blending with my old one like two seams folding together and meeting in all the right places.
Fitz’s hand moves across my jaw, fingers lacing into my hair. “Kingdom come,” he says finally, and then he’s stepping back, holding a hand out to me. “Now, let’s actually go enjoy this reunion before we miss tacos and what I’m guessing is a tipsy Alex.”
There are a lot of things I would do for my friends without protest. Looking at the man in front of me, I know there are a lot of things he’d do for them, too. Giving up a precious Saturday, several precious Saturdays, to help plan the reunion I wasn’t even going to attend, wasn’t so bad. Especially if that means getting to spend the rest of them with the people who made sure I got through all the bad days to get here.
Epilogue
Fitz
“Piper,youokinthere?” I stand outside the door of the master bathroom, my ear pressed against the cold white wood, trying to figure out what’s taking her so long.
“I’ll be out in a minute,” she calls, and then lets out a garbled sentence.
“Are you sure you’re ok to go tonight?” I try to wiggle the door knob, but it’s locked. “Come on, baby, is it your stomach?”
“We may live together, but there are some things a girl needs to do in private.” That sentence is crystal clear, and I pull my head away. Point taken. I turn on my heel, glancing around the bedroom of the house I’ve called home for the last several years. Well, we called it a home, but it didn’t really feel that way, not until, after her lease expired in September, Piper invaded with her colorful bookshelves and throw blankets on every surface possible. It feels like a home now - a messy, chaotic home that gives me anxiety.
And I know that’s what Piper is working through now, the stress of everything going on - the impending move, from this house to our first home together, a real home, that we picked out one cold December morning after seeing theFor Salesign on our way back from Frannie’s.
Am I looking forward to living so close to my sister I can see the rooster on her weathervane from my front porch? No. Am I looking forward to also being less than ten minutes from Seer? Absolutely fucking not. But moving further east means being closer for the Friday nights we already spend in that direction, with her friends, my friends,ourfriends.
There’s a flush, and then running water from the bathroom behind me, and the door opens. Piper flips the light off, drying her hands on a towel as she leans against my arm. I reach down and kiss the top of her head.
“You good?”
“Not even remotely,” she answers with a sigh, and then shrugs. “But I can’t miss birthday night.” She steps aside, throwing the towel back onto the counter blindly. It takes everything in me not to go hang it up on the hoop, which is literally a foot from where she threw it.
Focus, Westfall.
“Especially not for your birthday,” I add, sweeping my arms around her from behind and settling my chin where I’d kissed seconds before.
“Especially not for my birthday,” she echoes, and then wiggles her butt against me. I squeeze my arms around her.
“Don’t start something you can’t finish.” She tilts her head back, meeting my gaze.
“Bet.” I smile down at her, giving her a peck on the lips and she sighs again, this time a little less sad sounding. “Four years sober.”
“How does it feel?” Piper sways in my arms, moving to music I’m sure is playing as background noise under all those curls, the perpetual soundtrack she likes to hum, off key, when she thinks I’m not listening.
