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Lawson looked away from Evelyn and back at Nora. Shock wasn’t just in her voice—it was written all over her face. She knit her eyebrows together, and her expression made him pause. Until that moment, he hadn’t considered if the new development would make her upset.
“Yeah. Daddy said he would be my daddy. And he lives with us. And sometimes he can take me to school. And now I have a mommy and a daddy,” Evelyn replied, not stopping for a single breath.
Lawson watched as Nora looked down at her daughter then back at him, uncertainty still fogging up her pretty green eyes.
“I was going to tell you. She asked me this mornin’,” he explained. “I agreed.”
“Daddies are forever,” stated Evelyn.
His smile returned as he sought out her golden-brown gaze and dipped his chin in a nod. “That’s right. No matter what.”
He saw Nora’s arms tighten around Evelyn as she lowered her cheek to rest on top of her head before his attention shifted once more. Nora’s eyes were closed, but that did nothing to stop her tears from escaping. When he lifted a hand to take hold of the side of her face and graze his thumb gently underneath one of her eyes, she opened them. Her tears had cleared away anytrace of uncertainty he’d seen before. What he saw instead was acceptance. But he also saw even that was not enough. For the second time that day, he knew what he had to do—and so he would. Before the day was done.
“What about…Gwendolyn?” I ask as I fidget with his fingers.
We’re laying beneath the stars in the bed of his truck, hidden in a spot down by the lake. The night is cool, but both of us are naked from the waist down underneath the blankest that swaddles us. Lawson is on his back, his arm draped around me as I lay snuggled against his side. I peer at him through the shadows, his face barely lit by the nearly full moon.
“Sounds prissy.”
I laugh softly and try again. “Okay, what about Gwyneth, then?”
“You really are attached to those Gs aren’t you?” he teases. “What about Elizabeth?”
Scrunching my nose, I reply, “Too…Shakespearean.”
This time, it’s Lawson’s quiet laugher that dances around us. “Al’right, what else you got?”
I take a moment to think. “How about Lilibeth?”
“Huh,” he hums contemplatively. “I like it. Lilibeth. And what if we have a boy?”
“I hope we do. And I hope he looks just like you.”
At this, Lawson rolls over, coaxing me onto my back. I bite my bottom lip as butterflies swirl in my belly in response to the heat of his warmth between my legs.
“I want at least three. Maybe four or five.”
“Five?” I laugh. “You’re crazy.”
“Crazy about you,” he mutters, dipping his head to press a kiss against the side of my neck.
I close my eyes at the feel of his lips, instantly filled with a longing and a sadness that grows more pronounced as the weeks go by. Talking about the future with Lawson has always been a comfort to my soul, his promises a reminder that our love is forever—but the reality of our pending separation scares me. Even though it’s still a few months away, the thought of being without him plagues my thoughts each night.
“We’re gonna be okay, aren’t we?” I ask on a whisper. “We really are gonna get married one day and have babies and grow old together? You aren’t gonna forget about me when you go away?”
“Nora-Jean,” he says, lifting his face from out of my neck. “We’ve talked about this, baby. It’s just college, and you’re only a year behind me.”
“You say that now, but I’ve seen enough movies to know—”
He cuts me off with a kiss. When I open my mouth to protest, he sweeps his tongue between my lips, groaning softly as he rocks his hips. I suck in a breath, surrendering to my man as I wrap my arms around him. Anxious to feel all of him, I spread my knees wider. He doesn’t need more of an invitation.
Lawson pauses once he’s fully seated inside of me. He breaks our kiss, touching his forehead to mine as he breathes, “You’re mine, songbird. No matter what happens, no matter what separates us, you’ll always be mine, and I’ll always be yours. There’s no such thing as better than you, you hear me?”
“Yeah,” I reply, nodding my head against his. “I love you. I love you so much. I’ll never love anyone as much as I love you. I swear.”
“You better not.”
I can hear the smirk he speaks through as he begins to move inside of me, but I need more.
