Ready for You (Ready #3)(60)

Once I was sure I’d eaten an entire cow and a field of potatoes, I broke the silence. “Can I ask you something?”

“Are we going to have a heart-to-heart, Garrett? Because Leah will be home in, like, an hour, and she can totally take care of that shit.”

I grinned. “What I need to ask, only you can answer.”

“Okay, shoot.”

I took a deep breath. “Were you ever able to forgive Connor’s mother?”

Leah and Declan’s oldest child was his from a previous relationship. Declan hadn’t known Connor existed until a couple of years ago when Leah met Connor in an ER after his mother had been killed in a car accident. They had managed to put two and two together several months later. Heather, his ex-girlfriend, had chosen to keep Connor a secret from Declan.

Declan leaned back in his seat and stretched his neck, obviously giving himself a moment to think it through. “Eventually, yes, but it took a while. What she did was wrong, but it didn’t make her a bad person.”

“Even though she betrayed you?”

He nodded. “I didn’t say it was an overnight revelation. It took a while. But we all have to make tough decisions, and when faced with extraordinary circumstances, even the greatest of us can choose wrong.”

I let his words sink in. I’d never allowed myself to step into Mia’s shoes. I’d never wanted to. From the time she’d left, it had been all about me—my feelings, my wounds, and my pain. I’d never stopped to think about her feelings, her wounds, or her pain. How much had she suffered over the years?

“What is this all about, Garrett?”

I told him everything. I told him about Mia and my love for her. I explained the pregnancy and our shock but elation.

“Becoming teenage parents hadn’t been our plan, but we were going to make it work—together.” I explained. Declan silently listened as I finally came clean about my past. I told him about the note that had destroyed me and how conflicted I’d been since Mia’s return.

“And now?” he asked.

“I don’t know, but I can’t lose her again.”

“Then, you’ve got to let it go, man. Love is pure. Don’t let something like doubt or anger work its way in and taint it from the beginning. You’ll never recover.”

“I want to, more than anything. It’s always been her. I just can’t seem to find a way to get past it.”

Lily chose this moment to bang on the tray of her high chair, sending Cheerios everywhere. A few landed in my hair, and Declan laughed.

With a light smack to the head, he gave me my answer. “Stop looking behind you, moron.”

Chapter Twenty

~Mia~

Liv had spent the entire day making me laugh, reminding me what an amazing friend she was. I’d had other friends along the way since I left home, but none had been like Liv. She could read my mood with a single glance, hear my thoughts through my expressions, and know what my heart was saying even if I didn’t.

After the great breakfast debacle, I convinced her that a walk would be nice. If we happened to find some edible lunch along the way, it would be even better.

We picked up sandwiches at a small cafe and spent the rest of the afternoon meandering through different stores. I picked up a new skirt and a pretty pair of earrings. Liv tried on practically everything her eyes saw, but she walked away only with a scarf. When I asked her what she was going to do with a scarf in the middle of August, she just smiled.

I suddenly didn’t want to know.

After we walked back to my house, she said her good-byes, and then I ran upstairs and changed into my new skirt. For once, I wanted to look nice when Garrett showed up. Whenever he had come knocking on my door, I had answered it in cutoff shorts or yoga pants. I was feeling kind of slobby.

Barely fifteen minutes past five, Garrett came barreling through my front door—no knocking this time—lugging plastic bags from the home improvement store. Dressed in worn jeans and a dark T-shirt that tightly hugged his body, I wondered just how long he’d been away from work.

Before I got the chance to ask, he dropped the bags in the middle of the living room and swept me up into his arms. His mouth took mine in a fierce kiss as he dug his hands into my hair and pulled me closer.

When we finally broke apart, I was breathless.

My voice was ragged as I asked, “What was that for?”

“I missed you,” he answered with a grin.

“You just saw me this morning!”

“Mmm…I know, but I have lost time to make up for, and you look amazing.”

This time, when his lips touched mine, they were gentle. His mouth moved with mine, slowly tracing the soft fullness of my lips with his tongue. He pulled back, only to reach up and place a tender kiss on my forehead, and I melted. It was such a small thing but so significant in its symbolism.

“Why do you always kiss me on my forehead?” I asked, feeling a little silly every time he did so.

“I like to remind myself how perfect we are together,” he answered with a shy smile.

“And kissing me on my forehead reminds you of this?”

“When we stand face-to-face and I pull you into my arms, you fit perfectly, like you are meant to be there, and I’ve found my missing puzzle piece. I remember the first time I held you and I bent down to kiss your forehead, I thought, Perfect.”