Beautiful Broken Promises(68)

I laughed when a little fist appeared between the seats and touched Lane’s firmly, and then I heard his tiny voice say, “Rocks.” So the boys already had a secret language, did they? Why did I find that insanely adorable? Lane had already deduced Braden’s quiet personality and yet still found a way to communicate with him.

“It’s so good!” Kate spoke with enthusiasm through the seats.

“Listen, babe, I think we need to enjoy this now,” he repeated my earlier words back to me. “They’re good kids; I’m not going to complain. I’m sure we’ll pay our dues when they’re teens. Lord knows I’m going to be meeting Kate’s dates at our front door with a shotgun. And Braden will probably break curfew or sneak out of the house just like I did when I was in high school.” He sighed dramatically. “Shit… I bet they’ll really make us pay.”

“A shotgun?” I giggled.

“It’s Texas, that’s what they do.” He winked and then reached for his fork so he could actually try this pasta that apparently rocked.

It would take me a few more minutes until I replayed all of his words in my head. There he went again using words like ‘we’ and ‘our’ and ‘us.’ Future talk.



LANE –

I was nervous as hell. Jace met us at the airport and was now taking us all over to his house so we could pick up my car, which meant I was finally going to introduce my daughter to Audrey. It wasn’t just my daughter though, but also the woman my daughter believes to be her mom and the boy she believes to be her brother. It was like she was about to meet my… family.

Nervous as f*cking hell.

I looked in the back at their anxious, smiling faces. Braden and Kate were sitting in little booster-type seats. I hadn’t even thought about that.

“Good call on those kids’ seats. I didn’t know they needed that shit,” I said to Jace as he flipped his blinker on.

“Don’t thank me, I thought they would be too old. Audrey insisted they needed them though,” he replied, eyes on the road.

Every now and then I noticed Jace glanced at the rearview mirror, and I assumed it wasn’t to see out his back window. The trip from the airport to where we all lived was about an hour with traffic. Halfway there, Jace flipped down a little TV from the ceiling and played a movie for the kids. When they began laughing hysterically, Raegan put on a set of headphones too.

“She’s a knockout, dude,” Jace said lightly. I didn’t think that Rae could hear us up here with her headphones, but he still tried to speak only to me.

“Kate? She’s beautiful, huh? A little spitfire, too. I can’t believe how much life and energy she has thrumming through that little body.”

“I’m happy for you, man.”

I nodded my head but kept quiet. For some reason, I felt my hackles rise, and I had a feeling it was because Jace was gearing up to talk about something I wasn’t going to like.

“So…” Here we go, I thought. “I heard you call Raegan ‘babe.’ Is that like how you call Audrey ‘doll’ or is it… something more?”

“Something more,” I muttered to the window.

With a deep sigh, he continued, “You really think that’s smart? With the kids and all?”

“No.” It was the truth, but there was also the fact that I physically wouldn’t be able to stop what we had going.

“Just make sure you’re smart, man. Take care of your daughter first,” Jace whispered.

“What the hell? What do you think I’ve been doing for four damn years, Jace?” My voice began to rise and I caught Raegan’s movement behind me. I turned and saw her pulling her headphones off, her eyes growing wide. I turned, lay back against the headrest, and closed my eyes, trying to calm myself down. Jace didn’t respond and thank God he kept his mouth shut the entire rest of the drive.

We drove down their long, gravel drive, passing Jace and Jaxon’s mom’s beautiful house with its quintessential wrap-around porch. Audrey loved that porch so much that it was the only thing she asked for when she and Jace built their house further down the road.

Jace and Jaxon had been given all of their father’s land after he passed away. They each built houses out here, along with their best friend, Cole, and his wife, Quinn. This has become my family. Even Jace’s mom has taken me in as her own. I loved it out here. I loved the pond behind Jaxon and Emerson’s house. I loved the quiet and the tranquility of the country.