Reckless Hearts (Oak Harbor #2)(67)

“Really.” I can’t help smiling, seeing him so undone like this. So gorgeously, utterly mine. I touch my finger to his lips, and give him a meaningful look. “Somewhere that maybe isn’t full of photos of your ex-fiancée?”

That seems to snap him out of it. Will steps back, and runs a hand through the hair I just thoroughly mussed. He looks around. “You’re right, I wasn’t thinking. Sorry.”

“It’s OK.” Already, I miss touching him. I run my fingers over his arm, find his hand, and hold it tight between mine. “Believe me, I want to be kissing you too right now. And so much more. But we can’t just pick up like nothing’s happened.”

Will nods. “I know. So, what do you want to do?”

He looks at me with those smiling eyes, and right now, the only thing I want is to drag him to the nearest solid surface and strip him naked, but I need to keep it together. For once in my life, there’s so much more than pleasure on the line.

“Let’s get out of here,” I say, the creepiness of this perfect apartment finally getting to be too much. It’s full of the ghosts of an old, dead relationship. I don’t want it to have anything more to do with the start of something new. “Let’s just go somewhere and talk.”



Will and I exit his building out to the hot and bustling city streets. We walk, hand in hand, but neither of us say a word. Now that I’m over the first shock—and lust—at seeing him again, all my old doubts and fears are whirling in my mind.

I want to be calm, to say the right thing now, but all the questions that drove me crazy back in Oak Harbor are still looming, just as real.

“Tell me what you’re scared of.” Will finally speaks. He looks over at me, and the tenderness in his expression makes me ache. “I’ve told you what happened with Helena, and how much you mean to me. But I can tell it’s not enough. What can I do to make you believe in me?”

“I do believe in you,” I say, emotion knotting in my throat. “But it still makes me terrified.”

“What does?”

“Thinking you might do the same thing to me one day.” I admit it out loud, the worst of all my fears. “That you’ll just change your mind again.”

“Dee—” Will tries to interrupt me, but I shake my head. Tears are coming now, but I can’t hold back. This is too important not to get it all out, rip my heart straight from my chest and show him everything, every last fear and doubt and crazy, reckless insecurity.

“You shed this life like it was . . . like it was an old skin,” I insist. “You just woke up one morning and left it all behind. Your job, your home, your fiancée. How do I know you wont wake up one morning and decide to move on from me?”

My last word ends on a sob. Will pulls me into his arms. “Baby,” he says, holding me safely against his chest. I can feel his heartbeat, so steady and true. He tilts my face up to look at him. “This, all of this here, it wasn’t real. This was the act, something was missing for me: doing work that matters, feeling like myself when I get up every morning. And you.” He strokes my cheek gently. “I didn’t know how much I needed you until you just showed up on that street, looking so damn determined your car lock didn’t stand a chance.”

I manage a sniffling smile.

“You’re not a rebound,” he tells me, his eyes intent on mine. “You’re not temporary, or a distraction. You’re everything to me. I love you so much, and it’s been killing me that I might have lost you forever.”

I stare back into his eyes, at the only man who ever mattered. Who made me feel like the best, most brilliant version of myself. Happy. Free.

Loved.

“You haven’t lost me,” I tell him, and I can feel the relief flood through his body. But I still need to tell him something, the most important thing of all.

“I forgive you.”

Will doesn’t say a word, but I can see in his eyes, he understands just what that word means to me. And how offering it to him is the biggest gesture of love I could possibly give.

He kisses me, and I melt into the moment: the future unfolding, breath by dizzying, glorious breath. A new beginning. A love I never thought I could be lucky enough to find.

The man who finally had the strength and heart to prove me wrong.

I whisper in his ear, “I’m taking you home.”



ALMOST THE END…





Epilogue.


One month later…



“We’re going to be late to your own party.”

“But I can’t figure out what to wear!” I dash, barefoot, out of the brand-new closet Will only finished building last week. Moving into a falling-down shack has had its challenges, but there are plenty of perks too—like custom shelves made to fit my shoe collection. I hold up two dresses, still in my underwear. “Which one says ‘future real estate billionaire’?”

“I kind of like what you’re wearing now. Or, not wearing . . .” Will pulls me closer, sliding his hands over my bare stomach. I laugh, dancing out of reach.

“Later,” I promise, dropping a quick kiss on his cheek. “Everyone’s waiting on us, and I need to look perfect.”

“You already do.”