Until You (The Redemption, #1)(75)

I didn’t realize how much I’d been flying solo until I talked to Tenny. It felt good too. Vital. The fact that I opened up showed me how much I trust her. And this time with her, this piece of quiet we carved out right now, in the midst of the chaos going on around us, is even more important.

“There’s something about watching the sunset that’s relaxing to me.”

“Agreed. When I first moved here . . . when I was figuring stuff out, I used to sit and watch them every night. Just me and Hani and a glass of wine. The way I look at it, no matter how shitty the day was, the sunset was proof that even a bad day could end in beauty.”

“Says the book editor who always has a way with her words,” I murmur, loving when she rests her head on my shoulder. There’s something about the simple action that moves me. Maybe it’s the ease with which she does it after being with someone who did who knows what to her.

I’m glad I can give that to her.

“I wonder what they wished for?” she murmurs quietly, almost as if we’re afraid to disrupt the show Mother Nature is putting on with the pinks and the oranges owning the horizon.

“The girls?”

“Yeah. When they blew out their candles. I used to wish for the most ridiculous things. A pony for two years straight. Pointe shoes another. For Scott Lundy to kiss me after school. For Becky Decker to move away since she’s who Scott Lundy liked.”

I burst out laughing and press a kiss to her head. “I’m glad to see you had your priorities.”

“Those were priorities back then. I mean securing first kisses were very important.”

“Let’s just hope that’s not what the girls wished for,” I say and then fall quiet because I know exactly what they wished for.

I walked into the kitchen to grab more plates and overheard them whispering feverishly. Typically, I would have passed right by, but this time I stopped because I wanted to make sure their party was going okay and that there was no drama happening that I was missing.



“Okay. So you wish for us to move here permanently so we don’t have to leave Tenny or our friends, and I’ll wish for Tenny to move to Chicago with us,” Paige says quietly.

“Perfect. We’ll have both of our bases covered—that we get to keep her—regardless of what happens.”



The funny thing about overhearing what they said was that my gut reaction was to tell them that I’ve wished for the same thing too.

And that shocked me.

Our life is in Chicago. Leaving there isn’t something I saw for us any time soon.

But I want the girls to be happy. And God knows I want more of Tenny.

She makes me happy. She makes the girls happier. I mean . . . shit.

I need to feel this—us—out.

To see if we’re real.

To see if I can trust my judgment this time around when clearly I made a huge error when it came to Britt.

But when we sit here like this in completely comfortable silence, when we had a day like today where we flawlessly worked together as a team, and when I look at her and imagine not just tomorrows but forevers, I know we could make a life together.

But Tenny’s not leaving here. Not even when she knows that one might get lost better in a bigger city.

That much I know.

What about me? Is being a police officer so much of my identity, is it so ingrained in me that I can’t part with it? Or is it something I thought defined me but have since realized there’s so much more to me? A better, present father. An understanding, patient lover. A loyal, reliable friend.

Maybe coming here—simplifying things—gave me the clarity I was hoping for.

Which do I want more? The one thing that’s been true, been steady, my whole life? Or the one who just walked into it, turned it upside down, and made me want more?

“You’re awfully quiet,” Tenny says.

More shrieks followed by laughter float out the window to where we are as I wrap my arm around her shoulders and pull her in close to me. “I’m just thinking about later.”

“Later?”

“Yes, later when the door on my bedroom is locked, and ten girls are downstairs and passed out in a sugar coma, dead asleep to the world.”

“What about it?”

I chuckle. “It’ll be time to discuss those favors I owe you . . .”





CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE


Tennyson / Tessa


Three Years Earlier



Kaleo meets my gaze from across the courtroom. His dark eyes are almost black as they hold mine, his expression cold as steel.

He knows.

My mouth grows dry as the judge begins to address the court before she reads his sentence. As we wait to hear the punishment that is handed down. As we learn that his fate is sealed.

But he knows. Because the prosecutor slipped up when he entered a note into evidence. A note in my handwriting.

Handwriting that by the look on Kaleo’s face, he and his team caught.

Yes. I’m the reason you’re here, Kaleo. You decieved me in the worst of ways. This is your punishment. One you deserve wholeheartedly.

I lift my chin a little higher despite every part of me trembling inside and my pulse thundering in my ears. I refuse to back down. I refuse to let him know I’m terrified of him and the reach I’m sure he’ll still have.