“Perfect,” I agreed, looking over my shoulder to make sure the kids were occupied before I kissed her.
Our lips met, and then Ella deepened it. I was more than happy to oblige. Our tongues touched briefly, and then we broke apart, hearing the kids coming.
“Isn’t it so cool? It’s like you’re all alone up here!” Colt said.
“Almost alone,” Ella answered, shooting me a knowing smirk.
“Almost, but not quite,” I agreed over the kids’ heads as they looked out at the lake.
“I love it,” Maisie told me with a grin.
“Then it was all worth it.”
They ran to the other side of the house, and Ella leaned against my back, wrapping her arms around me.
“Can I get you alone later?” she asked, her hands skimming under my shirt to run the lines of my abs.
“Yes, as many times as you can handle.” God, I wanted her. Needed to get her under me, over me, around me. Needed to feel connected to her in the way that only sex gave us, the moments when there were no worries, no cancer, no kids underfoot, just us and the love we had for each other.
Before she could answer, my phone rang. I reached between us to my back pocket and pulled it out, swiping to answer. “Gentry.”
“Hey, I know you’re not on call this weekend, but we’ve got some lost hikers,” Mark’s voice came through the line.
I sighed. All I wanted to do was have dinner with the kids, tuck their smiling faces into bed, and then get very alone with their mother.
“How lost?”
“They missed their checkin four hours ago.”
“Go,” Ella urged, kissing my arm where skin met shirt. “I know you’re needed. Go.”
“I’ll be there in twenty.” I hung up the phone and pulled Ella into my arms. “I’m so sorry. This is the last thing I want to do right now.”
“Oh, trust me, you’re the only thing I want to do right now,” she said with a kiss on my chin before releasing me. “Stay with me tonight after you’re done?”
I nodded. We limited sleepovers, but I wasn’t arguing. Not tonight. “I’ll be back as soon as possible. I promise,” I told her before kissing the kids on the forehead as they ran by again. “Can you get Maisie down?”
“I’ve got this. Go,” Ella ordered.
I let my eyes roam her body and sighed in a pout. “Tourists.”
She flat-out laughed. “Hey, this is normal life. You were the one championing normal, right?”
“As long as normal means I come home to you tonight, I’m good with it.”
And I was. Me, the guy who never wanted roots, was all about laying them deep here. This was what I wanted. This life. Ella. Colt. Maisie.
Normal. Everyday, ordinary normal.
I just needed Maisie to live, because there was no normal without her in it.
Six Months Later
Chapter Twenty
Ella
Letter #5
Ella,
Ah, the dating question. I honestly don’t really date. Why? Because my life isn’t fair to any woman. We head out at the drop of a hat. And not like, “Hey, I’m leaving next week.” More like, “Sorry, I won’t be home for dinner…for the next couple of months.” Seems like a crap way to start a relationship when I never know when we’ll get home. Take this trip for example. We figured it would be a couple of months. Definitely not the multiple-stop journey it has been. I couldn’t imagine leaving a girl at home to wait through that.
So, without sounding…like a douche, I just prefer to not have long-term relationships. On some level, I’m also not sure I’m capable. When you grow up knowing nothing of a working, good relationship, it’s pretty hard to see yourself in one.
As for Robins, if you want to go, go. Don’t hide behind your life, or your kids. If you’re scared to get out there and risk yourself, then say that. Own it. What you went through would make any normal person a little gun-shy, no doubt. No one is going to think less of you. Just don’t hide behind excuses. You’ll be stronger when you identify what sets you on edge. And honestly, I’ve seen pictures of you. You’re not going to end up as the crazy cat lady, I promise.
Am I happy single? I think happiness is a relative term, no matter what the subject. I quit striving for happy when I was about five. Now I go for content. It’s easier to attain and doesn’t leave me feeling like there’s something missing. Eventually I’ll get out of the military, and then maybe we’ll see, but that’s a decade or more away. For now, this is the life I love, and I’m content. Goal attained.
Tell me a little bit about Telluride. If I came into town as a tourist, what absolutely has to be seen? Done? Eaten?
~ Chaos
…
Content. I’d been looking for the right word to describe my feelings about my blur of a life lately, and that was it: I was content.
I loved Beckett with an intensity that was almost frightening. That hadn’t changed—and something told me it wouldn’t. But I also knew there were things about him I’d never know. Even seven months as a couple hadn’t filled in all the holes of who he had been before he’d shown up at Solitude.
Most of the time, he was the Beckett I knew, but there were moments when I caught him staring out at Ryan’s island, or when he woke up from a nightmare, that I couldn’t help but wonder if I’d ever know him as well as he knew me.
Maybe that was simply what came with the territory when you loved a man like him. I’d learned a few months into our relationship that love was mostly about compromise, but it was always about acceptance. There were dozens of little things about him that could annoy the socks off me, and the same went for him, but for the most part, we were who we were, and we loved each other. There was no point trying to change each other, we either wanted to grow or change ourselves, or we didn’t. After you accepted that about someone and still loved them, you were pretty much indestructible.
Beckett had accepted that I was always going to be overprotective of the twins and that I wasn’t anywhere near ready to tell them that he’d adopted them. I’d accepted that there were simply parts of him that would always remain shadowed and secretive.
But there was no denying that my choice to keep the adoption under wraps was directly impacted by the moments Beckett distanced himself when I asked about his past.
It wasn’t that I didn’t trust him. He would die for me. For the kids. But until I knew with 100 percent certainty that he’d stay—that those shadows in his eyes wouldn’t lead to me finding his bags packed—the twins couldn’t know. God, they loved him, and even the chance that Beckett could destroy their hearts by being the second father to abandon them was too big of a risk to take. Not while Maisie was still fighting for her life.
The thought of losing Beckett stuttered my heart, and I reached across the console of the truck to take his hand as he drove us along the familiar roads to Montrose. He lifted my hand and kissed the inside of my wrist, a habit I happened to love, without taking his eyes off the road. Snow rose on either side of us, but at least the roads were clear. February was always an unpredictable month.
“You good back there?” I asked Maisie as she played on the iPad Beckett had gotten her for Christmas. It matched Colt’s almost identically except for the case.
“Yep, just working on a spelling game Ms. Steen gave me for homework.” She didn’t look up, just kept swiping away.
“Did you bring Colt?” I asked, spotting the pink bear wedged into the seat next to her.
“Yeah. He was mad that he couldn’t come, so I promised him Colt would come.” She met my eyes in the mirror and forced a little smile.
“You’re nervous.”
“I’m okay.”
Beckett and I shared a sideways glance, and we both let it go. She’d been through thirty-three days of hell a month ago. The mega-chemo had been the most vicious part of her treatment.