Kiss My Boots (Coming Home #2)

I kiss her temple and she shifts so that she’s curled up in my lap, head against my chest as she looks up at me, one hand moving up my naked torso until she stops and rests her palm there—something I’ve noticed she does a lot lately—her thumb tapping softly with the beat of my heart.

“No matter what, and no matter how far, I’ll follow, Quinn. Don’t ever be scared to tell me you need me when that’s somethin’ I’ve spent the past nine years prayin’ to God you’d feel about me again. I struggled for years knowin’ me disappearin’ like I did would stir up the painful memories of your mama doin’ the same, Quinn. Comin’ back and findin’ out that you felt that pain over and over again while I was gone slashed me through the gut, but you were usin’ all that—what I did, what she did, my unspoken truths and her lies—to convince yourself you were just like her when that couldn’t be further from the truth, that was a knife to the heart. It would be just as excruciatin’ stayin’ back knowin’ you would be facin’ these demons again and I wouldn’t be there again to slay them if you needed me to. But more than that, I want to be there because when you realize you’re nothin’ like her and finally see the beautiful strength inside you it’s goin’ to be somethin’ that steals your breath, it’s so powerful.”

She looks up and I pull my head back just in time to miss her colliding with my chin.

“You say that like you know from experience what it’ll feel like,” she gasps, eyes wide with a hesitant hopefulness.

“That’s because I do, baby,” I answer. “The day I knew there wasn’t shit keepin’ me from you any longer, I called my parents—FaceTimed them, so they wouldn’t be able to have a sliver of doubt as to how serious I was, bein’ able to see me—and even though I knew I’d still have to fight to convince you to give us another chance, they had to know where I stood.”

“And . . . where was that?”

“With you, Quinn. The same place I stood for nine years, helplessly on the sidelines miles away. I told them both that, while they might have been the reason I was alive—havin’ made me and all—they wouldn’t keep me from the person that keeps me breathin’ one day longer. My father actually laughed at me, and I swear to God, it didn’t even touch me, because I knew I had won. Not them. When I found out what had motivated my father to keep his son away from the woman he loved, I let the security of my win over his bullshit cushion the blow, and in that moment, I knew he might have cost us a lot, but in the end, we would be the ones to gain from his efforts. He finally taught me the difference between a coward and a fighter—somethin’ I couldn’t keep from mixin’ up the whole time I was away from you and powerless to change the course of my life—but in that one phone call, he at least gave me that.”

“Why did he do it?” she hesitantly questions.

Knowing this moment would come eventually and having to actually go through with it are two different things. She deserves to learn what motivated him, but I also don’t want her to think poorly of herself just because the man who fathered me is a spineless, misogynistic prick. My fear that she will is what kept me from telling her this weeks ago, when I explained why I stayed gone.

“He thought what he wanted was more important than what I wanted—that our family would gain something they couldn’t if I was attached to a family that didn’t have the bullshit social pull ours did. He had some bullshit plan that I would become a successful doctor and he could then use me as a pawn to collect more power players in his life, marry me off to someone whose family he could use to fulfill his need for supremacy. All my father saw was that I was begging him to let me be the man I wanted to be, not the one he tried to force me to be.”

Quinn whistles slowly in disbelief. “All of this because I wasn’t good enough? Everything we lost was because my family wasn’t important enough for him to use?”

I shake my head, praying she understands me. “No, all of this was because he never felt like what he had was good enough. He craves status and wanted to use me to get him more of it. It wasn’t even about you, in the long run, but about him securing a future through me that he could exploit for his own gain.”

“What would have happened if he had forced you further in his game? Tried to hurt more people in order to get you to agree to be his pawn fully?”

“Never would’ve happened. I’m not proud of it, but he was close to pushing me to the point of no return as it was. If fate hadn’t stepped in, I’m not sure I would be walkin’ the earth a free man. I did what he asked. I sacrificed my happiness to keep those he threatened safe, but I still had my pride. I would have killed him or been killed before I let him have that. I didn’t have you, and baby, death would have been a far less painful fate at that point.”

She gasps.

“I’m not my father,” I tell her, holding her gaze, speaking the words for my benefit just as much as hers.

She jolts in my arms. “I would never think you were, Tate. Does what you said shock me? Damn right it does. But I won’t ever hold what he did to you—to us—against you. I know you did what you had to do and that you would have done anything to get back to me if there had been another way. The only thing I hold you accountable for, Tate, is protectin’ those that you care about.”

“I would die for you.” I say the words softly, but there’s a desperation to the truth in them.

“I know, honey,” she breathes, pressing her lips against mine. “That’s why I need you with me. Every step, not just to help me deal with movin’ on from what my mama did. I need you with me to help me finally let go so I can give you all of me without the fear lingerin’ in the back. I also want you with me so I can prove to you that I’m worthy of you after the sacrifices you made. I’m nervous beyond belief, but I’m like you—I can’t let what her leavin’ did to me win over the future we have before us.”

God, this woman brings me to my knees. If only she knew how strong she was already just by admitting this.

“Trust me when I tell you, you’re gonna feel the nerves of knowin’ you’re about to face somethin’ that’s stood in your path in some form your whole life, even with me there to shield you the best I can. Your mama might not have stood in the way like my father did, but her leavin’ put a shadow on you that I think you’re just now startin’ to see fade. We’ll go talk to your brother this weekend. If you want me there while y’all talk, I’ll be there, or if you want to do that alone, I’ll wait close by for that to happen. Either way, you won’t be without me. We’ll figure out when to go out there, get things settled at the practice and the shop, and I’ll make the travel arrangements for us to go see her. However you want this to play out, I’ll move mountains to make sure it happens, as long as you know that through all that, I will never let your step falter, and in the end, I’ll be with you when you see the sun shinin’ and that shadow around you vanish completely.”