“Take me home,” I tell him, my voice creeping toward shrill.
He doesn’t listen. He rounds the hood and opens the passenger door.
I slap at his hands as he unbuckles my seat belt. “I want to go home! You said you’d take me home.”
But he doesn’t stop. He lifts me out of the SUV and carries me toward his perfect freaking house while I beat on his shoulders. Then he puts me down right in front of the door.
“Shut up for two fucking seconds and listen to what I have to say.” He points at the glass, and I can see straight through to the darkness on the other side of the floor-to-ceiling windows that must make up the back of the house. “You see that?”
“What do you want me to see? It’s a perfect fucking house to go with your perfect fucking life!”
“Wrong. It’s just a goddamned house. It has no meaning beyond walls and windows and doors. There’s no laughter. No family. No love. Only wood and glass and rock that means absolutely fuckingnothingin the grand scheme of things.”
I blink twice as I try to comprehend the point he’s making.
“You think your life is so fucking screwed up? Try having everything you could ever want but never being happy. Never having someone you can trust to love and share it with. You think my life is so fucking perfect? Well, it’s not, Whitney. Perfection walked out of my life the day you married another man.”
We stand in front of each other, our chests heaving, and my tears fall harder.
“So I ruined your life too?” I snuffle in a sob, and I’m close to full-on bawling.
49
Lincoln
I swear to God,no matter what I say to this woman, I’m destined to fuck it up.
“No. Fuck no.” I wrap my arms around her and yank her into my chest, letting her tears soak my shirt. “I did that all by myself.”
“Then—”
She sniffles, and I hug her harder.
“What I meant is that just because something looks perfect from the outside doesn’t mean it is, and the things that look like a complete disaster are sometimes better than we could ever imagine.” I pull back, and she lifts her chin to meet my gaze. Her blue eyes shine with tears, and just like it always has, it guts me to see her cry.
“We’ve always thrived in the middle of chaos. In the middle of adversity. That’s where you and I excel. All you have to do is give me another chance, and we can make this work. I swear to you we can.”
“How can you think it would end any differently than in some kind of fiery disaster, with us running in opposite directions, and the world burning down around our ears?”
I cup her chin and stare into her eyes. “Because this time I’m not giving up. Because with you and me against the world, we can’t lose.”
When my lips touch hers, everything else falls away, and the Whitney I remember comes to life in my arms.
I fumble for my door handle, thankful that my thumbprint opens it, and I pull her inside and pin her against the door.
Whitney claws at my shoulders even as she says against my lips, “We shouldn’t do this. This is a terrible idea. I’m cursed. I swear I am.”
“Shut up, Blue. I’m a hell of a lot more worried about you kissing me than cursing me.”
I lift her into my arms and carry her to my bed. The bed where I’ve never had another woman. The bed where I’ve only ever wantedthiswoman.
I’ve waited years for another chance. I’m not going to fuck it up.
Not this time.
50
Whitney