Chapter 53
Chapter Fifty-Three
FALLON
Her Light Is Not Gone
I look up from my laptop screen when I sense someone watching. It takes a second for my eyes to adjust to the dark before I see Charlotte standing in the archway of the living room, wringing her hands and biting her lip, her expression one of apprehension.
Setting my work aside, I motion for her to join me on the sofa. She takes a hesitant step forward, then another before curling up next to me. I wrap my arm around her, and she rests her head on my shoulder.
“Is Mama still asleep?”
“Yeah.” Thank fuck. Elizabeth crashed hard. She literally passed out in my arms while I was holding her this morning. It’s the first time she’s slept, truly slept, and I haven’t had the heart to wake her. “What are you still doing up?” It’s past midnight and on a school night.
Charlotte inhales like she’s about to say something, then exhales it all out as a sigh. She picks at the cuticle of her nail. “It’s just…”
“Just what?” I gently urge.
Her face tips up, the ring of copper rimming the green of her eyes striking, even in the dim light. “I was so mean to him. To Uncle Jayson.” Her lips wobble. “I didn’t mean it.”
Jesus, these kids with their bleeding, compassionate hearts. Just like their mother. Just like Ry.
“I know you didn’t, and he knows you didn’t.
Jay and I couldn’t stand each other most of the time.
But we had something in common.” I wipe away her errant tear that escapes.
“We both love your mother. It made us enemies, but it also made us friends in a weird sort of way, and I know he wouldn’t want you to feel sad.
Jay loved you and Chris and Marcus unconditionally. ”
“I was mad at him,” she admits. “He hurt Mama. And Daddy.”
“He didn’t mean to. Jay was battling demons of his own. It took him a long time to get better. People make mistakes. They shouldn’t be condemned because of them. Your dad never stopped loving Jay. Neither did your mom.”
She nods, absorbing that. “I was afraid when he came back.”
“Why?”
She gnaws on her bottom lip. “I was scared that you’d leave us. That Mom would choose him.”
Well, shit. How do I navigate this? I’m used to dealing with cutthroat businessmen and politicians wanting something in a quid pro quo . I’m not used to dealing with the fragile heart of a sixteen-year-old girl.
“First, I’m not going anywhere. Second, even if your mom chose him, it would be okay because she would be happy. That’s all me, Ry, and Jay ever wanted.”
She frowns. “I wouldn’t be happy if Grant started dating someone else. I’d kick his ass. Then I’d kick her ass.”
I chuckle. “You may be the one to start dating someone else.”
She vehemently shakes her head. “Nope. Not happening. I don’t want anyone else.”
I could tell her that what she wants now may not be what she wants five years from now, but I know when to keep my mouth shut.
Teenage love is a powerful force that gives you tunnel vision and defies sensible logic.
Then again, who the hell knows? She may be right.
Look at Elizabeth and Ry. They knew since the third grade they were soulmates, just like Jay and I knew from the first moment we saw her that she was ours.
Footsteps come shuffling down the hallway.
Stop. “Guess I’m not the only one who can’t sleep,” Chris mumbles and plops down beside Charlotte.
“I’m going to suck tomorrow at practice.
I’m so effing tired but wired at the same time.
I even tried reading War and Peace while listening to wind chimes on my Calm app.
” He reclines back and manspreads an entire half of the sofa. “Beer is supposed to make you drowsy.”
Charlotte scrunches her nose in distaste and pushes his knee away when it touches hers. “That’s just stupid.”
Reaching across the back of the couch, I lay my hand on top of his head when he looks over at me. “Since giving hard liquor to minors is illegal, how about hot chocolate?”
Charlotte perks up. “Homemade?”
“Is there any other way?”
Charlotte already has a small pot out when Chris and I get to the kitchen. He makes a beeline for the pantry and comes back out holding a carton of powdered cocoa and a bag of marshmallows.
“Grab the vanilla extract,” he tells Charlotte.
“You grab it.”
I do the biggest eye roll known to man. They live to get on each other’s nerves. I hope they grow out of it. “Charlotte, please get the fucking vanilla since you’re standing right there,” I say with exasperation.
She giggles and opens the cabinet in front of her where Elizabeth keeps the bottles of spices and herbs. “I should start a swear jar.”
I kiss the top of her head. “You’ll be a millionaire by tomorrow.”
I don’t like the smile that spreads across her face. She knows damn well that she has me wrapped around her little finger. The only reason why another car isn’t sitting in the driveway next to the Hellcat I gave Chris is because Elizabeth would kill me.
With their arguing apparently done, they work together, eyeballing measurements and making a mess of the pristine kitchen Meredith worked hard to clean when she dropped by this afternoon. I forgot how much that woman loves to talk. My ears are still bleeding.
“What are you making?” a sleepy Elizabeth yawns as she lopes in.
“Hot chocolate,” Chris replies, stirring the cocoa and sugar together over medium heat while Charlotte slowly pours milk into the pot.
He and Charlotte glance warily at Elizabeth, something she picks up on immediately. She engulfs Charlotte in a hug first. “I’m okay, baby. I promise. I’m sorry I made you worry.” She turns and takes Christopher in her arms. “I love you both so much.”
“I love you, too,” he hushes against her shoulder.
Elizabeth hobbles over and wraps herself around my middle, snuggling in deep.
Taken by the sweetness of her cuddling, I fold her in my arms and kiss the button of her nose when she peers up at me.
And that’s when I see it. Her light. The one that shines brighter than any sun or star in the expansive universe.
The one fueled by her heart that never dies out and shows just how fucking strong she is.
Chris tosses a jumbo marshmallow up in the air. It bounces off his forehead and falls to the floor. “Five-second rule,” he says, picking it up.
“Don’t you dare eat that, Christopher Randall Cutton!” Elizabeth snatches it from his hand just as he’s about to consume the entire thing. She chucks it into the garbage can and takes a fresh one from the bag, biting it in half. “I’m starving. Any leftovers from dinner?”
She looks at us weirdly when we start laughing.
“I would advise against opening the fridge.”
She doesn’t heed Chris’s warning.
“Oh, good god.” She takes out one of the containers. “What is this?”
“I think it’s tuna casserole,” Charlotte says. “Peyton brought it.”
Elizabeth immediately puts it back and takes out something else.
“Deviled eggs,” Charlotte remarks and turns the heat off the hot chocolate.
Elizabeth grabs a jar of dill pickle slices from the top shelf. “Hand me the bread.”
I reach behind me and pull the loaf out of the breadbox, then watch with amusement as she makes the most disgusting sandwich I’ve ever seen—and I once ate haggis and blood pudding on a dare, so that’s saying something.
Elizabeth crushes the deviled eggs in a bowl with a fork, scoops up the carnage, and slathers it onto one piece of bread, squeezes out a mountain of mustard, then lays pickle slices on top.
“You are not kissing me after you eat that.”
She smiles as she takes a huge bite. “Wanna bet, Nutter Butter?” she says with her mouth full, and I cringe at the ridiculous nickname she once gave me.
Charlotte dissolves into raucous snickers. “Nutter Butter?”
“Thanks for that,” I tell Elizabeth and haul her to me, kissing her soundly despite my revulsion toward deviled eggs.
“Good grief, get a room,” Chris complains, takes his hot chocolate, and leaves. “I’m going to bed.”
Not being subtle at all, Charlotte does the same. “Me, too. Night, Mama.” She kisses Elizabeth on the cheek, then motions for me to bend down before offering me the same. “Night, Uncle Fallon. And thanks.”
“Good night, Squirt.”
“Thanks for what?” Elizabeth asks when Charlotte practically skips out of the kitchen.
“She just needed someone to talk to.”
Elizabeth’s smile vanishes, and she puts her half-eaten sandwich back on the plate. “I messed up. Again .”
“Why do you think that?”
She turns and hops up onto the counter island, hooking her feet around my waist and reeling me in. Her hands go to my chest, her fingers playing with the buttons of my shirt. “Because I put my kids through the same shit again. Because I fell apart and left you to pick up the pieces.”
Taking her chin, I tip her face. “Baby, it’s okay to fall apart. You just went through something horrific, and you’re grieving.”
She places a tender kiss on my shirt, right over my heart. “It’s not only that. I’m so fucking mad. At him. At Fate. At God. At myself.”
My arms band around her, one hand cradling the back of her head, the other nestled across the small of her back, my need for this woman more vital than the breath I need to live. “Be mad. Yell and scream. Do what you need to do to heal. Just don’t disappear.”
She doesn’t know how much it hurt to watch her teeter on that edge. Every tear. Every time she stared blankly at nothing, like she was somewhere else entirely. Somewhere I couldn’t follow.
She closes her eyes, her forehead pressing lightly into my chest. “I tried not to, but sometimes I felt it was easier to just…fade away.” She lifts her head, and the grief that still lives there guts me—but overpowering the grief is love.
Fierce, raw, and undeniable. “I didn’t mean to leave you.
I know I did. Emotionally. I shut you out. And I’m sorry.”
I brush my knuckles down her cheek. “I love you, Elizabeth. All of you, even when you think you’re broken. You just have to let me love you through it.”
Her fingers find the collar of my shirt, and she tugs me closer until our lips are touching. “I love you. So much.” She kisses me then, not frantic or desperate, but deep and soul-shattering. “I don’t deserve you,” she whispers against my mouth.
I hold her tighter. “Other way around, Kitten.”
Her palms slide up my chest, my neck, and into my hair, her body arching into mine, and I can feel the shift in her—the darkness she’s been existing in for days falling away, like night right before the sun rises.
“Make love to me.”
With fucking pleasure. And when I’m deep inside her, I’m going to slide the ten-carat diamond solitaire I bought her onto her finger. I wanted the bigger one, but Aurora said Elizabeth would strangle me with it.
My hands find her thighs, sliding under them as I lift her off the counter and cradle her like she’s something precious and sacred all at once. I kiss her just as reverently. She gasps softly against my mouth as I carry her to the bedroom?—
—only to abruptly halt mid-stride when there’s a loud crash outside on the veranda.
“What in the hell?” Elizabeth says, and I set her on her feet.
“Stay here.”
Of course, the stubborn woman doesn’t listen. We both stop and look at one another when a feminine moan comes through the pressed wood, followed by a man’s muffled voice.
Elizabeth places a finger to her lips for me not to make a sound as she tiptoes over to the door and quietly turns the knob. Mischief alights her green eyes when she flings the door wide open.
“I want grandbabies. Lots of them,” she says loudly through the screen door.
Another crash. A high-pitched shriek.
“Christ, Mom! I swear to God!” Marcus shouts as he helps pick Hannah up off the ground where he unceremoniously dropped her.
Elizabeth laughs her ass off, and the sound of it is beautiful.