36. Ellie
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
ellie
“FUCK, I’M SORRY.”
Nearly the entire length of Sullivan’s six-foot-five frame pressed against my much shorter one as he caged me against the wall.
Which I honestly didn’t mind, but it did mean my entire backside was undoubtedly covered in yellow paint, adding to what was cascading down my arm.
Paint that Sully was trying to brush away, as though paint worked like that.
“Are you okay? I’m so sorry,” he repeated, and I glanced up to find his brows pinched together and his blond hair ruffled from his fall. And he looked so concerned that all I could do was tip my head back and laugh.
Sully stopped his fussing, his body stilling.
“El?”
Yes, I was aware that it might look like I was losing it, but I was standing in the London living room, covered in paint. And Sully was here, so close to me, in a position I never thought we’d find ourselves in again.
I never thought I’d find my way back to this, and oh God, I might just be happy. Right now, at this moment, anyway.
Maybe he was right to pick out this color.
“I’m sorry, I just—” Another laugh hiccuped out of me, and I was finding it hard to catch my breath. “I just never thought I’d be here.”
If sometime in the last five years you’d have told me that one day I’d move into this house and Sully would be living here with me, I wouldn’t have believed you.
I caught a glimpse of Sully’s eyes just as they softened.
He took the slightest step back, enough that it meant that we weren’t touching from head to toe, and it was easier to look at each other.
But he remained a breath away, and his hands were on my arms, fingers trailing up them, dragging through the paint.
And suddenly, I was shivering. And hot. Perspiration beaded on my forehead, and maybe it had something to do with how I’d been painting these walls like my life depended on it—because it was starting to feel like it kind of did—or maybe Sullivan was the cause—how close he was to me, the heat of his body, the warmth of his breath as it skittered across my pebbled skin.
“I am so very glad that you are here,” he murmured, giving me this glassy sort of look as he trailed a finger through the paint on my arm and then dragged it up my shoulder, across my collarbone.
“Are you?” I asked, the words falling out of my mouth.
Sully’s finger stopped in its tracks, and his eyes became clear, focusing.
“What?”
He looked stricken, and I shook my head.
Shit.
I’d meant for that, for my doubts, to remain inside my thoughts.
“Nothing.”
“No, El—” I tried to look away, but he caught my chin between two paint-covered fingers. I didn’t care much about that, though. I cared a lot more about the way Sully’s eyes were seeking mine, pleading for…something. “Why did you ask that?”
“I just—” I sighed, and Sully released my chin, his touch sliding down my neck, landing on my pulse. Could he feel how unsteady it was? How unsteady I was? “I’m glad to be here, Sawyer. And I’m glad to be with you. But I’ve been wondering lately…if it would have been better for you if I weren’t.”
This was a bad idea—to voice this. But it was too late to go back, and all I could do was study the way Sully’s lips were parting like he didn’t know what to say.
“If you weren’t?”
“Here,” I clarified. “If I weren’t here.”
“I don’t—” He shook his head. “I don’t understand.”
“If I didn’t come back,” I explained as my heart pounded so loudly in my ears, I could barely hear myself speak. “If I’d stayed in California, I could have spared you from…this.”
His brows furrowed. “From what?”
I fought the urge to look away. He’d only catch me, pull me back again. “The pain, I suppose.”
“Do you mean…” He spoke carefully, like the concept was taking its time connecting in his brain. “Are you asking if it would have been better if I’d never known you were pregnant?”
I gave a slow nod.
Sully seemed speechless at first, and I worried that he might say I was right. That he might confirm my fears. Add to my guilt.
But then he groaned my name and dropped his forehead to mine. “Eleanor, no.”
“No?” I breathed.
“No, no, no, no, no,” he replied, shaking his head. And when he finally pulled back to look at me, there was a sheen to his gaze. “The thought of never knowing…no.” He gave his head one more resolute shake. “Absolutely not.”
My breath hitched, and it felt a little like my body was floating, coming up to the surface, finding the light, maybe some air.
Sully wasn’t done, though. His glassy gaze bored into mine.
“To know that, even if it was just for a brief period of time, a blip of our lives, there was a part of you and a part of me that created something—someone—new together…Eleanor, I can’t tell you how much it would have killed me not to have known that they existed. Our child.”
And suddenly, I was crying.
Again.
And I knew it wasn’t pretty. I knew I was gasping for air. I knew my face was blotchy and my eyes red-rimmed. My brain was a mess these days, my nervous system shot as I bounced between highs and lows, as I switched from laughing to crying with the blink of an eye. But I couldn’t stop.
Because I’d needed so badly to hear him say that.
“They did exist,” I gasped, “didn’t they?”
“They did.” He was cupping my face now, and I didn’t care that I’d be covered in Buttermilk, didn’t care about anything but his response.
“They existed, baby. They were ours. And they were real. And loved. And I am—” His voice caught, throat bobbing.
“I am so heartbroken that I will never meet them. But I wouldn’t trade the ache or the pain, not if it meant I’d never get to have you here, hear you tell me that you’re pregnant, hold you—them—for one night. Okay?”
I tried to get a handle on my tears, swallowing down the thickness in my throat as I nodded.
“I wouldn’t trade it for the world,” Sully continued, despite his own voice growing rough.
“And I don’t want you anywhere but here.
I don’t know what I’d do if you hadn’t come home and I’d somehow found out that you’d gone through this on the other side of the country, alone. Without me. The thought that—”
He inhaled and then exhaled—shakily. His whole body was shaking, actually. Like he’d painted an image he couldn’t erase, and honestly, I was scared of that image, too. God, I couldn’t imagine doing this without him.
Sully closed his eyes for a second, and when he opened them again, they wandered over me, drinking me in. His body loosened, ever so slightly, like he’d remembered that I was here, and I wasn’t across the country, and everything was real.
And then, in a tender voice that renewed tears in my lash line, he repeated, “I am so very glad that you are home, Eleanor.”
I sniffled and wiped at my nose, even knowing that I was likely smearing paint everywhere.
Sully gave me a tilted half-smile as he used his thumb to brush my tears away.
And then his touch traveled lower again, like he planned to pick up where he had left off before.
His finger curved over my jawline and along the slope of my neck, grazing my pulse point.
He traced my collarbone and followed the shape of my shoulder.
I could feel the wet trail he left in his wake as he switched directions and painted lightly over my chest, circling my left side.
“Me too,” I whispered, caught in a sort of trance from whatever he was doing to me.
Touching me. He was touching me. And even though he’d touched me a million times, this felt different.
“Good.”
His finger dipped down until it was trailing yellow paint onto my overalls.
“I’m sorry I’m so…messy, though,” I breathed.
I’d never been more of a mess, never felt more confused about life and what I was supposed to do now. Even after I’d left Minnesota, left Sully, I’d had somewhat of a direction.
And now…well, I didn’t know what I was doing anymore.
But luckily, Sully seemed to know I was talking about much more than my current paint-covered state, murmuring, “I’m okay with messy.”
He lifted his gaze to mine and held it, branding me with the truth of his words.
“I think I can help with that, though, if you want,” he offered.
It was hard to say for sure what he meant by that. But considering I’d take any help I could get at this point, I nodded.
Within seconds, Sully had swooped me off my feet.
And I realized maybe it didn’t matter where I was going.
Not if I had him holding me along the way.
The humidity hit immediately as Sully brought me outside—the stickiness, the remnants of summer still in the evening air. It might be September, but it didn’t feel like it, not yet.
Which was good, since as soon as I heard the rhythmic ticking and slow hissing of the sprinklers, I had a feeling where Sully was going with this.
“Sawyer…” I started, a warning note in my voice, as he padded barefoot, following the wraparound porch to the back side of the house.
“You are covered in paint, Eleanor,” he said simply.
“I really thought we were talking more about how much of a metaphorical mess I am, if I’m being honest.”
He chuckled. “I’m here for all of it. I want to help you with that, too. But we have to do something about this paint first. Did I mention you’re covered in it?”
“And whose fault is that?”
His grin was soft as he looked down at me. “I would never claim to be innocent when it comes to you. You’re messy. I’m messy. We’re a mess, baby. But we’re in this together.”
He looked away then, watching his feet as he stepped down into the grass in the backyard.
But I couldn’t stop staring at him. At the planes of his face, which had little splatters of paint on it.
At the way his lips pressed together as he concentrated on carrying me.
At the little crow’s feet by the corner of his eyes, evidence that we’d gotten older but that he’d always be that boy who smiled at me and made me feel at home for the first time in my life.
“We can do this here or in the bathroom,” he went on, “but I think—”
“Here’s good,” I interrupted breathlessly.