Chapter 50
JAYDEN
It’s early evening when we arrive home from the pet and food stores. Eli is setting up a doggy corner for Bee where our Christmas tree was, while I sort through the groceries we bought. Finley is sorting through the laundry Eli and I attempted to sort into light and dark piles earlier.
“It would’ve been a travesty,” Eli finishes for her with a teasing chuckle. His arms lock around her waist, pulling her into him. “You realize that we have a housekeeper who does all of this, so you don’t have to.”
“I like doing it.” She rolls up on her tiptoes, giving him a quick peck while brushing the longer lengths of his hair to the side. When she’s satisfied that he’s all fixed up, she spins in his hold and bathes me with a heart-stopping, slow smile. “I like looking after you.”
That gooey look she’s giving me melts my insides, leaving me with a goofy smile of my own that matches Eli’s as he brings our girl toward me and perches her on the counter next to the pile of groceries I’ve kept out to make dinner.
A yellow-pepper pasta I’m trying to adapt for Eli, using cashews and milk to make it creamy without the cheese.
“I don’t know how I feel about nutty peppers,” Finley says, picking up a slice of bell pepper that she follows with a cashew.
“You love creamy nuts, don’t you?” I tease.
“Christ, that’s the worst joke yet,” Eli snorts.
Hearing his laugh makes my heart so damn happy. After our conversation with Parker, he was halfway to that dark place that makes my chest hurt.
It’s becoming easier to recognize the rises and slumps of his mood, and with that ease, the suffocation of the downs grows tighter.
Dinner works out great. The pasta isn’t bad, and Eli wolfs his down faster than ever while Finley is making all these sexy-as-hell, yummy noises that distract me from the fact that I’m eating pasta without cheese. And that is sacrilege. As bad as coffee without caffeine.
“That was delicious,” Eli hums, sinking back into his seat with a slice of garlic-oil ciabatta he’s slathered in what was left of the sauce in his bowl.
I watch him suck his fingers clean when he’s done, before he wipes them on his napkin. Satisfaction warms through me at the sight of him kissing our girl’s temple.
Finley’s soul-beaming smile greets me. It’s the one that lights up my entire existence. I don’t care if this pasta is the only thing I ever eat again, so long as she keeps giving me that smile and we can have moments like this forever.
“Movie and cuddles?” Fin asks when we’re all done eating.
At some point in the next twenty-four hours, Eli and I are going to have to review the game tape Coach sent earlier. Before Finley, we’d sit on the couch and dissect it second by second, play by play.
Then, it was another way of being around him, and I’d make any and every excuse to watch the damn tape.
Now we’re here. Eli isn’t going anywhere, and we have Fin, too. The tape can wait till tomorrow night when she’s out for dinner with Christina and the girls.
When Finley starts stacking the dishes, Eli quickly takes over.
“You and JJ have done enough.” His bottomless stare finds mine with a tender grin. “My turn to bring something other than my good looks to this relationship while the two of you pick something to watch and warm up the couch.”
Sweeping our girl up over my shoulder, I take her to the couch and drop into it. Shifting Fin onto my lap, her legs straddling mine.
“What are we watching?” She asks, tracing the Comets’ logo on my dry-fit shirt. Delicate fingertips trail each line over my chest while I flick through the TV apps.
“We can carry on binging Stranger Things.”
We’re slowly getting through my list of must-watch shows. Although she enjoyed the lighter comedies, Finley really gets into the supernatural, fantasy ones with all the jumpy scenes and tense moments that leave her on the edge of her seat—body coiled tight, eyes wide on the screen.
I had to educate Eli, too, but he’s more into true crime. Not something I’m into. I like my dark to be fictional and out of this world enough that I won’t go to bed thinking about how messed up the human race is.
“Yes, Stranger Things,” Fin sing-songs, her excitement palpable. “I’m still not over the way Billy was sacrificed. He was just coming into himself and there was so much potential…”
“Guy was a jackass; the only good thing he did was break free of the Mind Flayer.”
“Which saved Eleven,” she retorts with an all-too-righteous scrunch of her nose.
“Agree to disagree…” With a quick smooch to her nose, I put on the next episode and pause it while we wait for Eli to finish in the kitchen.
“Do you think he’s okay?” Finley whispers, looking past me to our man in the background. “He seemed a bit distracted after we left Summer and Parker.”
I lock my eyes on the chain around her neck, too afraid that if our stares meet, she’ll see everything I know. Everything she doesn’t.
“Our hands are kind of tied right now.” I settle for the easiest reply.
“But we know it’s him… Ryker.” The name is a wretched growl.
“Yeah, we know it.” I have to swallow down the acrid diatribe that threatens to spill from my lips so I don’t say something that will fuck us up.
“Why? I keep thinking it over, and I can’t understand why he’s doing all this. Why give that story to the press? Why give my number out? What does he want, JJ? What’s the end goal here? Because he’s not gaining anything. He’s not even hurting us, it’s all just unnecessary grief…”
Ice glints in her perplexed expression. Truth is, I don’t know the answers to any of her questions; all I know is that the hurting part isn’t true.
Ryker Hallman is intentionally hurting Eli. He’s hitting him in all his weak spots. The past, Finley, us…
“What do you know that I don’t, JJ?” Fin whispers, dipping her face closer to mine.
She’s searching, and I’m trying to bury everything I know. Desperately enough that it burns through my insides when I shrug, shaking my head so that I don’t have to verbally lie to her.
“I know he thinks I need protecting. That I’m not strong enough to—”
“You are strong, Fin. Trust me, we know you’re resilient and…” I blow out a sigh.
“So what have I missed? What don’t I know that makes all of this make sense?” The pitch of her voice is stark, fueled by anger and frustration as she pushes off my lap and stands in front of me, hands on her hips, chest heaving.
“Don’t be annoying,” Eli says from behind me with a light slap to the back of my head.
He’s completely oblivious to the conversation Fin and I have fallen into, and I want to warn him.
Except, before I turn to give him a silent sign, a caution, Fin asks, “What don’t I know, Eli? What haven’t you told me?”
Silence. It’s loaded and cocked between us.
If the moment in my dad’s office was suffocating, there are no words for the slow death choking me limb by limb now.
Then his hand closes around my shoulder, and his thumb works gentle circles on my shoulder blade. I don’t know if he’s trying to soothe me or center himself. Regardless, I’m grateful for his touch.
For the physical warmth of our connection, as he asks me, “Can you give me a moment with our girl?”
“Eli…” I can’t leave him to do this on his own.
I need to be here for him, for Finley, for us.
Leaning down, he kisses the top of my head. “It’s the right thing to do, Jayden, and it’s the right time.”
My plea is on the tip of my tongue. I want to beg him not to do it. To tell him that I was wrong, Fin doesn’t need to know what happened. He was right; she shouldn’t have to live with that knowledge corroding and diminishing every great thing she is and represents.
“I can take her across the hall and—”
“No.”
This is our home.
This is where we’ve made the good memories—the ones we’ll always go back to when shit gets hard. Fin needs to be surrounded by that when her world comes crashing down.
“Fine. I’ll take Bee out for a walk around the block. Give you both time to talk…” When I push to my feet, I grasp Finley’s clammy hand in mine.
It’s frozen cold as I step into her and lace our fingers together while I embrace her with my other arm.
“Listen to me,” I murmur into her ear. “Nothing will ever change who we are, Lucky. Nothing will break what we have. You hear me?”
She nods, but it’s weak.
“You are and always will be the best goddamn thing that has ever happened to us. No matter what. We love you, Baby. We will always love you.”
With an audible swallow, she takes a firm step away from me. She’s already on the verge of tears. Of breaking. And I am already desperate to haul her back together. But it’s impossible to fix something that’s not broken.
“Come on, Bee,” is all I say with a pat to my thigh as I head for the door with a pleading look at Eli for him to change his mind. To let me stay.
Instead, he gives me a wispy smile. One that makes it clear this is between them. It doesn’t matter that I already know, because the same way he gave me all of him back in Carolina, he’s going to give her everything now.
I can only hope we’re strong enough to withstand the gravity of the devastation that’s about to crash down on us.