Chapter 29
LONDON
T he first thing I notice when I wake isn't the obvious chill in the cool morning air or even the way my back protests against the uneven ground.
It's the weight of her head on my chest. Laney's blonde hair is sprawled across it as I take careful breaths to steady the rise and fall of my chest. I've spent a small eternity dreaming of a moment just like this one, where she is mine again, one where I wake up, and she's right where I left her, in my arms.
I don't need to question how we got here.
I remember every minute detail because I took my time cataloging each one, knowing tomorrows aren't guaranteed.
The fear of what happened before had sunk its claws deep, and this time, I was the one throwing up walls, hurting her with words that gutted me even as I spoke them.
But she refused to let them win. She fought—fought just like she did last time. Except, this time, I fought too.
Now, with her temple pressed against my chest and her arm draped loosely over my waist, something inside me cracks open.
Not a breaking, rather an opening, like a door I've kept locked for far too long.
Right now, in the still morning light, with her stubborn heart beating against mine and my own unyielding need to protect warring with this newfound clarity, I can see what I was blind to before.
We're not better apart. We're stronger together, and protecting her from a distance was never the answer.
It was cowardice dressed up as nobility.
The best way to protect her isn't to stand guard against the shadows but to stand beside her in the light, to be whatever she needs me to be.
That's the man I want to be. That's the man she deserves.
A breeze rustles the leaves above us, and Laney's eyes flutter open. For a heartbeat, her eyes assess mine and her soft gaze is unguarded. It's the way she used to look at me, and I'm going to do everything in my power to ensure I get to keep it.
"Morning," she whispers, her brown eyes almost hazel as they reflect the morning sun.
"Good morning." I smile softly, pushing a strand of hair away from her forehead.
We steal a few more seconds of silence, basking in the light of a new day, one that we started together instead of apart, before the sounds of catering crews breaking down tables filter through the air.
"What time is it?" she asks, looking over her shoulder and scanning all that there is to see in the light.
"I don't know. My phone is in the pocket of my jeans and checking it would have required letting you go."
She rolls her lips to stifle the smile threatening to take over her face. Her fingers lazily trace over my chest, my skin sparking to life beneath her touch. "Last night, were you aware Trigg knew you were under the table?"
I chuckle, my fingers finding hers. "Not at first, but there were signs," I admit. I know that when I went under the table, his eyes had drifted toward the bar, where I knew Asha was entertaining guests.
Pressing the tips of her fingers against mine, she asks, "Are you worried about telling him your plan to add him to the lease?"
I pull a cleansing breath through my nose and exhale slowly. " No, I started to tell him on our trail ride, but then you got attacked by bees. He knows I'm aware of the lease. I want to fill him in on my plan, but we haven't been able to sync up yet. Every time we're close, life happens."
"What changed? I thought you weren't sure if you could trust him."
"Hard times test your character, and watching how he's handled things since you arrived, I understand him more," I attempt to explain.
Six years. That's how long it's been since I arrived on Trigg's doorstep, a ghost from a past he didn't know existed. Beyond that first jarring moment when Baylor introduced us as brothers, we've found our rhythm, carved out a space where two strangers could become family.
The early days carried their weight of uncertainty, both of us walking on eggshells around truths, but that hesitation felt inevitable.
When your entire understanding of yourself gets rewritten in a single conversation, caution becomes a survival technique.
I catch myself wondering if our positions had been reversed—if he'd been the one standing on my father's doorstep with nowhere else to turn—would I have opened my door as readily?
Would I have demanded explanations he wasn't ready to give, or would I have possessed his quiet patience, waiting for trust to grow organically?
These questions gnaw at me because they matter.
They reveal the fault lines that run through both our lives, the damage done by a mother who chose abandonment, and the bitterness and pride that festers between our fathers.
They've chosen isolation over reconciliation and resentment over family, and those choices have shaped both of us in ways we're still learning to understand.
However, despite the scars of the past, we both seem to have one core value in common: our refusal to let the past repeat itself.
"Are you saying you agree with his tactics?" she questions, a little baffled by my acceptance.
We may have different temperaments and different ways of processing pain, but fundamentally, we are both determined to be more than the sum of our wounds. We both want something our parents couldn't give us: family.
"I didn't say all that, but the more you know him, the more you understand his ways.
He's good at playing the Jekyll-and-Hyde card, but he's never really the bad guy.
" I sigh. "I can relate to someone who'll let you assume the worst of them if it means they help you in the end.
He knew you wouldn't keep his secret, and the way he saw it, that benefited both of you. "
She's quiet, choosing to lay her head on my chest, pressing her ear to my heart as she processes what I've said. I know we are talking about Trigg, but I think she's heard another truth in my response—my truth.
"What about the things he said about Sydney?" she changes the subject.
I laugh and seductively drag my finger up the side of her arm. "I think that's when it became clear I was between your thighs, and he was trying to get a rise out of you." I bite my lip hard to force myself to think about the pinch of pain instead of the way she came hard all over my tongue.
Her head pops back up, and she rests her chin on my chest. "So you don't think it was true?"
"She's your best friend. You'd know better than me."
"Fair, but I know you have to have some kind of opinion. It's not like she's a complete stranger."
"I honestly don't have an opinion. Warrick and Sydney are both adults and free to do whatever they want.
He isn't that old. He's only in his early forties.
He and his late wife had Asha at a young age.
I could see the Sydney I used to know going for an older man.
She's very smart. An older man would challenge her the way men her own age can't."
Her eyes look past me, and I can see her wheels spinning. She agrees with me, but there's something else.
"I don’t disagree with you, but what if Asha finds out?"
There it is. She's happy to support Sydney, but she doesn't want to see a friendship destroyed over something that might not be forever.
"That's why I don't think Trigg's threat had any real imminence. I'm in the dark on whatever does or doesn't exist between those two, but I know he likes her, and because he likes her, I know he wouldn't frivolously hurt her."
"You're right," she says with a cleansing breath before propping herself up beside me on her elbow.
It's in that one natural movement, one that should be no cause for concern, that the blanket slips, and my heart beats out of rhythm.
Her eyes immediately zero in on the ink that wasn't there before.
"What's this?" She sits up, grabbing her dress to cover her breasts and get a better look at the heart on my right thigh with her initials in the middle.
I close my eyes when I feel her finger trace over it. This is it, London. You said you want to keep her, to stand in the light beside her and be whatever she needs you to be, so fucking do it.
"It's your initials…" I start.
"We have the same initials. I'm not sure I believe you…" The spirit in her voice dims, and something else filters in. "Why here?"
I grab the shirt I was wearing last night and sit up beside her, draping it over her shoulders before saying, "It was a reminder of why I had to stay away…why I lost my heart."
"I don't understand," she whispers, and when her worried eyes connect with mine, I see the exact moment her world starts to fracture.
My chest aches as my heart thunders against my ribs.
This is it, the moment I've clawed my way away from for six endless years, the reason I became a ghost in my own hometown.
I'm about to bleed out a truth so raw it might kill us both, and I'm terrified she won't survive it.
Terrified I won't survive watching her break.
"God, Laney, you have no idea how this is destroying me…" My voice cracks as I cup her face, memorizing every freckle, every curve, because this might be the last time she lets me touch her. "I ne ver wanted to hurt you. Never wanted to be the one to put that look in your eyes."
Her hand comes up to cover mine. "You're killing me now by not letting me in. We're drowning in secrets, London. We can't heal if you don't trust me with your pain. We're bigger than what's broken us."
The love in her voice still, after everything we've been through, guts me. "We lost six years, Laney. Six goddamn years because I couldn't bear the thought of you living with the truth."
"Then don't let us lose any more." Her lips brush my cheek like a prayer, soft and desperate. "I love you. Nothing changes that. Give us a chance to prove it. Please."