Chapter 19 Collide
collide
Cian
The hike, or rather walk, was good for me. This hot tub, though, is great.
I won’t say it’s not weird being in another man’s jacuzzi. It sort of is. But the heat around sore muscles and the sound of the bubbles are worth getting over it.
Me: I hope your day was great.
Me: You never said how Rosie is. I’m going to assume (since all the bad luck is mine and I don’t plan to share) that she’s fine. Tell me she’s fine.
Angel: She’s fine. Get you some Tramadol. She’s had that in her medicine cabinet forever from some old injury. That stuff apparently doesn’t let you know you hurt at all.
Me: I have Tylenol4. It’s effective. They also mean I can’t feel my brain, so I’ve been whittling down.
Me: Glad she’s doing better.
I click a view of the setting sun through the evergreens, framing it as if I were Ayla.
Me: {Picture message}
Angel: Gorgeous. You home?
Me: At Ayla and Christian’s. The other half have personal chefs. I guess I could sell pics of my feet if it got me a personal chef.
Angel: You know that men stare at those to get off, right?
Me: We’re gross. Now I need thick, thick socks to hide my handsome tootsies.
Angel: Tootsies? You sure this isn’t Ayla messing with me?
Angel: Hi, Ayla. Thank you for last night. I can’t tell you how relieved I was to know you were here. (Or there. I’m at Rosie’s.)
Me: My sister is great, but she’s not posing as me to get to talk to you. What’re you guys up to?
Angel: Sheet masks, pedicures and manis. If we get to everything.
Me: I wish I were there.
Angel: For the pedi, I guess. Just say no to feet pics.
Me: LOL
Me: I’m glad you’re having a good day. Call me before you go to bed?
Angel: Okay.
Angel: {picture message}
The image appears, and it’s one of her feet. Her toes are separated by spongy fingers, and she has robin’s egg blue nail polish on them.
Me: Are you flirting with me, Angel?
I extend my feet from the hot tub and take a snap of my own. And send it over.
“What are you doing?”
The disbelief and humor in my sister’s voice has me bobbling my phone.
I manage to catch it and hold it out of the water.
Jacuzzi water or stone terrace—either option is a bad one for the brand-new device in my hand.
No doubt Ayla would bitch if she had to get yet another one for me within the week. Besides, I like the texts on these.
“Sending feet pics?” I respond in question.
“I don’t want to know.” She drops her robe and slides into the tub on the opposite corner. “Seriously, I want to believe my brother has no kinks. Hell, I’d prefer to think you don’t have sexual organs. Gross.” She scrunches her face and looks disgusted.
“Right back atcha, sis.”
“How’s your girl?”
I fight the soft smile that wants to break across my face. It still hurts, but more so, it gives too much away. “She’s good. Rosie is too.”
“I notice you call her Rosie, but never her mom. What’s the deal with that?”
“She’s an adoptive mom of sorts.”
“And her biological mom?”
I let my gaze drift. The woman I’m so invested in, the one I never stopped loving… I know so little it’s almost embarrassing.
“I don’t know. She ran away from home as a kid. I didn’t know that in college. I was just learning all the details, and then this.” My index finger pokes out of the water at my face.
“Take it from me. Knowing someone and knowing about someone are two different things. Unless it’s critical, move forward and trust. It all comes out in the wash.” She looks away and her voice goes quiet. “Or it doesn’t, and that’s okay too.”
“It’s like I finally had everything I wanted within reach only to have the rug, the floor, and the foundation below it ripped away.”
“I understand that more than you know. Only it’s in my grasp, and I’m left holding on for dear life.”
“Murphys are made of stronger stuff than what tries to take us down.”
“I think Ocotea’s are too,” my sister says quietly.
“I know they are.”
I’m a prune by the time I get out. I’m relaxed and am not far from retiring for the night when Christian walks out. “Wife.”
Fuck. I’m out. “Goodnight. See you in the morning.”
“I’m out early tomorrow morning. Can Ellie go with me?”
“Eleanor. And sure. She needs it. No bears.”
“No bears.” She holds up four fingers. “Scouts’ honor.”
She was no scout, and that’s no salute. It’s merely her telling me she’s going to do what she wants and let the chips fall where they may. And she’s taking my Eleanor along for the ride.
I shake my head and wave over my shoulder as I head for the living room doors.
Another man’s hot tub – ick.
Sariah
I can’t remember the last time we spent the night at Rosie’s. It’s been ages, and I don’t know why we don’t do it more. She’s a blast.
There’s something about it being her house that made it easier for me to turn off mom mode. Not all the way, but enough…
She turned in around ten. The effects of last night are still making her more tired than normal.
Renée slipped into her guest room to play her game, realizing there’s no table here where she has to leave her phone.
After last night and lunch today, I’m willing to be more lenient.
We’ll get back to regularly scheduled programming tomorrow at home.
For now, a little extra flexibility won’t hurt, right?
My last text to Cian went un-replied to.
Me: What if I am?
Nothing like being left on read when I’m trying to put myself out there. If he wants me to call before I go to bed, he can’t leave me hanging like this.
I flip to the silly game that made me late going home yesterday. One game won’t hurt.
One game turns into ninety minutes of accelerated heart rate and probably dilated pupils. I’m turning off the lights when my phone vibrates in my hand, and not from the gaming notification.
I feel like a teenager with a crush—or how it’s portrayed in the movies anyway.
Cian: Goodnight, sweet Angel. Or good morning if you see this on Saturday.
Me: Goodnight, Ci.
Cian: If you’re awake…
I check that both bedroom doors are closed and hit call, lifting the phone to my face.
“Angel?”
“Who else would it be?”
He pauses, and I wonder if I said something weird.
“A week ago, I got to hold you.” His voice is a husky whisper. “Best night I’ve had in the last decade for sure. I wish I could hold you tonight.”
“Me too. The last week’s been”—I pause, looking for a way not to overstate—“eventful.”
“That’s one way to put it. It’s been a rollercoaster on my end.”
“Same here. Do you feel like the universe is conspiring against us? Or trying to warn us?”
“You’ve always been the one for me. If it’s a warning, it’s one I’m ignoring and running right past. And conspiring is futile. We’ll find a way.”
We’ll find a way.
“But God willing, it won’t be another fifteen years. I’d wait, but my feet wouldn’t be nearly as handsome by then.”
“Fifteen years sucked. I had Renée so that made it easier. It also made the time fly by.” I fiddle with my ponytail, glad he can’t see my nerves.
“Ayla and I were talking tonight.”
Holy subject change, Batman. “Yeah?”
“I realized I don’t know a lot about you, but I know you.”
“Yeah. You’re one of an elite club that does.”
“So long as I’m in that elite club, as you call it, I can live with that. But, Angel, I want to know more. I want to know it all—the great, the detestable, the things you keep hidden so they never see the light of day.” There’s a long pause before he adds, “I promise I’ll never make you regret it.”
“I know, Ci.” I drop my eyes closed and fight the enormity of what he’s saying—the good and the risky. “I trust you.”
“Thank you, baby. That’s the greatest gift I’ll ever receive. It means more than I can tell you.”
“It scares the fuck out of me.”
“It means even more then. What would make it less scary?”
Time. Getting past Renée’s fourteenth birthday. And her fifteenth. Launching her safely into the world with the confidence of a well-loved daughter and a brutal right hook.
“Sariah?”
I’m lost in my head. Be right there. “Yeah?”
“You trust me?”
“Yeah.”
“Love you, baby. I know it’s soon. I know it’s too soon, and you don’t have to say it back.
But know that I’m giving you the scariest thing I can think of.
My heart… For the second time.” He pauses as if thinking.
“Or maybe for the only time. Maybe it’s been yours all along, and I’m just recognizing it. ”
“Ci—” His name comes out on a sigh. It’s laced with hope, not exasperation. “Thank you. And soon. But give me a little time?”
“Sure, Angel.” His voice is steady and soothing. “I can be brave while you’re learning to be vulnerable. I get the feeling it’s been a while.”
Fifteen years. It’s been fifteen freaking years. “Yeah. It has, but I’ll get there.”
“Why are you awake so late?”
“Oh, that? Renée got me onto this game. Ridiculous really, but super addictive.”
To my surprise, he offers the name.
“How did you know?”
“She asked me to send her photos of Liam and Ayla but wouldn’t give me her number. Annoying, but smart.”
“That sounds like her. She’s all about the game and can I just say I’m secretly pleased she didn’t give out her number?”
“She put each of us through our paces. You’re raising a firecracker.”
“That I am. A firecracker who has a phone addiction.”
“Don’t we all?”
“Yeah. And, lately, it’s been worse.”
I can hear the smile in his voice when he offers. “Same here. It’s my connection to you when I can’t hold you. And I really wish I could hold you.”
“If you start that, you can’t stop, you know?”
“Counting on that, Angel. Now get some sleep. I’ll do the same and try not to spend too much time thinking about your feet.”
“Do the feet really do it for you?” I stare down at my own and wiggle my toes.
“You do it for me. They’re simply attached.”
“Goodnight, Ci.”
His voice is warm and husky and does something to my insides. “Goodnight, Angel”
We disconnect, and I stare at the phone wondering if I can puzzle out what my life has become since I saw Cian a week ago last night.
Rollercoaster is accurate. But the highs are all about him. The lows, while terrifying, were made easier by him, or his sister and brother. Something dawns on me that I failed to recognize last night. Sherman, the attorney, said I’m “one of them.”
They knew nothing other than I needed them or needed them to save Renée, and Liam headed straight over.
Ayla did too. Her husband called his attorney, dispatching him to get me, and then ordered pizza to my house.
Cian made sure my daughter knew who was coming by sending pictures so she was prepared.
The man claimed me, rallied the troops, and made me safe. His family dropped everything in my time of need.
Even before he told me, he was loving me.
Even before he told me, he was showing me.
My heart has been his since I was nineteen years old. He says I’ve had his since then too. Maybe this isn’t the universe conspiring or warning, maybe this is what happens when hearts that belong together, but have been separated, collide.