Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
Chrissy
I wake up tangled in soft sheets and warm arms, blinking at the ceiling while sunlight spills through windows overlooking the lake. Then Ace shifts beside me with a sleepy sound against my shoulder, and every memory from last night comes back at once.
Heat floods my cheeks and I bury my face briefly in the pillow.
Ace laughs softly. "Morning, Speed Racer."
"You're annoyingly cheerful in the morning."
"After making love to you? I'm thriving."
I snort and roll over to look at him. Hair messy, voice rough with sleep, and still the most deliciously beautiful man I’ve ever laid eyes on. His expression is soft and unguarded. The smug smirk has vanished. He just looks happy.
"Pancakes?" he asks.
My eyebrows shoot up in surprise. "You cook?"
"Of course. A man has to eat.”
He climbs out of bed and disappears toward the kitchen. I take twenty minutes to collect myself before wandering out to find him barefoot at the stove, sunlight pouring through the windows behind him, flipping pancakes with the same easy confidence he seems to apply to everything.
The sight stops me for a second.
Because this feels so domestic. And I want this feeling to last forever.
And forever might just be too much to hope for.
Ace glances over his shoulder and grins. "There she is."
He hands me a mug of coffee before I can even ask for one, and we plate our pancakes before carrying them outside to dine on the porch.
It’s a perfect summer morning, the air is still cool, and fog still shrouds the mountains in the distance.
The whole scene is picturesque, and I am trying very hard not to notice how easy it would be to get used to this.
I know the danger of getting used to things. Of wanting things.
After my dad got sick, everything in my life changed.
My hopes and dreams, even my education, were shuffled to the side.
Life became about working one shift at a time at the local grocery store to help cover the bills and trying my best to keep my mom from falling apart as Dad’s health deteriorated.
Somewhere along the way I stopped making plans for myself. Stopped wanting more.
It’s been two years since Dad died, and Mom’s in a good place now. She goes to a support group for widows, made some lovely friends, and traveled to Italy for the summer with a few of them. She told me it was time to get on with my life, too.
She’d hugged me tight before saying, “Consider this your eviction notice. When I get back from Italy, I expect you to have a plan for your future. The sky’s the limit for you… but you can’t stay here.”
Tears welled in my eyes. “You’re kicking me out?”
“It’s for your own good,” she’d said. “It’s time, Chrissy. Your life has been on hold for long enough.”
It’d been so long since I’d considered what I wanted that I had no idea what to do. But I couldn’t stop thinking about all those childhood summers in Mercury Ridge. My aunt and uncle retired to Florida, but Dani was still here, running the bait shop.
It was meant to be a pit stop. A summer of discovery on the lake. But did I find where I actually belong?
"What are you thinking about?” Ace asks.
"The future,” I say simply. “And what I want it to look like.”
“Chrissy—” The way he says my name makes my heart flip.
“Yeah?”
“Not to pressure you or anything… but I hope you see a future with me in it.”
I look at him. His face is open, honest, and patient. He’s not asking me for anything. He’s just telling me what he wants.
No one else seems to have a problem admitting what they want. Maybe it’s time for me to give it a try.
“I absolutely want my future to include you, Ace.”
His whole face changes—a bright, immediate grin stretching from cheek to cheek—then he reaches across and steals a piece of my pancake off my plate.
"Hey!” I protest.
"Oh,” he says innocently, popping a bite of the pancake into his mouth. “Did you see your future with more pancakes in it?”
“Yes,” I say, laughing.
“Then I’ll make you more,” he promises. “Today and every day, for as long as you want.”
“You’re impossible.”
“What else does the future hold for you, sweetheart?” Ace asks.
I ponder the question for a minute. “I’d like to go back to school. I was working on a degree in wildlife conservation. Mercury Ridge would be the perfect place for that sort of career.”
Ace smiles. “It certainly would.”
“But first,” I say, pointing my fork at him. “We have a relay race to win.”