Chapter Fifty-Three
T ender and sweet, he simply held me.
“Twelve,” he whispered.
I had no words for how loved he made me feel. I didn’t take offense at the fact that I was the twelfth woman he’d been with, or how his mind worked. He wasn’t comparing me to a number. He wasn’t comparing me to anyone. He was being Preston, and I loved the way he was. He wasn’t just a war-hardened Marine who fucked like a god. He wasn’t a broken man. He was a warrior who’d survived more battles than ten men combined. The fact that despite everything, he still made room in his life for love made me feel even more honored to be on the receiving end of it.
I was lucky.
But I still had questions and my mind was swirling, so I asked.
“Your house. That’s a multimillion-dollar estate.” I’d been way off when I’d said a million when I’d first walked in. I’d googled the address during the movie Nash and I went to and about fell out of my chair. “How did you afford it?”
Direct, no emotion, he answered. “I’ve made and I have millions.”
Jesus fuck . “How?” Did I really want to know?
“Gambling.”
Shocked, I pulled back enough to look up at him. “Like what, the casino? You can’t make that much at the Seminole casino.” Could he?
“Not Fort Lauderdale,” he corrected. “Vegas.”
Christ. “Vegas.” I shouldn’t have been surprised.
“First Reno,” he amended. “For practice. Then Vegas, then Monte Carlo. I eventually got kicked out of all three places for counting cards. But not before I’d made and surpassed my monetary goal.”
“Which was?” I dared to ask.
“Initially, twenty million.”
Holy fucking shit . Mouth open, I stared at him. When I recovered, my voice came out high pitched. “But you made more?”
“Yes. I was playing blackjack, but then I added in betting on horse racing. That was easy money.”
I couldn’t even comprehend this. “Are you still gambling?” Because shit, I couldn’t go down that road. I couldn’t bring something that irresponsible into the mix with Nash.
“No. It served its purpose.”
Relieved, I laughed uncomfortably. “Quit when you’re ahead.”
“Precisely.”
Twenty million. Jesus . “Anything else I should know about?”
Not answering my question, he traced the only ink I had on my body. “Why did you get a tattoo of a daisy?”
Inhaling, I bargained. “I’ll tell you why if you tell me how you knew I had the ink.”
His finger swirled over my hip. “Five years ago, I saw you with Nash at the beach. White bikini, cut-offs, your hair was up. You took your shorts off after you spread the towel out.”
It made my heart hurt to think about how I’d told him daisies weren’t my favorite flower. “Why didn’t you come say hi?”
Without any preamble, he told me the hard truth. “I was angry he wasn’t mine.”
I filled my lungs with air before I asked the question I had to ask. “Are you still angry?”
He didn’t hesitate. “No.”
Relief eased the tension from my muscles. “Thank you.”
“I didn’t do anything.”
He’d done everything. “I’m sorry I told you I didn’t like daisies.”
“You didn’t say you didn’t like them, you said they weren’t your favorite flower. Why?”
I looked out the high window over our heads. The night sky was slowly lightening to dawn. I didn’t know how he would react to the truth, especially considering the ink on his body. “When Nash was one, I took him to the botanical gardens. It was a difficult time in my life, in both our lives. He was old enough to start talking, other kids his age had been speaking, but he wasn’t even attempting to make sounds. I knew he was deaf. I’d been doing my best to teach him ASL but it was slow going and it hadn’t clicked for him yet, and all I selfishly wanted was to hear my son call me Mommy.”
Cupping my face, Preston swiped at a tear I hadn’t realized had fallen.
Laughing uncomfortably, I tried to wave him off. “I’m fine. I’m just being… sentimental.”
He didn’t let go of me. “Tell me the rest.”
Taking a deep breath, I let it out slow. “I spent that day signing to him, over and over, the names of the flowers. I was being ridiculous. He was one. But I just… I wanted….” Shame flushed my skin and my voice dropped to a whisper. “I just wanted a normal kid. For one day, I wanted a child I could tell the names of the stupid fucking flowers to.” More tears slid down my face.
Preston gently brushed his thumb over my cheek, but he didn’t judge me. He didn’t even give me any useless, bullshit words aimed at easing my conscience.
So I told him the rest. “Nash was such a good baby. Angel good. He never fussed or seemed to lose his patience at not being able to hear. He was curious in his own way and, minus the lack of communication between us as we both learned ASL, he was perfect. Except that day in the damn botanical garden, I was an overwhelmed single parent and I wasn’t seeing the gift I’d been given. After signing what felt like a hundred damn flower names, we were in front of some daisies and I lost it. I grabbed one of the flowers by the stem, looked at my deaf son and I raised my fucking voice and said, “It’s a goddamn daisy. A fucking white daisy!”
“He didn’t even flinch.” I laughed without humor. “I mean, why would he? He’s deaf. Anyway, I pulled my shit together, plopped him back in the stroller and pushed him back to the car as people stared at me. I put him in his car seat, got behind the wheel and cried the whole damn way as I drove us home. It wasn’t until I was taking him out of his car seat that he looked up at me and held his tiny-as-shit hand out.” My voice broke. “Scrunched up in his little fist was a daisy. He’d picked it without me seeing him do it, and his little one-year-old self was holding that flower out to me like it was made of pure gold.” I laughed through a sob. “I didn’t even like daisies. I liked the roses. But that day I fell in love with a stupid flower that doesn’t even smell good.” I looked up at Preston. “And I realized I’d been given the best fucking gift in the world. A week later, I had a white daisy tattoo.”