Chapter 34
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
JO
“Okay, for sure you have, like, a steel stomach.” Noah groans as we all make our way out of Quincy Market, where we’ve spent the last two hours eating everything from clam chowder to lobster rolls to Boston cream pie and a bag of the best gummy candy I’ve ever had.
I glance over at his slightly green complexion and grin. “I do. But also, Jordan and I have been training for this moment, like, all summer long.”
Jordan smiles and swings his arm around my shoulders. I get a whiff of his scent and practically go weak in the knees. With his perfectly fitting blue T-shirt showing off forearms that make my mouth go dry and aviator sunglasses covering his eyes, he is the poster boy for hot . I have the sudden urge to drop to my knees right here and worship him, tourists be damned.
“She’s right. The J’s Summer of Fun was basically a crash course in eating lots of food in weird combinations and living to tell the tale.”
“What’s the J’s Summer of Fun?” asks Elliot.
I grin at him, sliding my arm around Jordan’s waist. “It’s my name for this summer where I make Jordan do crazy shit and he humors me because he likes me.”
“Can’t say no to my girl,” Jordan says, leaning down and kissing the top of my head.
“Sexy, crazy things?” Noah asks, giving me a salacious wink that has me throwing my head back and laughing. I love Jordan’s brothers so freaking much.
Cooper puts a hand over Noah’s face and shoves. “Can you ever be serious about anything?”
I link my free arm through Cooper’s. “Give him a break, Coop. I never had brothers. This is fun.”
I have a quick moment of panic, wondering if it’s weird that I basically just claimed Jordan’s brothers as my own, but when I glance at Jordan, he’s smiling down at me, giving me a look that has my stomach swooping. One that holds the same kinds of feelings I have for him. The feelings I hope eventually he’ll give me in words.
There is so much in me for him. I love him in the forever, always, only you kind of way. But for the first time in my life, I’m not letting loose every thought in my head. I hope he feels those things for me. Or that he will one day. But he’s been through so much, and this thing between us has grown so fast. I need him to give me the words first. To tell me he’s ready for this. For what it could be.
I give Noah a wink. “So many sexy things,” I say in a staged whisper.
“Hurricane…” Jordan groans. “Don’t say sexy things in front of my brothers.”
I grin, leaning up to press a kiss to Jordan’s jaw as we walk through the busy Sunday crowds towards Boston Harbor. “But you’re so good at the sexy things. Everyone should know. That kind of skill deserves a parade, J.”
Elliot snickers as Jordan groans again. “Jo Jo, please never leave. You’re the most fun we’ve ever had. You should both move to Boston, then we could all rib Jordan together.”
I smile at him, trying to hide the little glow his words give me. I love it here so much. I love the city of Boston—its energy and history and charm, and its magic. I love Jordan’s parents and his brothers, and I love being here in his world. But most of all, I love how Jordan is in Boston, surrounded by his family. He’s lighter. Freer. It feels like the place he’s supposed to be.
We’ve only been here for the weekend, but I can already see how it would be for us to be here together. To make a life here. I know it’s too soon for any of that, but I am who I am, and I’ve never pretended to have a patient bone in my body.
I glance over at Jordan to see what he thinks about what Elliot said, but he’s unusually quiet. His eyes are fixed on the Boston Harbor, taking in the view, as he slides his hand up to cup the back of my neck, his thumb drawing slow circles that have goosebumps rising on my skin despite the summer heat.
We all stop at the fence along the water, and I turn to Elliot, stepping in front of Jordan, who immediately wraps his arms around me from behind. “I don’t know, El. Boston’s okay, but have you ever seen the view from Mount Washington? Or done a food tour of the Strip District? Pittsburgh isn't an easy city to leave. Not to mention my job that I super love.”
Jordan stiffens a little, and his arms tighten around me. I glance up at him and see his jaw clenched, but when our eyes meet, he gives me a soft smile and bends down to kiss my neck. My heart takes flight, and before I can stop it, my traitorous brain spins a tale about how Jordan doesn’t like the idea of me being back in Pittsburgh where he isn’t.
I don’t mention that I have an opportunity to do the job I love in a way that would let me live anywhere I want or that all I really want is to be wherever Jordan is. I’m keeping that to myself for now, until I know he’s ready to be wherever I am too.
“Pfft.” Elliot waves all that away. “Boston is the best city in the world. Everyone knows that.”
“Sure is,” I hear Jordan say quietly behind me, leaning his cheek against my head.
“Okay, friends,” Noah says, pushing away from the fence. “I’ve gotta go. I’m on call tonight, and I have to get to the hospital.”
“Will we see you before we leave?” I ask, pulling away from Jordan to hug his brother.
“I wish. I’m on for twenty-four.” Noah wraps his arms around me in a tight hug. “Come back, okay?” he whispers into my ear. “You make him happy, and he hasn’t been happy in so long. And say hi to Hannah for me.”
I smile, filled with affection for all of these men who love each other so much. “Couldn’t keep me away. From here or from him,” I whisper back. “And I’ll say hi to Hannah, but you know she has a pretty serious boyfriend, right?”
“For now,” Noah mutters, and I wonder what that’s all about but don’t have time to think about it before Jordan pulls Noah back.
“Dude, that’s a long enough hug.”
When I turn, Jordan is smirking at his brother. I step into Jordan, who immediately wraps his arms back around me. “Don’t worry, J,” I say, patting his arm. “You’re the only Wyles brother who gets me going.”
“Fucking right I am,” he mutters, while the rest of his brothers laugh.
Noah throws his arms around Jordan, so I’m squeezed in between them. “Love you, brother.”
“Love you back,” Jordan says, his voice laced with emotion.
“I’ll head home with you,” Cooper says. “I have some work to do before tomorrow.” Cooper is an associate at a big law firm in Boston, and from what Jordan has told me, he works almost nonstop. “Jo Jo, you were definitely right about the gummy peach/gummy coke bottle combo. It’s my new favorite.”
“It changed your life, right?”
He wraps me in a tight hug. “Sure did. You officially have the best taste in candy ever.”
“That’s the best compliment you could ever give me.”
“I’m heading out too.” Elliot leans in to hug both of us, and then I step aside and watch as all four brothers wrap their arms around each other in a four-way hug. Tears prick my eyes as Elliot grips the back of Jordan’s neck and squeezes. The emotion from their hug and the way they love each other is palpable. It’s so clear to me how much the four of them need each other, that this is where Jordan belongs. I hope he sees it. And I hope, maybe, he wants me to be here with him too.
It's a lot to hope for, but I’ve always been an optimistic sort of person.
When they break apart, we all exchange one more hug before they turn to leave.
“Hey, Elliot?” I call, and he turns back to me. “Keep looking for the girl from the plane. You never know what might happen.”
He flashes me a grin and glances from me to Jordan. “You sure don’t.” Then he turns and heads off with Noah and Cooper.
“Where do they all live?” I ask Jordan as we watch them go. They all stayed at their parents’ house for the weekend, so I have no idea where they call home.
Jordan kisses the top of my head and turns us back to the Harbor so we stand together, looking out at the water. “If you can believe it, they all live in the same building in Back Bay.”
I grin, leaning my head on Jordan’s shoulder. “That sounds like so much fun.”
“It really does,” he says, a wistful note in his voice. He turns me around to face him, leaning down to give me a soft kiss, smiling against my lips. “Is there anything else you want to do before we head back to New York tonight?”
I reach my hands up, sifting my fingers through Jordan’s messy brown hair, and I meet his eyes, the water of the Harbor turning his irises cobalt. “I want to know what your favorite place in Boston is. Can you take me there?”
Jordan smiles, gripping my hips and pulling me closer to him, kissing me again. My blood zings at the feel of his lips on mine, and I wonder if kissing him will ever feel habitual.
I hope not. Jordan Wyles lights every part of me right up.
“I know just the place,” he says when we break apart. “Do you mind a bit of a walk?”
I lace our fingers together, swinging our joined hands between us. “With you? Literally never.”
* * *
“Oh, my god,” I squeal, bouncing on the toes of my Converse as I take in the nine bronze duck statues lined up on the cobblestones in the Boston Commons. “This is AMAZING.”
Jordan grins at me. “You know, Make Way for Ducklings ?”
“Are you kidding me?” I crouch down and run my hand over the smooth back of the biggest duck. “It’s only my favorite children’s book ever. I mean, Mrs. Mallard walking with ‘ an extra swing in her waddle ?’ Come on. That’s iconic behavior.”
Jordan crouches next to me on the cobblestones, so we’re shoulder to shoulder. He presses a kiss to my temple and tugs me so I’m sitting between his legs, facing the statues, my back to his front. It’s starting to get dark out, and the air is heavy with an impending thunderstorm that seems to be chasing the tourists away. The Boston Public Garden is unusually empty for a summer evening. “When we were kids, my mom used to bring each of us into the city for a special day every few months. We went out to lunch and got to pick all the activities. When it was my turn, I always wanted to end the day here.”
I smile and turn sideways, tossing both my legs over one of Jordan’s so I can see his face. I hand him a Fireball and ask, “Why here?”
Jordan pops the Fireball in his mouth and props his chin on my shoulder. Wrapping one arm around my waist, and the other hand holds his phone in front of my face with a picture of Dippy on the screen, the scarf covered in ducks.
I giggle, leaning a shoulder against him as he wraps his other arm around me. I can feel him smile into my hair, and that turns everything inside me gooey. “How did you know we would end up here?”
“I took an extra picture just in case we did because I really wanted to bring you here. This is my favorite place. I loved the book. I thought it was so cool that I could recognize Boston in the illustrations and that I could come here, and it was like looking at the pages of the book. Those ducks were looking for a home, and I liked that they made it here in the Boston Public Garden. I think I knew, even as a kid, that Boston was the only place that would ever truly feel like home to me.”
The hint of longing in his voice from before when we were standing by the Harbor is now full-blown yearning. I turn and brush my fingers along Jordan’s forehead, pushing back the hair that’s falling over his face. “You miss it.”
Jordan takes in a shaky breath and lets it out, glancing around the Commons. “So fucking much. I didn’t realize how much until I came back. I stayed away for so long, made a home in Pittsburgh, and then ran away and hid in New York when my life fell apart. I needed to do both of those things. But it’s like now that I’m here, everything in this city is pulling me back towards it. This is my favorite place.”
A little curl of anxiety snakes through me, like I can already sense that this is what is going to tug us away from each other, at least physically. But Jordan has lost so much, and I love him too much to make this about me. I lay my hand on his cheek, brushing my thumb over his cheekbone, looking into his beautiful face. “Have you considered coming back here? For good?”
Slowly, Jordan nods. “It’s not something I thought about until the last couple of weeks, and when I did, it was more in the abstract, I hate my job operating on adults kind of way. But it’s like the second we pulled up at my parents’ house the other day, a missing part of me clicked into place. Boston is home for me. Would you ever…” He breaks off and swallows hard, locking eyes with me and trying again. “Could you ever see yourself here?”
My heart takes flight as we stare at each other, falling silent as the air around us crackles with electricity and an unnamable something that feels both new and like a tale as old as time. Jordan’s eyes are intense, and my heart beats out the simple words that mean everything.
I love you.
I love you.
I love you.
I have lived out loud all my life, and keeping this feeling to myself is the most counter-intuitive thing I have ever done. But I know in my gut that it can’t come from me first. Jordan needs to be the one to take the step. To be the first one to say the words that mean future and family and forever. I want all those things with him more than I want to take my next breath. But he has to want it too, and I won’t push him into something he’s not ready for.
I love him too much for that too.
Jordan’s hand comes to my face, gaze steady on mine. His eyes blaze with emotion and it’s like I can see everything I feel for him mirrored in those gorgeous blues.
“Jo,” he whispers, and my name sounds like a prayer on his lips. “I…” He pauses, and my heart gallops. “I’m crazy about you, Hurricane.”
I force my face not to fall as my insides do. I know I can’t rush this. Not if I want us to have a chance at something real. A chance at forever. I shove down my instinct to blurt out all my deepest feelings, to smother him with all the love I feel for him. All the love he deserves.
“I’m crazy about you too, J. And if Boston is where you want to be, then this is where you should be. You should be in the place that makes you the happiest. You deserve to be so, so happy, Jordan. The happiest person in the world.”
“You make me happy, Jo. I can’t be the happiest person in the world if I don’t have you. You’re mine.”
His voice catches a little on the word mine, and I turn completely so we’re facing each other, cupping his face in my hands. “You have me, Jordan. You were mine the first night we went stargazing, and you told me I got all the constellations wrong, and you’re mine now.”
Jordan takes a deep breath in through his nose and lets it out slowly. “But what happens in a couple weeks when summer is over?”
I give him a small smile, thinking of the work opportunity I have. The one that would let me work from anywhere. The one I hope I can do one day from wherever he is. “I have a job to get back to in Pittsburgh, and I have a feeling there’s a condo in a Back Bay building full of brothers calling your name. There are video calls and visits and maybe even old-fashioned letters because I love myself a stationary store.”
Jordan smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. My stomach clenches, but I know this is what has to happen if we have a chance at something real. All I want is to be wherever he is, but he needs to decide where he wants to be first.
And it may be stupid, but I need the words.
“I’m not going anywhere. I’m yours. Long distance sucks, but it’s workable. Decide what you want your next step to be, and then we can figure out all the details.”
I hope the details involve him professing his undying love to me and me moving here to Boston to be with him and his big, wild, crazy family because I love it here, and I love them already too. But Jordan has to be settled first. He has to be ready, and he has to be sure. If I follow him here now, we won’t have a chance. The fact that Jordan nods in agreement, eyes blazing as he wraps his arms around me and holds me tightly against him, makes me sure of it.
Thunder rumbles in the distance and lightning flashes, but neither of us moves. And then the sky opens up, and rain comes pouring down, soaking us both. Tipping my face up, I laugh because this is a sign if I ever saw one. If we’re going to be separated in a few weeks for who even knows how long, I’m going to grab hold of all the time we have left with every single optimistic bone in my body. Starting right freaking now. I jump up, holding out my hand to Jordan, who takes it and stands.
“What’s so funny, Hurricane?” Jordan asks, raising his voice over the pounding of the rain. He wraps his arms around my waist, his mouth tipping up in a smile. He looks so gorgeous with rain dripping down his face, wet hair fanning over his forehead.
I wind my arms around his neck and stand on my toes. “We’re basically in a rom-com right now. You have no choice but to kiss me.”
Jordan brings a hand up to my face, grazing my cheek with his fingers as he pushes my wet hair behind my ears, his eyes swirling with emotion. “Oh, yeah?”
I shrug. “Those are the rules.”
Jordan smiles, leaning down until his lips graze mine. “I’ve always been a rule follower,” he murmurs before covering my mouth with his in a hot, wet kiss full of passion and longing and promises we can’t make in words. Our tongues tangle in a sensual dance as we press closer to each other. I whimper. He groans. Words like mine and yours and forever and only you swirl around us like wind in the summer storm.
And as the rain pours down over us and we kiss like the world is ending, I send up a prayer to the universe that one day, this city won’t just be his. It will be ours. Together.
And we’ll say all those words out loud.