38. Trevor
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
TREVOR
“ S traight to bed, Gem,” I say, nudging her down the hallway to her bedroom.
“Yeah, yeah. I got it.”
“Hey.” I press a kiss to Willa’s nose. She wrinkles it, but my heart skips a beat at the smile she sends me. “Give me a few minutes, and I’ll be right there.”
“You don’t have to…”
“But I want to tell you all my secrets.” I flicker my eyebrows suggestively and head back out the door.
Unpacking my truck shouldn’t take long, but I need to do something more important first. Leaning against the back hatch, I pull out my phone and open up my therapist’s scheduling app.
The first telehealth appointment available is tomorrow around lunchtime.
I should have set this up before we left Nebraska.
Hell, I should have set this up before we went to Nebraska, but I was so hopeful I wouldn’t need a preventive appointment this year. Better late than never .
It only takes twenty minutes for me to get my things inside before I’m sliding in next to Willa.
I pull her close immediately, hoping to erase the last two days.
They happened—and I need to make up for it—but now that I know she wants me to touch her, I’m not stopping for anything.
Forty-eight hours felt like a lifetime without her.
She snuggles into me, and I light up inside. “How are you feeling?”
“Bored.”
I chuckle and nip at her ear. She’s going to be insufferable on bedrest. “I meant the bleeding.”
“Oh, it’s bored too.” She jumps when I tickle her side, and says with a sigh, “It’s less than it was. Still spotting.”
“Any cramping? Nausea?”
“No, Dr. Jones.”
“Don’t get sassy. I’m just checking.” Nibbling my lip while my hand trails up and down her spine, I need to tell her everything— want to tell her everything.
I’m just worried it’ll change how she sees me.
“So…I made an appointment with my therapist for tomorrow while I was outside.” Our eyes meet, and she moves her hand to my chest, right over my pounding heart.
“I should have called her days ago when I noticed I was spiraling. And I feel really bad about?—”
“Hey.” She palms my cheek. “You’re already forgiven. Do what you need to do, but I’m ready to move past it.”
I nod, settling into her gaze. “Maya’s had to fill me in on a lot of this stuff.
I was three, so I don’t remember much about home life before we went into foster care.
But I do remember my bio dad was always yelling and hitting Mom.
Whenever he was mad and drunk, he’d home in on me, saying, ‘ This is your fault . Everything was fine until you showed up . You’re the reason we’re fucked . ’”
“Oh, Tre…” she says with misty eyes.
I glance away to get through the rest. “That’s why Maya started putting me in the closet when he got out of control.
If I was out of view, I wasn’t a problem.
The night we went into foster care, he stepped on one of my toys and lost it on me.
Threw a table lamp against the wall above my head and a shard caught me here.
” I tap the scar in my right eyebrow. “When I started dripping blood on the carpet, he came after me, yelling about it being my fault he was gonna lose the rental deposit. His eyes were almost black, like the rage blew out his pupils. I remember that part. It sobered Mom up enough that she locked me and Maya in the closet.”
“What could a literal toddler have done to him, though?”
I take a deep breath and shrug. “Even back then, he and I looked alike, and he hated it. Our parents had Maya in high school. Both of their families kicked them out. They moved to Heritage for the cheap housing. Maya said it was okay for a little while. She remembers fun and laughter until bio mom got pregnant again. I was the surprise neither of them wanted, and I guess me looking like him was a constant reminder of all his mistakes. He started drinking, lost his job, and couldn’t hang on to anything for longer than a couple months after that.
She started drinking after I was born, mostly to find common ground with him again. The rest is history.”
Willa reaches up and swipes her thumb over the scar in my eyebrow with a pained look on her face. “I hate that you had to go through any of that. You were so little.”
“I’ve mostly worked through my trauma from back then, but those key phrases have always stuck around, no matter what I do.
With everything that happened after Christmas, I let it get the best of me.
But this, us , no matter how new it is or how slow we decide to go, it’s important to me to get this right with you.
I never want you to feel like you’re anything less than perfect, exactly as you are. I don’t want to be like him.”
“You’re not.” She smiles softly.
“But I was. I have the potential to be…”
“No. You had to face a traumatic moment and shut down. We both did… But you—the man that you are—Tre, you’re nothing like him.
” Sliding her fingers around the back of my neck, she pulls me toward her.
Her kiss is soft and sure, and the one I return embodies every apology that’s been in my mind since that night.
She smiles against my lips. “I mean, you put up with me, for fuck’s sake. That has to count for something.”
“Willa,” I whisper, shaking my head. These self-deprecating comments she makes about herself being too much kill me.
She bites her lip and looks down, but I need her to truly hear me when I say this.
Tilting her chin up, I dust another kiss on her lips.
“How anyone could ever want to change a thing about you is beyond me. You’re the prototype—they broke the mold with you.
You’re timeless, a masterpiece, and I’m in awe of everything you are.
” Her eyes glisten behind fluttering lashes, but the growing smile on her face is all the reassurance I need.
“I promise you, no more yelling and no more shutting you out.”
Willa shakes her head. “No more shutting each other out. Communication always. We talk about it, even when we’re scared shitless.”
“Even then.” I smile and nuzzle her nose. “Especially then.”
“Then I should tell you something.” Willa’s eyes widen, and I swear her heart beats straight through all the layers of clothes between us so I feel it against my skin. “I’m scared of what you mean to me, Tre.”
The pounding in my chest matches hers. Our entire journey has been a whirlwind thus far, but we’re about to go the deepest we’ve ever gone with each other. “And what do I mean to you, Gem?”
“…Everything,” she whispers. Her eyes stay fixed on mine as she shows me the full range of her fear. It’s raw and breathtaking, seeping into my chest. A privilege I swear to never take for granted.
“You mean everything to me too, Willa. Everything.”
With slow kisses, she brands me as if she’s my first and my last. Everyone before her is irrelevant. She’s the only one who matters. I urge the message forward, my heart to hers, and her kiss answers the quiet call, laying claim on the secluded places inside my heart.