Chapter 12
I was out of my Jeep walking up to Brooklyn’s house when the door swung open and Brooklyn appeared on the stoop.
“Mayday. Mayday. We have a problem,” Brooklyn said then disappeared into the house.
I jogged the rest of the way up the walk, jumped the three steps leading to the porch, and rushed into the house. My hand went to my hip as my eyes scanned the room and took in the mess, then my eyes landed on Remy, smiling.
Smiling.
What the fuck?
“Momma’s in there.” Remy pointed to the hall.
I stood frozen, staring at my boy, and my heart pinched.
Never in my life had I ever wanted to touch another person the way I wanted to scoop my boy up and hug him. I had four years and a handful of months to make up for. And fuck, but I wanted to start right that very second.
“Remington!” Brooklyn shouted and Remy took off.
I followed, taking in the state of Brooklyn’s living room.
Total disaster. Remy’s toys were strewn from one side of the living room to the other.
Jesus. How was it possible for one little human to make that much of a mess in less than three hours?
The second thing I noticed was that there were towels all over the floor leading down a short hallway.
Wet towels.
Fuck.
“Baby, get Momma some more towels,” Brooklyn requested.
Remy rushed past me just as I stepped into a small bathroom. Brooklyn was on the floor, on her right hip, half her body under the sink, and water was pouring out of the cabinet onto the already-soaked towel.
“Sugar, come out of there and let me—”
The rest of my instructions were cut off by a very loud, very high-pitched squeal.
Brooklyn sputtered and covered her face as water shot out of the broken pipe.
Soaked from head to toe, water now cascading, I moved quickly. I bent, hefted Brooklyn to her feet, scooted her out of the way, then got to my knees.
Cold water blasted me in the face as I shoved my shoulders under the sink and felt around for the shutoff valve. My wet hand hit the regulator and turned it. Once I didn’t have water blasting me in the face I spotted a screwdriver and a pair of pliers.
“How did you do that?” Brooklyn asked.
I slid out and snagged the tools and held them up.
“What are these for?”
“Here.” Remy came back into the small bathroom with an armful of folded towels and skidded to a halt. “You fixed it.”
I took in my boy’s wide-eyed wonder and I blinked. Then I thanked God I was already on my ass because I was having trouble finding my breath.
Dark brown eyes clashed with dark brown eyes.
Father and son.
My son.
Jesus Christ.
Without meaning to I lifted my hand and rubbed the area around my heart.
Remy dropped the towels then dropped to his knees and asked, “Will you show me?”
“Show you what, bud?”
“How you fixed it.”
With a great deal of effort, I tore my gaze from Remy and looked up at Brooklyn. When I did I found her staring at us with a ghost of a smile on her lips and for some reason that felt really fucking good.
“Babe?” I held the tools out. “A screwdriver?”
Her lips curved up to a full-fledged smile and she shook her head. “What? Everything can be fixed with a screwdriver.”
“And the pliers?”
“Just in case the screwdriver didn’t work.”
“Right.” I chuckled. “C’mere, bud.” I waited until Remy scooted closer. Then I waited another second to revel in my boy’s nearness. After I was done but before I got the ache in my chest to subside I pointed to the back of the cabinet. “See those two knobs back there?”
“The plastic ones?” Remy asked and pushed closer.
Three deep inhales later I nodded and continued, “Those turn the water off.”
Brooklyn was lucky and the break was below the turn-off valve or I would be at the curb turning off the main line.
“That’s it?”
Remington sounded disappointed and I couldn’t help my smile.
“Nope. That just stopped the water. Now we hafta crawl back in there and replace the pipe. But first, we need to clean up this mess and I need to go to the store.”
“Can I go to the store with you?”
Jesus fuck, I wanted that almost as badly as I wanted to pull the boy into my arms and hug him for the first time. But reality crashed in quickly. I was not in charge, Brooklyn was.
“That’s up to your momma after we clean up this mess.”
Remy’s face scrunched and he looked around the towel-covered floor. My gaze followed and something struck me.
“This is a lot of water. How long was this leaking?”
“A few days.”
“A few days?”
Brooklyn sighed.
“It was just a trickle. So I had a bowl under there to catch the water. Today when I got home, I dumped the bowl like I always do then went about my business. Remy came back to go to the bathroom and the hall had water in it.”
I was stuck back on the part where her pipe had been leaking water for a few days.
It pissed me off badly that she and Remy lived alone and she was dumping buckets of water out for two days.
How many other times in the last five years had Brooklyn had to go it alone?
How many other things around her house had broken that she didn’t know how to fix?
My guess was a lot and that pissed me off, too.
I should’ve been there to take care of them.
I tamped down the irrational anger and asked, “Do you own or rent?”
“Rent. I called my landlord and he’s sending someone out to look at it. And just to say, if I knew about the knobs under there I would’ve turned off the water. And now that I know, I feel pretty stupid.”
“Can’t feel stupid about something you didn’t know about. We’ll mop up this water and I’ll run to the store, get a new pipe, and fix it. You can call your landlord and tell him he doesn’t need to send someone out.”
“You don’t have to.”
Yes, I did.
“There another bathroom?”
Brooklyn rubbed her lips together and an inappropriate thought rushed front and center.
Me on my back, Brooklyn naked on top of me, her lips wet from our kiss, and Brooklyn rubbing them together.
She’d done that a lot when she was thinking about something.
The night we’d shared, the wall she’d put up as soon as we’d walked into my room, I hadn’t asked her what she was thinking.
Now, I didn’t want walls, I didn’t want secrets between us, I didn’t want her holding back.
“What’s on your mind, Sugar?”
Brooklyn’s eyes snapped to mine and I was lost in a sea of blue. So beautiful for a moment I wished Remington had inherited her eyes. A new thought flashed and I hoped we’d give Remy brothers and sisters.
I waited for my brain to kick in and remind me I was insane but no such thoughts arose. No panic, no hesitation, no remorse.
“This is the only bathroom,” she told me.
“And?”
“And I rent. I don’t want you wasting money fixing—”
“It’ll cost ten bucks and you can give the receipt to your landlord.”
A tiny hand landed on my forearm and I sucked in a breath at the contact.
“Can I go with you?” Remy asked again.
Brooklyn’s gaze darted from me to Remy and that was when I saw it. She wasn’t thinking about the bathroom situation, the pipe, or the cost of a six-inch PVC pipe and fitting.
“Hey, bud? Can you do me a favor and start soaking up some of this water in the hallway? Can’t go to the store until the floor’s dry.”
Remy hesitated a moment before he pulled his hand back. I however felt no hesitation when I lost my son’s touch—the pain of loss was immediate. I waited until Remy jumped to his feet and dashed out the door before I stood and faced Brooklyn.
“What’s wrong, Sugar?”
“Nothing.”
I stepped closer. My hand went to her hip and I gave her a squeeze. I released the pressure but didn’t let go.
“Easy to read, remember?” I prompted.
“Nothing’s wrong. Just watching you two together and hearing Remy ask if he can go with you to the store made me think about all he’s missed, but at the same time I’m happy he hasn’t missed the big stuff.”
Fuck, that felt good.
“Big stuff?”
“He can ride a bike; he missed you teaching him that. But that was something I could handle. He wants to learn how to ride a dirt bike, something Michael’s been wanting to teach him and I’ve been dragging my feet.
He can throw a baseball but not well because I’m not big into sports.
He’s never picked up a football. He loves to draw and do puzzles and put together Legos—I can cover those things but there’s so much I can’t teach him and I was dreading him getting older and needing a dad and not having you that I felt guilty for all the ways I was going to fail him. ”
Brooklyn stopped, inhaled a deep breath, and settled her hand on top of mine before she finished.
“So seeing him next to you asking you how to fix a sink—which obviously I have no idea how to fix—I was thinking how good it felt knowing you were here to give Remington all the things you can give him. Things that I can’t. ”
No, that didn’t feel good—that felt fucking great. So great, I couldn’t vocalize how phenomenal it felt knowing that while I’d missed a lot I wouldn’t be missing any more. Not another day, hour, or second.
“You good with me teaching him how to ride a dirt bike?”
Brooklyn frowned and pinched her lips.
“I’ll take that as a no.”
“He’s four,” she noted.
“Your call.”
Brooklyn heaved a sigh and for once I couldn’t read her. Which was unfortunate because that meant I was unprepared for her to rock my world.
“Our call. Mine and yours.”
“Sugar—”
“I was dragging my feet coming up with excuses to put Michael off. My dad taught me how to ride. I remember every moment of it.”
I didn’t understand—if Brooklyn knew how to ride a dirt bike why hadn’t she taught Remy?
“Not tracking. Why didn’t you take Remy out?”
“I’ve never taken him to a movie at a movie theater. I’ve never taken him to Silverwood. I’ve never taken him out on the lake,” she weirdly admitted.
“Baby, you say that like you’ve committed a mortal sin.”
Brooklyn’s head tipped back and with her eyes brimming with tears she whispered, “I was waiting for you.”
Un-fucking-done.
My lungs seized and my body locked.
The atmosphere in the small bathroom charged when two words rasped from my throat.
“Come again?”
“I was waiting for you,” she repeated. “Family memories. Stuff that I didn’t want to do on my own with Remy. It was selfish not giving him—”
I didn’t give her a chance to finish. Unpolite and unyielding, I slammed my mouth down onto hers. Brooklyn gasped, and not being the sort of man who missed an opportunity, my tongue pushed past her lips.
Good Goddamn.
Little feet pounded down the hall, ending a kiss that wasn’t just a kiss but a welcome home. A glide of tongues. A sample of what was to come. The best thing I’d tasted in five fucking years.
“Done!”
Much to my shock, Brooklyn didn’t jump away when Remy appeared in the doorway. She did back out of my embrace to take the sopping towels out of her son’s hands.
“Thank you for helping.” Then without missing a beat she smiled at Remy and continued. “If you want to go to the store, you need to change your clothes. You’re all wet.”
“Be back,” Remy whooped. “Don’t leave without me.”
“You’re wet, too.”
The only thing that held back my retort was the pink that tinged Brooklyn’s cheeks telling me she was thinking exactly what I was thinking and for now, that’d have to do.
“That I am,” I agreed with a wink.
“I’m gonna…I’ll just…” she stuttered and I smiled.
“Sugar?”
“Yeah?”
“Thank you.”
“I didn’t—”
“For thinking of me all these years. For giving me a chance—us a chance. And just so you know, you wantin’ for our boy to have family memories doesn’t make you selfish.
It makes you a good mom. So mostly I’m thanking you for giving that to my boy.
And when the time’s right we’re gonna start making those memories. ”
“I’m ready.”
I paused to take her in. Whatever brought us back together—fate, the stars, the universe, I was grateful as fuck.
One step at a time, I reminded myself.
One. Damn. Step.
I wanted to charge ahead.
“We’ll give it a week, then we’ll introduce sleepovers.” When Brooklyn didn’t protest I went on. “We’ll start by going up to the cabin. Neutral territory for him.”
“Okay.”
Thank fuck.
“Before that, you need me to leave after dinner so you can get him to bed, I’ll leave and come back after he’s asleep. I want all the time I can get with Remy. But that doesn’t mean I don’t want alone time with you.”
“His bedtime’s eight and he knocks out fast.”
She was onboard.
Thank fuck.
“Go check on Remy, Sugar, so we can get to the store and get back.”
Brooklyn didn’t move—she stared.
And the longer she held my gaze the tighter the area around my heart constricted. One of her hands went to my chest, the other landed on my shoulder. Then she rolled up onto her toes and kissed me. After that, she dashed out of the bathroom leaving me in a daze.
Stunned stupid, I didn’t move.
From a brush of her lips.
Brooklyn Saunders wasn’t going to be the one that got away. She was the one I was going to keep.