Chapter 25
[Tate]
Warning flags billow around Neve. She pulled out of my arms a second time, but I curl my arm around her shoulders. She’s stiff underneath my touch, but I’m afraid to let her go. Once we reach the designated axe-throwing competition, I’m afraid, she’ll disappear.
The shock of seeing Jake and Lisa certainly has me ruffled.
I truly am over the engagement between Jake and Lisa, like I said. Lisa and I were a long time ago, and our breakup was never as simple as her falling in love with my brother. We wanted different things. We weren’t on the same page. Lisa and Jake are better suited for each other.
Their engagement, announced last Christmas, only threw me into a tailspin because of the idea of them. The idea that I’d been the one who wanted to get married while Jake never did, and yet here he was looking for wedding venues in a state Lisa hated to visit.
I’m guessing Dad had a say in the wedding direction. Lovewell Landing is his birthright after all.
Anyway, I didn’t care about Lisa and Jake as a couple. I care about Jake. I love my brother. We are opposites, but we are also close. I don’t hold any grudges against him, and I told him about Neve and the pregnancy, so he didn’t need to act so surprised.
Then again, I hadn’t had the best initial reaction either when I first saw Neve with that rounded belly.
How long has it been? Only a few weeks ago, and now her due date is almost here. Twelve days, but it’s not like I’m counting down or anything.
With another kiss to her head, I say, “Wait for me.” We need to talk, like I said, but the looks Fisk and Landon are giving me say get your ass over here.
The day is growing warm, and I tug off my sleeveless flannel and tuck it in the back of my waistband. I spread my arms wide, then wrap them around my chest to loosen them up. I haven’t tossed an axe in ages.
I glance over at Neve, confirming she’s still nearby, and catch her eyes fully checking me out. Just to tease her, I run my hand down my chest to my belt and watch as her gaze dips.
I want this woman so bad that it aches inside me.
And it isn’t just the pregnancy. It’s the way she looks at me.
The way she makes me feel. I’m like the monster in Frankenstein brought to life.
My skin crackles and my heart races, and I just want to spend all my time with her.
To laugh with her. Make meals with her. Hang out with her.
We should be spending time together, not me here participating in this lumberjack festival, and yet, isn’t that exactly how I envisioned couplehood happening? I’d be involved with a woman who did things with me. Fun things. Complicated things. A woman who supported me. Stood by me.
As I want to stand by Neve.
“You’re up first,” Landon says, handing over an axe.
I glance back at Neve and wink. She smiles, slowly, tightly.
Doesn’t she get it? I’m in love with her. Not like I thought I was in love with Lisa. This is different. Like a seasonal shift. Like the leaves brightly changing and the temperature dipping.
Neve feels like . . . home.
And yet, there’s still something holding me back from professing my feelings to her.
I toss the first axe, watching it flip through the air then hit the board. A valiant effort, but I’ve missed the designated mark. The moment feels prophetic.
Because before I can tell Neve how I feel about her, I need to come clean about one more thing. Guilt crawls over my skin, like a spider inching up my arm, causing my entire body to shiver. I’m never going to hit the mark with Neve until I’m completely honest with her.
I toss again, the axe landing within the circle drawn on the board, like another prophecy. Like I’m in the right hemisphere, but I’m never going to hit the core, get to the heart of Neve, if I keep withholding something from her.
I need to put all my chips in, lay it all on the line, and just confess the truth to Neve, then tell her how I feel. It might hurt her. It might even scare her. But I’m hopeful she’ll forgive me once she knows everything.
I throw the final axe, and it nails the center, as if confirming that honesty is the right path to Neve’s heart.
After my cousins and I complete the final competition—log-rolling—I’m done, because I’m soaked. I didn’t have a prayer of sticking on that log, especially as my head wasn’t in the dance necessary to stay afloat on a tree trunk bobbing in the lake.
My jeans are waterlogged. My flannel shirt is not worth wearing.
“Come home with me,” I ask Neve, knowing she arrived with her sisters, but lost both of them throughout the course of the day.
I’m getting the idea that Isolde wants to avoid Landon at all costs. Lumi ducked out earlier, after a final check on Neve.
Jake and Lisa fell into the crowd somewhere, although Jake sent me a text that he wanted to meet tomorrow morning for breakfast. Thankfully, he didn’t ask to stay at the house.
“Okay.” Hesitation fills Neve’s voice. She’s been off-kilter ever since Jake and Lisa arrived.
I wrap my arm around her shoulder until she pushes at my side, reminding me I’m soaked.
“You’re all wet.”
There are so many comebacks I could make, but instead, I intend to act them out.
When we get to the house, I tell her I need a quick shower. “Just to get the lake off me. Be back in ten. Make yourself at home.”
I want her to feel comfortable in my house, because I’d like this house to become her home. She looks good here. She looks right.
I’m back downstairs in eight minutes, finding Neve on the back porch, watching the sky creep from bright blue to streams of violet and orange.
I hold out my hand as she sits on the swing. “Come with me.”
She gazes up at me with those eyes, full of trust conflicted with fear, and then gently sets her hand in mine.
I lead her through the living room to a door beside the fireplace.
Once inside, Neve gasps. “You have a game room.”
“No cottage would be complete without one.” The dark green interior is a sharp contrast to the rest of the décor in the house.
The plush, plaid carpet blends with the wall color.
A poker table stands in the corner. A bar cart beside it.
One wall is a giant bookcase, full of books, but also puzzles and games.
The final wall has a dartboard, complete with a chalkboard beside it for scorekeeping.
“Cottage,” Neve scoffs, running her fingers along the leather back of a chair pushed against the poker table. She glances from shelf to shelf, quietly reading off game titles.
Then she looks at the dartboard.
“You didn’t get to throw something earlier,” I say, having no doubt Neve could have thrown an axe and won the tournament had she not been so pregnant. “Still want to throw something?” I arch a brow, then cross the room for two sets of darts. “Let’s play a game.”
I hand her three darts and keep three for myself. “Here are the rules.”
She gives me a skeptical look, like she knows the rules for darts.
“Every time you get a dart in the circle, doesn’t matter which one, you get to request the other person remove an article of clothing.”
Neve stiffens but her hand drifts slowly, almost absently, over her stomach. She bites her lower lip, eyes dropping to the ground for a second like she’s considering something.
Then she looks away from me entirely, giving me the side of her face. That’s when I know something isn’t right.
“Neve,” I say, softer now. “What’s wrong?”
Her shoulders lift slightly on a breath she doesn’t quite release. For a second, she doesn’t answer me. She just stands there, eyes fixed away from me, like she’s weighing whether whatever she’s thinking is worth saying out loud.
I don’t rush her.
Eventually, she lets out a small breath and shakes her head once, like she’s annoyed with herself for hesitating.
“It’s nothing,” she starts automatically, then stops. Her jaw tightens.
“No,” she corrects quietly. “It’s not nothing.”
She fully has my attention.
Her gaze flicks to me, then away just as quickly.
The loss of her gaze slows my heart rate, making it difficult to breathe.
“I just . . .” she starts, then hesitates again, like the words don’t want to form cleanly. Her fingers press against her belly before she slides her hand lower, cupping the swell, cradling it.
Finally, she exhales sharply through her nose.
“I just don’t know what you see in me,” she says, her voice quieter. “Now. With me like this.” Her eyes don’t quite meet mine when she adds, “I don’t know what you think of my body anymore.”
Her honesty lands harder than anything flirty she could have said.
I don’t speak straight away because she’s not asking for reassurance in a casual way.
She’s asking if she’s still wanted. Desired.
By me. So when I speak, I keep it steady, letting my attraction and need for this woman bleed into my tone, into my words.
“You think I’m looking at you like something has changed and it needs to be adjusted.”
Her eyes flick up to mine, then away again.
“No.” I step closer. Not crowding her. Just close enough she hears me. Really listens. “I look at you, and I want you.”
The truth here is simple.
“All of you. Every curve. Every inch.” I pause a beat, letting my gaze roam over her. “I wanted the you that you were on New Year’s Eve. Confident, loud when you wanted to be, walking around like you didn’t care who was looking at you. I wanted you then.”
Her expression shifts, uncertain. I don’t stop.
“But the way you are now,” I continue, exhaling with awe. “Carrying my child, standing in my home. No less beautiful. No less fascinating. I still want all of you. Maybe even more than I did before, because now I’ve gotten to know you better.”
Her hand slips over her belly again.
“And afterward,” I add, quiet but firm. “Whatever you look like after our baby arrives, you will still be the most incredible, beautiful, captivating woman alive.”
I hold her eyes.
“It’s not versions of you, Neve,” I say. “It’s all of you. That’s what I want.”
Silence stretches between us.