Chapter 38
HUDSON
Leah surprises me by turning the tables and taking control of the kiss. It’s wonderfully intense as our mouths press together, our breathing turns staccato, and the electrical current sparks between us.
What else should I have expected?
Certainly not how we sync together.
Then again, maybe I’m mistaken and this is what we’ve been resisting because we both knew once we started, we’d never stop.
She tugs on my shirt and her palms run over the ridges of my muscles like she’s not sure where to land and maybe doesn’t want to.
It’s like we’ve both danced around this desire for weeks. Well, she may have been in denial, but I’ve caught her checking me out. Have noticed lingering looks and felt moments crackling between us.
I’m not sure if she feared she’d be betraying my brother or if it’s something else. Now that she’s mauling me, I say the wait was worth it.
Her hands dig into my hair as she presses herself flush against me, sending my head spinning. My brother is an idiot for passing up Leah. She’s ferocious in the best kind of way, giving back in the kiss as it deepens and expands.
We don’t run out of gas, though we do slow down and fall into a gentler, smoother pace as we each find our breath, slow the wild groping until my hands grip her jaw and hers lace around my neck.
It’s like the initial shock of the kiss had us desperate to give and get whatever we could, but we settle into it together.
For all the sharpness of Leah’s claws, she’s the softest, gentlest kisser now that she realizes I’m not going to try to stop this.
No, I’d like to do this for a long time.
So we do.
Later, while Leah unpacks some of her things, I consider the conversation we had in the living room. I should’ve already told her everything that happened back in high school, but I’d hardly remembered and figured it was irrelevant.
I had no idea I’d hurt Leah so much and feel terrible. This partly explains why she became so sassy and guarded.
She’s always been such a baddy, yet a buddy among the guys that I didn’t think she’d even care, but her feelings run deep. Mine for her, even more so.
Later that afternoon, we go to Valentina’s house across town. I learn that her husband, Grant, is expected home from the military around Christmastime, so right now she has the space to host what the Smith-Torres family calls Wedding Eve, abbreviated to WE. Makes sense.
This tradition hardly does.
What ensues is a veritable minefield of marriage challenges. First, we play a game of, “How well do you know each other?”
Leah and I both lose, but it’s a tie loss. Note to self: she’s savage when it comes to competing.
There’s a team scavenger hunt. I get Abuela on Team Groom, so we win. Shh. Don’t tell anyone. She cheated.
Then we’re blindfolded while only wearing shorts and T-shirts.
The task is to dress each other. Leah gets the prize that time.
When our outfits are revealed, she’s wearing a pair of my exercise shorts with a hockey T-shirt and a button-down dress shirt along with my goalie helmet …
as if I were a drunk two-year-old trying to dress myself.
Yeah, I’ll have to work on that. Hopefully, this won’t ever be a real-life scenario.
However, I get the meaning of the importance of thinking of each other and not just ourselves.
Lastly, we have to cook a meal together consisting of outrageous ingredients, including barbecue sauce, broccoli rabe, condensed milk, popcorn, kumquats, chicken thighs, puff pastry, goat cheese, pine nuts, and sauerkraut. Everyone else gets pizza.
Leah has seemed nervous tonight, whether because of our conversation from earlier, the kiss, the wedding, or something else, she won’t say so I’m glad when we’re finally alone in the kitchen.
While sniffing the kumquat, I say, “I sort of get the point of the other tasks.”
“Trust me, there’s no point.”
“I thought this one is so we don’t poison each other the night before we’re supposed to get married?”
She grips a frying pan in her hand. “Or have any other unfortunate accidents.”
Setting the cast iron pan on the burner, we sort out what we’re going to make that’s edible, and I wonder if all of this is really to see how well we work together as a team while under pressure.
It requires all of our focus.
At last, we present grilled barbecue sauce marinated chicken with a side of sautéed broccoli on a bed of sauerkraut and topped with goat cheese and pine nuts.
There are also puff pastry tarts with condensed milk and thinly sliced kumquat coins.
We make the popcorn as an afterthought and Leah starts throwing it at her family, who proceed to make a game out of it by seeing who can catch the most in their mouth.
Gotta say, it’s fun until Valentina declares that the bride and groom are on cleanup duty.
The cheese-covered dough smells so delicious as everyone gets their pizza, but this meal is the first we made together and that’s pretty special. Abuela offers a prayer, thanking God for my buns … er, at least that’s what it sounded like, and we dig in.
As loud conversation carries on around us, Leah leans so close, I feel her soft breath on my neck. “There’s something you should know.”
I drop my fork. “Is there poison in my food?”
“What? No!”
“Like definitely not or maybe.”
She rolls her eyes. “I didn’t poison your food.”
“Did you pay off one of your cousins to do it?”
“No. As far as I know, no one in my family has gone that far. However, my third cousin Felipe did get terribly sick on his wedding night. It was blamed on the shellfish appetizers.”
A shiver runs through me.
“Tonight is more like an opportunity for us to air our grievances.”
“I thought we did earlier.”
Leah’s throat bobs on a swallow. “There’s something else … related.”
I rub my hands together like I’m gearing up for another challenge. “It’s Wedding Day Eve, let’s have our first almost-married couple fight.”
“Are you nuts?” she asks.
“Then let’s have our first and only married couple fight.”
She shakes her head slowly. “We can’t fight because everyone will join in. It’ll be bedlam, also let’s call it one and done.”
“So we are going to fight? I’m not much of a fighter,” I confess.
“Tell that to the LA Lions. You destroyed them.”
She has a point.
Leah draws a deep breath. “This might be the deal breaker. For real.”
To lighten the mood, I whisper into her ear, “Leah, if it’s about passing gas, everyone does it. Plus, you can just blame it on Tinker.”
Her eyes widen. “Smith-Torres women have a rule. Husbands, brothers, nephews, even the babies toot outside!”
“Seriously?”
Her smile suggests it’s more of a suggestion.
“I think it’s adorable that you’re trying to find an objection here. In the movies, when the minister or priest asks if anyone objects, isn’t it usually one of the guests, not the bride?”
Leah faces me, gaze set on mine, searching for courage and the truth. “What I thought was my nickname was bad, but the bet tipped me over the edge.”
“I apologize. I wish I’d been more mature and just talked to you about what Hunter was doing.”
“Yeah. Communication. Well, I found a way to express to you how I felt.” She tells me about spotting my yearbook one afternoon and writing a note in the back, then what followed.
My jaw slackens, my suspicions confirmed. “So that was you?”
She nods slowly.
“Which means you lay claim to those emails.” I had a hunch given the recent content of the emails.
“When I typed up the first one, I never meant to press send.”
“They kept coming.”
“Despite the fear of guilt and regret, it felt good to direct my frustrations in life somewhere.”
I let out a long exhale. “We’ve got to get you to a boxing gym.”
As Leah continues her confession, I tell her that I’m not even slightly surprised.
I should be angry. The emotion is dull like a distant memory that’s no longer relevant—like what I wore to picture day in fifth grade or school lunch on Tuesdays.
It just doesn’t matter anymore. The recent emails were rather endearing and I admire her fortitude for keeping them coming all that time.
“Hudson. I’m your secret adversary. Why are you still here?”
“This tart isn’t half bad.” I take another bite.
“Don’t you hate me?”
“Quite the contrary.”
“Why aren’t you running for the hills?”
I answer, “This is Nebraska. It’s pretty flat around here.”
“Wipe that lazy half-smile off your face and be mad at me.”
I don’t obey, but I do meet her eyes. “We’re not exactly who we were back then.”
“I wrote you an email as recently as this month.”
“You were asking about advice for your friend.” I wink.
“That’s also me.”
“I know.”
Her lips part. “Once, when you replied to me, you wrote those very words. So you did know it was me?”
“To be honest, I wasn’t one hundred percent sure. I know you, Leah, and you’re not truly hateful. You were hurt.”
Liquid brims in her eyes.
“Can I hug you?” I ask.
“In front of my family? No. They’ll take photos.”
“Is that a bad thing?”
She shrugs. “One step at a time.” Then she tips her head from side to side and leans in, wrapping her arms around me.
I draw her close, flush against my chest, enveloping her in my arms and making a space just for her, a place where she fits, feels at home, safe, and loved. Her curves meld to my muscles and a question about how well two people can fit together—that I never had—is answered.
We just do.
I whisper, “The only letters I want now are from my not-so-secret admirer. At least one a month.”
“It’s more of a spontaneous thing.”
We both laugh, but given the smirk on her face, I have a feeling she’s going to be channeling her hate for me into something else.
After dessert, which includes plenty of polvorosas, everyone says goodnight … slowly. It takes at least three more hours. This family knows how to party and I am here for it.