Chapter 41
Bodie
I’d left the front door unlocked on purpose.
Maybe it was stupid. I preferred to think it was hope.
The house felt hollow in the way places do after a storm moves through—everything upright, nothing where it belonged.
Her shoes weren’t by the door. Her mug wasn’t by the sink.
Rubble kept going to the bottom of the stairs and listening, head cocked like she might conjure footfalls with desire alone.
I made a pot of coffee I didn’t need and didn’t drink.
Washed the one pan in the sink from the eggs I’d forced down for breakfast. Turned on the porch light.
Turned it off again. The hearing had emptied me out and filled me up in the same hour, and I didn’t have a good place to set any of it.
I’d walked out first on purpose, left her to her family and to that three-second hug with her brother that had put something right in the world. I figured the next move had to be hers.
The door eased open a little after eight.
I stood before I meant to. Rubble beat me there, nails skittering on wood, tail thumping. Emmaline stepped in without knocking. No preamble. No apology. She shut the door behind her and leaned back against it for one breath, like the day had been a weight she could finally put down.
“Hey,” I murmured.
“Hey,” she said back.
Despite every atom of my body screaming to go to her, I kept my hands at my sides and waited. I’d promised her space.
She slipped her tote off her shoulder and set it on the bench by the wall, then bent to give Rubble scritches before the dog went apoplectic from happiness.
“I owe you an apology.” She kept her gaze on the dog. Maybe that was easier.
“For?” I had some ideas, but I wasn’t about to move forward based on assumptions.
“For leaving the way I did. For not answering you.” She swallowed. “For thinking the things I thought.”
I edged past the sofa, closer to the entryway. “Tell me what you thought.”
She lifted her eyes. They were tired and stripped down and honest. “That you married me because you felt guilty. That hearing you at the station meant you were… weighing something. Deciding you owed me, not that you wanted me. I heard one sentence and ran with it like a fool.”
I frowned, not at all clear what the hell she was talking about. “What sentence?”
“‘I already said I’d do it. I just worry I’m making a mistake.’” She said it exactly the way I must have said it on the phone with my mentor yesterday, like she’d been carrying the shape of the words around in her mouth. “I thought the mistake was me.”
I let that sit in the open space between us, so neither of us would be tempted to dress it up.
“It wasn’t,” I said. “It was the hearing. I was talking to Hale. My old chief.” The man I’d called when I realized every hat I wore could get me yelled at from one direction or another.
“I told the board I’d speak before I considered how it would look. ”
Her shoulders eased a notch. Not all the way. “And the mistake part?”
“I wanted to get his opinion on whether my speaking would make things worse for Wesley. I didn’t want to get it wrong and risk tipping things against him.
” On a breath, I scrubbed a hand down my face, thinking of a dozen things I wished I’d said and done over the past weeks.
“I should’ve told you I planned to speak.
I wanted to avoid making it heavier, and I made it worse by leaving you in the dark. ”
She gave a tiny nod. “Communication. Imagine that.”
I relaxed a fraction at the little thread of dry humor in her words. “I’ve heard it’s important.”
Her mouth twitched in that way it did when she wanted to smile but wasn’t quite ready yet. Then it faded. “I saw Marla yesterday.”
Point to Colter for that guess.
“Where?”
“In town. She’s been following me.” The words came out flat. The kind of flat you get when you’ve emptied your temper and all that’s left is the dregs. “I dragged her into the alley and told her to knock it off. She said she already got what she wanted—that she’d turned Wesley against me.”
“How? Your brother adores you.”
Emmaline blew out a breath and winced. “More things I should have told you. She’d apparently been following us. Taking photos of us. She showed them to Wesley, told him I’d chosen you over him. And he believed her. Laid into me during my last visit.”
Shit. That explained her mood since she’d come back.
“I’m guessing Marla didn’t stop there.”
“No. She said the will was Gran telling everybody I wasn’t enough. That you married me to ease your conscience.” A beat. “She is very good at using words like knives.”
My hands curled into fists. “Say the word and I’ll—”
“No.” She shook her head. “I won’t have you spending your badge on my mother.
It’s not worth it. That’s not what this is.
” Her eyes flicked up to mine and stayed.
“Despite my best intentions, I let her voice get in my head. Then I walked into the station and heard your voice, and in that moment, I decided they matched. That’s on me. ”
“Her voice doesn’t get to live here,” I said, touching my chest with two fingers, then gesturing to the space between us. “Or here.”
A breath gusted out of her that wasn’t quite a sigh. She straightened from the dog. “Bodie?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you love me?” The question wasn’t a test; it was a need.
For half a second I wondered how she couldn’t already know, but no matter how much we’d shared—vows, a house, a life—I realized I’d never outright said the words. So I said them now, clean and unvarnished.
“Yes, I love you.” I kept my gaze steady so she could see I meant every word.
“I loved you when we were kids and didn’t have a word big enough for the thing.
I loved you standing in that kitchen when you said yes to this ridiculous plan.
I loved you at the courthouse. I loved you when I asked you to give this marriage a real shot, to be the mother of my children.
I loved you when you beat nine Gibsons at Uno and laughed like you owned my whole damn family.
I loved you today when you stood up for your brother with your hands shaking.
And I will love you when we fight, and when we’re old, and when you forget where you left your glasses and they’re on your head. ”
Her mouth gave up the fight and smiled. Small, but real. “They’re always on my head.”
“I know.” I let that hang there with the rest of it and didn’t move.
“I’m sorry,” she said again, softer. “For leaving the rings on the dresser and making you find them like that. For making you wonder.”
“I did wonder,” I admitted. “Hard.” I slipped my hand into my pocket, where I’d been carrying those very same rings. “You don’t owe me penance. You do owe me honesty. Do you want to be here?”
“Yes.” No hesitation. “I love you, too, and I want to come home.” She swallowed. “Can we try again?”
“We never stopped.”
I pulled the rings out, stacked them properly and waited. Without hesitation, Emmaline held her hand out.
I slid the rings back where they belonged. Her knuckles brushed my thumb, soft and warm, and something in my chest loosened that had been wound tight since the moment I’d found them.
She lifted her eyes, and for the first time in days, they didn’t look haunted. Just open. Present. Mine.
I stepped into her then—just close enough that our chests brushed, just enough for the world to go quiet again. Her breath caught, and before I could second-guess it, she rose on her toes and kissed me. Not deep, not hungry—just a press of truth, a homecoming.
Everything I hadn’t had words for—relief, forgiveness, love that refused to quit—slid back into place with that kiss.
When she pulled back, her forehead rested against mine, her fingers still tangled with mine. “Home,” she whispered.
“Yeah,” I said against her lips. “Home.”
“I want to do one more thing. Say it out loud so there’s no room for old ghosts to rewrite it later.”
She inched closer to me. “Okay.”
“I didn’t marry you out of guilt. I don’t carry a ledger for you.
If I use the word owe, it’s like this: I owe you respect.
I owe you the truth. I owe you the best I can be.
That’s it.” I watched her take it in. “And I know I can’t protect you from your mother’s mouth.
But I can stand next to you when it opens. If you want me there.”
“I like having you next to me. I like having you stand for me. But sometimes it’s good for me to stand for myself. I did a little of that today, and it felt good.”
I pulled her closer, sliding my arms around her. “Then that’s what we do. You tell me when to step in and when to stand down.”
Her arms came around me. “I can work with that.”
On a sigh, I dropped my brow to hers. “There’s one more conversation we need to have sometime soon, and it can wait if tonight is not the night.”
Her hands linked behind my back. “Which one is that?”
“The one about the future with small humans who steal snacks and cheat at Uno,” I said. “I’m not asking for an answer. I just want you to know the idea is on my mind. And I’d rather carry it with you than by myself.”
Her laugh was quiet and surprised, and no longer guarded. “Dean’s big mouth. He put that in there.”
“He did,” I admitted. “But it was already growing roots.”
“For me, too,” she admitted softly.
“Yeah?”
Tipping her head back, she met my eyes, her lips curving into a smile. “Yeah.”
I let myself get taken by the fantasy for a few moments. My gorgeous, wonderful wife, glowing and round with our baby. Damn, but I wanted that. Wanted to place my hands on her belly and feel that little Gibson kick. Wanted to pick out nursery stuff and playsets.
I cleared my throat. “We should probably wait for all the probate crap to be wrapped up.”
“Uh-huh.” Emmaline pressed closer.
“And you’ll need some more help at the bakery.”
“That would be the responsible thing to do,” she agreed.
My dick pressed hard against my fly, arguing that responsibility was overrated. I swallowed hard.
“Of course,” she added, “it occurs to me that, between both our families, we have approximately twenty willing helpers.”
Very much liking where she was going with that, I curled my hands around her hips and backed her a couple of steps toward the stairs. “That’s true. We rolled the dice on our marriage and won.”
Emmaline slid her hands up to my shoulders to link behind my neck. “The jackpot. I’m willing to roll the dice with you again, Bodie Gibson. Because you’ll always be a solid bet for me.”
I boosted her up so her legs wrapped around my waist, struggling not to let my eyes cross as she settled against my erection. “You’re sure you want to do this?”
“I’m sure I want to be as close as it’s possible to be with you. And if the Universe thinks we’re ready, then I think we could both use that kind of joy in our lives.” She stroked her fingers down my nape. “Welcome me home, husband.”
Taking the stairs two at a time, I carried her to our room, to our bed, where I spent the rest of the night doing exactly that.