16. Taryn
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
TARYN
The smell of beef stew drifted through the little Craftsman long before dinner was ready.
I leaned against the kitchen doorway, arms folded across my chest, watching three grown men somehow turn cooking into a competition.
Beck stood over the stove with a wooden spoon in one hand and an expression of extreme concentration on his face. “If you wanna make everything you cook taste great, there’s just one trick.” He winked at me over his shoulder. “Season everything with love.”
“I haven’t taken the first bite, and I already feel sick.” Lucas looked up from slicing carrots Harper had gifted us from her garden. “You should’ve just let me do it. I bet mine would’ve been way better.”
“The hell you say!” Beck frowned at him. “I’ve been cooking my own shit since I was five.”
“Lovely,” Lucas drawled. “Using the word ‘shit’ to defend your cooking skills.”
“So, he’s still his usual sweet self?” Lila murmured as she walked from the bathroom to my side, her voice still watery.
I sighed. “Yes. Did you expect any different?”
Lucas frowned at both of us, his hearing more than adequate to catch her quiet words.
“Maybe.” She shrugged. “He teamed up with Adrian and Beck.”
“That was strength in numbers. Nothing else.” It was my turn to shrug.
I avoided making eye contact with the asshole, even though I could feel his eyes burning into the side of my head.
“While Lila is here, we need to figure out our next moves.” Adrian flipped through some notes he’d gotten from Finley.
I pushed away from the doorway and wandered farther into the kitchen, Lila close behind. “What’s your plan?”
We all knew he already had one.
Adrian leaned back in his chair and, to my surprise, pulled me onto his lap. “We leave in forty-eight hours.”
Beck stared at me in Adrian’s lap for several seconds before clearing his throat. “Why wait?”
“We need to gather as much food as we can carry, and Finley promised me some basic medicine to take back with us.” He ran his nose along the side of my neck as if he were scenting me.
I gave a small shiver. “Are y’all positive we can trust him?”
“As much as I can be,” Adrian smirked at my reaction. “I have a few alternatives if he betrays us.”
“How many supplies do you think we can realistically carry?” Lucas walked over to the stove and dropped the carrots into the pot.
“With our enhanced strength? Enough,” Adrian answered with certainty. “Probably most of the stuff we have stashed.”
“We could steal one of the old cars they use to scavenge.” Beck threw in a dash of salt, pepper, and who knew what other spices into the stew.
Max lay stretched across the cool hardwood floor directly beneath the table, his head resting on his paws. One eye cracked open every time someone walked past the stove, hopeful that dinner might accidentally end up on the floor.
“No. We need to stay off the roads.” Adrian vetoed that idea. “As soon as we’re reported missing, Gideon will send men to find us.”
I nodded in agreement. “Probably. But maybe if we’re lucky, they’ll just go on with their lives and not bother looking for us at all. If we took one of the few vehicles they have, that wouldn’t even be possible.”
“I wouldn’t count on that. Mace is pissed about his loss, and taking two women from the community won’t be taken lightly,” Lucas said, sitting back down at the table and peeling potatoes. “Guess having two dicks in your life really pumped up your optimism, huh?”
“That’s enough, Lucas.” Adrian narrowed his eyes. “You’re going to back yourself into a hole you can’t get out of.”
“Or back his mouth right into my fist.” Beck scowled at him.
“That makes absolutely no sense.” Lucas rolled his eyes.
“Neither will you after I give you a concussion.” The heat from Beck’s eyes was trying to drill a hole into Lucas’s face.
Lila hung her head. “Maybe I should just stay. It might appease Mace, and plus I can’t travel as fast as you three.”
“Hell no!” I stood up from Adrian’s lap. “You’re family, and I won’t let you sacrifice yourself like that.” I grabbed her hands. “It’s my fault you’re here.”
“You’re not the terrible Taryn you used to be.” Lila smiled sweetly. “And it isn’t your fault. I followed you, remember?”
“That’s your opinion,” Lucas stated dryly. “It’s entirely her fault you’re here.”
“Why don’t you shut up already?” Lila shocked us all when she snapped at him. “What Taryn did to you was wrong, but she’s more than made up for it. None of us would’ve made it this far without her and her dad.”
I didn’t agree with that last part because we’d all contributed, in one way or another, to our survival, but I appreciated the sentiment.
Lucas growled something so low that even we couldn’t hear it and put more force than necessary into peeling the potatoes.
“No more talk of anyone sacrificing themselves.” Adrian pulled me back into his lap. “Either all of us leave or none of us. Bad things happen when we separate.”
Soon, we all sat around the table with steaming bowls of stew in front of us, and for a while, no one spoke. It was a rare treat to eat so well, and everyone wanted to savor the moment fully.
Beck leaned back in his chair and patted his flat stomach. “That was fantastic, if I do say so myself.”
Lucas grunted, not agreeing or disagreeing. “We need to get to the gate before someone comes looking for us.”
Beck reluctantly stood. “As much as I hate to agree with you on anything, you’re right.” He leaned in and gave me the softest kiss, then grabbed his gun from a side table. “We’ll be back in a couple of hours.”
“Could one of you walk me back to the hotel first?” Lila also stood.
“Why don’t you stay here?” I disliked the idea of her going back alone. “We have plenty of room.”
“It’s better for her to go,” Adrian stated reluctantly. “We don’t want to garner any more attention than we already have. The goal is for us to follow the rules and fit in.”
Lila leaned over and gave me a hug. “I’ll be fine, and the fewer eyes on us, the better.”
Hugs were still awkward for me, but I was getting better at them.
After everyone left, Adrian and I cleared the table and washed the dishes.
Max was snoring gently on the floor, full from the meat scraps we fed him earlier.
“Come outside with me?” Adrian held out his hand.
I nodded shyly as he laced our fingers together.
As we sat on the front steps, I noticed how peaceful this moment felt. The old tire swing swayed gently beneath the enormous live oak, and only crickets filled the silence.
For several moments, neither of us spoke. Being together, enjoying the stars, was more than enough.
Finally, after a time, Adrian spoke, “I owe you an apology.”
I sighed, “I think we’re past all of that.”
“Maybe, but I want to clear the air between us.” He kissed my knuckles. “It’s been a long time coming.”
I nodded. If he needed to get things off his chest, then I was more than willing to listen.
He stared out into space, gathering his thoughts. “After Mom died, I couldn’t bear to stay in that house. I knew Ben was tough on you, but I also knew he loved you.” Adrian let go of my hand and put his arm around my shoulders, drawing me closer.
“Now I know he loved me, but he never showed it in a way that I understood,” I mumbled.
I regretted that Ben and I had started mending our relationship, only for Nash to rob us of it.
Adrian gently kissed the top of my head.
“I understand that now, but back then I was just a young kid. I believed that if I took some time away, I’d eventually be able to return.
I wasn’t lying when I told you that.” He paused, then continued, “Time passed quickly, and when I finally came home, you weren’t the snaggle-toothed little girl I’d left behind.
You were this confident, vibrant young woman, so incredibly beautiful. I fell in love with you immediately.”
I leaned my head against his shoulder. “I’ve loved you for so long that I can’t remember a time when I didn’t.” I sighed softly. “But now I love Beck too.”
“I know you do.” He pulled me even closer. “I never, in my wildest dreams, thought I’d be able to share you with someone. Now I think it’s the only way to keep you safe.”
I tilted my head up. “You know I can take care of myself, right?”
“I don’t doubt it for a minute. That devious mind of yours is one of my favorite things about you.”
I laughed. “So, it’s not my perfect ass?”
“No,” Adrian smirked. “But that ass has appeared in my dreams long before it was appropriate.”
“Your ass has featured in several of my dreams too.” I grinned slyly.
He stood suddenly and pulled me to my feet. “I’ve waited long enough to get inside you.”
I couldn’t help but laugh as he picked me up and slung me over his shoulder.
Had the pod people taken him over? Adrian had never been this impulsive.
He interrupted my thoughts by kicking open the door to the first bedroom he reached. “Get those clothes off and lie on the bed.”
That bossy tone was more like what I was used to.
I stripped as fast as humanly possible and lay flat, feeling myself grow damp at the admiration on his face. I was a little self-conscious about the weight I’d lost, but the look in his eyes told me he was far from disappointed.
Adrian looked at me like he was trying to memorize every piece of me before the world found another way to pull us apart.
The very thought of that made my chest tighten.
“What?” I asked softly.
A slow smile tugged at one corner of his mouth. “I’m trying to decide how I got lucky enough to be standing here.”
He took another step until he stood beside the bed, the lantern in the room casting warm light across the sharp angles of his face. There were shadows beneath his eyes from too many sleepless nights, yet somehow, he’d never looked more like the boy I’d spent years trying to hate.
His fingertips softly moved a loose strand of hair away from my face, a gesture so tender it nearly made me cry.
“I’ve missed you,” he admitted quietly.
My throat tightened. “You didn’t have to.”
“I know.”
“You’re the one who left.”
“I know that, too.”
Every ounce of anger I’d carried for years sat between us, but it didn’t feel nearly as heavy as it once had.
He leaned closer, giving me every opportunity to turn away.
I didn’t.
He kissed me gently at first, as if he were still trying to wrap his head around my being there. The hesitation lasted only a heartbeat before years of regret, longing, and words we’d never said caught up with us.
My fingers instinctively curled around the front of his shirt, holding on tight. Now that I had him, I was never letting go.
When we finally broke apart, we were both breathing a little harder.
He rested his forehead against mine and closed his eyes. “I’ve imagined this more times than I’d ever admit.”
I reached up and traced a fading bruise along his jaw with my thumb. “Not nearly as much as I have.”
Adrian’s gray eyes met mine again, and for just a second the years between us disappeared.
There was no apocalypse.
There was no Gideon.
There was no farmhouse and the responsibilities waiting there.
It was just Adrian and me, finally finding our way back to each other.