12. Chloe
12
CHLOE
The pounding headache that won’t subside when I open my eyes to a single ray of morning light aimed right at my face should have been my first warning that something isn’t right.
Instead, I groan and roll over, trying to cover my head with the blanket, promptly hitting the hard floor from a drop of less than an inch. But it is the scariest inch that I’ve ever fallen in my entire life. Why? Because I have absolutely no idea how I ended up on the living room floor in the first place. Let alone on the floor on a bed of pillows.
“What the hell?” I rub my forehead, trying to ease some of the sting of hitting my face on the wood. “What happened?”
When an answer doesn’t immediately come, I breathe out deeply and try to remember if I had too much to drink. But I didn’t. The last thing I really remember is eating breakfast and then driving home and not feeling right.
“Oh no.” My face flames. I threw up on Ian.
And he took care of me after.
“We got the flu,” Parker groans from somewhere above me. A small flu, but a flu nonetheless. It is miserable.
“You farted on Remy.” Emma laughs bitterly from the other side of the room, and I open one eye to glare at her.
“Who did?” It can’t be me. I already did one embarrassing thing. That doesn’t need to be compounded by another ridiculous action. “It wasn’t me, was it?” When she doesn’t immediately answer me, I open the other eye and sit up, taking in the scene around me. Like we are in an eighties movie, the entire living room has been turned into one giant pillow fort, complete with sheets draped over the windows to keep out the majority of the light.
“No, that was me,” Parker groans and slaps a hand over her face. “I can’t believe I did that. I can’t believe he didn’t throw up from that. It had to smell terrible. Pregnancy gives me the worst farts ever. Usually, I can hold them until he’s not around. Ugh.” She leans back against the chair. “I’m just going to go back to bed and try not to die of embarrassment.”
“He watched Cassie come out of your girly bits,” Kennedy points out. “I think it’s pretty safe to say that you farting isn’t gonna scare him away.”
A pillow flies at Kennedy’s head, and she ducks to avoid it.
“You don’t know that,” Parker hisses. “He could decide my ass is too smelly and he doesn’t want to put up with me.”
“Fat chance.” Emma shakes her head and cradles a pillow to her chest. “That man loves you.”
A dreamy look crosses Parker’s face momentarily, before she scrunches up her nose and sneezes.
“Bless you.” Emma rocks into herself, her eyes half-closed.
“Do I even want to know everything that happened?” I rub my forehead, blocking out the memories that threaten to pop into my mind.
“I mean, you should.” Emma lowers her voice. “You told Ian that you loved him.”
My heart stutters in my chest, and I choke on air at her words.
“Wha—” A gasp for air leaves me unable to talk for a few long seconds. “What?” I try again with more success. “No, I didn’t.”
Four sets of eyes stare at me with varying levels of disbelief and annoyance.
“Yeah,” Parker says quietly. “You did. Remy told me about it when I woke up and had to take a shower.”
“Oh no,” I moan. “He helped me shower, too.”
A round of titters fill the air. “Yeah, he did.” Kennedy smiles. “And I heard that he tore his shirt off for you too.”
He did. A flash of memory hits me like a freight train. After I threw up on him, Ian stripped right there outside the car, at least out of his shirt, and he helped me inside.
“He carried me.” The words are nothing more than a whisper. “And he helped me get cleaned up before he did anything for himself.”
The memory is burned into my head, along with every other happy thought I have about Ian and our life together.
“Yeah.” Poppy clears her throat. “Okay, I’m just gonna lay it out there because no one else will and you deserve to hear the truth from one of us because no one likes to hear that they were in the wrong or were an asshole. I know that I don’t want to hear it from anyone else. So… You’re an asshole, Chloe.”
I sit there with my mouth hanging open while she pauses and puts her curly red hair up into a bun on top of her head. Then she sits forward in her own blanket and points a finger at the window behind her.
“That man out there. Wherever he is.” Her finger turns into a hand which waves around. “You know what I mean. Ian. That man. The one with the stupidly godlike body. He loves you enough that he didn’t abandon you when you needed him the most. After Kevin died, you ended the engagement. That was a rash decision and one you made without thinking it through. It’s clear to literally anyone who knows the two of you or even spends thirty seconds around you together that you love each other. Not even a little bit of love, either. The kind of love that people write books about or make videos about wanting. That once-in-a-lifetime, crazy kind of love. But you made a stupid choice, and you punished him for putting you before anyone. Before his career in the military. Before your brother. He chose you. Over and over again. Do you know how lucky you are that you’ve never been his second choice?” Poppy’s voice breaks, and she sobs on her words.
When she doesn’t say anything more, I know that I need to be the one to admit it. That I fucked up and I have to fix it. “I know.” The words rip out of my throat and lay bare ever single emotion I have over not admitting the truth to Ian.
“What?” It’s Poppy’s turn to stare at me with her mouth open.
“I screwed up. I was so angry, so sad when Kevin died that I gave Ian back his ring and kicked him out. I told him I never wanted to see him again. Then he was there at the funeral. The only man who never let me down. Even though it gutted him. Even though I gutted him. He was there. He held me. He didn’t abandon me. I know that.” I push myself up off the ground. “But I’ll be damned if I tell that to you all and not him.”
I walk out, not caring that my hair is a tangled mess. Or about the fact that I’m pretty sure Ian helped me into a pair of leggings so old they are almost better as rags than pants. I can see a hole on my knee as I walk.
“Nice ass!” Kennedy calls out after me.
Yep. They are see-through. But I don’t really care right now. If I think about it or care, I might chicken out. Again.
I step out onto the back porch and cover my eyes with a hand to avoid the bright light and for them to adjust.
“Stupid sun fuckin’ sucks,” I complain and step back under the shade.
“Chloe?” Ian stands down on the beach, and I move so that I can see him. “What are you doing up?” He’s actually not that far down on the beach, so I can hear him without him yelling.
“Ian.”
Hesitation is clear on his face while he takes in my appearance. “Are you okay?”
“What?” I look down just to make sure the leggings he put me in aren’t see-through in the front, then shake my head slightly while doing my best not to move my head too much. “I feel like I’ve got a hangover even though I wasn’t drinking, but I’m fine. Come here for a minute, okay?”
When I came outside, I was full of confidence. Or, at least, I had enough confidence that I knew what I was going to say to him. But standing here, waiting for him… it all just vanishes into thin air and I’m stuck feeling like an insecure little girl in the face of one of my greatest fears.
He takes the steps two at a time until he is standing right in front of me, blocking the sun and staring down with concerned eyes. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m an asshole,” I answer plainly. “I gave you the ring back, and I didn’t want to. I was so mad. And you were the only one I could take that anger out on. Almost immediately, I wanted to take it back. I wanted you back. Where you belong. I didn’t want?—”
Ian shuts me up with his lips.
His kiss devours me, consumes me and everything around us, until there is nothing left but him.
I feel his hands gently come to a rest around my neck, holding me still as he takes his time. When my back hits the wall on the side of the house, I realize he has moved us while he continued the kiss.
Leaning back, I gasp for air when he finally lets me go, only to rest his forehead against mine while I catch my breath.
Then he presses his lips back against mine and I let him. I give him every part of my mouth. I wrap my arms around his waist and stand up on my tiptoes so that he doesn’t have to crane his neck so far to reach me.
“I love you,” he breathes. “I don’t care that you took your time coming to your senses. My feelings for you have never changed. They never will. When you told me we should talk after this week, I thought you were going to put an end to us for good.”
He slides a hand down my face and my arm, coming to a stop when his hand covers mine. “I’m going to put my ring back on your finger, Chloe. And it’s going to stay there forever. Do you understand?”
I manage a nod. That’s it. Because in the face of everything that Ian is, everything he brings into my world, I’m not a match. I’m not much of anything compared to him.
“You’re everything.” He lifts my chin so that my eyes meet his. “Do you understand me, Chloe? You are absolutely everything, and I want you to know that.”
His body goes rigid.
“What?” Panic fills my veins. Panic and something I don’t quite understand.
“I’m giving you time to change your mind,” he whispers, more broken than I could have ever imagined. “I’m afraid this is a dream. That you’re going to walk away and I’m going to be left alone again.”
I have to fix what I broke. I have to make him see that I’m not leaving. “I’m not walking away.”
“As beautiful as this is, we’re ready for the next bucket list item, and you two are wasting valuable time.” Ben throws a football that hits the house right next to my head.
“Mind your business,” I snap at him from around Ian’s body. “We were in the middle of something.”
“You were about to be in the middle of an orgasm in just a minute.” Linc walks by with an ice chest in his hands. “We don’t have time for that.”
“We’ve got a little time,” Ian whispers against my forehead.
“No time,” Linc snaps. “We’ve gotta race across the lake and back, and it’s gonna take all afternoon.” He whistles sharply. “Come on, Kennedy. Let’s kick some ass.”
I pull my eyes away from Ian to see that they’ve been lining up two-person kayaks on the side of the lake, along with life jackets and ice chests full of drinks.
“We have to do that… now?”
“Yeah.” Ian kisses me on the cheek before stepping back. “Don’t worry. We’ll have time later. There’s still Kevin’s list to get through, remember?”
I shuffle back and forth. “I don’t want to throw up on you again.”
Ian outright laughs and then shakes his head while he smiles at me. “We’re gonna be on the lake. If you do, I’ll just jump in and clean off really quick. Then you can make it up to me later.”
“I’ve got to change.” Running a hand over my head, I add, “And maybe brush my hair.”
“Go. We’ll be on the water waiting.”
Before I leave, I look up at him with a question on my lips. “Do they know that we used to go kayaking every weekend?”
Ian’s smile tells me they don’t, but he shakes his head all the same.
“Did you put money on us winning?” I don’t even have to ask if Ian will be my partner. Every single weekend during the summer, we went kayaking. We’ve even gone across Sebago a few times from the public landing. No one else stands a chance against us in a race. Not when we both know the lake, and better than that, we know each other and how to work in sync while on the water. “I’d love to take their money, especially since they interrupted.”
“Of course I did.” Ian raises an eyebrow. “It’s teams of couples, and Ben’s going to stay on the beach and officiate, because no one loves him enough to be his partner. And I already claimed you before he could.”
“Thank you, Ian.”
“For what?” His eyes flash with warmth and desire.
I swallow back the fear and just spit it out. Ian deserves every part of me. “For not rejecting me.”
“Chloe, you’re the only thing in the world that I want in my life. Why would I reject you? What do you think I am, stupid?”
“No.” I turn and walk back toward the house. “I was the stupid one… for almost letting you go.”