Chapter 33
Thirty-Three
Briar
“And then we add…”
Colt glances down at my recipe—and seriously, thank God I laminated it because it’s covered with flour and egg goo and who knows what else.
I can just wipe it clean later.
Instead of having to rewrite the whole thing.
Maybe I need to laminate everything in the house for easy cleanup.
Grinning, I watch my man and my daughter lean close as they scrutinize the paper.
“...three-quarters of a cup of heavy whipping cream.”
“That’s this one, Daddy!” Frankie says, reaching for the carton and holding it up.
Colt’s smile for her—
God, it’s so beautiful it’s almost painful, piercing my heart somewhere deep inside and burying itself there, never to be shaken free.
Because I’ve felt that same thing for Frankie, for the beauty we created together.
So, seeing the clear evidence of his love for her…
Yeah, it may be the most beautiful thing I’ve ever had the privilege to witness.
So much so, I don’t jump in to help them, don’t clean up the mess they’re creating—on the recipe card and the counters and the floor. I don’t chime in that they’re mixing too vigorously or that the pie crusts are overfull.
I just lean back against the opposite counter and soak in seeing the man I love creating a memory with our daughter.
He’s missed so much.
Yet, he’s here right now, creating this moment in time.
And Frankie, because of all the love and time her uncles have given her over the last four (and three-quarters) years, time and love I’m so damned thankful for because it made her the girl she is today—confident in that love, comfortable in her place in the world, knowing that she’s safe and protected and valued for who she is—soaks it all in.
And flourishes even more.
Because even though Colt missed so much, he’s here now.
He’s engaged.
He listens and puts the time in.
It also doesn’t hurt that he’s tall enough to reach the oven and strong enough to slide the cookie sheet with those overfull pies in.
I’ll have a mess to clean up later, that’s for sure.
But it’s a mess I’ll clean up with a smile—
And with my daughter and my man scrubbing dishes beside me.
First, though, we’re going to have pie.
“Can we get this one, Mom?” Frankie asks, jumping up and down and pointing to a truly ginormous Christmas tree. “Can we?!”
“I’m not sure it will fit on top of the car, sweetie,” I say, eyeing the size of the trunk and mentally calculating how long it will take to hack through it with the dull bow saw the kid at the front handed us when we entered the tree lot.
Spoiler alert, it will take approximately one million years.
Hyperbole? Maybe.
A giant tree filled with a shit-ton of needles I want to sweep up over the next weeks (and months)? God, no.
“It’ll fit,” Colt says, immediately crouching down and eying the trunk.
“Well, I don’t think that you’ll want to saw through it,” I try. “That’ll take forever, right?” I ask, lifting my brows pointedly.
A point he misses because he turns to Frankie. “This the one you want, sweetheart?”
She nods.
He looks at me. “You approve, baby?”
“It’s a beautiful tree, honey,” I say, and it’s not a lie. My daughter picked out a truly gorgeous Douglas fir, even and straight, no holes. If it wasn’t gigantic, I’d be all over it. “But—”
He lays down, shoving the branches out of the way.
“Colt.”
His eyes come to mine. “We don’t need—”
“You like the tree. Frankie likes the tree.” He positions the saw. “My girls are getting what they want.”
Then he starts sawing.
And I find that I suddenly have to unzip my hoodie.
Thanks, SoCal heat.
Except it’s not just the fact that it’s December and nearly eighty degrees…it’s also the fact that Colt is sawing and I’m watching the muscles on his forearms, along with his biceps and triceps flex as he cuts through the trunk.
Then there’s the fact that his shirt has ridden up a couple of inches, exposing those dips near his hips that I ran my tongue over only the night before.
And also maybe his words.
My girls are getting what they want.
Sigh.
I really, really love my man.
“Are you going to help Daddy cut down our super-duper big tree, Mommy?” Frankie asks, skipping around the branches.
“No,” Atlas says, bumping his shoulder against mine as he and Royal walk by, his voice dropping when he adds for my ears only, “she’s too busy drooling.”
I swat at his chest.
“He’s not lying.” Royal smirks. “Pull it together, Thorny.”
I swat at him too, but he just grins and loops an arm around Jade as she studies a nearby tree—though it’s not nearly as big as ours—pulling her back against his chest.
Banks is already lugging his tree to the road, Aspen, who’s holding Maisie (adorably decked out in a Christmas-themed outfit) trailing him.
And Willow’s supervising Dash as he ties their tree to the roof of their SUV.
Lily’s on tour, but I don’t miss that Atlas has finished teasing me and started getting serious about cutting down a nearby pine.
Everyone’s paired up.
Domesticated.
I smile.
Because this year, Christmas spirit is all around us.
And truly, life can’t get any better.
“What if he says my list is too long?” Frankie asks, her fingers laced with mine, gently swinging our hands back and forth, back and forth.
I glance ahead of us at the line to see Santa, see that it’s showing no sign of moving.
So, I crouch down in front of my daughter and gently grasp her shoulders.
“You know that the real magic of Santa is not that he gives you everything you want, but what you need, baby.”
“But you said we need to go shopping for underwear after this. What if he knows that’s what I need, and he doesn’t get me anything on my list?”
My lips twitch.
Because fuck my daughter is the best.
She never fails to leave me smiling.
“Sometimes Santa brings underwear,” I tell her because that’s the reality of the world we live in, and lots of kids aren’t as privileged as my girl is (who’s getting the number one item on the list she’s holding so tightly—a Polly Panda doll—because I preordered it a month ago when it looked like it was going to be this Christmas’s hottest item for four and three-quarters-year-olds).
“But oftentimes Santa does his best to make it both something you want and something you need.”
She considers that for a long moment.
Then nods.
I straighten and we close the gap that’s opened up between us and the next family in line, and she’s reviewing her carefully written list as Colt comes back with the coffees he left to snag for us.
Because our girl needed to get to Santa first thing this morning.
And she certainly didn’t care that he and I had been up late last night—very late—going through our own list.
And one that’s entirely filled with things that bring us both pleasure.
“All good?” he asks as we sip and keep shuffling forward.
“Frankie’s in deep introspection about her list for Santa.”
“Why’s that?”
Frankie doesn’t even look up from the paper she’s perusing. “Because I don’t want Santa to bring me underwear.”
Colt’s mouth drops open.
I stifle my laughter as I lift on tiptoe and murmur in his ear, “I’ll explain later.”
“I’m not sure I want to know.” He tugs a lock of my hair.
“You do,” I say. “Because it’s about our daughter.”
His face goes soft. “Yeah, baby,” he says. “You’re right. I want to know.”
“I love you,” I whisper.
“I love you too,” he whispers back.
“Santa,” I hear Frankie say. “I’ve been a very good girl this year so can you not bring me underwear?”
Colt looks at me.
I look at him.
Then we both start laughing.
And I do it thinking that life can’t get any better.
The next week, exhausted after a long—and messy—night of helping Frankie decorate cookies for her preschool teachers and aides (which means there were a lot of cookies to decorate), Colt almost immediately falls asleep next to me.
I get it, Frankie’s a lot. This time of year is a lot.
And he’s been killing himself to do it all…and to do it all big.
Hitting the gym to get his strength back.
Learning the ropes from Dash to see if he wants to buy into Dash’s security company.
Volunteering at the school gingerbread house decorating event.
Decorating our ginormous tree with a truly absurd amount of lights and ornaments and tinsel.
Spending hours shopping for Christmas presents and then wrapping them carefully and arranging them under the tree.
I’ve tried to remind him that he has time, that he doesn’t have to cram it all in at once.
But…
It’s Christmas. His first Christmas with us as a family, with him as a father, with him as a member of a growing family.
So yeah, he’s putting in the time.
And I love him for it.
He just…needs to chill.
I’ll remind him of that tomorrow. Tonight, I’m going to enjoy the fact that Frankie’s as tuckered out as him and read my book.
So I do exactly that.
Staying up far too late, but fully stuck in that just-one-more-chapter mode, it’s not until well after midnight that I put my Kindle aside and start to turn off the light—
“No!”
I jerk, eyes flying to Colt. He’s asleep, his brows pulled tightly together. “Honey?” I ask quietly.
“No!” he says again, this time paired with a flinch, his big body thrashing on the bed. “Don’t!”
He’s having a nightmare.
I reach over, settle my hand on his arm, and—
Gasp as I’m suddenly on my back, my arm twisted above my head, his fingers wrapped so tightly around my wrist pain ripples up my arm.
“Colt,” I say. “It’s me, baby. It’s—”
His eyes are open but unfocused and his grip tightens.
Going so tight I whimper in pain.
He stills.
Then he’s releasing me, horror rippling across his face.
“Fuck, Briar,” he says immediately rolling off me.
“Fuck, I’m so sorry.” He sits up, hands going to either side of his head, gripping his hair so tightly I worry he might pull it out by the roots.
Then he turns his gaze back to mine. “I’m so sorry.
I didn’t mean to. You have to believe me. You—”
I sit up, shifting so I’m sitting behind him. He hesitates then reaches out for my hand, carefully lifting it and pressing his lips to the reddened marks on my wrist.
“It’s okay,” I say. “I’m okay.”
“I hurt you.”
“Colt,” I say. “Stop. You were having a nightmare. It’s okay. We’ll be okay.”
He shakes his head.
“But we do need to talk about it, honey.” Because he’s been having too many of them. Because this one was worse than the rest. Because he won’t be able to sleep beside me if he’s worried he’s going to hurt me. “And we need to find a way to make them stop.”
He exhales. “I should be over this shit. I’m home safe. I have everything I ever dreamed of.”
“And that makes it even scarier.” I slide his fingers through mine. “Knowing how good it can be, knowing how precious it is. Knowing what living without it is like.”
His throat works before he whispers on a rasp, “Yeah.”
“Do you love me?”
His eyes lock onto mine. “God, yes, Briar.”
“And do you love Frankie?”
Those blue eyes cloud. “Of course, I do. How could you think—”
“I don’t think anything except that because of that, you can’t bury what happened to you.”
His inhale is sharp.
“You need to be your best self for me and Frankie.” A beat. “And for yourself.”
He nods but his expression is agonized. “I know. I just…I’ve always handled this shit on my own or with Dash.”
“Then start by talking to him, honey.”
“I don’t know if he’s ready for that.”
I squeeze his fingers. “Honestly, I think he needs you to need him. I think after all that’s happened that will heal him in a way you can’t even imagine.
” I draw him back down into bed beside me.
“But I get if that’s too much for you after all this time.
So, if it’s not Dash, we need to find you someone else you can talk to. ”
I wrap my arms around him, hold him tight.
He’s still, stiff. Hurting and scared and haunted by nightmares.
But he’s also Colt.
The man I love, the one who will do anything for Frankie and me.
His body softens and he hugs me back, lips coming to my ear.
“I’ll talk to Dash in the morning.”