Chapter 53
Note to self:
Buy a second copy of How to Pirate Like a Professional to keep in the car.
Mom and I had a long talk at a little café we found a few blocks from the hotel. She cried; I cried. All the things I’d kept in came bursting out. I even told her about the seizure eight months ago. To her credit, she held it together.
“I can’t just turn off my worrying, honey,” she said.
“I need you to rein it in some.”
Somehow, I knew we’d have this conversation again and I was okay with it. I was lucky to have people who loved me enough to worry about me. The alternative was pretty damn depressing.
Back at the hotel, Mom hugged me long and hard before heading back to her room to see the state Dad and Abe were in. It was when I was strolling by the lounge I saw him, a handsome man with curly blond hair, nursing a drink and staring at a game on the television.
Like the creeper I was, and had always been where Theo was concerned, I watched him for a while. With his hunched shoulders and pensive, forlorn expression, he reminded me of a lost little boy. My heart squeezed.
I strolled in and slid onto the stool next to him. “Hi.”
He turned. A tiny smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Hi.”
“So, how’s your grog?”
One dark-blond eyebrow lifted. “Pretty good.”
The bartender moseyed down to us and asked if I wanted anything. “Can you make a Wrecked Pirate?”
Theo chuckled. “A Wrecked Pirate?”
“I’ve been doing my research.”
Theo laughed softly, the sound sliding through me. “You have a thing for pirates?”
I turned my body and propped an elbow on the bar. “I might. You know any?”
The corners of his eyes crinkled. “Maybe.”
My drink appeared, and I took a sip, pleasantly surprised at the taste. “Shiver me timbers, as the sea dogs would say.”
He laughed. “Did you memorize a pirate dictionary?”
“Oh, no. I’ve been reading these pirate romances. So good.” I leaned in closer and lowered my voice. “Very educational.”
“You’ll have to tell me more about these books,” he said solemnly, although his eyes sparkled.
“I see that in our future. Although I should warn you, the author has a very active imagination.” I slid closer.
Mouth stretched in a wicked little smile, he placed a hand on my knee. The skin there thrummed warm at his touch. “Are you flirting with me now?”
“Aye. How am I doing, matey?”
We stared into each other’s eyes wearing matching dopey, smitten smiles like dopey, smitten lovebirds for far too long before Theo leaned forward to press a kiss to the tip of my nose. Both of us straightened. I took a healthy sip of my drink to fortify myself.
“I’m sorry,” we both blurted at the same time.
“I tried to call you a few times,” he said. “Knocked on your room door, too.”
“I turned off my phone then I fell asleep. Mack woke me because Dad and Abe got into it, and then I went for pie with my mom.” I bit my lower lip. “I wasn’t ignoring you, I promise.”
“What kind of pie?”
I smirked. “That’s your question.”
He grinned. “I tried to tell you about the interview earlier, but we got distracted.”
“So, there’s really a job in Chicago you’re considering?”
“I am.” He shook his head. “I was.”
I sat back, putting distance between us, and pretending my heart wasn’t starting to ache. “Chicago is a long way away.”
“After my mom died, I felt sort of alone, restless even. Like I should be doing something. And things were…hard. There was this woman I couldn’t stop thinking about, but she was in a relationship. I thought I was in love with her, but I wasn’t sure how she felt about me. So, I thought a change of scenery might be a good idea.”
“Who’s this woman?” I asked, sounding like the jealous girlfriend I totally was.
He gazed at me intensely. “You don’t get it, do you?”
“Get what?”
“A few months before my mom died, we were at a family dinner at your parents’ house. It was before Cal left and you and Alec were still together. You were sitting next to me, and you were teasing Frankie about his workout clothes.”
Strangely, I remembered the family dinner he was talking about. Frankie had been deep in his wrestling onesie phase. Someone had to call him out.
“You turned to me and smiled and asked me to pass the salt and pepper. That’s when it hit me.”
“What hit you?”
He picked up my hand and began making those slow, small circles with his thumb, warming me from the inside out. “That I wanted to sit next to you all the time. That I liked hearing your laugh and seeing your smile and watching your eyes light up and listening to whatever you had to say. That I wanted you to ask me to pass the salt and pepper every day for the rest of my life.”
“Oh,” I breathed.
He huffed a laugh. “But you had a boyfriend. Then you didn’t have a boyfriend, but I wasn’t sure how you felt about me. I was scared to tell you how I felt.” His gaze dropped to our hands, but he couldn’t hide the pink blooming from his neck to his cheeks. He was nervous. Somehow, that made me want to throw myself in his arms even more.
“A friend from college works at a sports magazine based in Chicago. He got me an interview. It’s right after the wedding.”
I leaned down to try and catch his eye. “That’s what the phone calls were about.”
“Yeah. But a couple of weeks ago, Cal asked me if I’d be willing to go to Colorado and talk Abe into coming to the wedding. I got this idea that maybe if, well, if I could spend time with you, I could figure us,” his gaze met mine, “out before I made any big decisions. So, I told Cal you should come with me for purely selfish reasons. I wanted to spend time with you.”
“What did you figure out?” I held my breath; this seemed like the most important answer.
“I don’t want to go to Chicago, Ali.” Those blue eyes locked onto mine, full of so much emotion, my heart ached. “I’ll cancel that interview in a heartbeat if you want me to, but you have to tell me.”
I hesitated. Why wasn’t I shouting my answer? Yes, cancel the interview, marry me, let’s have babies, and make everyone sick over our all-encompassing love. But I didn’t say any of that. Why?
“You’re scared.” He cupped my cheek. “I know. This is terrifying.”
I let out a wet laugh. “Yeah, it is. I don’t want to screw it up.”
He pressed his forehead to mine. “You won’t. You can’t. I’m already yours.”