Chapter 11 #3
“I noticed,” I admitted. “More often than I’d like to admit.
But it’s one thing to acknowledge that you’re objectively gorgeous and sexy.
It’s a whole other thing to think of you being sexy with me.
I tried not to let myself think that way until you put your offer on the table, and then…
I dunno. It’s kinda like one of those hidden-image pictures, where it’s all dots and squiggles until you step back and shift your focus, and suddenly, you don’t know how you could have missed it.
” I dragged my thumb over his mouth again, tugging at his bottom lip.
His eyes went unfocused, and my gut cramped with need so hard I forced myself to pull away from him.
I was not fucking this man in a cave, damn it.
Not today, anyway.
“Too bad I didn’t figure this out sooner.
Would have saved us weeks of turmoil.” I shook my head.
“But now I need to know… What do you want, Hawk? You offered me friendship and sex, and I don’t want to presume too much.
I know you’ve got a lot of stuff going on right now.
” I waved a hand to encompass the tent, the mountain, his protest. “I know you’re processing a lot of emotion.
A lot of anger. If this isn’t the right time for you to be thinking about more…
okay.” I shrugged. “Basically, I’m done telling you how you should feel about this. Tell me what you want from me.”
Hawk hesitated. He put his hand on my chest, stroking me through my T-shirt like he needed the contact. “I want a relationship with you. Definitely. I just… I wish you weren’t so hesitant about it, I guess. Does this make you happy?”
“Baby, there’s no part of me that’s not happy. Being with you like this? Having all the things that I adore about you and getting to kiss you, too? Christ, I’m fucking ecstatic. It’s just… I guess I’m processing through some stuff, too.”
“Like…?”
I blew out a breath. Was I really going to talk about this shit? I darted a glance at Hawk, who looked hopeful but wary, and realized that for him, there wasn’t much I wouldn’t do.
“You know, ah… you know my dad died when I was a kid, obviously.”
He frowned. “Yeah. Of course. We’ve talked about that.”
“We’ve talked about some of it,” I corrected. “About what it was like growing up without a father.”
He nodded.
“But there are some parts of that I haven’t really talked about much. Not that it’s a secret, just… I don’t like to dwell on it, you know? To really sit with those memories.”
“Okay,” he agreed cautiously. “I can see that.”
I cleared my throat. “Like… I don’t know if I ever told you that my parents were high school sweethearts? Mom played clarinet in the marching band, and Dad played—”
“Tuba,” Hawk supplied softly. “It was fate.”
I laughed. “Kinda, I guess. Mom got pregnant with me senior year, and my grandparents were not okay with that. My parents ended up getting married immediately and… instant family. No college, no youthful adventures. But my mom says neither of them regretted it.” I shrugged.
“My dad didn’t have much family of his own—only his mom—and my mom’s family kinda disowned her after the surprise wedding, so they were both excited to have a little family of their own. To build something better, you know?”
Hawk nodded. “That sounds like your mom. Positive attitude, always looking for the silver linings.”
“Mostly, yeah. So after I came along, my dad did every job imaginable. He delivered newspapers before the sun rose—sometimes he’d even take me along.
He worked at a chemical plant during the day.
My mom did data entry at night. They didn’t have time to build much of a social network, but that was okay because we were tight.
A unit. They relied on each other, and I relied on both of them, and it worked.
We never had a lot, but we were happy.” I paused. “And then he got sick.”
Hawk made a wounded noise because he knew how this part of the story ended, but he didn’t interrupt or offer me empty platitudes. He just clung to my hand like he wanted me to know I wasn’t alone, and I felt an overwhelming rush of affection for him.
“It was pretty typical movie-of-the-week stuff, looking back,” I said with an eye roll.
“And a lot of it I didn’t really understand until I was older.
Our health insurance was the cheap kind that young, healthy people get because they don’t realize they need better coverage until it’s too late.
There was no life insurance either—who had money to pay premiums when someone always needed new shoes?
We never had a lot, but things got worse pretty quickly. ”
“Fuck,” Hawk breathed.
“Yeah. It was a scary time. When I was young, my mom tried to shield me from the financial stuff as much as she could, but the worst part for me was… was seeing what happened to her. She was tired and strained all the time. Like the life had just been sucked out of her. And as an adult, I look back and think… shit. She lost her best friend, her lover, her partner, her anchor, her safety net… all in one fell swoop. Her happiness had been tied with his.” I pressed the fingertips of both hands together like the pointy roof of a house.
“And when he was gone…” I removed one of my hands, and the other toppled.
Hawk flinched, and I searched his gaze intently.
“It’s scary to imagine building something with someone when I know how easily I could lose it. ”
“I had no idea,” Hawk whispered.
“How could you?” I shrugged. “It turned out okay. My mom is a fighter—you know that. She got public assistance for a while to keep some food on the table. They helped her find a full-time job at a place that paid for her to get her degree at night. I started working, too, when I was old enough. We paid off dad’s medical bills and saved as much as we could.
We only really got our feet under us financially maybe ten years ago now—”
“Ten years? So you spent most of your childhood…? God, Jack. No wonder you’re a workaholic.” Hawk propped his chin on the back of his hands, which were resting on my chest. “You’ve experienced true scarcity.”
I shrugged again. “I never want my mom or me to get back in that place.”
He pushed himself up until the sleeping bag fell off him. “That’s why you’re not fighting the development.”
“Yeah.” I rubbed a hand over my face. “It’d be nice to believe that no one in the Hollow has to do without, but that’s not real life.
The town could really use a steady influx of tourist cash—ideally in a way that doesn’t destroy the beauty of the place the tourists are coming to see.
I’m all for coming up with an alternate plan, for making sure there’s plenty of oversight, all of that.
But I don’t wanna lose our chance either.
And I sure as fuck am not gonna be the guy coming up with a brilliant idea that marries both needs—”
“Especially since you’re a little busy trying to keep the diner afloat during the summer rush when you’re missing your most dedicated employee?” Hawk smiled wryly.
“Exactly.”
He nodded. “Thank you. For explaining that. For trusting me with it. I understand where you’re coming from now.”
“Maybe I should have explained it fully before. I just…” I blew out a breath.
Hawk shook his head. “It’s okay. You don’t owe me those stories, Jack.
And it’s my fault, too. I was so frustrated and my thoughts were so tangled I felt like you weren’t listening to my very important reasons for feeling the way I did.
I didn’t stop to consider that you had your own reasons that were just as important. ”
I felt worn-out, stripped and bare, vulnerable in a way I’d never made myself before. “So… what happens next? Now that we’re, you know… doing the relationship thing.”
Hawk blinked at me, all innocence. “I sort of imagined we’d follow the traditional Little Pippin Hollow relationship protocol.
Official meeting with Mayor York to declare our relationship intentions.
Get our blood tests and star charts done.
Register the date of our consummation with the town’s Anniversary Committee.
Do the public claiming ritual on the common—conveniently for us, the Pye Day Potluck is already happening today, so we won’t need to wait for them to organize anything special.
And, if we’re very lucky, we’ll get a commemorative scroll,” he finished matter-of-factly.
I stared at him. “You’re joking.”
He laughed out loud. “Of course I’m joking. I mean, not about Pye Day, because that’s actually today. But about the rest…”
“After what happened with Luke and Webb, you never know,” I said darkly.
“True. Look, the real answer is…” Hawk shrugged helplessly. “I don’t know what happens now. Don’t forget, I don’t have any more experience with relationships than you do. So maybe we write our own rules in a way that works for us. Okay?”