Chapter 26
THE KISSING TRUTH
Declan
Since my dog followed Ginny when she left the cookout, I head back to the main house to collect her after the barn is cleaned up.
Felt good to talk to Adelaide about her mom. To do a good deed for the day.
And it felt even better to watch Ginny get mad.
Not because I like her being mad.
More because I’m glad she’s not still stuck on being agreeable all of the time.
That she feels comfortable enough with me to get mad at me.
That she’s not trying so hard to make the people around her like her that she forgets to claim what she likes for herself.
I’m crossing in front of the gardens between the main house and the mother-in-law quarters that Shade’s staying in when I notice Ginny and Flow.
They’re on a bench in the midst of the flowers and vines, lit half by the moon and half by the garden lights lining the short path to the stone bench.
Ginny’s scrolling her phone.
Flow’s huddled in Ginny’s lap, but she shifts her eyes my way and whines, which makes Ginny look up too.
She grimaces, then squeezes her eyes shut briefly before offering me a hesitant smile as she sets her phone aside. “Guess you want your dog back.”
Flow whines harder and crawls more into Ginny’s lap.
“Sorry to interrupt. Just checking on her,” I say.
And you.
“She’s good,” Ginny says. “She’s being brave and facing the dark, aren’t you, Flow? Yes, you are. Such a good doggy.”
Flow licks Ginny’s face while Ginny scratches behind her ears.
I tuck my hands into my pockets and look away.
“I’m sorry I was an asshole,” Ginny whispers after a moment. “Tonight. With your shirt. And the ribs.”
“You weren’t.”
“I was. I’ll give you your shirt back.”
“Keep it. I want to see what it looks like after you tie-dye it.”
“You were right. My room’s a disaster.”
It’s impossible to not smile at that. “Good.”
“Good?”
“Yeah. Good.”
“You can barely walk through my room to get to my bed.”
“Then you’re doing it right.”
“Are you for real?”
“You like your mess?”
“Yes.”
“Then yes, I’m for real. You should be you and do things that make you happy.”
“What if I’m very confused about if…other things…make me happy?”
There’s something in her voice that has the teeniest shard of hope sneaking into my heart, but I shut it down. “Lovely place to be.”
“Confusion is a lovely place to be?”
“Means you get to try all kinds of different things while you’re looking for what makes you happy.”
She’s watching me closely.
Possibly closer than I’ve ever seen her watch me before.
Like she’s seeing me for the first time.
Recognizing me as a separate person beyond being her ex’s best friend.
And I need to not go there.
“I want to go to Zander’s show,” she says in a rush.
I nod like my pulse isn’t dancing at the idea of her seeing my brother. “Sure. Want his phone number?
“With you,” she adds. “I want to go to his show with you.”
That teeny shard of hope wiggles bigger and deeper in my chest.
“But I don’t want it to be complicated,” she continues. “For you. Because—because I’d never ask someone to pick between me and their best friend. Or to give the appearance that I think I want you to.”
Flow whines and whimpers harder and tries to climb Ginny’s shoulders too.
“It’s okay, girl,” Ginny whispers, and I wonder if she’s talking to herself as well as Flow. “It’s okay.”
I help myself to the other half of the bench, mostly because I suddenly don’t trust my knees.
She wants to go with me.
“It’s not your job to make my life less complicated,” I tell her.
She blinks at me, then drops her head against my dog with a heavy sigh. “How do you keep doing that?”
“Doing what?”
“Saying all of the right things.”
“It’s the curse of growing up in a mentally, physically, and emotionally stable environment.”
“How terrible for you.”
“Completely awful. No unnecessary drama. No question how much my parents loved me. No film crews recording my every move.”
“No passive-aggressive manipulation?”
“Nope.”
“No siblings who left you behind with a narcissistic mother?”
“Or who tormented me with spiders.”
She shivers and inches closer to me like she’s remembering the On the Rhodes episode where Ten kept leaving fake spiders all around the camper for Ginny to find. “My mom and the director made him. And then Ten took me out for ice cream to apologize after the cameras were off every time.”
The urge to hug her is so strong it physically hurts. “You’re honestly tight with your siblings?”
“The bonds of shared trauma.”
“Your mom hint at all that she’s coming back?”
“No. Caro’s back from her honeymoon and Mike’s off filming in Canada, so she has her favorite to latch on to again without having to suck up to her new son-in-law.”
I pinch my lips together.
“It’s not bad, not being her favorite,” Ginny says. “She punishes me for all of my various ways of disappointing her by visiting less often. So it’s actually a win.”
She scoots even closer to me.
I’m not imagining it.
She’s getting closer.
I swallow hard and tell myself she’s not doing it on purpose. “That could be the Mabel effect. She’s scary.”
“Mabel’s the best.” A small smile flickers over her face as she stops in the middle of leaning her shoulders even closer to me, then rubs Flow instead, sinking her fingers into my dog’s fluffy coat.
“I—I’m a little on the struggle bus right now.
I have this thing about latching on to people who show the smallest bit of kindness, and you—you’re the only person from my before times who’s been nice to me lately.
So I—I appreciate that. A lot. But I don’t trust myself with anything more than appreciation. No matter what I might think I feel.”
I want to wrap her in a hug and hold her tight and shield her from anyone who would make her feel unworthy and tell her that I feel it too.
But I don’t because I don’t want to scare her away.
Again.
So instead, I nod at the ground. “That’s not something you would’ve said out loud the last time I knew you.”
“Rah-rah, hooray therapy.” She twirls a finger in the air.
I smile at her. “Sarcasm looks good on you.”
“I’m not rude or sarcastic to other people.”
“I know.”
“You brought it on yourself.”
I smile broader. “I did.”
She nudges my knee with hers. “Now even when I want to be a little nice, I feel like snapping at you.”
“Bring it. I can take it.”
“Why would you encourage me like this?”
“I like honesty.”
“Sarcasm isn’t honesty.”
“Isn’t it?”
Flow barks at me like she’s telling me to quit baiting Ginny.
“See? Flow’s on my side.” Ginny’s hand rests on my thigh, giving it a playful squeeze. “She’s such a smart girl.”
She’s flirting with me.
Ginny Rhodes is flirting with me.
I have to swallow twice more before I can speak, and it’s hard to keep my voice steady with her body leaning into mine and her hand on my leg.
“My parents used to argue in front of Zander and me fairly regularly. And then they’d apologize to each other and talk through it in front of us too.
But my mom—she never argued with anyone outside the house.
Not her parents. Not her siblings. Not my dad’s family.
The ultimate peacemaker who regularly suppressed her own wants and needs to make everyone around her happy.
She can say the hard things to Dad though.
And that’s why they had a good relationship.
No suppressing things to spare each other’s feelings. Just raw honesty. All the time.”
Ginny leans even harder into me. “That’s why you like when I’m mean to you.”
“Not mean. You’re never mean.” She’s torturing me right now with how close she is, but she’s not mean.
I hope. Fuck me, I hope she’s not teasing me.
“That’s my idea of a healthy relationship.
Not that—that this is a relationship. That kind of relationship.
I—I just mean it’s how I am with everyone. ”
Her hand tightens on my thigh. “I know. You’re leaving, and we have no reason to be friendly after you’re gone.”
“I—I’d like to be friendly with you.”
“I can’t stop thinking about our kiss,” she confesses.
“Ginny—”
“And how much I liked it and how much I want to be bad, but I don’t want to be bad because you deserve so much more than me wanting you to be bad, but I like you, and I don’t like anyone. I don’t let myself.”
“I don’t mind if you like me.” My voice is hoarse and my dick is straining and my dog is glaring at both of us, still in Ginny’s lap even as she scoots so close that we’re shoulder to shoulder, hip to hip, thigh to thigh.
“Is that raw honesty?”
“I want you to like me.”
I want you to love me.
I want you to love me the way I’ve always loved you.
“I want to kiss you again,” she whispers.
“Anything you want, Ginny. Anything.”
Her hand drifts up my thigh, her arm brushing the unmistakable evidence of everything I’m willing to give her.
She licks her lips and studies me. “Will you kiss me again?”
“You’re in charge.”
“Stop me if—if you don’t want to—”
“I want to.”
Flow whines again, huffs, and leaps off Ginny’s lap.
Ginny smiles that brilliant smile, and it takes every ounce of control I possess to not grab her and kiss her and touch her and take her right here.
“You’re very serious,” she murmurs, trailing her fingers up my wrist, my inner forearm, over my biceps to my shoulder, leaving a trail of electrified goosebumps in her wake.
“I don’t want—to worry—you’ll have regrets,” I force out.
I shiver as her fingers scrape up my neck, her face drifting closer and closer, lips parted, eyes searching mine.
“I’m going to kiss you and try very, very hard to not fall into old habits and regret it.”
“You never have to regret anything about me.”
Her lips brush mine, and I make myself hold very, very still, waiting—hoping—wishing—
“Kiss me back, please,” she whispers against my mouth.
The magic words.
She wants me.
I give in to every desperate desire I’ve ever had, and I sink into kissing Ginny.
Mind.
Heart.
Soul.
All hers.
However she wants me.