Chapter 33 #3
The first tear breaks loose and runs down her cheek, but she doesn’t wipe it away.
“Wyatt.” My name is a bare whisper.
“Say you hear me.”
“I hear you.”
Her hand closes around mine in the water, and her grip is harder than I would have guessed she had left in her.
After a beat, she lifts my battered hand out of the water and slowly presses her lips to the back of it, right over the worst of the cuts. Then she turns it palm up and presses her mouth to the heel of my hand before dropping a third kiss on the inside of my wrist where she can feel my pulse.
Three small kisses. Three vows.
And I can feel every one of them everywhere.
She leans up, her mouth coming to the cut on my cheekbone. She presses it there so carefully, the smallest kiss I have ever been given, and I’ve no doubt it’s the one I’m going to remember the longest.
I turn my face and catch her mouth properly.
I haven’t kissed her since the loft, and neither of us rush it. My wet palm finds the side of her neck, hers finds my jaw, and we kiss in the warmth of the steam without going anywhere with it.
When she pulls back, her forehead settles against mine.
“Hi,” she says.
I huff a small laugh. “Hi, baby.”
“Bed.”
I get out first, wrap a towel around my waist, and hold the second one open for her. Then I dry her where she stands as she dries me, careful to bend at the knees so she can reach.
There’s a soft knock at the door of the room beyond, but instead of getting it, I tuck a towel around Daisy, lift her into my arms, and carry her to the bed, setting her down on the edge of the mattress.
I cross to the door, tightening the towel around my own waist before answering it to June.
“Brought you some turkey sandwiches, and that tea Daisy likes.” She shrugs as I empty her arms. “Best I can do at short notice.”
Leaning over the threshold, I press a kiss to my little sister’s brow, then whisper against it, “Made me so proud today, Junie.”
When I pull back, she’s biting down on her bottom lip, eyes glistening. She clears her throat before murmuring, “Yeah, you too, Wy.” Then, shooting me a watery grin, she turns and speeds back down the hallway, calling over her shoulder, “I’ll be here if you need me.”
I close the door and set the wrapped sandwiches and the thermos on the dresser. Then I bring the first-aid kit back to the bed, and crouch down between Daisy’s knees, where I open the kit in my lap.
Her tiny feet are clean from the bath, and the cuts stand out even more starkly against her smooth skin. Cupping her left heel in my palm, I lift it gently, then pluck an antiseptic wipe from the kit.
“Sting comin’, baby.”
She nods, eyes staying on my hands as I dab the wipe across the worst cut on the arch of her foot. I work slowly, and as gently as possible, but she doesn’t flinch, even when I know it has to burn.
“You can complain, you know. About anything. I’m takin’ requests.”
Her mouth lifts at one corner, not quite a smile, but enough.
I lay a square of gauze over the cleansed cut, then unfurl a roll of gauze to start wrapping, keeping it snug. She slides her hand from her lap into the hair at the back of my head, leaving it there to comb her fingers through soft and slow while I finish up.
“You’re staying off these for two days. Three if I can help it. Anything you need, anything at all, you point. I fetch.”
A sound somewhere between a breath and a laugh escapes her lips, and I look up to find her watching me, amusement dancing behind her eyes.
“I’m serious. You walk on there tomorrow, I’m carrying you everywhere. Bathroom included. So decide what you want to do with that.”
“And here I thought I was the bossy one.” Her tone is dry as she quirks a brow.
“You can be the bossy one in this bed all you want. You were the last time, Daisy-girl, and I can’t say I minded.
” A real smile lights her face, and I reach up to run my left knuckles down her cheek before palming the side of her neck.
“But when it comes to keepin’ you in one piece, the boss is me. ”
Her smile reaches her eyes, and I return a soft one of my own before I let my hand drop, and pick another antiseptic wipe up.
I move to her right foot, repeating the process just as slowly. By the time I tape the last edge of gauze down, her thumb is moving back and forth across my temple, brushing my hair off my brow with each pass.
Sitting back on my heels, I look up at her. She slides her hand out of my hair to palm my cheek, ghosting the pad of her thumb over the cut on my cheekbone.
“Thank you.”
I shake my head. “Don’t thank me, baby. Don’t ever thank me for this.
” Then I push to stand, lift her off the bed.
The damp towel loosens around her, and I let it fall to the floor, then lay her down on the cool sheet.
She makes a small sound of contentment when her back finds it.
My own towel goes before I climb in beside her.
After today, I need nothing between us.
She comes to me before I’ve settled. Her shoulder fits into the hollow of mine, her head goes under my chin, and her hand comes up to hover a fraction above the bruising across my ribs before she lets it land lightly.
I press my mouth to the top of her head and murmur against her damp hair, “Daisy-girl.”
Her response is a sleepy, “Mm.”
My arms tighten around her, ever so slightly. “No one will ever hurt you again. Not a man. Not a memory. Not one bad dream. Not while I’m breathin’.”
She lifts her head, and I can see her chin is doing the thing it does when she is trying to stay strong.
“I mean it, baby. Every word.”
“I know you do.” Her hand slides up from my ribs and settles flat over my heart.
For a moment, I just look at her.
Damp hair combed back from her face as the lamp catches the amber flecks in her eyes. The small bones of her shoulders bare above the sheet, while her hand rests warm and steady right over the place that has belonged to her for years.
Daisy Monroe is in bed with me, in the house where we met, here in Blackstone Creek. Her hand is over my heart, and she is looking at me like she has been waiting for me her whole life, when the truth of it is the other way around.
“I love you.” The words are out before I’ve even thought them and she stills on a sharp inhalation.
“I love you, Daisy. I’ve loved you for longer than I’ve had the right to.
I’ve turned every other way I could think of for the last six years to keep from sayin’ it out loud, and then this morning I almost lost you, and there isn’t a goddamn thing left in me that’s willing to keep quiet about it for one more day. ”
A tear breaks loose down her cheek, and I catch it with my thumb, dragging it across the freckles there.
“You walk into a room and the air changes. You’ve done that since you were twenty years old in a red dress, and I haven’t been the same man since. I have been yours, Daisy-girl. Whether you knew it or not. Whether I let myself say it or not. I have been yours.”
She doesn’t speak, doesn’t move her hand from my chest. Simply closes her eyes and presses her face into my throat, where I feel her mouth shape the words against my skin soundlessly.
I love you. I love you. I love you.
She says it three times silently into my collarbone, and I feel each one of them hit harder than anything she could have said out loud.
Then she pulls back, just far enough to look at me. Her hands come up to my jaw to hold my face, and her thumbs settle on my cheekbones, her eyes intent on mine.
“I love you, Wyatt Hartley.”
It is the smallest sound she has made all day, and I feel it like she’s driven a fist straight through my chest.
She leans in until her forehead meets mine, then closer still, until her mouth is a breath from mine.
“I love you,” she whispers against my lips.
“Say it again.” The words are hoarse, barely above a whisper. “I’m going to need you to say it every day for the rest of my life.”
“I love—”
I draw her mouth down to mine and kiss her with every word I’ve not spoken in six years. Her lips part for me without a sound as I take her mouth slow and deliberate, the way a man takes something he plans to keep. I’ve waited too long to be in any hurry now.
When she pulls back, her forehead settles against mine.
“Sleep now, my Daisy-girl.”
“Stay with me?”
“I’m not going anywhere, baby. Close your eyes. Rest now.”
She lets out the smallest breath of a sound and lowers herself back into me. Her hand finds mine on top of the comforter and her fingers thread through.
And as sleep claims her, I hold her closer, grateful for this moment I thought I’d never get, and almost lost forever today.
Sleep is a long time coming, but that’s alright. I have her.
She’s breathing. She’s here. She loves me.
And I’m not wasting another second.