Page 155 of Return To You

“Oh right. You don’t need comfort. I forgot.”

She smiles at me tenderly. “I love the comfort you provide for me,” she says, and for real, my dick stands at attention. “I just don’t want you to think you need to do anything special for me.”

I cup her face with both my hands. “I want to do these things for you. I always did. I always will. And no matter what you say, yeah, I do want to catch up with the past. Erase it. Make up for it. You deserve it. And I want it.”

“Okay then,” she says, caressing my face dreamily.

“Good.” We stay like that for a while, looking at each other. She asks me where I got the stuff, if anyone helped me with the build. “Nope. I wanted to do this alone. It was… I guess it was cathartic for me. The physical labor. The quiet. Being alone.” Being close to her in my thoughts. I let this sink in a bit. It does feel like I’ve rebuilt a bridge, in a way.

Grace moves on the mattress, and her belly rumbles.

“Hungry?”

“Starving.”

I reach over to the cooler hidden in a vintage travel trunk—the last item I brought this morning—and pull out a chilled gazpacho soup and a fresh white wine. From a side compartment, I produce a baguette freshly baked by Chris. “There’s apples and nuts for dessert,” I say, suddenly self-conscious that this is a frugal and simple meal.

“Ohmygod, Ethan, this is perfect. Look at those little bowls!” she says, talking about the pottery. “Where did you get the soup? It’s delicious.”

I shrug. “I made it.”

She stops with her spoon midair. “You what?”

“I used Justin’s kitchen to make it without you knowing. If I’d done it at the farm, someone would have told you, so—”

“Hold on. You made this?”

I nod.

“From scratch?”

“Eh, just some veggies and seasoning. Throw it in a blender and voila!”

She looks dreamily at me. “Yeah right. Where’d you learn how to—never mind. I don’t want to know her name.”

I laugh. “From Justin’s chef, Shane. They had it at the fair, and it was pretty good. I asked him for his recipe and made it myself.”

She blinks. “I’m sure he would have made it for you. If you’d asked.”

“Yeah. I’m sure he would have. Wouldn’t be the same, though.”

She falls silent for a spell, and I wonder where her mind went. “You okay?”

She answers with a question. “When did you decide to do this? The treehouse, I mean.”

“I saw how easy it was to build that cute frame for Justin, using fallen tree branches.” His project was a surprise for Chloe. “I figured…”

“You figured you could one-up him,” she laughs.

“Nah,” I say, trailing the soft skin of her belly. “Those days are over. I’m happy he’s happy.”

She tilts her face to me. “Ours is a place to hide our relationship. Was a place to hide our relationship.” She finishes on a whisper, and although her tone is soft and mingles with the humming of the forest in the most peaceful way, it pierces me like a dagger.

“I know I shouldn’t, and I know it’s impossible, but there’s a part of me that wants to fix the past. Erase our mistakes. Start over and get it right this time.”

Her eyebrows knit. “We’ll get it right. As long as we don’t expect to have it all.”

But that’s the thing.

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