Page 98 of Yours Truly

“So, wait, why did you come to Bluebell? I know you saw his post but why?” I ask, not understanding why this man resurfaced after what sounds like years of no contact.

“Wanted to rekindle my relationship with my twin,” Derek balks, his face smashed to the wall. I love watching Trace’s bicep flex as he pins his brother, keeping him suspended for me.

“They’re divorcing. That’s what he said earlier. They’re legally separated.” He chuckles as something clicks in place. “She realize it was you with my assistant, and not me?” Trace looks to the back of his brother’s head. “Not that it matters, but I officially lost my TV contract because of that one, Derek.”

“Look, I didn’t mean for that to happen. I just wanted to visit my brother onset and that assistant of yours—shit, she came for me, she really came for me.” He snorts, attempting to victimize himself. “No man would say no to what she offered. It was her unfortunate fault that she thought I was you.” Derek grunts before Trace releases him. Derek stutters and steps back toward Deuce, dragging his wrist under his nose, where he’s bleeding.

“Your entire life is pretending to be me,” Trace says. “If that isn’t fucking pathetic enough, you have to try to ruin the life you’re emulating.” He shakes his head, stroking his hands through his hair as he exhales. He turns to face me, and I open my arms, begging for him.

A small sigh leaves him as we embrace, Trace collecting me in his arms, lifting me into his lap as he sits on my bed. I bury my face in his neck.

“I’m sorry I doubted you,” I breathe, because I did. I doubted him long before Derek resurfaced. But the shit I’d seen in the tabloids about his affair with his assistant, it wasn’t even him. It was Derek.

He laughs. “You have nothing to be sorry about, Firecracker. I lied to you at Goode’s because I didn’t want to face what happened. I’ve been denying him and their marriage and that part of my life for years. But that was stupid. I was stupid. I should have told you.”

“You would have, eventually,” I say, lifting my face from the crook of his neck to smooth my hands down his cheeks, pressing my lips to his. Our kiss is hungry and feral, and at some point, Deuce takes Derek out and the door closes.

“I would have, yes. I mean, I was going to. But if I would have told you that day,” he lifts my hand between us, gently smoothing his thumb over the white gauze. “You wouldn’t have hurt your tattooing hand.” He kisses the bandage, and brings my hand to his heart, holding it there. “I’m sorry my lie hurt us, Ivy. And I’m so sorry for what you must’ve thought tonight. Because I know that pain, and I’m so fucking sorry you went through it.”

The ugly sobs hit hard. “You didn’t cheat on me,” I cry, tears of happiness commingling with tears of relief, my arms around him again.

“I couldn’t, Ivy. I wouldn’t.” He peels me off of him, and takes my chin in his hand. “I love you, Firecracker.”

My face tingles, and my stomach free falls, my ribs tight, a knot in my throat. “Say it again,” I breathe.

“I love you,” he repeats easily.

I smile. “I love you too.”

“I had something special planned tonight.” He skirts his lips against mine. “I wanted to tattoo you, since you tattooed me. A double rite of passage.”

With my hands on his shoulders, I steal another kiss from his lips. “Yes,” I breathe, “I want that.”

He chuckles, smoothing his hands up my back, heat blooming between my legs at our closeness. “You didn’t ask what I want to ink on you.”

“I don’t care,” I say truthfully. “I just want your work on me.”

He scoops me up. “Hospital for a check on that hand, Ink Time, then my place,” he lists.

“My hand is fine. Dash sewed me up.”

“Oh yeah, a crooked cop is someone I trust with your tattooin’ hand,” he scoffs, pushing out the bedroom door. A moment later he’s lowering me to a barstool in my kitchen. Juniper, Dash and Sterling are standing around a pot of brewing coffee, despite the fact it’s nearly nine o’ clock at night.

They seem to be soothing her, but when we lock eyes, she smiles, rushing forward. “I heard, Deuce explained,” she says, pulling my head into her chest. “I would have done the same thing and I’m just glad it wasn’t true.”

Sterling hands me a cup of coffee, but Trace snatches it, moving through my kitchen to find my protein powder. He grabs milk from the fridge and mixes the two, pouring it over the steaming cup of caffeine. “There,” he says, passing it back to me with a wink.

“Your brother is waiting in my truck,” Sterling tells Trace as Juniper toasts me a fresh slice of bread, bringing me a canteen of fresh water and some pain reliever pills. I love my sisters.

“What do you want us to do with him?” Sterling asks.

Dash pinches the bridge of his nose. “Please say take him to the airport or something.”

Juniper’s gaze flicks between the two men. “Let Trace answer.”

Trace shrugs. “I don’t care. I don’t care what happens to him.”

Dash’s shoulders slope as he releases a long sigh, and Sterling shifts on his feet, a worried look sliding to my older sister. “We can take him to his car and let him go,” he offers, and it’s now that I realize they’re bartering with Juni. That she clearly wants another fate for Derek.

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