Page 73 of Blue Moon Love

I’d never heard Witty talk about my grandma. I just assumed he’d treated her the same way my dad had treated my mom. “So, then, were you faithful to Grandma Louise?”

Witty’s jaw ticked, and he stared at me with a look I hadn’t seen since he caught me and Milo smoking in the backyard when we were thirteen. “You’re damn right I was, son. That was my sweetheart. I never stepped out on her. From the first moment I saw that girl, I was hers. I never even looked at another woman. A love like that, it only comes around once in a blue moon.”

“So all your…messing around, that was only after she died?” I tried to make sense of what he was saying.

All my life, I’d grown up thinking that fucking everything that walked was in my DNA. I was a Whitlock, so, therefore, I was a womanizer. I’d seen the damage my father did to my mother, and I always assumed it was the same fate my Grandma Louise had suffered.

“You’re damn straight. I’m a one-woman man. That woman just happens to be in heaven right now. I might try to distract myself, but I could never give anyone else my heart. My Lulu had it since the first time I laid eyes on her, and I know she’s takin’ care of it until I see her again.” He laid his hand on his chest, and more tears filled his eyes.

I sat, dumbstruck at what I’d just heard. I wasn’t sure I knew how to process it.

“My daddy, and your daddy, they made their choices. They lived their lives only carin’ about themselves. That’s not you, son. You have the biggest heart of anyone I know. And guess what, it belongs to that redhead over there. She is your blue moon love. That kinda love—that’s bigger than any DNA. That’s the kind of love that heals the sick, that moves mountains, that lasts a lifetime, even if that life is cut short.”

I looked over at Kenna as what Witty said sank in. Tears began to pool in my eyes. Everything I believed, everything I based my life on, had been a lie. Now that I was seeing the truth, I couldn’t imagine how I’d believed so much bullshit for so long. It’s like I’d been brainwashed, and it had taken Witty all of five minutes to set me straight.

“So, I’ll ask you again, son, when are you gonna get down on one knee and ask that girl to marry you?”

Without responding, I stood and headed across the room. I had no plans on proposing; that was bad form at a wedding, but I was going to get a few things straight, like the fact that I was completely in love with Kenna and had been since I was, well, as Witty so eloquently put it, I was knee-high to a grasshopper.

When Kenna saw me walking toward her, she stopped the conversation she was having and headed my direction. We met halfway across the room, which was nice for me because, besides breathing, walking also hurt.

“Can we dance?” My throat was tight as I held out my hand.

She looked shocked by my request but also very concerned, presumably because my eyes were watering. “Are you okay?”

“No.” I pulled her into me and wrapped my arms around her. I tried to hold her tightly; I just needed to be as close to her as I could, but she pulled back and lifted her head to look up at me.

“What’s wrong?” she demanded. “Is it your head? Is it your ribs? Your shoulder? Your knee?”

“No. It’s me.”

“You?” Her eyes searched mine, then she looked up and down my body, trying to find some clue about what I could possibly be talking about.

“Yes. Me. I’m an idiot.”

She tilted her head as a smile formed on her perfect fucking lips. “I mean, I’ve been telling you that for years.”

“I know. You were right.” My arms wrapped around her tighter. Now that I was holding her, I never wanted to let her go. I thought about all the years I’d wasted, convinced I would be bad for her. I could have lost her. I felt tears begin to form in my eyes.

“Hey, I was kidding. What is it? What’s wrong?”

“I love you, Kenna.”

“I love you, too,” she quickly replied, just like she did every time I told her I loved her.

She wasn’t getting this. She didn’t understand what I was telling her.

“I’m in love with you. I’ve been in love with you since you went off that bike ramp and crashed, and I cleaned your knee.”

Her eyes widened. “You have?”

I nodded. “You stood up, and you could barely walk, but you kept your head high. Then, when I was picking the gravel out of your knee and I poured the hydrogen peroxide, you just pursed your lips as a single tear fell down your cheek. You were such a badass, even then.”

As if on cue, a single tear fell down her cheek. I lifted my hand and wiped it off.

She leaned into my touch and grinned. “I wanted you to think I was tough.”

“I did. I wanted to kiss you that day. And I’ve wanted to kiss you every day since. But I didn’t let myself. I wouldn’t let myself, because I thought if I did, I would hurt you. I never wanted to hurt you like my dad hurt my mom.”

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