Page 137 of Bound By Words

“Finally,” she yawned as they left the room, reaching down to grasp the back of my hand. “We need to talk.”

“We don’t need to worry about anything right now,” I assured her, turning my hand to interlace our fingers. I wasn’t going anywhere. “You need to rest.”

“I want to talk about coming back to Boston with you.”

Shaking my head, I grabbed her water bottle, placed it gently on her lap, and nodded toward it. “Drink.”

“Yes, Sir,” she winked as she slowly lowered her mouth toward the straw, a mischievous smile on her lips.

“Behave. You’re in no shape to be doing anything,” I scolded, my lips twitching as she pursed her lips into an exaggerated pout.

“But you’ll still obnoxiously insist on me being hydrated.”

“You are correct,” I chuckled, enjoying the little flare of defiance in her gaze. “You need to rest and take care of yourself. I’m worried about you, Kelly.”

She nodded, swallowing hard, her eyes becoming suddenly glassy. “Okay, quit distracting me. I’m coming home with you when you leave. How long are you here?”

“As long as you need me.”

“Then you can help me pack once they let me out of here.”

“Kelly,” I sighed as I held up my hand, but she didn’t stop talking.

“You’re not talking me out of this. You have family in Connecticut. I have family in Connecticut. My parents have talked for years about moving to North Carolina to be closer to my aunt and uncle. I think the only thing keeping them here was me,” she explained, but I didn’t want her to jump into a decision like this.

“You don’t need to make this decision now. I know your career is important to you, and I don’t want to pressure you. We can figure it out. You need to rest and heal first. You shouldn’t be in a rush to do anything but heal right now.”

“I don’t want to figure it out.” Kelly reached forward and cupped my cheek.

“Oh…that’s…” My heart dropped as I tried to determine what she meant she didn’t want to figure out. I hoped it wasn’t our relationship.

“Because I want to go home with you. Not just to visit for a weekend. I want to stay. With you. I love you, Nathan.“ My heart warmed as she smiled at me, still so beautiful beneath the discoloration on the side of her face and the bulky bandage.

“I love you too, sunshine. So much. But this is a big decision, and I don’t want you to make it because you’re scared. I can’t ask you to walk away from your job.” I didn’t deserve to. While I wanted her safe, I wanted her happiness more. If that meant I came here, then I would. I opened my mouth to tell her as much as she laughed, holding up a finger.

“You don’t have to. It can come with me. Deacon told me I could continue to work remotely. He wants me to take the next several weeks off to recover, but returning to the office is my decision.”

“You were high on pain meds yesterday. He just got you back from leave. There’s no way he’s gonna let you go this soon.”

“This was before the good drugs,” she joked, but I was still failing to see the humor. “My head hurts but I don’t have amnesia.”

“But that’s not a long-term solution, and you’ve got Tom, Charley, and Sam and Kris…” I pointed out. We couldn’t live in limbo as we waited for them to call her back to Chicago. What happened when the guilt over what happened wore off, and her boss wanted her back in the office full time?

“Do you not want me to move to Boston?” she frowned.

“It’s not that. It’s just…”

“Talk to me, stud. Tell me what you want.” I wanted her—forever.

“I want you with me. But I don’t want you to do it out of obligation.” It’d kill me if she uprooted her life and decided she didn’t want to be in Boston with me. “I know this changed things, and it kills me that I couldn’t protect you from him.”

“Since when have I done anything because I felt obligated?” Kelly laughed. “I want to move to Boston. To be close to you. And to be close to my niece or nephew. It wasn’t your job to protect me. We had no way of knowing things would turn out like this.”

Chase and Evan told me they had shared the baby news with her when I’d gone to the cafeteria to get dinner last night before her family left. I hadn’t wanted to leave her alone.

“But what if you decide you don’t want me?” That was my biggest fear—being abandoned. I knew it stemmed from my adolescence, with how things had fallen apart after my father’s death, but it was something I could never shake. “What if you can’t see past what he did?”

“I’ll always want you, Nathan. Always. Because I don’t think I’ll ever love anyone as much as I love you. I don’t feel like this is my home anymore because you’re not here. I won’t be able to return to that office and not think of what he…” Her voice was quiet as she trailed off, but I could tell she meant every word. She wanted to be with me, and she wanted to escape the reminders of him.

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