Page 53 of Whatever You Want

This entire situation was unfair. Sure, she would give me her body, but I wanted her heart, which belonged to another man, and maybe it always would. So, where did that leave me?

A poor sap, that’s where, because I would take whatever this woman gave me. As long as I got one more day, one more minute with her, it would all be worth it.

I ran a hand through my hair, hoping I could convince her to take a chance on us. “I know you have a past, and I don’t want you to think you need to be someone you’re not. This thing between us has evolved into something that I want to invest in. I can handle you being sad. I can understand why you’re afraid.” I swept my thumb under her eyes. “But I can’t handle you doubting us.”

“It’s not you that I doubt. It’s me. I don’t have a whole heart to give you. Would you be okay with that?”

“Yes.” My reply was automatic. “You don’t have to stop loving him to fall in love with me. It doesn’t have to be one or the other. You can still hold him in your heart. I’m just asking for you to make room for me too.”

She shook her head as if she didn’t believe me. “You say that now, but grief isn’t something that can be controlled. There are still days where I cry, where a song will come on the radio and I’ll think of him. Where a Philly’s game will be on the television and I’ll sit in his recliner and wrap myself up in his blanket just to feel close to him. There are birthdays and holidays that aren’t always joyous. Why would you want to put yourself through that?”

“Listen to me.” I grabbed on to her shoulders. “I can handle all that as long as you’re honest with me about how you’re feeling. But right now, I want you to shut off your head and open up your heart to the possibility of more with me. You don’t even have to let me in yet, just don’t close the door on us without even knowing what’s on the other side.”

I wasn’t naïve enough to know that everything would be smooth sailing. Life was messy and complicated, filled with mistakes and disappointments, but it could also be wonderful and amazing. That was the reality of life. You have to love through the bad, just like you love easily through the good. If I could convince her to give me the broken pieces of her heart, I would do everything in my power to mend it back together.

Her eyes watered and I worried that I might have pushed her too far. “You have no idea how much I’ve let you in.”

“Ava…” She placed her hand over my lips, silencing my words.

“Please let me say this.” She swallowed. “When I’m with you, I feel like I can breathe again. You make me happy and I know that’s a step in the right direction, but I’m not quite ready to leap. And that’s so unfair to you. You deserve so much more than this and I’m afraid I’ll never be enough for you.”

I kissed her nose. “You talk about not being enough for me, but you have no idea how much you mean to me.” I brushed a piece of hair off her shoulder. “Like I said before, you’re not the only one with a past. I have my own issues to work through. We might not be on the same page now, but our story isn’t over yet, and there isn’t a chance in hell I’ll let it end before it even has a chance to get started.”

She buried her face in my neck. “I don’t deserve you.”

I rubbed my hand up and down her back. “You’re right. You deserve so much better than me.”

She laid her head on my shoulder. “You’re making me cry. Do you always have to say all the right things? It’s kinda hard to resist you when you’re so perfect.”

“Ava, there is no such thing as perfect.”

“Fine. But you still deserve someone who can give you so much more than I’m capable of giving you.”

“I just want you to want to be with me.”

Her thumb grazed along the top of my cheek. “I do want to be with you, but you scare me.”

Our eyes met, and my heart began to race. “Why do I scare you?”

Truthfully, she terrified me. She was a widow with a young daughter who was trying to put her life back together. I shouldn’t have wanted her as bad as I did, but she made me feel things I couldn’t ignore. Now that I knew what it felt like to have her in my arms, I couldn’t pretend not to want to be with her. I wanted to take her pain away, make her smile, and one day, hopefully, she would fall for me like I was starting to fall for her. I’ve been fooling myself by thinking this was something I could control. Because now that I have her, I don’t ever want to let her go.

“The last thing I want to do is go through what I went through last year, but here’s the thing, I can’t pretend that these feelings between us aren’t there. If I learned anything over the last eighteen months, it’s that life is short.” Her thumb grazed along my bottom lip, and I felt something shift between us.

My heart hammered against my ribs. “What are you saying, Ava?”

“I’m saying men like you only come around once in a lifetime. There is risk in every relationship. And you, Logan Blake, are worth the risk. I’m done worrying about what everyone else will think. The only opinions that matter, are Madison and Brina’s. Let’s tell them first and go from there.”

The girls’ feet smacked against the hardwood floor above my head as I placed the last plate in the dishwasher. Logan and I were planning on having a talk with Madison and Brina today. I thought about the conversation we had in my bedroom last week, and he raised a lot of good points. We couldn’t hide our feelings from the world forever. There was still a possibility that one or both of the girls might not be happy, but Logan was confident we would find a way to make things work somehow.

Madison still carried a good amount of anxiety, and I didn’t want her to worry about how Logan and Brina would fit into our lives. And Brina, I really wanted her acceptance. I would be very disappointed if things didn’t go as I hoped they would.

“Relax.” Logan’s lips pressed against my temple. My stomach buzzed with nerves at the sound of the girls running down the stairs. “Everything will be fine, especially since you let them eat chocolate muffins and donuts for breakfast.”

“A little bribery never hurt anyone.” I did my best to school my features as soon as I spotted them.

“Can we go outside now and ride our bikes?” Madison asked, pulling her hair back into a ponytail.

I wiped my hands along my shorts. Here went nothing. “Before you go outside to play, Logan and I want to talk to you both about something.”

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