Page 81 of Chasing You

“Stop making that face.”

Adele rolled his eyes. “I can’t help it. I’ve thought about shit like this for years. I mean, the night of my first wedding, I woke up after having a sex dream about you.”

Kash choked on his own spit. “What?”

Adele flushed and pulled his hand back to hold the wheel steady. “I never told anyone about that. I woke up humping the bed, five seconds away from coming all over my sheets.”

Kash said nothing for a long time, and then he said, “Would you change anything if you could? Like for real?”

“I’d change a lot of things,” Adele told him. “If I could go back and find a way to have you and still be the ones who got to adopt Gage, I’d change everything. But I’m happy now, and that matters, right?”

Kash touched the side of his face with gentle fingers. “It matters. Right now, it feels like the only thing that does.”

Adele turned his face briefly to kiss his hand, then kept his eyes on the road. They stayed quiet until they saw the turn for downtown, and then his heart began to kick off in his chest. He tried to breathe slow and steady, but it wasn’t helping.

“I think I might have a panic attack before we go in,” he admitted, pulling up to a meter spot. He turned the car off, but he couldn’t bring himself to look over at Kash.

“Are you having second thou?—”

“No,” he interrupted before Kash could put the full thought out there into the universe. “Not a chance. I…I don’t know. I feel overwhelmed.”

“This is a lot. We should have waited,” Kash said softly.

“Do you want to wait?”

Kash’s laugh was high and tight. “No. God, no. I’m scared if we don’t do this now, shit will keep coming up to stop us, and it’ll never happen.”

“Not a chance.” Adele released the wheel and, with trembling hands, turned and cradled Kash’s face between his palms. “Nothing will stop me. I don’t care if I have to fight a god for this.”

Kash’s smile was so big his eyes wrinkled in the corners. “But the panic…”

“It’s not because I’m afraid to be married to you. I think it’s because I’m afraid not to be. I’m scared we’re going to walk in there, and someone’s going to tell us we’re not allowed. It’s irrational, I know,” he added before Kash could debunk his anxiety. “But it is what it is, and I’m trying to let myself feel these things so they don’t bottle up so much.”

“Kiss me,” Kash whispered. “We’re ten minutes early.”

Adele leaned in and, for the next eight minutes, busied himself with Kash’s lips and tongue. By the time they were forced to pull apart, he was no longer shaking. He was still a mess of nerves, and he fumbled a bit as he grabbed their folder full of paperwork—the few things that they’d managed to salvage from Adele’s fireproof safe—and they headed inside.

This wasn’t the wedding day. It was paperwork day. But it was the first step toward their actual forever, and as afraid as he would always be that someone would come between them to stop him from being happy, he was ready to face that head-on.

twenty-two

KASH

One footin front of the other. Heel, toe, heel toe, heel toe. It was a mantra Kash had to repeat whenever he started to feel twinges in his body. He was still waiting on word about the wheelchair funding, though it was the last thing on his mind with Adele needing a new house and all of them losing nearly everything they had.

But the days after the fire had been a struggle. He felt like he was fist-fighting his body every morning to get moving, and he knew it had everything to do with the stress of what had happened. But he wanted to be able to walk down the aisle on Adele’s arm. So to speak. There wouldn’t be an actual aisle—it was a small courtroom in front of a judge who would have them recite impersonal vows before signing their marriage license.

And then it would be over.

It would be done.

He would be a husband. He would be Adele’s husband…and Adele would be his. He got tingly about it every time he pictured a ring on his finger, though they didn’tactually have rings. He wasn’t quite sure what to do about that, but?—

His thoughts were cut off when Adele yanked him to a halt. He leaned heavily on his cane as he turned. “Um. Can you not do that? I really don’t want to embarrass myself in public.”

Adele quickly wrapped an arm around him. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking. I saw…” He trailed off and jerked his chin toward a shop window with a ring display in the window.

Kash tried not to wince. “Those look expensive.”

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