Page 79 of Black Roses

“Aren’t you exhausted?”

His roguish half-smile hypnotizes me with a single upturn of his lips. “I’ll never be too tired to see you. It may be a difficult night for you and I want to make sure you’re okay.”

“Fine.” I roll my eyes at his protectiveness. But inwardly, I love it. I love having someone who considers my every need before their own.

My heart sinks a little thinking how that used to be Charlie. I don’t even know where she is right now. She said she needed time on her own. Time to not rely on me to justify her very existence. I don’t even have a phone on which to stalk her. I wonder if she will ever be lucky enough to find a guy like Mason. Surely more of them exist. My sisters and I couldn’t have landed the only three selfless men on the planet. The three of us had to trudge through some deep shit to come out on the other side. Charlie—she’s still entrenched in her hell.

My eyes become heavy and I drift off thinking of my best friend.

~ ~ ~

“Thank God.”

Mason’s words wake me, along with the jolting bumps of the plane’s wheels touching the ground.

I look at him with sleepy eyes and laugh. “Not a fan of flying?”

“It’s not that,” he says, squeezing my hand. “I never thought I’d get you back here. A few days ago, when I found out you left, I thought you’d never come back. I thought you got on that plane and took my fucking heart with you.” His icy-blue eyes stare into mine. “So yes—thank God.”

My heart surges forward in my chest, clawing its way to him. Still not completely at ease saying those three little words, I tell him, “I’m glad I’m moving to New York.”

He nods, his features etched with emotion because he gets me. “I love you too, Piper Mitchell.”

He reaches his hand behind my neck and pulls my face to his, kissing me with such intensity and passion that several rows of people around us break out in cheerful applause.

“Sweetheart?” he says, his voice extracting me from my daze.

I look up to see him standing, waiting for me to exit my seat. It appears he kissed me so senseless, I didn’t even feel the plane taxi up to the gate.

He grabs our one small bag from the overhead bin, its only contents being my new running shoes and a jacket, along with a few toiletries I’d picked up. We left most of our sweaty, stinky, days-old clothes on the floor of the hotel room.

I smile once again at the shirt he’s wearing. It was the only one at the hotel gift shop that fit him. And even at that, his biceps are stretching the material to within an inch of its life. The horizontal red and yellow stripes with the Spanish coat of arms decorate the oh-so-touristy t-shirt.

And knowing he’s totally commando under his jeans makes me want to find a shower before he drops me off at Skylar’s.

He catches me appraising him. Raising an eyebrow, he says, “Do you think the airport has any showers?”

Yeah. It’s creepy how much he gets me.

~ ~ ~

Two pairs of red puffy eyes stare back at me, mirroring my own that are drowning in emotion. Telling my sisters was hard, but just as Mason promised, each time I talk about it, I push the demons further and further away. And the uninhibited cry I shared with them was cathartic.

“I just wish I would have known,” Baylor says. “I would have helped you like you helped me.”

I shake my head. “You knowing back then would have made it worse. You had a child. You would have tried to talk me out of it. But the circumstances were different, Bay. I just couldn’t.”

“Cassidy is a flaming bitch,” she says. “As if things couldn’t get worse for you, she tried to sabotage your relationship by throwing Mason under the bus.”

Both of my sisters lunge forward and capture me into the couch with a long hug, muttering apologies along with words of encouragement.

“I knew it,” Skylar says, pulling away and wiping her eyes. “I knew all along Mason would be good for you—that he was the one.”

Baylor narrows her eyes at her. “Since when didyoubecome the romantic sister?”

We all share a much needed laugh.

“So you’re staying?” Baylor asks.

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