Page 75 of All Along The Watchtower

“You’re not a bitch. You had a right to be hurt.”

“Either way, we can’t change the past.” She propped her chin on my chest to look at me. “But we can do better going forward.”

“Yeah?” Hope bloomed in my chest.

“Yeah. I want to try. For real this time.”

I grinned at her. “Why, Bree Cartwright. Are you saying you want to date me?”

She thumped me against the shoulder. “Don’t tease. I’ve never really done that before. I’ll probably be terrible at it.”

I brushed her hair back from her face. “You’ll do fine. There are no rules here. Our relationship doesn’t have to look like anybody else’s, and we can take it at whatever pace you’re comfortable with. Just promise me something, okay?”

“What’s that?”

“That we’ll talk things through the next time I fuck up or you get upset. The only way this works is if we communicate better than we did at twenty.”

“I can do that.” The soft, sweet expression sobered. “Do you think Peyton will be okay with this?”

I snorted. “In case you’ve missed it, she’s been trying to match-make us almost from the beginning. She’ll probably throw a party that we finally got our heads out of our asses.” I paused to consider. “My moms will probably help.”

“Oh, my God.” She buried her face against my chest.

I tipped her chin up, so she had to look at me. “All teasing aside, you and Peyton are my priorities now. Equally. It might not always be easy, but we’re going to make it work.”

Her eyes softened. “I believe you.”

Those three words meant almost as much as her declaration of love. Trust had always been the real issue between us. Earning it back was everything, and I was never taking it or her for granted again.

CHAPTER 35

BREE

The car tires thumped as Ford navigated off the ferry ramp and back onto Hatterwick. We’d been gone for a full week that felt more like a million years. I half expected everything to look different. For Sutter’s Ferry to have undergone some kind of metamorphosis in my absence. But everything was the same. I was the one who’d changed.

Ford glanced over from the driver’s seat, his thumb grazing over the back of the hand he held. “You okay?”

My fingers tightened reflexively on his, compulsively checking my lifeline. Because that’s what he’d been. “What are we going to tell them?” The question popped out before I could think better of it. The status of our complicated relationship was hardly the update everybody was waiting on.

He lifted my hand and brushed a quick kiss to the back. The gesture had gooseflesh rising along my arm, even as a dozen erotic memories of how we’d spent much of our time outside the hospital unspooled in my mind.

“We don’t have to tell them anything until you’re ready. We have all the time in the world to figure out the details of us. Let’s just take this one step at a time.”

All the time in the world. Because he was staying. Building roots and a home for his daughter. And he wanted me to be a part of all that. It didn’t surprise me. When Ford Donoghue made a decision, he leapt in with both feet. He wanted to be with me—something I was still wrapping my brain around—so in his mind, the rest was a foregone conclusion.

But he understood that wasn’t how I worked.

I mustered a smile. “Thank you. I just don’t think I’m up to your moms’ reactions.”

“Valid. They’ll be… enthusiastic.”

I slanted him a look. “Will they? I basically excommunicated you from my life for a decade.”

“They never held that against you. Mimi’s been waiting for me to get my head out of my ass and fix things with you for years. So, yes. But they’ll all be focused on Ed, so we’ll roll with that for now.”

I wasn’t sure what to say to that, so I lapsed back into silence as Ford turned south of the marina and headed for the lighthouse. It was strange to be going there now. It had been so much a part of my childhood and teen years. As much a home to me as the house I’d shared with Pop. But I hadn’t been out here in a long, long time. I’d even avoided driving by, if I could help it, because it inevitably reminded me of Ford.

Coming back now, a trickle of unease slid through me. It wasn’t rational. Mama Flo and Mimi had been nothing but kind to me over all the years I’d cut Ford out of my life. They hadn’t avoided me. Hadn’t interfered in any way. And, of course, over these past weeks since Peyton had come into our world, they’d treated me as if nothing had changed. But a part of me still worried about my reception as he parked the car in front of the house.

---