Page 57 of Until I Found You
And just like that I’m lost in this moment with him again. When our lips break apart, we stand here with his forehead pressed against mine as we both work to regain our breath.
“How was your day?”
I wait for him to answer, all while thinking about how crazy I’ll probably look to him when I tell him how I literally couldn’t keep my mind off him all day. How I was tuning out my clients when they talked, thinking back about our time in the dining room followed by our long night together in his bed.
“Busy,” he says, running the palms of his hands over his eyes. The fatigue I noticed the night of the wedding is still there. It hurts a little thinking about how different his day probably was for him.
“What’s wrong?”
“Just a lot going on at the office. Then, the fire chief stopped by to talk to me about the fire at my mom’s.”
The mention of the fire piques my interest, as I pull him behind me into the living room. I urge him to sit down beside me on the couch, taking his hand waiting to hear what he says next.
Not liking the way we’re seated, he scoots back and picks up my legs so they’re laying across his lap before wrapping his hands back around mine. I rest my head on his shoulder, as I wait for him to continue.
“They confirmed it was arson,” he sighs.
Sitting up, I look at him. I know they were going to investigate it, and despite the worry in the back of my mind, I still expected them to come back with a different answer.
“Do they have any suspects?” Immediately my mind jumps back to our conversation about Krate and what he told me the other night. I imagine someone trying to hurt Sandy and it kills me to think about the extent they would be willing to go now to do so.
“They do,” he says, pausing as he looks at me. “Apparently they think it’s some kid who lives nearby. He was caught doing the same thing last month at a house down behind Brodie’s.”
“Do you believe them?”
He looks over at me, and I see the answers in his eyes. This is what is wearing on him. He doesn’t believe it for a second.
“Not at all. I can’t help but think it has to do with Krate and his guys. After that night he bothered you outside of Hudson’s, we think he’s been trying to send a message for us to back off him. We know something is about to go down, we’re just not sure what. He’s trying to scare us into backing down.”
“Graham,” I say, confirming my earlier fears. What lengths are they willing to go to try and get them to back down?
“Halle, do you trust me to always keep you safe?”
Squeezing his hands in mine, I hold them up to my mouth as I press a kiss against his skin. He leans forward and presses a kiss against my lips. I want to get lost in him right now. I want to forget about the world outside my doorstep and just stay here, just the two of us, forever.
“Do you trust me?” he asks, as our lips break apart.
“You know I do,” I whisper. I realize then that I do. Despite everything that happened between us before, I do believe he’s always done right by me. We may not always agree on what that means, but I do believe he wants to keep me safe and protect me.
“Good, I need you to trust me right now. I would never let anything happen to you or my mom. I’d go down fighting, I’d give my very last breath before I’d ever let anyone hurt you.”
Tears form in my eyes because even though I know without a doubt he means what he says, I hope it would never come to that.
He presses his hand against the side of my face, running his thumb underneath my eyes to catch a tear trailing down my cheek.
“Don’t cry, baby. You’re too beautiful to be crying.”
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, running the palms of my hands over my face. “I’m okay, I promise.”
Taking a deep breath, I flash Graham a hesitant smile as he moves my legs to stand.
“C’mon, let’s forget everything and go have some fun.”
He holds his hands out in front of me and I grab them, as he pulls me to stand with him. As soon as I’m standing, he wraps his arms around me in a hug as he whispers “I promise” into my ear before grabbing my hand again and pulling me alongside him over to the front door.
The excitement I had felt earlier feels like it’s been sucked right out of me.
“Do you think we should still go? What about your mom? Maybe we should go over and stay with her for a little bit.”
