Page 70 of Surrender
She nodded, eyes focused on the fire pit. “Yeah… it’s just different. Being here with everyone. It’s nice. Warm. You know?” She smiled softly, shaking her head. “James would have liked this.”
My chest tightened. “Yeah, he would’ve.”
She rested her head on my shoulder. “I wish he could be here. I wish he could see this.” She swallowed hard. “I wish he could see us.”
“He knew,” I said, the words falling out of my mouth before I could stop them.
She sat up suddenly, and I had to grab her before she toppled off my lap.
“What do you mean?” she asked quietly. “He knew? About us?”
“Yeah, he knew something was going on.” I chuckled, shaking my head. “I believe his exact words were,‘You and Darcy aren’t that slick.’”
Her eyes sparkled with unshed tears. “He was okay with it?”
My hand rested on her thigh, brushing back and forth. “He was terrified about how his cancer was going to impact you,” I said, staring into the raging fire for a moment before looking back at her. “I think knowing that I cared about you like I did made it easier for him to say goodbye, because I promised to make sure that you would follow your dreams and achieve the things he was scared you would give up on when he was gone.”
Tears dripped down onto her cheeks, and she quickly swipedthem away, her trembling bottom lip turning up into a smile. “And as much as we both hated it, he would be proud of you for sticking to your word and nudging me, in your own special way, toward Juilliard.”
“Hated it is an understatement,” I rasped, trying to fight back the damn lump forming in my throat. “But I think it’s taught me a lot about surrendering our lives to fate. Who the hell knew that after everything, we’d both get what we needed from that time apart? You with dance, and me with the club. And now we get to try again.”
Before she could respond, music began growing louder and louder from inside, and Darcy’s tears quickly turned to laughter.
“Are they playing “Like a Virgin”?” Bishop called from the patio, pinching at the bridge of his nose. “Fucking hell.”
Shay popped out of the patio doors. “You can speak to Blue about it,” she accused, pointing in my direction with a wide smile. “I love eighties rock, but we needed something to dance to so… Darcy! Come on!”
Darcy patted me on the chest as she slid off my lap, her fingers dragging over my skin like she was apprehensive about leaving.
“Sorry,” she said with a grin, backing away toward the clubhouse. “I love Madonna.”
I watched her with a smirk, shaking my head like I was disappointed she’d leave me for them, but realistically, the fact that she was fitting in here, with the old ladies and the club, it was like she’d always meant to be a part of this.
Unfortunately, that didn’t stop the chill that sank into my skin when the space she left began to turn cold.
Darcy belonged with me.
Beside me.
She always had.
And soon, she’d wear my name on her back too.
Chapter Twenty-Five
BLUE
“When did you know that letting Darcy leave was the right thing to do?” Rafe asked, just before he swung at the punching pad in my hand.
I frowned, swinging it over his head and making him duck twice before he popped up again to take another shot.
“What do you mean?” The question had come out of left field. At least I thought so, but after a late one at the clubhouse last night and then meeting Rafe here at Brawlers before twelve, I was wondering if I was just too damn tired for a deep and meaningful.
He dropped his hands after a few more shots, his shoulders rising and falling with each heavy breath. “I mean,” he said, swiping at the sweat on his brow. “You forced her to take that place at that school even though you wanted to be with her. So, how did you know that her being without you was going to be better in the long run?”
I patted the pads together in my hands. “I didn’t,” I told him after a beat. “I made the choice I could live with, but I had no idea whether it was the right one.”
“Right…” Rafe said, nodding slowly. He rolled his shoulders, his eyes fixed on something else, his mind God knows fucking where. I reached out and tapped him around the side of the head with the pad in my hand, and he cursed, rubbing at the spot with a frown. “What the—”
