Page 96 of Absolutely Pucked
Tracing a touch over my lips, he shrugged, thenrolled toward me. With a strong hand, he lifted me a bit and rested the end of my stump against his hip. The normal pressure-pain in my joint eased almost instantly. It was like he was tuned in to me, able to perfectly position himself to give me peace in every atom of my body.
“It doesn’t matter what you want to ask about her. I won’t feel it. I won’t want it. I won’t say it. The last two weeks have made me realize that I don’t feel anything about her. The only thing that matters is closing the door on this part of my past. I’m ready for my future.”
I smiled. “Your future.”
“You,” he said, cupping my jaw. “In case I wasn’t clear.”
I couldn’t help a laugh. “It was clear, baby. It was definitely clear.”
He kissed me for that, a long, indulgent, heavy moment. “When I come back,” he started, but after a beat, he didn’t finish.
“What? You know I’ll give you anything.”
A smile played at his lips. “I want it to be like this all the time. You and me. I know it’s probably moving fast, but?—”
It only took me a second to realize what he was dancing around. I answered him with another deeper kiss. “Yes,” I murmured against his lips, then eased back into the cradle of his arm that was propping up my head. “I want you with me all the time. Here or some other place we can find. I told everyone I would take that fuck-ass coaching job, so I’ll make a proper salary, and I can help pay my way.”
He sighed against my temple, nosing along my hair. “I’m going to change areas of law, I think. I need to lookinto it. I’ll have to get certified to practice here, but that shouldn’t be a problem. I’ll make a good life for us.”
“It’s already good,” I told him. “I would live in a tent with you and be the happiest man on the planet.”
He was still for a long, long second, and then he squeezed me so tight I grunted. “Sorry, just…I think I’ve always wanted to hear that. That what I can bring to the table is enough. And I never have.”
I didn’t say anything. I didn’t have the words. So I held him instead, kissing his neck, down his chest, over his beating heart. “It’s a good thing Carol-Ann isn’t here to hear all this sappy shit.” I pointed at the blanket fort door flaps that were closed.
“The leg or the girl?”
“Yes.” I felt him frown against me, and I waved my hand absently. “You get it.”
Leaning back, his rich, rumbling laughter filled the tent. He kissed me again. Then again. Then one more time. “I actually do.”
I believed him.
He was the first.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-SIX
KILLIAN
It took nearlythree months for…well, I hate to say all the shit to hit the fan, but it kind of felt that way. Not everything was bad, but it was a lot. I’d completed the reciprocity process, which meant all I had left to do was be sworn in, and then I could practice law in Turenne.
Then, of course, I had to get a job.
But although Daniel had walked Delia through how to freeze my accounts, she hadn’t been able to touch the money I’d been putting aside since high school. The prenup—the only thing I’d been smart enough to do before we got married—made sure that would never be hers.
If I’d still been with her, it would have been enough to live on for a few months, maybe. With Ford, we could get by for a few years. I had time to get on my feet without being a burden to him, not that he’d ever made me feel like that, even when I was at my lowest.
But that was the easy part.
The hard part came when I got the call that ourhearing date for the divorce had been set. I had six days to fully prepare. And on the heels of that—and I mean literally hours after I got that call—Tucker showed up at my front door.
His hair was plastered to his head because he’d been walking in the rain. He had his white cane in one hand and a walking cane in the other.
“You looked like a drowned otter,” I told him, stepping aside. “Also, Ford’s working an overnight shift because of some inventory problem, so he’s not here.”
“Otters swim, you fucking dipshit. They live in the water. Also, I know that. I’m not here for him.” Then he shook himself like a dog, soaking me and the floor beneath him.
