Page 75 of Endlessly Yours
I rolled my eyes but blushed.
“Brooks.”
“What? It’s not like they don’t know.”
“Oh, we know,” Cameron said, even as her lips twitched into a smile.
I grinned and leaned into him. “I don’t want to know what you know.”
She just laughed and went over to help Ava move a few things into the house.
I smiled and watched as the youngest girls danced around, and everything just felt right.
Like this was a family.
I missed my sister and my parents something fierce, but I also knew they were never coming back. We had somehow been forced to make this new family of ours, and while I couldn’t say we were always blessed, not with the pain that brought us here, but with what we had right then? I wasn’t going to take this for granted. Because the girls were healthy and they were safe, and the man I had fallen in love with had his arms around me.
Honestly, that didn’t sound like too bad of a way to celebrate the end of a lovely weekend.
“Hey, are we eating at your place or at his,” Ava asked, and I pulled myself out of my thoughts and grinned.
“I actually have some of the side dishes over at mine, so let’s bring everything in there?” I asked.
“No problem. We’re good here. Let me just…” Her voice trailed off as the hairs on the back of my neck rose. I turned to see what he was looking at, what had just made his face pale, and it felt like everything tilted on its axis.
An older couple stood there, both of them holding onto one another as they looked surprised to see Brooks here at his own home.
The husband had a stern expression on his face, and the woman was just staring at Brooks as if she were seeing a ghost. For some reason, I felt as though I needed to stand in front of him to protect him or hide so no one could get hurt.
“Brooks?” I asked, my voice soft.
“I— it’s my in-laws,” he whispered, his voice broken. “I just, hey Wyatt, can you handle the grill? I’ll be right back.”
His brother gave him an odd look, pity filling his gaze as he looked at me before he gave me a tight nod.
“No problem. You guys head into the house, Brooks, you let me know if you need anything.”
“Yeah. Yeah.” Brooks squeezed my hand but didn’t kiss me as he walked away without saying another word. He just left. Left us behind without looking back.
Luckily, I didn’t think the girls quite understood what was happening as they had already been moving towards the house, but Wyatt did.
“Hey. We didn’t know they were coming. It was a surprise. Everything’s going to be okay. All right?”
“Yeah,” I said, clearing my throat. “We’re all good. I just hope Brooks is okay.”
He gave me an odd look, but I didn’t want to stay to interpret it. Instead, I took the last few things, other than the burgers themselves, back into my home, leaving Brooks back at his place with his in-laws and the slap in the face of a past that I knew still haunted him every time he closed his eyes.
I just had to hope he was okay. I wanted to wrap him in my arms and tell him that he was okay. That he didn’t have to worry about me, that I would take care of him. And yet, part of me didn’t know if I had the right.
How silly was that? I was just telling myself that I was in love with him, that I needed to tell him, and the parents of the woman that he had loved more than anything, the woman that had shaped him into the man that he was now, had made him look as if he had seen a ghost.
The ghost that had always stood between us, or perhaps, next to us.
I shook myself from those thoughts, knowing they weren’t going to help anyone, as I went to help a curious Ava set up the rest of the meal.
I looked over the crew, realizing that Wyatt had come in with the burgers to help set everything up with Ava. Faith and Alice played a game beside her, but I couldn’t find Cameron.
The wind picked up, slamming open the back door that I hadn’t latched properly, and I went to close it, only to see that Cameron was still outside.
