Page 112 of Unlocked Dive
She shakes her head. “It was almost a relief when he first took off, you know. The year after he lost his place at ENC, he was a nightmare to be around. Drinking too much, snapping at everyone who offered anything resembling comfort or advice. I felt so helpless, seeing his pain and self-loathing and then being forced to watch it turn slowly into rage. Hals was lost in his own anger, and poor Milla didn’t know what to think, so when he left, life got a little easier.” She sighs. “But he’s my first baby. It’s unbearable some days, not knowing what he’s doing or if he’s okay.”
“I can’t even imagine. You know how sorry I am. We both are.”
“I know.”
We share a moment of useless silence.
“For what it’s worth, I believe he’ll come around eventually. He’s always been a fighter. One day, he’ll realize your love is stronger than his shame and be ready to accept help.”
“I hope so.” She leans her head briefly against my arm, then gives herself a shake. “Enough of my depressing shit. Are you ready for tonight?”
I glance at Echo, elbows resting on his knees and dark head bent to Josha’s ginger one. Whatever he’s saying coaxes a reluctant smile from the younger man’s lips.
How much do I owe to a similar sight?
But there’s no trace of flirtation now, and the only feeling stirring in my chest is pride.
“He’s a good man, your Echo,” Shilo observes, following my gaze. “And a lucky one.”
“I’m the lucky one.”
“You aresofucking gone,” she laughs. “We need ice for the party. Go and get him out of here for a few while we finish setting up.”
“How’s Josha holding up?” I ask once Echo and I are out on the road.
“He’s worried about Gem, of course, and hurt, but mostly he’s pissed. Shilo and Hals—all of Big Top—they’re his family, and he doesn’t understand how Gem could just abandon them because he made one mistake. I don’t think Josha’s ever given up on anything in his life. So he can’t relate.”
There’s a note of self-deprecation in his voice that has me glancing over to study his profile. “And you can?”
“I know what it feels like to be convinced something’s been taken away from you, and you can’t see your way through to getting it back.” His eyes are on the manzanitas sweeping past outside the window, but his hand clenches reflexively in his lap, faded silver scars stretching beneath the ink. Taking his other hand, I squeeze all the comfort of my unflagging love into his strong fingers to banish his restless ghosts. A wry smile tugs at his lips as he squeezes back.
“I don’t tell you enough how grateful I am that you never gave up on me. I wouldn’t be here today if it wasn’t for you,” he says.
“You would have found your way eventually. All I did was give you a safe space to try.”
“You reminded me that I had wings, and you made me love them again, even though they had scars. You showed me that they could still take me where I wanted to go. You made this”—he raises his wrist to flash his tattoo—“something strengthening instead of shameful. Something to overcome rather than hide behind.” He turns toward me, pulling his leg up onto the seat so that his knee brushes my thigh, and fuck, I don’t want to be driving right now. He should be wrapped in my arms for these confessions so I can spill my sorrow for his struggle and my gratitude for his strength into his sable hair.
“You loved every fractured piece of me. How could I do less?”
“Falling in love with you was never a choice,” I assure him. “And your pieces always fit together flawlessly from where I was standing.”
We’ve hit the stop sign at the end of Little Lake, thank god, so I tug him across the console to claim his mouth before his defenseless beauty makes me weep. He comes willingly, surrendering to the urgent sweep of my tongue, and his lips curve in a smile beneath mine.
“You were always right about me going to school,” he says when I reluctantly release him to make the turn toward town, and his voice is lighter now, touched with the self-aware amusement of battles long won. “I wouldn’t have been able to compete at Cirque du Dumain if I hadn’t gone to Cici, and Terry Crane would never have hired me if I was only the tagalong boyfriend. Now we get to spend next year touring with the premier rope company in the country. Together, because of you.”
I’m not about to argue, although I’m pretty sure Acrobatic Conundrum would have taken him in a heartbeat, with or without his NCC diploma.
“It goes both ways, baby,” I say instead. “I wouldn’t be touring at all if you hadn’t pushed me out of my comfortable self-pity and given me something to go after.”
“For our next gig, maybe we can come back and work for Big Top? I like the idea of doing a season here, where we started. I wanna develop some of the duo stuff we’ve been working on and create a new act. Something hot as fuck and hopelessly romantic that will make the audience fall in love and want to fuck us at the same time.”
“You mean the duo stuff that always ends with us naked?”
“Whose fault is that, Mr. Baardwijk?”
To be fair, more often than not, I am the one who loses focus and drives our private training sessions into the bedroom—if we even make it that far. Partly because being restrained in a basing wrap with Echo’s lithe body climbing all over me is more than a little distracting, but also because there’s something intoxicating about the level of trust involved—that his faith in me extends to my grip on the rope when it’s the only thing between him and another fall. Seeing him grow beyond his wild potential and mature into a dynamic, confident artist makes my heart pound and my dick hard. From his sassy, delicious mouth to his bright grace to his honest vulnerability, it’s only grown harder to keep myself from claiming him at every opportunity.
And the smartest thing I ever did was stop resisting.
