Bliss and the Art of Forever (A Hope Springs Novel Book 4)

by Alison Kent

  “I really appreciate this,” he said to his father as the older man closed the door. “And I’m sorry for calling so late. How’re you doing?”

  “It’s no bother. You know I’m a night owl.” He gestured for Callum to follow him, shutting off the kitchen lights and leading the way down the hall to the spare bedroom Addy used when she slept over. “Your mother would’ve loved to wake to find Adrianne here, but now I get to have all the fun. And I will. So don’t worry about me.”

  “I’ll be back first thing,” Callum told him, worried anyway, even though his father looked less wan and less stressed and less . . . stooped and old than he had in months. “Hell, I may come back and crash on the couch so you don’t have to deal with breakfast. Addy’s still acting out about her Grammy being gone.”

  “Then she needs to see exactly how much fun breakfast can be when we don’t have to worry about our silverware matching while we eat pancakes shaped like snowmen.” His father gestured toward the bed, where he’d pulled down the covers before they’d arrived. The lamp on the bedside table burned on low.

  After laying down his daughter, Callum waited for her to roll onto her side before pulling the bedspread around her shoulders. His father was taking his mother’s absence a whole lot better than Callum would’ve imagined. He wasn’t even sure he was taking it as well, but then, he was dealing with Addy’s emotions and outbursts, which influenced his own feelings about what his mother had done—and not for the better.

  “I would say you don’t have to spoil her with snowman pancakes, but maybe it’s what she needs. God knows I’m not exactly doing the best job of figuring that out these days.” Then again, he wasn’t doing such a good job with any of his relationships except maybe with Lena, and that was because she didn’t let him get away with shit.

  “How’s Brooklyn?” his dad asked as if reading his mind. “The two of you doing okay? Getting any closer to making things official?”

  “You know me,” he said, wiggling his daughter’s backpack off his shoulder and tossing it to the seat of the corner chair. “I’ve been kinda snake-bit these last few years when it comes to making choices.”

  His father huffed. “Easy to understand when you get told you’re making bad ones often enough.”

  “Took me until ten thirty-three tonight to make the one that brought me here.” And then he’d called his dad at 10:34.

  From the doorway where he stood, his father chuckled. “Marking the date and time for posterity, huh?”

  “Not on purpose,” Callum said. “I can’t let her go. Not without her knowing . . .”

  He let the sentence trail, and smoothed Addy’s hair over the pillow. He was still on shaky ground, and wouldn’t have his footing right until he talked to Brooklyn in person. He glanced at the clock beside the bed, his stomach tumbling. Time was ticking.

  After kissing his daughter’s temple, he headed for the door. His father backed into the hallway, waving him toward his study. Ticking, ticking, ticking.

  “Dad, I really should go. It’s late.”

  “Humor me for five minutes.” The older man walked into the room, lit a bright aquarium blue, and switched on a lamp. “I know what you feel for Brooklyn has come on suddenly, but that doesn’t make it suspect. There is such a thing as love at first sight.”

  Callum hoped his father was right, because he didn’t want to think he was making a mistake, falling so hard and so fast. Falling in love—because he was. Completely. In ways he’d never known love existed.

  “Dad,” he said, his throat tightening around the words. “I’m going to ask her to marry me.”

  “Well, that’s the best news I’ve heard in a while,” he said, the big wide grin splitting his face quickly turning into a frown. “Except didn’t you tell me the night we cooked burgers that she’s flying out of here later this week?”

  “She is,” Callum said, nodding, his hands at his hips, the thought a monstrous weight dragging him down. “She’s scheduled to, anyway. I’m hoping she’ll change her mind. Or at least do what she needs to do and come back sooner than she’s planning to.”

  “What is it she’s doing?”

  He gave a sharp snort. “Believe it or not, scattering her husband’s ashes.”

  “Ah,” his father said thoughtfully. “So changing her mind has some complications.”

  Callum nodded. They were complications he wasn’t sure he could overcome. One thing was certain: he wasn’t going to get anything settled standing here. “Dad, I really need to go.”

  “All right, but I’ve got something I want to give you first,” his father said, making his way to his desk. “I’ve been holding on to it for a long time.”

  “Well, it can’t be a piece of advice, since you never held back any of those,” Callum joked as he walked closer.

  “Funny man you’ve turned out to be.”

  “I had a good teacher,” Callum said, his chest tightening as the realization of how much he meant it struck unexpectedly hard.

  Closing his desk drawer, his father walked to where Callum stood and handed him a hinged jewelry box. “This belonged to my mother. And to her mother. She wouldn’t tell my grandfather which stone was her favorite, so he gave her one of each. Your mother wanted to resize it and replace some of the stones, but I told her we’d just save it for you, since it never was to her taste.”

  Swallowing hard, Callum opened the box and stared down at the ring of gold and precious gems, picturing it on Brooklyn’s hand. He couldn’t imagine anything more perfect, more suited to her understated style. But even more moving was the very idea of his father saving this for him.

  The older man, never physically demonstrative, wasn’t one for sentimental gestures, either, and the surprise of his doing so, of his doing this . . . Callum cleared his throat as he closed the box, then wrapped both arms around his dad, who returned the hug, patting him on the back, then covering his own mouth with his fist as he coughed his emotion away.

  “I hope she likes it,” he said, having removed his glasses to rub at his eyes. “I hope you like it.”

  “I can’t imagine she won’t, and I love it. Thank you,” Callum said, shoving the box deep into his pocket. “Now I just hope I don’t mess this up. I know I did with a lot of things, early on, after high school—”

  “Nothing that you haven’t fixed since.”

  “I wish you and Mom had been there for Addy’s birth. Or maybe not for the birth so much”—what had happened in Cheryl’s hospital room had not been pretty—“but when we got home. When she was a baby. Those early days were something else. I was a wreck. Completely clueless.”

  His father took his time with his glasses, worrying the earpieces into place. “Someday you think you’ll want to talk about Addy’s mother?”

  “I don’t know. It’s probably better if I don’t. She’s never going to be a part of Addy’s life. Or mine.”

  Nodding, his father asked, “Anyone else know who she is?”

  He thought back to the last time he’d seen Duke and Lainie. “A couple of people. Her brother and his wife.”

  “But you’re not in touch with them.”

  “Not for five years now, no.”

  “You going to tell Addy about her?”

  “One day, maybe. Or not. She’s the one mistake I’ll be fine never thinking about again.”

  “Then we’ll just let things stand.”

  “Thanks, Dad,” he said, taking a deep breath and blowing it out, surprised at the relief that he pulled in when he next inhaled.

  Then the older man cleared his throat. “Though you can make up for me missing those early years by being sure I’m invited to the wedding.”

  “If there is one,” Callum said, torn between laughing and launching into a string of curses. If he’d read Brooklyn right. If he hadn’t waited too long.

  “I’ve got a good feeling there will be.”

  It was nearly midnight when Brooklyn heard
the knock on her door. She wasn’t sleeping. She wasn’t even ready for bed. Not that she had a bed anymore. Or would be sleeping in what used to be her house ever again. She couldn’t imagine her visitor would be anyone but Jean come once more to convince her to use her spare bedroom instead of spending the next few nights in a hotel. Unless there had been an emergency . . .

  Heart racing, she hurried to answer it, reminded of the notification two years ago that had changed her life. This wasn’t that. This couldn’t be that. The thought of having to face such another such event, her entire world turned upside down, everything she’d come to expect as normal gone. And yet when she opened the door and saw him standing there . . .

  Her world flipped. Her new normal vanished. This moment. Right now. The wild wings of her heartbeat told her nothing would ever be the same. She just wasn’t sure where she’d find herself after. “Callum. What are you doing here?” He waited for her to invite him in, though she could tell it was a struggle. “Is everything okay? Is Addy—”

  “She’s fine. I left her with my dad—”

  “Why didn’t you tell me about your mother leaving?” she asked as she stepped back to let him inside. “I had to hear it from Jean and Dolly yesterday.”

  “I was too pissed off.” He stood in the center of her living room, his hands at his hips as he shook his head. “I didn’t want to unload on you.”

  “You should have. Seriously.”

  “Can we talk about this later?”

  His voice was gruff, his tone impatient, and it worried her. She hugged her arms over her chest. “Sure. Of course.”

  “I didn’t know if you’d still be here.” He glanced at the only things in the room: her carefully packed carry-on, and the futon she was leaving for the charity truck to pick up tomorrow along with the boxes in the garage. Jean would let them in.

  “I was just about to leave, actually,” she said, though she’d been tempted more than once to grab one of the blankets out of the box beside the futon and curl up beneath it for hours. She was so incredibly tired. “I wanted to do one more walk-through, even though I’ve done about ten already.” She waved one arm in a gesture meant to encompass the entire house. “With all the trouble I had getting started, I ended up finishing the packing days earlier than I needed to. I haven’t found anything I’ve missed the last nine times. I’m not sure why—”

  They were the last words she got out before Callum stepped into her, wrapped his arms around her, brought his mouth down hard on hers. He’d kissed her before. They’d had sex before. But this wasn’t either of those times. And this wasn’t a good-bye. It was almost brutal with need, but tender in execution, not hurtful, a consuming mating of mouths and breath and the tactile pleasure of touch.

  That part she realized when the room’s still air hit her back as Callum’s warm hands lifted the hem of her shirt. She raised her arms and he pulled it over her head, then she reached for the clasp of her bra, but he beat her there, undoing it and sliding the straps from her shoulders. He held her, his big hands kneading her, all while he stayed with the kiss, slanting with his mouth, sweeping with his tongue, stirring her as he brought her body to his.

  She gave him the contact he wanted, but for the briefest moment only, breaking free to undo the buttons of his oxford, and realizing she hadn’t heard the rumble of his bike before he arrived. “You came in your truck.”

  “Easier to haul all of Addy’s things to my dad’s.”

  “So he knows you’re here?” she asked, pushing his shirt from his shoulders.

  He nodded.

  “And he knows what we’re doing?”

  He shrugged.

  “Does it bother you?”

  “For my dad to know how much I love you?”

  She stopped with her hands on his shoulders and closed her eyes. The words tripped through her like tiny little feet, landing over and over and over, but it wasn’t enough. “Say it again,” she whispered, looking up.

  He looked down: at her hair where it feathered over his hand, at her ear where he cupped it, at her jaw along which he dragged the tip of his finger. At her eyes where he lingered. “I love you, Brooklyn. Heart and soul and forever.”

  “Oh, Callum.” She shuddered with everything she was feeling. Lust and desire and fear of the unknown and obligations and promises and vows. But more than anything, she nearly shook with the love she had for this man. “I love you, too.”

  She ran her palms from his shoulders down his biceps to his forearms. The room was too dark to make out all of his ink, but she could see enough to know she wanted time to learn all of it. For now . . . “The day you came to my class that first time, not to read, but later. When you came back. You were standing in the door with your arms lifted, and I could see just a hint of this.” She ran her finger along the dragon’s back. “I could make out the scales, but that was it. I didn’t know if it was an iguana or a turtle or a fish.”

  “A fish.”

  “I saw that it was a dragon that day in my garage. But in my classroom, all I could see were the scales.” She read aloud the words about facing down the mind-killer that was fear. “But I couldn’t imagine you’d be afraid of a fish.”

  He snorted. “It’s not a fish.”

  “I know that,” she said, running a fingertip along the dragon’s spiky spine, and realizing he wasn’t going to admit to what it was he’d feared. “Why the dragon?”

  “You don’t want to know.”

  “You don’t want me to know.”

  “That, too,” he said and then his mouth was on hers again and any other questions on the tip of her tongue were swept away.

  He was hungry, and he was greedy, and she was both of those things, and her only fear was that she would never know this again. He’d built her a library, a room of all the things she loved, the colors and the words, and offered it to her should she need the respite. But he hadn’t asked her to stay.

  He hadn’t said he wished she would forgo the trip and rescind her resignation to the district, if such a thing was even possible. He hadn’t told her he wanted her with him forever. Neither had she said that with him was where she wanted to be, and that was her fault; she should have told him sooner.

  But she had tonight, and his declaration of love, and this moment. And she refused to waste it regretting that she’d been so slow in coming to know her own mind.

  She knew it now, and she tugged at the strands of his hair hanging free, and begged him, “Take it down.”

  He grinned against her cheek and did as she asked, the wild mass falling like a cloak on either side of his face. She thought as she had so often of Heathcliff, at least the Heathcliff of her imagination, painted with this smile and these eyes and this hair.

  “What else?”

  “Take me to bed.”

  They were naked and wound up in each other on the futon in seconds. She’d never thought of herself as particularly small, or soft, but with Callum she did. His body was hard. Everywhere. His thighs where they pressed between hers. His backside beneath her questing hands. His chest pushing down and his stomach pushing down and his mouth as he sucked and licked and bit her and kissed her. Then there was that very hard part of him, sheathed and pushing deep inside of her. He possessed her so fully she wasn’t sure she still belonged to herself. She feared he’d claimed her in such a way that who she’d been was lost forever.

  Her thoughts. She didn’t even know what they meant. She was floating and elsewhere and this time didn’t truly exist. It couldn’t exist because she didn’t understand any of it. Not what was going through her mind. Not what was happening to her body. Was this because she’d been alone for so long? This strange sense of surrender? Of being taken over as she did?

  Or was this Callum? Just Callum? Only Callum? Callum, who was moving above her, whose abs contracted as he withdrew, whose chest hair rubbed over her like the softest down, tickling. His hair was soft. There, and on his head where it was loose
and falling over her face, a curtain closing them off from all but their breath and their sighs and the sounds they made.

  It was a language she hadn’t spoken in ages, and yet she knew the moans and the grunts and the desperation. His. Hers. Theirs, shared and more powerful because of the uncertainty that brought them closer instead of working itself between them like a wedge—one sharp and damaging when the last thing either one of them needed was to be hurt again.

  “You good? You okay?” He asked the questions while stroking her, his hips rolling, his hand braced on the outer curve of her thigh.

  “I’m good. I’m okay.” Her words were as breathless as his, as raw and honest and purposeful as his. Significant in their simplicity. Eloquent in all the emotion they conveyed. The hunger they conveyed. The truth.

  She opened wider to give him more room to settle against her, wanting him nearer and profoundly buried and full. Wanting him here forever because he made her feel so many things, and beautifully good, and filled, when for so long she’d been empty and hollow and left barren.

  “I don’t want to hurt you,” he said, grunted really, the sound gruff and raw.

  “You won’t. You can’t.” She was beyond hurt, she’d ached too much already, and she’d lived with the worst hurt she could imagine for far too long. “You can’t. It’s not possible.”

  “I’m not sure I believe you.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” she said, shaking her head.

  “That I believe you?” he asked as he slowed, as he pulled far enough away to look into her eyes. “Or that I’m hurting you?”

  “Please don’t stop.”

  “I’m not stopping. But we’re going to finish this conversation.”

  “Later then. Not now. I can’t . . . not now.” Her body was burning with the way she wanted him. Her soles were pressed taut to his ankles. Her shoulders knew the weight of his, and she felt the same in the places between. Her knees. Her hip bones. Her ribs she feared would crack from the pounding beat of her heart.