Though he hadn’t been to the park since that night, he found the square without a problem.
Raven sat where Levi had stood. She sobbed into her hands.
It’d been months since he’d seen her, and the sight of her stopped his heart.
He’d missed her so much.
“I was standing right here when I pulled the trigger,” he said, his voice raised to carry to her.
He planted his feet in the same exact spot he’d stood when he pulled the gun from his holster and shot a man his age, who was only reaching for a pack of smokes. Levi’s crime? Being in a dark park at midnight to fetch his sister from a friend’s house.
Raven jerked her head toward him, and she wiped her eyes. “What are you doing here?”
He waited until he was closer to her before he responded. “I just came from your parents’ house. They told me where I could find you. They know, Raven. I told them.”
She didn’t need to ask what he’d told them. It was evident in his pallor he referred to only one thing.
“How did they take it?”
Raven winced. What a stupid thing to ask. There were a million other things she wanted to know instead. Why are you here? Why do you want to see me? Do you still love me? Did you ever?
But the sight of him rendered her to a stuttering idiot, her mind blank except for the fact he stood before her in his usual navy suit, shadows haunting his eyes.
“As well as I could expect, I guess. They didn’t throw me out. They could have. Perhaps they should have. How have you been, Raven? You look good.”
She ran a hand over her hair, messy from the wind that would sporadically burst through the trees. “I’ve been . . . okay.” Missing you. Craving your touch. Wishing things had turned out differently.
Jax took another step forward. “Your mother tells me you’re engaged.”
Raven slipped her left hand under her skirt. “How are you, Jax? You look tired.”
He did, too, the poor baby. She wanted to hug him to her, kiss away his pain. Only, she’d tried that before, and it hadn’t worked so well.
“I am. I’m tired of running. I’m tired of living my life without you. Can I?” he asked, gesturing to the concrete.
She nodded.
Jaxon Brooks sitting on the ground in a suit. It would have made her speechless if his presence hadn’t already made her so.
“The night I kicked you out, earlier that day I saw my old police chief. I wanted to be able to start fresh, a clean slate with you. Stop running once and for all. When he handed me that report—I knew the moment I saw Levi’s name we were over. How could you love the man who killed your brother?”
Tears gathered in his eyes, and he looked away as they dripped down his cheeks.
Raven opened her arms and he fell into them.
She cradled him as he cried against her breast.
His keening shook his entire body, and Raven held him to her, rocking back and forth, running her fingers through his hair.
“Shh, shh. I would have still loved you, Jax, because that’s what love is. It’s standing by someone when they’ve lost their way. I let you push me away because I didn’t feel like I belonged with you. I felt so out of place in your life. I’d been on the streets; you saw the kind of life I lived. I thought maybe it was all for the best. You said I could always go back, and maybe you would have taken me back had I begged. But nothing would have changed.”
Jax lifted his head, and the pain in his eyes tore her heart in two.
“Now it’s too late. You’ve found someone else.”
He tried to stand, but Raven held on. She couldn’t let him go just yet. The warmth of his body, the touch of his skin. Just another second.
“I’ll file the papers. I saw you signed them.”
Raven clutched at the lapel of his jacket. “Isn’t that what you wanted?”
Jax pulled the ring she’d left behind from his breast pocket. “Since the moment I saw you in the church, you’re all I’ve wanted, Raven. It just took this old fool too long to see it.”
Raven held out her bare left hand, and Jax slipped the ring onto her finger.
“You’re not engaged.”
“No,” she said, cradling his face in her hands. “You’re the only man I want to be married to. You came for me. I lost my faith in you, in us. But you came for me.”
He rested his forehead against hers. “Always.”
She pressed her lips to his. Salty from tears, but firm, warm.
Jax wrapped his arms around her, and leaning against his chest, she sighed against his mouth.
When she looked into his eyes, she finally found peace there. And love.
“Are we still married, then?” she asked.
Jax rubbed his nose against hers. “Yes. I didn’t have the heart to file the paperwork.”
Raven traced his lips with her thumb. “Good. Let’s keep it that way. I love you, Jaxon Brooks. Never will I see the man who took Levi’s life, but the father of my children, the man who rescued me. And always, always, the man who will search for me until he finds me.”
Jax smiled. “Let’s go home.”
Raven let Jax pull her to her feet. It didn’t matter where Jax took her. In his arms, she was already there.
Epilogue
“Are you okay?” Jax asked, sinking into a chair beside his wife. He loved thinking about Raven that way. Though she’d been his wife since the day they met, they lived it, now, and nothing suited him better.
“I’m fine, but the baby must be doing somersaults in there.” Raven patted her belly.
At eight months along, Raven said she felt like a house. But Jax had never seen her look lovelier. He leaned over and kissed her belly, grinning like a madman when the baby kicked under his lips.
“Erik looks so happy,” Raven said, placing a hand against Jax’s cheek.
“He and Finn make a fine pair,” Jax agreed, straightening the tux he wore to be Erik’s best man.
The last two years had gone by in a whirlwind. Jax and Raven sold the house, leaving behind the worst memories and determined to make new ones, happier ones.
They’d found a house in a lovely part of the city near the river and good schools, which proved lucky when a year later Raven announced she was pregnant.
“You look like the cat who ate the canary,” Raven said as Axel strode up to them, and Jax laughed at the accurate description.
After Axel graduated with his business degree, Jax had put him in charge of the foundation he’d founded in Levi’s name. The foundation awarded funds and resources to at-risk young men and women bound on the path to homelessness. Axel’s knowledge of the streets, and how easy it was to end up there, became invaluable.
Raven finished her memoir, and though sales were slow at first, they’d snowballed. All the royalties she earned went to Levi’s foundation.
She was in constant contact with Elle, who wrote in long letters she was doing great, and she’d come to visit once, too. That had made Raven very happy.
And there was nothing Jax wanted more than to make his wife happy. That included a renewal of their vows, combined with a belated honeymoon, after the baby was born.
Raven’s parents accepted him into their family, and they held fundraising events at their country club for the foundation. Not to mention, they were thrilled with the idea of becoming grandparents.
“Jax, will you dance with me?” his mother asked.
“I—”
“Go,” Raven said, pushing on his shoulder. “Axel will keep me company while I put my feet up.”
After giving Raven a quick kiss, Jax led his mother onto the dance floor.
“Your father and I are so happy for you,” Grace said, stopping their dancing to give her son a fierce hug.
“Thanks, Mom, but I owe it all to Raven. She could have hated me for what I did, but she never said one word against me.”
“Have you told her yet?”
“About turning Z Avenue into housing an
d places of employment to help the homeless get off the streets for good? Not yet. I’m waiting until after our wedding. Our real one. It’s my gift to her.”
Grace squeezed Jax’s arm. “That’s a huge wedding gift. Do you know what she’s giving you?”
Jax watched Raven laugh with Erik and Finn who had joined her and Axel, distributing thick wedges of wedding cake. “She doesn’t need to give me anything. She’s already given me everything I could ever want.”
Acknowledgments
Thank you to Gareth S. Young, David Willis, and KT Daxon for looking over my book before publication. It always helps have some feedback, and you didn’t steer me wrong. I appreciate it!
About the Author
Vania Rheault has lived in Minnesota all her life. In 2003, she graduated with a BA in English with a concentration in creative writing from Minnesota State University, Moorhead. When she’s not writing, she’s reading, playing with one of her three cats, or going to movie night with her sister. All of Nothing is her fifth Contemporary Romance.
Find Vania on www.vaniamargene.com and these social media platforms:
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