“Was I?” I replied to Ivy’s leading question.
I knew I’d been quiet.
I was quiet because Jack Devlin had told me he loved me. That he’d loved me for years. And instead of euphoria, I’d felt paralyzed by fear. Jack had stormed out, and other than clipped, short texts checking in about my well-being, I hadn’t seen or heard from him since.
A week of no Jack.
It was miserable.
“How are things going with you and Jeff?” I asked, trying to distract her.
Ivy threw me a smug smile. “Fantastically.”
“In all the Jess, Cooper, Tyler excitement, I never asked how dinner went with your parents?”
“Oh, Mom was her typical embarrassing self, asking Jeff questions about marriage and kids and all those scary, forever topics that we have not broached.”
I groaned on her behalf. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine. Jeff has a great sense of humor. We laughed about it afterward.”
“So, you’re still taking it slow?”
Ivy gave a little huff of laughter. “Trying. I know he’s trying to.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means he’s intense. Not in a bad way,” Ivy hurried to reassure me. “I know the signs for intense in a bad way. I just mean we’re trying to go slow, but we enjoy being around each other. We really, really love sex with one another. And we can talk, Em. We really talk about stuff. Things I never thought I’d ever be able to talk about with a man.”
“That’s great, Ivy.”
“Yeah. I just hope we’re not rushing in too fast. I can’t seem to help it with him.” She grinned, her smile all the more beautiful for how happy she looked. “It’s like having a crush on a really hot famous guy, meeting him, having him miraculously crush on you back, and even more miraculously turn out to be the best guy ever.”
It made me so giddy for her. And giddy for him. He deserved someone great to feel that way about him. “I’m glad for you both.”
“Don’t tell anyone I said all this to you. I don’t want to jinx it.”
“I won’t,” I promised.
“So, you and Jack?” She dove right in.
After all Ivy had confessed to me, I had to trust her. She deserved trust to be reciprocated. “We’ve been having sex.”
“Oh. Okay.”
“A lot of sex. It was supposed to be no strings attached.”
“Yes, because that kind of arrangement makes total sense with the man whose baby you’re carrying.”
I ignored her sarcasm. “He told me he loved me. The morning after Tyler was born. And I didn’t say it back. We haven’t spoken since.”
“Why didn’t you say it back?”
The million-dollar question. I’d had time to think on it this past week. “Because … You know my past, Ivy. You know what’s happened when I dared to love someone. I survived all that. I survived my parents’ lack of love, for goodness’ sake. I survived Tripp. But Jack.” I looked at her, emotion welling inside of me. “Jack has been and always will be the person I want most in the world. And I already know what it feels like to be hurt by him. If I allow myself to admit to him … to start an actual relationship and then he turns around and stops loving me … How do I survive that? And I don’t just have me to think about anymore. I have my baby. I can’t fall apart over a broken heart when I have a child I’m responsible for.”
“Why would Jack stop loving you?” she asked.
“Because people stop loving each other all the time.”
“Okay. Then let me pose another question. Say you do push Jack away because you’re terrified of being hurt. It doesn’t change the fact that you love him. And then he eventually settles for some other woman since he can’t have you. You’ll have to drop off your kid to Jack and this other woman who will help raise your kid. With Jack. How does that make you feel?”
Anytime I imagined that hypothetical, my chest burned like it was on fire from the inside. “Heartbroken,” I whispered.
“So, let’s look at the math. You tell Jack you love him, you create a real family together, and somewhere down the years, there might be a 0.1 percent chance that Jack falls out of love with you and you get your heart broken. Or … you let Jack go now. He meets someone else. There is a 100 percent chance it will break your heart. I don’t know about you, but I much prefer the percentage of the former.”
“Ivy, 0.1 percent is being generous.”
She threw me a wry smile. “Em, do you know what we’ve all been talking about behind your back for weeks?”
I stiffened. “What?”
“You and Jack. And how it makes our stomachs flutter just witnessing the way he watches you.” Ivy fanned herself comically. “Seriously, Em. If I thought for one second Jeff was looking at me like that, I’d never let him out of bed. Even Bailey, who has Vaughn treating her to his smoldering intensity all the time, said no guy she’s ever met has ever quite looked at a woman the way Jack looks at you.”
I gaped at her, my heart racing. “How does he look at me?”
She gave me a quick, somewhat misty-eyed smile. “Like he’s just waiting to jump in front of a moving car for you. Or take a bullet to protect you. Like he couldn’t live without you.”
Tears brightened my own eyes. “Ivy.”
“Like you’re the reason he exists. It’s intense, Em. But it’s a good intense. I would never say this if I didn’t mean it … But you should tell Jack you love him and give it a shot. So, there’s a tiny, tiny chance it doesn’t work out between you. Is that slight chance worth losing out on being with a guy who looks at you with such longing, it makes my heart hurt?”
I sucked in a deep, shaky breath.
And I knew she was right.
I knew if I let Jack slip away, I’d regret it for the rest of my life.
“Goddammit,” I huffed. “Now I really just want to find Jack.”
“Take a minute, breathe,” Ivy advised. “We’ll go to the group. You can get your head together and think about what you want to say to him when we get back into town.”
So that was the plan.
And I was a jittery, distracted mess as we hung out with the kids.
Leaving Ivy to teach Casey solitaire, which was a much less controversial alternative to poker, I was walking across the room to where the kids were playing a video game when I felt a painful squeezing sensation in my belly. It was like a period cramp.
Even though my heart sped up at the feeling, I tried to shake it. But when I took another step, I experienced another painful squeeze.
Concern made me flush hot from head to toe. Excusing myself, I hurried to the restroom and locked myself inside a stall. My mind raced to the worst-possible reason for the cramps, and I unbuttoned my jeans.
There on my underwear was my worst fear. A few spots of blood.
Terror ricocheted through me at the same time another cramp did, and I let out a little whimper.
“Em?” Ivy’s voice rang out through the room, and I realized she’d followed me. “Em, are you okay?”
My entire body shaking, I pulled up my panties and jeans and hurried out of the stall.
One look at my face made Ivy pale. “What’s wrong?”
“We need to go to the hospital.”
41
Emery
I could still hear Ivy’s voice as she called Jack. She’d called him as we rushed out of Balance. Her words echoed around in my head.
“Jack, you need to get to Hartwell General. I’m taking Em there now. She’s cramping … and bleeding … I know”—her voice broke a little—“but I’ve got her, okay?”
I wondered what he’d said.
But I didn’t ask.
I was too busy being petrified out of my mind about losing our baby.
Ivy must’ve broken every speed limit to get us to Hartwell. She kept cool and calm when we arrived at the hospital, her voice authoritative as she explained to the emergency room nurse what was wrong.
/>
They took me into a private room right away. Five minutes later, Dr. Britt arrived. I remembered answering her questions as if on autopilot. She examined me. Ran tests. But it was like I was outside of myself. Fear had caused some kind of dissociation. Fear that not only would I lose this baby … but in losing my baby, I’d also lose my Jack.
Before I ever got the chance to have him.
“Em, your heart rate is high. I need you to calm down.”
She’d just finished saying those words when Jack appeared, striding through the door. The sight of him was like a rubber band snapping at my nose. I felt present again. No less fearful, but present.
He reached my side, grabbing my hand between his. “Sunrise.”
“You’re here,” I whispered, relief flooding me to feel his firm hand around mine.
“I always will be,” he vowed, his voice gruff.
“Good timing, Dad,” Dr. Britt said with a smile on her face. “The baby is fine. Heart rate is normal.”
“But—”
“The bleeding was merely spotting. And the cramping happens sometimes for no nefarious reason. I’ll have you monitor things and come back in if you have any heavier bleeding, but I’m not concerned. And I don’t want you to be.”
The terror that had been building inside me unleashed in a fit of sobs.
Jack’s arms wrapped around me, the bed depressing as he slid onto it so he could hold me as close as possible. “Shh, sunrise, you’re killing me,” he said hoarsely. “Please, please, Em, you’re okay. We’re all okay.”
“I’ll give you a moment,” I heard Dr. Britt say.
We were all okay. Jack kept whispering it over and over until it began to sink in.
I needed to tell him. I needed to tell him before it was too late.
“Jack.” I pulled my face out of his throat and clasped his cheeks in mine, feeling the prickle of his stubble tickle my palms.
His blue-gray eyes were bright with concern and love, and so much more.
I saw it.
I saw what Ivy was talking about.
God, Jack Devlin adored me.
And I adored him right back. “I wanted to see you this morning.” I moved my hands to his throat and down his shirt, curling my fingers in tight. I was afraid he’d disappear. Disappear before I had the chance to tell him. “Jack, I love you too. I love you so much more than I ever thought I could love anyone.”
His arms tightened around me, hope beaming through his concern. “Em, don’t say it just because we got a scare this morning.”
“It’s not that.” My fingers curled around his collar, pulling him to me so his mouth almost touched mine. “Ivy asked me how I felt about the idea of you with someone else, raising our child with some faceless woman,” I spat out the word woman and saw Jack’s lips twitch with amusement. “I wanted to throat punch her. The hypothetical woman. Not Ivy.”
Now he was just flat-out smiling. “This hypothetical woman is in a lot of danger from you.”
“I’m not joking, Jack. I’m sorry I’ve hurt you.” My face crumpled as the tears came again. “I’m such a coward,” I sobbed. “I’m so sorry.”
“Hey, hey.” He lifted my chin. “You are not a coward.”
“I am. I thought I was going to lose our baby and then I’d lose you too.”
Disbelief filled Jack’s expression. “Let me make one thing clear. No matter what happens, there is nothing in this world that could tear me away from you. God, Emery, don’t you know by now that I fucking live for you? I don’t care what that says about me. It’s how I feel. You make living worthwhile and if it had taken me ten, thirty, or fifty fucking years to convince you to give me a shot, then that’s how long I would’ve waited. There will never be another woman for me. Never. It wouldn’t be fair to any woman to share my life with them when I belong so completely to you.”
Fresh tears fell down my cheeks, but these were good ones. Happy ones. Brave ones. “I’ve never loved anyone like I love you. I’ve been in love with you for nine years,” I admitted, and he reacted by holding me impossibly tight. “There’s no one else for me either, Jack. There never will be.”
A wide, ecstatic, sexy-as-hell smile spread across Jack’s face. “So, we’re doing this? We’re going to be a real family?”
His joy and excitement were infectious. “Yes,” I promised.
“About damn time!” I heard Ivy shout from outside the doors.
I laughed and Jack cupped my face in his hand, watching me. “God, I hope our kid gets your eyes and your laugh.”
I didn’t get a chance to reply.
Jack was too busy kissing me.
A deep, tender kiss that tasted like a vow.
Epilogue
Emery
Waking my husband up by making love to him was one of my favorite things in the world. And considering I’d woken up an hour before our alarm was set to go off, I took advantage of this fortuitous situation.
While I’d finally relinquished control on the bookstore café and hired a full-time employee to help me out, Jack’s workload had only increased. Going into business with Cooper and taking over Germaine’s, a club on Main Street that had gone up for sale six months ago, meant he and Jack were buried with work. They’d decided the club needed updating and had closed it for renovations. Between their other businesses, it meant neither Jess nor I had seen our husbands much lately.
We got it.
We supported them.
But I missed Jack.
I shared this in the kisses I trailed across his chest. I licked at his nipple and felt him stir with a slight groan. Slipping my hand inside his pajama bottoms, I took a hold of him and he hardened as I kissed my way down his abs.
“Sunrise,” he growled.
I looked up at him and saw the sleep in his eyes obliterated by heat.
“Get up here.”
I did as I was told. But first, I yanked his pajama bottoms down far enough for access. Then I climbed over him.
I was already naked.
Straddling Jack, I pressed my breasts to him, undulating as our lips met. He slid his hand into my hair, fisting it to hold me to him as he kissed me hungrily. Feeling him ready—I’d been ready since I woke up and started ogling him—I shifted my hips until he was right where I wanted him and drove down.
As Jack entered my body, we both moaned, breaking the kiss.
I pressed my hands to his chest, gazing lovingly, hotly into his eyes as I rode him.
Jack gripped my hips, watching me with deep, male satisfaction. Our pants were deliberately restrained, my cries choked in my throat as the tension coiled tight and low in my belly.
“Em,” Jack groaned, his hands moving to my ass. “Fuck.”
“Shh,” I reminded him.
In answer he sat up, changing the angle of his thrusts and catching my pleasured cry in his mouth. Wrapping my arms around his shoulders as he pulled me tight to him, kissing me hard, deep, our mouths fighting to stay together as I rode him, I moaned helplessly against him.
I missed being able to scream his name as I came, and I knew he missed it too.
His hand moved between us, his thumb pushing down on my clit. “I’m close, sunrise. I need you with me.”
He rolled his thumb on the bundle of nerves between my legs and I slammed my mouth down on his so he could swallow the sound of my climax. Then I was taking his grunts of release. He throbbed inside me as my pulsing sex wrung him dry.
“Fuck,” he muttered, pressing kisses down my chin, my throat. I arched my neck, sighing blissfully as he captured a taut nipple in his mouth and sucked.
“Jack …” I undulated against him again, my fingers curling in his hair at the nape of his neck. “Baby—”
“Daddy!”
Jack released my nipple and pressed his forehead to my chest.
“Mommy!”
“I’ll go,” I whispered.
Jack lifted his head. “It’s okay.” He gave me a squeeze.
“
No, you don’t have to get up for another half hour. Sleep.” I gently pressed him back to the mattress as I lifted off him.
His jaw clenched and he grunted as he lost me. “Fuck, I miss my sunrise.”
“I’m right here.” I grinned at him as I rolled out of bed.
I could feel his eyes on my ass as I moved across the room to where I’d thrown my nightie.
“You know what I mean, Em,” he murmured.
Turning around, I pulled on my robe just as our daughter yelled for me again. We could tell by her tone it was not urgent, she was not hurt. She was just ready to get up and face the day.
“You’re launching a business. It takes time.”
“It’s not worth losing time with my two favorite girls. That’s the first time we’ve made love in three weeks.”
I knew that.
I was counting.
“We’ll talk about this later.” I threw him a reassuring smile and hurried out of the bedroom.
When we were deciding about where we would raise our kid, we’d decided on the beach house, even though Jack’s house in South Hartwell was larger. I told Jack to continue with the sale, and while he was at it, sell his place in North Hartwell too.
Despite only having three bedrooms, the beach house was in the perfect location.
Thankfully, it also had land on either side of it because we would need to build an addition. And I didn’t want to move.
Hurrying down the hall, I pushed into Tabitha’s room. Our daughter was turning four in three months’ time. However, first, her archenemy, Tyler Joseph Lawson, was turning four today.
We had such high hopes that those two would hit it off.
But they fought like cats and dogs and had done this since they could walk.
The problem was they were both too bossy for their own good.
It seemed my child had inherited her grandmother’s sass.
Despite our differences, it made me smile to think of my grandmother looking down on us and feeling smug that she’d passed along some of her traits to her great-granddaughter.
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