“Jenna,” I hissed, glancing at Evan, who’d decided we were boring after all, his attention wrapped up in watching Josiah dancing around the screen with his face the center of a flower.
She stalked toward me, a gleam in her eyes, and then turned so her back was toward Evan. “Was he good? Oh, God, I bet that doctor is amazing with those big hands. I told you all you needed was a big, yummy dick and all would be right with the world.”
Her words deviated from a salacious secret to a breathy wisp to the worst kind of tease.
“A lady never tells,” I tried to defend.
Though I might as well have been shouting it from the rooftops with the way heat went flushing over every inch of me, the memory of the way he’d touched me. Bringing me to ecstasy as if he were the one who’d always possessed my pleasure, the one sent to deliver it.
“Oh, come on, Hope. That’s a total crock, and you know it. You’ve at least got to tell me if the man knows where the clicker is.”
How she and I were friends, I didn’t know. When I didn’t answer, her grin just grew, yet, her voice turned soft. “At least tell me he knows how to treat you right. That’s the only thing I want for you. Don’t ever settle. Not again.”
I cracked, whispering, “He definitely knows how to treat me right.”
In every way.
We were all hushed secrets behind the corner Jenna had backed me into. “How right?”
“So right.” My tummy flipped at the thought.
“Like . . . how . . . how right?” She angled her head, prying the truth out of me.
“Like, so very right. Like I’ve never felt anything close to the way I do when I’m with him. Not in all my life.”
She squeezed me in her arms like a miracle just had happened. “Praise Mary.”
Then she pulled me back, staring at me as all the prying tease left her voice. “Are you okay?” she asked me again. Though this time, the question was entirely different.
Because when I said she knew me, she knew me. She knew I’d never have slept with him if it didn’t mean something to me.
I searched around inside myself for what to say. How to express what it was I really felt. “My life is crazy with Dane right now . . . I feel like I’m running faster and faster, trying to outrun him, praying he doesn’t catch us.”
All the while not fully understanding why he was chasing us in the first place.
My words started to become breathy, the horror of what Dane might actually do, what he might actually want.
“I’m terrified of what’s coming. But somehow . . . that world? Right now, it feels like it’s stronger than it has ever been. Like maybe Kale is holding some pieces together I might have lost if I had to do this alone.”
“He’s good with Evan?”
“He’s amazing with him.”
She rubbed her thumbs where she was still holding me by the arms. “But you know it’s got to be more than that, Hope. This can’t just be about Evan. And I know you live for that boy, as you should, but you deserve to find happiness in the middle of that, too. Real happiness.”
I knew she was prodding. Digging deeper. Forcing me to evaluate everything. That was Jenna’s way. Goading and coaxing and shoving me toward something she might think I needed and then urging me to look at it for what it was.
Playing devil’s advocate. “It’s so much more than just that.”
I glanced at Evan before turning back to her. “Evan will always be my first priority, and I’ll never allow a man into our lives who doesn’t care about him. But this . . . what I feel?” I splayed my hands flat across my chest. “It’s overwhelming and wonderful and terrifying, and what happened between us last night? It was bigger—more powerful—than anything I could have imagined.”
Magical. A fantasy that shouldn’t have been real.
“I want to feel like this, every day, for the rest of my life. And I want to get to do it with him.”
She huffed an affectionate breath and edged back. “Oh, Harley Hope. You’re already in love with him.”
Maybe it made me a fool.
Naïve and unsuspecting.
“I don’t think I could have stopped myself from falling for that man if I’d tried.”
She quirked a playful brow. “He is delicious. Sex on a stick. Tell me we are naming a cupcake after him.”
“Watch yourself,” I tossed at her with a small laugh.
My phone chirped on the island. I went for it, unable to stop the force of my smile when I read the text.
“Look at you over there, grinning like you just swallowed a big ol’ canary,” Jenna teased. “Don’t think I need to ask you who it is. What’s he sayin’?”
“He wants Evan and I to go over to his place for pizza and a movie this evening. He said he’d pick us up since my car is still over there.”
“Oh, Harley Hope. I think that man just might be a keeper.”
“I know.”
He was so, absolutely a keeper. I could only pray he was really ready for it. For us. That he understood what being with us would be like.
Because Evan and I? I knew we were a big decision. What I knew would be a huge change to his life . . . his previous lifestyle so different than the kind of life we had to offer.
But I knew, with all of me, that Evan and I could fill his life with so much joy. The kind of joy he had evoked in me.
And my heart?
It was always hung on hope.
And all I was hoping was Kale could see it, too. That he really wanted it.
That he would take a chance on us.
23
Hope
A rim of light blazed at the edge of the horizon as the day sank away. The twinkling lights that were strung between the buildings sparked to life and spilled in through the bank of windows that overlooked Kale’s balcony and the bustling city below, casting his loft in a warm glow.
Or maybe the warm glow was actually radiating from Evan and Kale where they sat facing each other on the expansive plush rug on the floor.
We’d just finished eating pizza, our bellies satisfied and full.
I watched them from where I was curled up on the same couch, in the very spot Kale had undone me yesterday afternoon.
God, that seemed like a lifetime ago. Another world. As if a stake had been driven into time, segmenting and dividing it, giving us a new direction and a new day.
A new chance.
A chance that maybe the three of us could become one.
A rush of nerves streaked my spine. Hope and a niggle of fear. Because Kale and I were moving fast. So fast that I was still struggling to wrap my mind around the fact I’d given myself to him last night.
Fully.
Wholly.
But somehow, despite everything that was going against us, every worry and every complication, I knew this beautiful man with that huge, magnificent heart was meant for me.
Because there he sat, grinning at my son, his right hand lifted as he attempted to copy the sign language letters Evan was trying to teach him.
“Like this?” he asked aloud, concentrating and still getting it horribly wrong.
Emotion pulsed in my chest, lost to the adorableness of it all. The man, who was larger than life and seemed as if he could accomplish anything, couldn’t seem to manage to get his fingers to cooperate.
Evan rapidly shook his head and reached out and tried to move Kale’s hand into the correct position.
Like that, Evan mouthed.
Kale’s hand curled into some kind of deformed ball as he struggled to keep the position. “Got it!”
I bit back my amusement at his fumbling because he so didn’t have it. Honestly, it seemed downright absurd, considering I knew firsthand the type of magic those fingers could evoke.
Evan laughed that scraping sound. I could feel the echo of it ripple across the wooden floor. Joy and life. Vigorously, Evan shook his head while he leaned over to write on his notepad, all too eager to hold it up for Kale to see.
Dr. Bryant, you’re not even close.
“What?” Kale defended playfully. He sent me a roguish wink that made my tummy tumble before he let his expression wind into a goofy face that he directed at my son. “What are you talking about? That was perfect. I mean, how hard can making an ‘A’ be?”
Evan wrote some more.
Too hard for you!
In mock horror, Kale’s mouth dropped open. “Hey, I thought you told me the first time I met you that you were going to let me try to keep up with you?”
Evan’s little hand flew across the page.
I said you could TRY to keep up with me.
“And you think you’re too fast for me?”
A downpour of love flooded me as I watched Kale interact with my child. These overpowering, stunning emotions hitting me from every side.
They were feelings that were foreign, though, I intrinsically knew I’d been missing them all along.
Emphatically, Evan nodded, grinning big enough to fill the room.
“Oh, little man, you better run, because I’m about to show you just how fast I am,” Kale warned.
Evan’s eyes widened in both surprise and delight, and he scrambled to his feet at the same second Kale leapt to his. Evan darted across the living room and Kale was hot on his heels.
Always just missing him as they zigzagged and weaved.
Evan’s sock covered feet slid on the slick floor as he rounded the island in the kitchen and came running back for me, arms thrown above his head and face tipped toward the ceiling, silent laughter pouring free.
I stretched my arms out for Evan. “Hurry, Evan. Mom’s home base!” I called.
Right before Evan made it to me, Kale scooped him up from behind and tossed Evan onto his back, galloping around the room with him, Kale’s deep laughter ricocheting against the walls.
Both of them were smiling these smiles that blasted through me.
So wide.
So happy.
So right.
I pressed my palm over my mouth. Overcome. Because I’d had no idea I’d wanted this so much.
No true idea how much I’d been lacking until Kale had filled that vacant place. I had to wonder how much my son had been lacking, too. I’d spent years trying to compensate. To fill all the holes Dane’s rejection had to have carved into his innocent spirit.
Suddenly, I hungered for it, this feeling of completeness that took me over and set me free when Kale looked at me that certain way.
As if I were his everything and he would always crave more.
Added and multiplied to that was the way he treated my son.
Accepting his disability and still acting as if it weren’t there to begin with.
Adoring him in spite of it.
Loving him because of it.
Love.
Is that what shone when Kale grinned up at my son, holding him in the security of his arms and still allowing him to fly?
“Got you,” Kale sang.
Evan kicked and flailed and laughed before Kale settled him on his feet and ruffled his fingers through my son’s mess of red, red hair.
Somehow, I understood exactly the way Kale felt in that moment. Evan was eight, yet still so vulnerable. I always had this incredible urge to pick him up and hold him. Protect him forever and never allow anything to happen to him.
I could see the exact same feeling written all over Kale’s face.
Evan began to frantically sign, hands flying in front of him.
Kale looked over at me for help, and a shiver raked across my flesh when the power of his gaze landed on me.
“He said you’re stronger than Superman,” I told him, trying to keep the needy tremor from my voice.
Kale chuckled and looked back at Evan. “Superman, huh? My goddaughter, Frankie Leigh, would argue with you. She insists I’m Captain America.”
Evan signed again.
“He wants to know who she is,” I said, emotion tightening my throat.
Kale widened his eyes in emphasis. “Wonder Woman, of course.”
Evan grinned, his own eyes going wide with excitement. This conversation had definitely taken a turn down Evan alley.
WHO AM I? he signed and mouthed at the same time.
“That’s a no brainer. You’ve got to be The Hulk. Smart as a whip and look at these muscles.”
Kale squeezed Evan’s tiny bicep.
Evan’s whole body rocked with his glee, and he forced out the rasping words, as if he couldn’t hold back his praise. “Dr. Bryant.”
Slowing, Kale’s gaze turned tender. “What do you say you start calling me Kale instead of Dr. Bryant?”
Affection burst in my chest.
Evan signed quickly, his head cocked to the side with the question.
“He asked if that’s because you’re his friend now.” My words were choppy.
A warm smiled pulled to Kale’s lips, something so genuine and sincere. “Yeah, buddy, because you’re my friend. Because I care about you.”
Evan signed, OKAY, beaming at the man who continued to weave himself deeper and deeper into my skin.
Into my heart.
“Good,” Kale said as if what he’d just done didn’t matter all that much. “I think it’s movie time. What do you say we put us on some superheroes, and we can decide exactly which we are? I have just about every Marvel movie ever made.”
YES! Evan signed, giving a little fist pump in the air.
A small giggle fluttered from my lips, but my tone was coated with the emotion that gathered thick. “Careful, Evan won’t ever want to leave.”
My insides fluttered when he began to stalk toward me.
Potent.
Powerful.
Persuasive.
That was what the man looked like. Persuasion and dominance and sex.
Most of all, right then, he looked like he was mine.
I sucked in a breath when he leaned over me, his mouth coming to my ear. “Maybe that’s my intention.”
“Don’t say things you don’t mean,” I whispered.
He pulled back and stared down at me, those blue eyes intense. “What if I do?”
That crazy attraction I felt around him climbed to the air. This time fuller. Denser. Brimming with more.
So badly that I wanted to lean forward so I could press my mouth to his.
Touch him and claim him as mine.
But we’d decided to take it slow in front of Evan. Working him into the idea of us, especially since Kale and I hadn’t quite established what that meant.
But it was Kale who pushed it further, inching closer, the words a breathy murmur that sent a shiver down my spine. “I can’t wait to be inside you again. I’ve been dying to touch you since the second you walked through my door. Second I get the chance? You’re mine.”
Oh.
Butterflies scattered in my belly and desire pooled. There was nothing I could do but press my thighs together.
Kale edged back with a smirk. “That’s what I thought, Princess.”
As if he hadn’t just made my knees knock, he stood straight and shifted his attention back to Evan.
“So, what movie do you want to watch?” Kale asked. He grabbed the remote, flicked on his big television, and switched it to the long list of his downloaded movies.
He hadn’t been joking when he said he had about every Marvel movie ever made.
Boys.
Evan grabbed his pad.
We have to take a vote. That’s the rule.
An affectionate chuckle rumbled from Kale. “You are just full of all kinds of rules, aren’t you, little man?”
Only good rules.
Contentment seeped into my pores.
More so than I’d ever been.
Darkness swam through Kale’s loft, broken by the flickers and flashes from the television as the movie played on.
We were on the second Avengers movie, and my son lay across Kale’s couch, still facing the screen, his breaths soft snores as
he slept the movie away.
His head was on Kale’s lap and Kale was running his fingers through his hair.
I was on the other side of Kale, curled up so I could rest on his shoulder.
He pressed his lips to my temple, his voice a rough murmur. “I’m so glad you’re here.”
Shifting to face him more, I peered at him through the shifting light. “I’m so glad I’m here.”
He traced his nose down the curve of my jaw. “You’d better be.”
A tiny moan left me when he kissed down the slope of my neck. “Is that so?”
I could feel his grin against my skin. “You know it’s so.”
“Stalker,” I whispered with a smile fluttering at my lips, the word nothing but affection.
“Knight, Princess. Knight. After last night, tell me I get to be your king.”
My head tilted back, and the smile that had been threatening lit in a full bloom. “Hmm . . . I don’t know,” I teased, my fingers twining in his soft hair.
“Ouch, Princess. You know exactly where to hit a man where it hurts, don’t you?” It was all mischief on his tongue as he kissed and nipped. “I guess you don’t need me after all.”
A giggle slipped free before I pulled back and cupped his face, sincerity weaving into my tone. “Yesterday was terrifying, Kale, and somehow . . . somehow you turned it into the best night of my life.”
Those soulful eyes glinted in the light, his throat bobbing as he swallowed. “I don’t think I’ve ever felt the way I felt last night,” he admitted his voice gruff.
I tucked my bottom lip between my teeth before I asked, “What are we doing, Kale?”
His fingertips fluttered across my cheek. “I think we’re needing each other.” He blinked. “I had no idea I needed anyone or anything until I met you.”
And that need . . .
I could feel it compounding and expanding and shifting.
Restoring.
“Stay with me tonight,” he said.
My gaze moved to my sleeping son. “I don’t think he’s ready for that yet. Plus, I need to be up early to get to the shop in the morning, and Evan has his summer program.”
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