ALL THINGS PRETTY PART TWO

by M. Leighton

  Sig’s deep, muffled voice gives Travis short, snappy instructions. Get me some towels. Do you know where your bandages are? Get me whatever you can find. Call 911.

  I hear him muttering, his voice shaking when everything else is so rock-steady, even the accelerated beat of his heart beneath my ear.

  “Please don’t leave me, Tommi. Please don’t go.”

  As cold as I am, I warm at his words, wishing that I could’ve told him how I felt before I did what I did. But then he’d have known. He’d have known and he’d have stopped me.

  There’s movement. Pressure at my wrists. Jostling. Hands grabbing, fingers holding. More pressure. A light touch to my neck. Faint throbbing at my pulse point.

  “Travis, would you mind to watch for the ambulance?” Sig asks.

  I hear no response, but after a few seconds, I sense the absence of my brother.

  And then I’m being crushed in arms that feel like steel. Sig’s face is buried in my hair, his huffing breath moist against my skin. “Please don’t go, Tommi. Please. I never wanted to love you like this, but I do. But you weren’t supposed to leave me. You weren’t supposed to take everything I am, everything good in my life, and leave me with nothing. I did everything I could for you, so you could be free and happy and we could be together. Please don’t leave me like this. Oh God, please.”

  I recall our conversation, the one where he admitted he never wanted to love someone so much that life would be less without them. Yet he loves me. He risked his worst fear for me. For the love of me.

  He’s crying. It’s a slight, manly shaking of his big body that makes me want to pull him against me, to comfort him and tell him that I’m not going anywhere, that I would never leave him like that. Only I know that it’s probably too late to turn back now.

  “I love you,” he whispers, wetness coating the area under my ear. “I love you more than anything else in my life. What am I supposed to do without you? You can’t leave me now, so soon. Not like this. Please, Tommi. Please, please, please. I love you. Tia, I love you.”

  Tia, I love you.

  Tia. That’s me. The real me. The girl who killed her brother by accident. The girl who forged checks and lied about who she was. The girl who bargained with her body and her soul, the only things she had left, in order to save her brother.

  This man, this strong, amazing, funny, caring man loves me.

  I’ve waited all my life, all my disaster-of-a-life to find him, to hear those words. And now I’m leaving. This glimpse, this short, heartbreaking glimpse, is all I’ll ever get.

  Why? Why did I do this? Why did I give up so easily? Why did I run instead of fighting? I’ve come this far, why didn’t I finish the race?

  Thoughts war. Wills battle. Something dies. And something new emerges.

  As though it’s a physical exchange, I feel the past and all its sadness draining out from me, leaving me along with my blood. But inside, somewhere deep inside, I feel love and hope and determination well within me, a spring overflowing in my chest, filling me with warmth and determination.

  With every ounce of strength that I have, I force my lids open. The room dips and sways, but I blink back the dizzying spin and try to focus.

  “Sig,” I murmur, my lips dry, my tongue thick.

  Stillness. Absolute stillness.

  “Sig,” I say again, as loudly as I can muster, pushing past this overwhelming weakness.

  Slowly, as though I’m the most fragile thing in the world, Sig lowers me away from him enough to look down into my face. His eyes are wet with tears, the lashes spiky and black around the warm chocolate centers. One tear slips out and runs down his cheek. “Tommi?”

  “I’m s-so sorry. I…I wish…I regret…” It’s so hard to talk. I’m so tired, the temptation to shut my eyes so compelling. “I p-panicked. Felt s-so bad. So…ashamed. The guilt. So much. B-but I shouldn’t have done this to you, t-to Travis. I love…love you. So much.”

  He squeezes his eyes shut and presses his lips to mine. “Please be strong. For me. Help is on the way. Just stay with me until they come. Okay?” he asks, looking down at me again. “Promise me you’ll stay, you’ll fight.”

  “I-I promise.”

  Then he holds me tight against his chest, like he never plans to let me go, and I think to myself that if I have one last wish, one last prayer to pray, that I’ll beg God to let me stay.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX - SIG

  Two months later

  “So when will we get to see Sloane?” Travis asks for the fifth time at least.

  “She’s getting married, dude.” The look on his face says he doesn’t care. “Don’t make me regret bringing you.”

  He sits back against the seat, holding his hands up in surrender, but he’s trying not to smile. And I like seeing that. I wasn’t sure the kid would ever smile again there for a while.

  “So what am I supposed to do while you’re up there?” he asks when I shift into park in the church lot and cut the engine.

  “Keep quiet, which I know won’t be a problem for your sulky ass. You’ll be in the front row. Just sit there until my brothers find you.”

  “Which ones are they again?”

  “Steven and Scout.”

  “Hemi and Reese and what’s the other one’s name?”

  “Leif. Bu they’re in-laws. Hemi is Sloane’s fiancé and his brothers are Reese and Leif.”

  “And Reese is married to…”

  “Kennedy.”

  “She’s pretty hot, too.”

  “Yeah, she’s all right.” There was a time when I thought she was really hot, but that was before Tommi. Tia. She forever changed beauty for me. She forever changed me. My chest gets tight when I think about her, just like it’s done a million times in the last couple of months. Since that night she…

  “Not as hot as Sloane,” Travis mutters.

  “Ewww. She’s my sister, douche. And you’d better keep comments like that to yourself. Hemi’ll whip that ass if you’re not careful.”

  “Penis envy,” Travis deadpans.

  I laugh. I can’t help it. The kid cracks me up.

  It feels good to laugh. Like Travis, I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to laugh again either.

  When we get out, I reach out to straighten Travis’s tie. Then I straighten my own and tug at the bottom of my tux jacket. “So, am I killin’ it?” I ask.

  “As much as big, goofy bastard like you can, I guess.”

  I lightly punch his arm. He takes it and leans far to one side and springs back, like one of those inflatable punching bags with sand in the bottom. He doesn’t retaliate, but I see his lips twitch. That’s good enough for me. One step at a time.

  We make our way into the church. It’s just starting to fill up. I drop Travis off at the front row and head to the area behind the pulpit, where the groom awaits. It’s lighthearted in here. Hemi can’t stop smiling. His brothers can’t stop teasing him. It’s like all is right with the world for them.

  My sister’s best friend, Sarah, asked her mother, Blaire, to take care of the baby during the ceremony. After a short knock, she appears at the pastor’s door carrying Eden, my niece.

  Blaire carries her to Hemi. “She was getting fussy and I think the bride has her hands full at the moment.”

  I watch Hemi take his daughter from Sarah’s mom. My gut squeezes at the way his face lights up. He looks like a complete ass when he starts talking baby talk, but it’s the good kind of ass. The kind that makes me ache somewhere in the vicinity of my heart. The kind of ass I’d gladly be.

  “Daddy’s making Momma an honest woman, today, isn’t he, baby girl?” he coos.

  “Took you long enough, you jackass,” I tease.

  Hemi flips one middle finger up at me behind his daughter’s back. “Watch your filthy mouth around my kid, Locke.”

  “Sorry, man,” I tell him sincerely. It makes me sympathize with my dad a little, remembering how hard it was for him to try and raise a lady in a house full
of foul-mouthed boys. Most of them cops, no less.

  Hemi kisses Eden’s belly, which sticks out roundly from under her frilly pink dress, filling the room with her sweet laugh. Just as her giggling is really kicking up, the preacher comes in to tell us that it’s time. Hemi gives Eden back to Blaire and turns back to us, a huge smile wreathing his face.

  “It’s time,” he says. It’s plain to see he’s not the least bit nervous. In fact, he looks like he just won the lottery.

  “You ready?” Reese asks.

  Dumb ass. You can see that he is.

  “Are you kidding? I’m finally getting to make the girl of my dreams mine forever. I’ve waited my whole life for this day.”

  “That’s all fine and good, but just remember that if you make her cry, you’ll be running for the rest of that life,” I add. Not that I think Hemi would hurt my sister. I don’t think I’ve ever seen two people more in love. But still, she’s my sister. The only one I’ve got. I’ll gladly hunt him down if he hurt her.

  Hemi claps me on the shoulder, his expression sincere. “I’d rather cut off my own damn arm than to see her sad for even a day. I promise I’ll do everything in my power to make sure she’s the happiest woman in the world.”

  We nod at each other, both understanding how important Sloane is to the other, and we turn to line up at the door. As we stand waiting, there are smiles all around, slaps on the back, playful remarks about wedding nights and how Hemi got the bride knocked up too soon. It puts me at ease, reminds me of how rich and full life can be when you’re surrounded by people you love. And when you find the right person to share it all with. I found that. Even though I wasn’t looking for it, I found it. I found her.

  I shake off my thoughts and focus as the door swings open. Quietly, we step out in order. Me, Leif, Reese and then Hemi. As soon as we are in place, the minister nods to the small string orchestra that sits off to one side of the front of the church. They play a pretty song. I’m not familiar with it, of course. I’m a dude. I have balls. It’s not like I’ve been to many weddings. But whatever it is, it seems to suit a day like this.

  I watch the back of the room, my eyes trained on the door. My heart is hammering in my chest like it’s me who’s getting married. I probably won’t ever get used to the feeling. But then again, that’s probably a good thing.

  At the back of the church, the two ushers left pull open the doors and there, standing like a gorgeous, golden angel, is Tommi. Tia, I correct.

  Tia is her name, but in my mind, I still often think of her as Tommi. That’s the name I had for the girl I fell in love with, right up until I learned who she really is. The only thing that changed was her name. Now it’s Tia. I just have to get used to it. But she’s still my Tommi. The love of my life. And the main thing, the most important thing, is that I can call her mine. I don’t give a damn about the rest.

  Her hair is piled up on her head in that style that I love. Her skin looks like cream silk against the dark rose-colored dress she’s wearing. And on her face, the beautiful smile that I never get tired of. I used to wonder when I’d see it, the genuine smile. She didn’t use it much when we first met. But now, ever since she woke up in the hospital recovering from her accident with the razor, she’s hardly taken it off. And that’s fine by me.

  I think back to how she explained her…happiness when she was finally discharged and I got to take her home.

  We were lying in bed together, her head resting on my chest, one of her legs thrown over mine. She was drawing circles around my nipple. She had bet me that she could make me hard doing that. I had bet her that she couldn’t. I lost. But she cheated.

  Anyway, she was telling me about how she felt. “It’s like part of me died that night.”

  My chest got tight then. Like it gets tight now. Just the thought of her not being here, of living my life without her…I can’t even picture it. Hell, I don’t even want to try.

  “After you picked me up, when I really realized what I’d done, I promised God that if He’d help me through it, give me yet another second chance, I’d live every day like it’s my last. That I wouldn’t let the past tarnish one second of my future. Not one single second. Even then, though, I wondered how I could ever let it go so completely. But when I woke up in the hospital, saw you asleep with your head resting on your hand where it held mine, it was like everything that happened was just…gone. Almost like it never was. I think I bled out that night. Bled out all the bad, all the shame and bitterness. All the hurt and darkness. And the emptiness that should’ve been left behind wasn’t emptiness at all. It was a fullness, a place that only had room for the good. You. Travis. Momma.”

  She brought those big eyes up to mine that night, tears sparkling in them. “I’d die all over again if it meant coming alive to you. To us. To this. I never thought I’d be this happy. It makes all that we went through, all that we sacrificed worth it.”

  “I’m glad, baby, but don’t even talk about dying. I don’t think you know how hard it was for me to see you that way, for me to wait by the bed for those hours, praying that you’d wake up.”

  “I can only imagine. I’m so sorry, Sig,” she told me, burying her face against my chest.

  “Don’t apologize. I know you didn’t do it on purpose. And when the doctor explained that you were suffering from severe depression and post-traumatic stress after everything that happened, I realized that you weren’t trying to leave me. You were only trying to make the pain go away. I’m just glad that it went, but left you with me.”

  I leaned down to kiss her forehead and heard her soft reply. “I am, too. I never want to be apart from you. Ever. Not for even a day.”

  “Well, I have to work, you know.”

  “Then I’ll come with you. What do you think they’d say about a criminal working at the police station?”

  She said it jokingly, but I didn’t think it was funny. I didn’t want her to feel that way, like a criminal. Like she’s somehow less.

  “You aren’t a criminal. A court of law determined that what you did was an act of self-defense. You feared for your own life and that of your family. Period. Anyone else would’ve done the same thing.” I reached down to turn her face up to mine. “Don’t you understand that I’d kill for you? I’ll kill a hundred men. A thousand, if I had to. I’d kill for you, die for you. I’d do anything for you.”

  “Well, let’s hope it never comes to that,” she said lightly, which I knew would lead to a change in subject. She never likes talking about that stuff too long. And I never try to make her.

  She ran her tongue over my nipple then, biting it a little when it got hard. I felt her hand glide down my stomach, her fingers wrapping around my already-stiff cock. “You’re cheating,” I said on a sigh.

  “What are you gonna do, Officer? Cuff me?”

  That was the last thing she said for at least an hour. Well, unless you count moans and the screaming of my name.

  It was a damn good hour.

  Now we’re here at my sister’s wedding. Sloane insisted that Tommi be a part of it. They got close fast. Which is good since they’re the two most important women in my life. I’m not really surprised, though. I knew that Sloane would love Tommi once they met. Once she gave her a chance.

  Now, two months later, here we are, healthy and happy and whole, surrounded by the most important people in our lives, and I’m watching her walk toward me, wishing it was us joining our lives together today.

  Her sparkling green eyes meet mine and hold them over the spray of lilies she’s carrying. She winks. I almost laugh out loud. She says it drives her crazy when I do it to her. Thought she’d show me. Give me a taste of my own medicine. My heart fills up to the point of bursting and I think to myself that as long as I have her, I’ll be all right. Better than all right.

  We fought for each other, bled for each other, even died a little bit for each other. We never gave up. Even when it hurt. And it was worth it.

  I always knew it would be.
>
  EPILOGUE- TOMMI

  Four months later

  I reach up to touch the blindfold around my eyes. “Where are we going?”

  “You’ll see,” Sig says. I can hear the grin in his voice.

  I rest my temple against the headrest, facing Sig even though I can’t see him. I don’t have to be able to see him to recall every detail of his strong profile. though. Everything about him, even when I can’t see him, oozes strength and power. Protectiveness and possessiveness. After Lance, I never thought I’d like that in a man, but Sig isn’t just any man. He’s my man. And all that is for me. Because he loves me. That makes all the difference in the world.

  The verdict was handed down on Lance Tonin today. Guilty on all counts. He was convicted on drug charges that Chaps and Trip’s brother, Davey made stick (all with the help of Travis’s testimony). He was convicted of several of a mixed bag of other felonies like collusion, conspiracy to commit murder, obstruction of justice and a whole slew of other goodies they discovered that Lance was involved in. For all of that, he’ll be going to prison for the rest of his life. At least. Sentencing is next week, but my body didn’t wait for that to fully relax. From the moment that Sig swept me off my shaky legs in the courthouse parking lot, I’ve felt free. Finally. Fully. Free.

  The truck slows and Sig cuts the engine. “I’m coming around,” he announces and then I hear the door open and close. I wait, a happy little smile playing with the edges of my lips, until I hear him open my door. “Come on, beautiful. I’ve got something to show you.”

  He scoops me up, cradled against his chest, and carries me until I feel him dip down, one hand messing with something. I hear a key slide into a lock and a knob jiggle as it turns. A thrill of anticipation ripples down my spine. I can only hope that wherever he’s taking me is private. Very private.

  The smell of polyurethane assails me. Sig’s footfalls echo as he walks, making a light tapping sound. I can almost picture the hardwoods beneath us. The acoustics change from hollow and empty to cozy and muted, as though we’ve entered a smaller or fuller room.