Start Again: A Novel (Start Again Series #1)

by J. Saman

  I hate the sincerity in her voice. Unable to even look at her right now, I turn, facing the sink and the window with my back to her.

  “I wanted to. Believe me when I tell you that I did, but I still wasn’t ready. I needed more time. I needed to find myself.”

  “What the fuck does that mean, Katie?” I spin around to glare her. “What kind of crap is that? You couldn’t even let me know that you were safe? That you were in town and doing okay? I would have given you space if you had asked, but to never even contact me…” I shake my head, unable to finish my thought.

  She looks down, setting her glass on the marble. “I’m sorry, Ryan. I really didn’t think of it like that. I was afraid that if I came to you too soon, I would mess everything up worse than I already had. I’ve never been alone. Not since the age of twelve.”

  She does that nervous laugh thing again before pulling her attention back up to me.

  “I mean, I was alone for those two plus years after they died, but that didn’t really count. I’ve never been alone, living a real life. So I got a small apartment close to the hospital, transferred my nursing license here, and I joined a mixed martial arts studio to help channel my anger. I do yoga twice a week to try and Zen out all of that anger, and I go to a support group once a week for people who have lost spouses and children. I finally feel like I’ve gotten myself together,” she spits out as fast as she can before her shoulders sag slightly, like just saying all of that was exhausting.

  Standing up slowly, she moves around the island, stopping in front of me and locking her eyes with mine.

  “I know I’ve been gone a while. That you’ve been living your life without me and that I don’t deserve your forgiveness, let alone another chance, but I want it. Both of them. I want to be with you, Ryan, and all that entails.”

  Chapter 30

  Ryan

  I want to say yes to her instantly. To grab her small perfect body that I love so much and kiss her into tomorrow, but I’m not moving. I’m just staring at her, wondering if she’s going to cut me to shreds again. Wondering how long this new Katie will last before the old wounds come out and take her from me.

  “I’m ready, Ryan,” she says as if reading my thoughts. Stepping forward, she reaches out, placing a hand on my arm. Her touch is like the best sort of fire on my skin. “I wouldn’t be here if I wasn’t. It’s why I stayed away so long. I’m ready and I love you, and I’ll never hurt you again,” she promises.

  Lowering my head, our foreheads touch and a heavy, shaky breath leaves her lungs as her eyes close. “I missed you,” I whisper, staring down at her.

  My world begins and ends with her.

  “I’ve missed you too. So much. I’m so sorry,” she says as sweet tears cascade down her reddened cheeks.

  My thumbs come up to wipe them away, caressing her silken cheeks and cupping her jaw.

  “Don’t cry, sweetheart. Everything is going to be okay.”

  Her eyes open, blinking a few times to clear her tears before focusing on me. “Really?”

  “Yes. I love you too much to send your adorable ass packing.”

  She laughs through her crying, and I can’t help but return her glowing smile.

  “Good. I was worried you would be over me by now.”

  “Never, Katie. I already told you that. Haven’t my pictures and texts been enough of an indicator of my feelings for you?”

  She shrugs a shoulder. “You could just have a penchant for sending pictures and texts. It’s hard to say what kind of kink you’re into.”

  I laugh and brush my lips against hers, unable to hold back any longer. She tastes like minty toothpaste and hot chocolate, and Katie.

  She tastes like my Katie and I can’t get enough of her.

  Just as I’m about to part her lips and get a real taste, the motherfucking doorbell rings.

  “Expecting company?” she asks, quirking an eyebrow up at me.

  I nod. “Thai. You hungry?”

  She nods back. “I’m always hungry.”

  “Then I’ll go get our dinner and you can sit your ass down in front of the fireplace, but only after you go upstairs and find yourself something warm to wear. I don’t want you getting my couch all wet.” I pull back with a devilish smile. “At least not yet.”

  She laughs, shaking her head and pushing me towards the door like the last three months of separation never happened. Like we’ve been playing this game all along. Like we’ll be doing it with each other for the rest of our lives.

  I pay the guy, and when I turn around after shutting the door, Katie is walking downstairs in one of my shirts and nothing else.

  She looks crazy sexy.

  She may have something on underneath, or not. There is definitely only one way to find out though.

  “That smells good. I’m starving.”

  Me too, I think, but definitely not for food. I set the bag down on the coffee table before crooking a finger at her. “Come here.”

  She smiles playfully, knowing where my mind is and fully intending to mess with me. “Mr. Grant, I believe I was promised dinner. Is this how you treat all your dates? With seduction before the meal?”

  “Well, madam—” No way in fucking hell am I calling her Mrs. Taylor again, ever. “Most of my dates don’t show up in only a t-shirt after a three-month absence.” I take a step towards her, like a tiger stalking its prey. “And they certainly aren’t nearly as sexy as you are right now.”

  The hands folded against her stomach are shaking, but it’s not in fear. It’s in anticipation. I can see it in her eyes as they darken the closer I get to her.

  I haven’t been with anyone since Katie.

  Couldn’t stand the thought of it, really.

  So now, I’m going to fucking devour her and we might not come up for air until I have to go to work on Monday. First, I have to clarify something.

  “Are you working this weekend?” She mentioned she has a job and I know nurses work odd hours.

  She shakes her head, sinking her white teeth into her plump lower lip.

  “Do you plan on going anywhere anytime soon?”

  Another shake of her head, the damp ends of her hair making rings of water on the cotton of the shirt she’s wearing.

  “What if I never let you leave again, Katie? What if I demand you stay here with me forever?”

  Her eyes widen at the thought, and I wonder just how ready she really is. But then a smile spreads across her face, lighting up her eyes and it’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. She steps into me, gliding her small hands up my chest, her eyes watching the motion until they find mine. Holy hell that’s hot.

  “Then I guess I’m your prisoner, Master.” Fuck. She crooks a finger at me, asking for me to bend down so she can whisper in my ear. “I’d very much like to be yours forever.” Her sweet breath brushes against the shell of my ear. “I love you, and I’m yours if you’ll have me.”

  My arms wrap around her in an instant, and I pull her tightly against me, taking her mouth like a starving man who’s found the best tasting food in the world.

  Dammit, I’ve missed her lips, her taste, her smell, her touch.

  I’m dizzy. I’m lost. I’m never coming up for air again. Everything I need to survive is in my arms right now, and I’m never letting go. Ever.

  “Katie,” I breathe, and she shudders.

  “I’ve missed you so much, Ryan. I’m so sorry for everything I put you through.”

  “I’ve missed you too, and you have the rest of the night to make it up to me,” I wink. Scooping her up in my arms, her legs wrap around my waist as I carry her upstairs to our bedroom. I’m going to need time with her. Hours and hours, and days and days, and months and months, and years and years.

  Forever. That’s what I need.

  I set Katie down on the bed gently. Despite how rough I want to be with her, I’m holding myself back. I can be rough with her later, but the first
time we’re together again, I want it to be everything she wants it to be.

  “Ryan. I need you. Now.” She reaches for me, grabbing my shirt and pulling me on top of her.

  Well, on second thought. Fuck gentle.

  I ravage her. Taking her mouth hard, I rip my shirt off her small curvy body, only to find that I was right about nothing being underneath, other than her panties. A guttural groan comes from my chest and I can’t get enough. Can’t touch her enough, taste her enough, kiss her enough. I need more.

  “More,” she moans, reading my thoughts exactly as she arches her back, her lips parted. So fucking hot. “Oh god, Ryan. More.”

  And that’s exactly what I give her.

  Because she’s more.

  She’s so much more than anything I’ve ever experienced. Nothing will ever feel as good as being inside Katie. All of my fantasies and memories and thoughts about being with her have not done the real thing justice. She’s incredible. We come together, her nails raking down my back, only adding to the pleasure of it.

  Katie is wrapped up in my arms, her back to my chest, my nose buried in her hair. It’s hard to believe that this is real. That’s she’s back and in my arms without any plans to leave.

  “I’ve missed you so much, Katie.” I feel like a broken record saying that, but I can’t seem to stop.

  She nuzzles against me. “Me too, baby. Me too.” We lie like this for a few more moments, our breathing evening out again when she says, “Ryan? I’m really hungry.”

  I laugh. She’s always hungry.

  It’s one of my favorite things about her. “Then let me feed you.” We get dressed again—she’s only wearing my shirt, which I love—and I reheat the now cold Thai takeout. “Thai food?” she smiles as she crunches on a spring roll. “I should have known.”

  I pause, food suspended in mid-air. We’re sitting on the floor eating in front of the fireplace with our backs against the coffee table. “Is that a problem? Because if it is, I may have to rethink this whole loving-you-forever thing.”

  She laughs, slapping my arm playfully. “I have no problems with Thai, but I can’t live on takeout, Mr. Grant.”

  I frown at her. “Then how will we eat?”

  She blinks at me. “Cook?” Her eyebrows raise up like she doesn’t understand how I didn’t automatically draw that conclusion.

  “I don’t cook.” I’m not being an ass or anything. I really do suck at it, and beyond that, I have zero interest in learning when there is someone who will do it for me, like a restaurant.

  “Well, I do and since I enjoy it and am rather good at it, I guess it’s going to fall on me to sustain us.”

  “You cook?” I can’t handle this. “And not only do you like doing it, but you’re good at it?”

  She laughs at my expression. “Yes.”

  “How did I not know this?” I ask more to myself than to her. “If it’s possible, Katie, I may love you more now than I did moments ago.”

  “Pathetic,” she shakes her head, feigning dismay. “I was a wife and a mother, cooking sort of came with that.”

  I cannot believe how casually she just said that. The flash of pain still flies through her eyes—I suspect it will always be there—but she’s not letting it control her anymore. It’s not running her life, she is, and she’s kicking ass at it.

  I’m feeling brave, or stupid, or both. “Do you want that again?” She knows I’m not asking about the cooking.

  She just stares at me for a long beat, my heart rate increasing with each second that ticks by. I’m suddenly wondering if I’ve pushed her too far. But I have to know. Finally, she nods once, but no words come with it. I don’t know if I had asked her that question months ago if she would have given me the same answer.

  “Do you?” Her voice is so soft it takes me a moment to realize what she asked.

  I look over at her, her sweet face shining up at me, so vulnerable and beautiful. “Yes, Katie. With you I want everything,” I tell her, leaving no doubt as to what I’m saying, because as much as I need to know, so does she. “But first I want you to move in with me.” There, I said it.

  “But you don’t know me that well.”

  She’s kidding me, right? “Katie, I lived with you in a car for almost a month. I’d say I know you pretty well, and we can learn the small stuff as we go.”

  She smiles softly, her shy smile. “Are you sure that’s what you want? I mean, it’s been so long since we’ve been together. Longer than we were together.”

  I put down the container of noodles and reach for her, bringing her down to the floor and hovering my long body over her short one. I love how she feels beneath me. I love how perfectly she molds to me, how she feels like she was made to be in my arms.

  “I don’t care about any of that, Katie. I want what we had in that car. I want the excitement and the laughing, the teasing and the fun, the lust and the love.” Her heart is hammering against my chest. “I want our adventure.”

  Her smile is dazzling. “Okay, Ryan. I’m in.”

  Epilogue

  Two and a half years later

  “Can’t you drive any faster?” Katie yells at me as I try to get us around midday traffic in Seattle. The fact that it’s also the last day of Bumbershoot today—which is where we were when this happened—is only making it worse. I’m freaking the fuck out. My heart is racing a mile a goddamn minute and I’m sweating like a fat man running up a mountain.

  “I’m trying, sweetheart.” Fuck, I can’t even sound calm. “I’m going as fast as I can.”

  “Ryan, love, I’m not delivering your children in my Prius.”

  I look over at her, feeling my eyes turning as wide as saucers.

  She’s beet red, her brow slick with sweat, and her eyes are…in control. “How close are you?”

  “My contractions are three minutes apart and I’m having twins. None of this is good. I should be in the hospital by now.” She’s talking so fast I can hardly keep up. “My fluid was clear, so that’s good. But these babies weren’t supposed to be delivered for three weeks, and even that was early, so you need to get me there now.”

  “Just breathe, sweetheart. Breathe.” Isn’t that what you’re supposed to say when your wife is in labor? That’s what they always say in the movies, but she’s shooting me a look that says she’s about to pummel me. Out of freaking nowhere she folds into herself, grabbing her round, tensing belly and yelling so loudly that the windows shake.

  “Fuck,” I hiss out.

  “Ahhhh. Ryan, drive this car to the goddamn hospital!”

  “I am!” I shout back over her screaming, but I realize I slowed during her last onslaught of pain.

  Shit. Crap. Shit.

  The navigation pops on telling me to take a left, and I do that at the speed of light. The Prius can really corner; I’ll give it that.

  “You doing okay? Hanging in there?” God, everything I’m saying feels wrong.

  “They’re early, Ryan. Early even by twin standards.” Shit. She’s crying. “What am I going to do if they’re not okay?”

  I reach out and grab her hand to squeeze, but I quickly have to put it back on the wheel since I’m weaving like a bastard around cars.

  “It’s going to be fine. Our babies are going to be perfect, just like their mother, you’ll see.” She’s right though, she’s only thirty-four weeks. “The last ultrasound looked good, baby. Remember that.”

  “Ryan, if something happens to me, you’ll protect our babies with your life, right?”

  “What the fuck?” Yeah, I said that out loud, but seriously?

  “Promise me,” she snaps back with a force I didn’t know she possessed. “I need you to promise me. Not only am I a nurse who’s seen the worst of the worst, but I’ve lived it too.”

  She’s thinking about Maggie and Eric.

  Of course she is.

  I soften my outrage. “I promise, Katie. I will always protect my family
. You included.”

  She doesn’t say anything, but her eyes close and she begins to hum as her hands run rhythmically over her large belly.

  We got engaged about a year after Katie moved in with me, and we married a few months later in a small ceremony. Nothing fancy.

  Katie said she didn’t want to do that again, and I didn’t care either way. I only cared about making her mine forever, so I went along with whatever she needed to get through it.

  That included taking off her precious pendant.

  It was her therapist’s idea and I supported her no matter what she chose.

  Small fact that I did not know: that pendant contained some of both Maggie’s and Eric’s ashes, which is why she clung to it. Even though that did creep me out a little—sorry, I’m only human—I understood her desire to have it. The pendant didn’t go far though; it sits in a fireproof case in her nightstand.

  We also flew to Boston—with me heavily sedated—after the engagement, so she could tell Eric in person and talk with him about it.

  It was emotional as hell, and even I got in on the action by asking his permission to take his wife as my own. I half expected him to reach out from beyond the grave and grip my balls in a vice, but he didn’t.

  He was very understanding.

  At least that’s what Katie said when I told her my concerns.

  So I married her and we ended up buying the house I was renting because it’s an awesome house with a good-sized backyard and has three bedrooms, which we’re going to need very, very soon.

  My software hit the market and my company has grown exponentially. I put Luke in charge of its release, including dealing with the press. When our company makes a public statement, it comes from him. We have some of the biggest corporations in the world as our clients, and I’ve even had to occupy an entire building since we now have over two thousand employees and are still growing with a shit-ton of hardware to house.

  Luke and I also singlehandedly saved Tommy’s company.

  He had been hacked hard and didn’t even notice it.