“Heck no.” Aiden reached for her hand, bringing her to her feet. Cait clung to him as he helped Abby up. He put his arms around their waists and said, “A beautiful woman on each arm. I feel like the luckiest guy on Silver Island.”
Cait smirked. “If I get hurt, you’ll be the deadest guy on Silver Island.”
Offering to teach two women to skate had been Aiden’s first mistake.
He had only two hands, and while Abby had fairly good balance, when she got talking, she forgot to pay attention to skating, tripping herself up a multitude of times. Cait, on the other hand, was a walking calamity. When Aiden told her to glide, she did some kind of stomp-dance-trip step, stumbling so many times, he worried she might end up in the emergency room.
“I think I’ve got it!” Abby exclaimed. “Give me space.”
Abby shooed them away, her knees buckling, and she wasn’t even skating yet. She wobbled, her arms flailing. Aiden held on to Cait, dragging her back toward Abby. He reached for Abby just as she thrust her hand out, catching Cait’s shirt, causing them all to lose their balance. Their legs shot up, arms flailing, yelps sounding, as they tumbled to a pile on the pavement.
“Everyone okay?” Aiden asked as Cait and Abby peeled themselves off each other and burst into hysterics.
“My ass hurts,” Cait complained.
“At least it’s hot!” Abby slapped Cait’s ass, giving in to another fit of laughter.
Cait snort-laughed. “If you’re into bruises!”
“Did you guys have a few drinks that I’m not aware of?” Aiden asked. They were a hot mess, but he was having a blast. He pulled out his phone and navigated to the camera as they cracked up and made more jokes.
They made silly faces and bunny ears, which made them laugh even harder. Abby put an arm around each of them and said, “Smile, guys. This one’s going on the Christmas card.”
Forgoing any more bruises, they decided to get some ice cream before heading back to the house. The delicious treat and the memories of their first trip to the ice cream shop, which had led to Abby and Aiden’s first incredible kiss, went a long way to soothe the bruises that were probably forming on Aiden’s ass. Or maybe it was the thought of fulfilling the promise he’d made to Abby of giving her a full-body massage later. He glanced at her in the passenger seat scrolling through the pictures he’d taken on his phone.
“Oh my gosh, look at this one.” She leaned over the back of the seat to show Cait the picture. “You’re laughing so hard.”
“I guarantee I won’t be laughing tomorrow. I’ll be lucky if I can sit down.” Cait shifted in the back seat.
Abby righted herself in her seat, chatting about the other pictures. “I’m sending this one to myself so I can send it to Deirdra.” As she did so, she said, “And these are going to Remi right now. Don’t worry, Aid. I’ll tell her it’s me texting from your phone.”
He had never in his entire life let a woman do anything more than use his phone to make a call, and yet here he was, giving Abby full rein and loving every one of her comments, and her inclusion of his sister.
As he pulled into the driveway, his nerves knotted up. Abby was looking down at the phone when he parked in front of the house.
Cait opened her door and said, “Wow, Abby, I guess your lawn guys came.”
“I don’t have—” Abby looked up, and her jaw dropped. She opened the door and climbed out.
Aiden came around the front of the car in time to see her eyes light up. He’d spent the entire day power washing the house, cleaning up her front yard, rototilling the gardens so they would be ready for planting, and repairing the fencing.
“Look at the gardens. It’s like they’re brand-new, and the fence is fixed. Oh my gosh, the house. It’s white again.” Abby sounded like she might cry.
“Did our mom have a gardener or a handyman?” Cait asked.
“If she did, he sure let the yard go to he—” Abby looked at Aiden, understanding dawning in her eyes. “Did you hire someone to do this?”
“That would have been the smart thing to do, but no. I borrowed Brant’s pressure washer and picked up a few other tools in town.”
“Is this why you didn’t go sailing?” she asked. “This is why you were late to meet us?”
Now she looked like she might cry, and his gut twisted. Had he done the wrong thing? Lord knew he was good at stepping on people’s toes.
“The pressure washer stopped working, and I had to wait for Brant to come over to fix it,” he explained. “I wanted to get it done today because tomorrow is Mother’s Day, and I thought you and Cait might want to work in the garden together.”
Abby covered her mouth, tears brimming. “Oh, Aiden,” she said as her tears broke free. She threw her arms around his neck and kissed him. “Thank you. You can’t imagine how much this means to me.”
“And to me,” Cait said softly. “Thank you, but you’re not getting a kiss.”
He pressed his lips to Abby’s. “You’re both welcome, and these are the only lips I need.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
SUNDAY AFTERNOON, ABBY was wrist deep in dirt, with the sun shining on her face, and loving every second of it. She still couldn’t believe Aiden had done so much to make her house and yard beautiful again. He was kneeling in the dirt a few feet away, chatting with Cait as they planted vegetables. After they devoured the surprise Mother’s Day brunch she’d made, the three of them had gone to the nursery and picked out vegetable plants. They’d also chosen others to plant later in the season. Abby hadn’t enjoyed Mother’s Day this much since her father was alive. Deirdra had always had an excuse not to visit on Mother’s Day, but Abby had made it a point to come home for the weekend. The holiday hadn’t been easy for her mother. She’d missed Deirdra, and their father, which had led to more drinking. Aiden’s thoughtfulness took what could have been a sad day and turned it into a day of coming together.
He looked over and winked, handsome and rugged in his Silver Island hat and shorts. She was wearing the baseball cap he’d given her the second day he’d helped at the restaurant. “I thought I felt your eyes on me. Do you need something, babe?”
Yes, your lips on mine, please.
She shook her head and said, “Just enjoying the view.”
Last night, when he’d thought she was asleep, he’d whispered about how he didn’t want to leave her and how that freaked him out a little. She’d been tempted to let him know she was awake and tell him that she was thrown by the power of their relationship, too. But she’d lain still. She may have hoped she wouldn’t form expectations, but they were blossoming anyway, and hearing his private thoughts had helped tamp down the anxiousness those feelings caused.
But he deserved to have his worries eased, too, so she said, “Actually, I was thinking about how much I’ll miss you when you’re gone. Other than my father, I don’t think I’ve ever missed a man.”
“I’ll miss you, too,” he said, emotions taking root between them like the vegetables they were planting. “We won’t go long between calls.”
Cait looked up from where she was working, her eyes hidden behind her sunglasses as she said, “If we’re confessing, can I get in on it? I missed you guys when I was gone, and I never miss anyone. It was weird. Tank realized something was wrong and thought I had found a boyfriend and wanted to come check him out.”
“We thought about you when you were gone, too,” Abby said. “Aiden and I were talking the other day about how it felt weird when you were gone. I had joked about how maybe the stars were starting to align for the first time in our lives, and you were helping it happen.”
“I like that thought,” Cait said.
“I do, too. I guess this means I haven’t totally failed in the new-sister department.”
“You’ve got to be kidding. You and Deirdra are awesome,” Cait reassured her. “I think Deirdra might have started texting me because she wanted to be sure you were okay and Aiden wasn’t a jerk, but we’ve become friends. She’s
always so busy. I have no idea how she can live like that. I mean, we all work a lot, but we have downtime, too, and I have a bruised butt to prove it. But even at night she’s working when she texts.”
“Sounds like my normal life,” Aiden said.
“We’re all workaholics,” Abby said. “But there’s this new guy in my life who keeps giving me a reason to slow down and smell the roses.” She never would have taken an entire day just to enjoy being back on the island if not for him. And she was so glad she’d done it.
He blew her a kiss. “I can say the same for you.”
Aiden’s phone rang. He wiped his hands on his shorts and pulled it from his back pocket, glancing at the screen. “It’s Remi. I guess Mason gave her the Mother’s Day gift I sent.” He pushed to his feet, walking out of the fenced area as he answered the FaceTime call.
Remi’s voice exploded from the phone. “Aiden! Thank you! I love my gift so much!”
Aiden had shown Abby a picture of the gift he’d had made for Remi’s first Mother’s Day as a foster parent. It was a framed collage of family photographs from Remi’s childhood, with a picture of Remi, Mason, and the girls in the center. The mat around the collage was made of paper ornaments Remi and her mother had made from the pages of their father’s favorite books. Aiden had gone on to describe how much Remi loved making them, and he’d said that when they’d moved from West Virginia, she’d taken their father’s books and their mother’s crafting supplies. To this day, she continued making ornaments and had even taught the girls to do it.
It was such a thoughtful gift, Abby had fallen harder for the man who was nothing like the regular guy he claimed to be.
She didn’t want to eavesdrop, but their voices were hard to miss. She heard Aiden talking to Patrice and Olive, the love in his voice inescapable.
“Abs, Cait,” Aiden hollered. “Come say hello to my family.”
Cait looked like she was going to beg out of it, so Abby dragged her to her feet.
Cait gave her an imploring look. “I don’t want to impose. You’re his girlfriend. You should go.”
“You’re my family, and he’s my guy. Do it for me?”
“Fine,” Cait said begrudgingly, though her smile told Abby she didn’t really mind.
Aiden introduced Cait to Remi and the girls, and he introduced Olive, a pretty blonde with a sweet face and wavy hair that hung just past her shoulders, to both of them. Since Abby had already told Cait about Remi being the Remi Divine, she kept her fangirling to a minimum. But it was cute to see her gushing. While Patrice chatted about the breakfast they’d made for Remi, Olive kept looking at Abby and Aiden.
“Can you believe I ate four pancakes?” Patrice exclaimed.
“I believe you,” Remi said, kissing Patrice’s head. “You’re my little pancake gobbler.”
Patrice beamed at her. “And I’m Uncle Aiden’s Patty Cake. Are Abby and Cait your girlfriends, Uncle Aiden?”
“He doesn’t have two girlfriends at the same time,” Olive said sharply.
Aiden chuckled and said, “Abby is my girlfriend, and Cait is her sister.”
“Olive is my foster sister,” Patrice chimed in. “I’ve had lots of foster sisters, but I love Olive, and I hope she’ll be my forever sister.”
“Me too, squirt,” Olive said. She and Patrice did some sort of secret handshake, which made Patrice giggle. The girls turned to Remi, and she did the handshake with them, too, followed by a group hug.
“Hey, I want in on that secret handshake and hug,” Aiden said, and the girls lectured him about not being a sister or a mom.
Cait nudged Abby and whispered, “He really loves them, doesn’t he?”
“He does,” she said as the girls giggled.
“They’re lucky,” Cait whispered. “All of them.”
Abby stepped closer to her and said, “I think we’re pretty lucky, too. All of us.”
After chatting with the girls and Remi, and finally meeting Mason, they said goodbye and went back to gardening. They worked until they’d planted everything they’d bought, and when Cait went into town to run an errand, Abby and Aiden decided to check something off his Let Loose list and sacked out in the hammock. The feel of Aiden’s arms around her, the sure and steady beat of his heart against her cheek, and the warmth of the sun lulled Abby to sleep.
When Cait got home, they headed inside and went through their mother’s bedroom. They boxed up her parents’ belongings, most of which would go to Goodwill, and Aiden carried them out to the garage as quickly as they could fill them up. They each chose a few items from their mother’s jewelry box as keepsakes. Abby kept the ring her father used to wear and her mother’s necklace she’d worn the first night Aiden had come over for dinner. Even though Deirdra had been adamant about not wanting anything, Abby saved the necklace Deirdra had made for their mother when Deirdra was nine. It was strange picking through her parents’ things, but it was also cathartic, getting rid of the clutter of bad memories and holding on to the good ones.
After they were done, Cait said, “Do you think you’ll move into this room?”
“No. It would feel weird,” Abby said.
“Even if you paint it and replace the furniture with your things from New York? Make it your own?” Cait asked.
“I don’t know. It was still my parents’ bedroom, you know? I’ll do all those things—paint, get rid of their furniture, and move my things in. But I don’t think I want to sleep there.”
“Maybe you can make it into an office,” Cait suggested. “Or a nursery one day?”
Abby had never imagined having a family of her own. Maybe that was because she’d never been with anyone like Aiden, who not only supported her professional dreams but also made a point of suggesting she set up a schedule that would allow time for her to enjoy being back on the island and living her life. Her thoughts drifted to a different type of future, one with Aiden and a family of their own. She knew she was getting way ahead of herself, but if Abby believed in one thing, it was the power of dreaming. Even if she didn’t expect something to happen, she could still wish for it.
“Maybe one day,” she said.
“Have you read Mom’s letter yet?” Cait asked.
“No. I feel like I’ll know when the time is right. I’m waiting for a sign, which is silly, but whatever.”
“It’s not silly. I haven’t read mine yet. Deirdra hasn’t either, but I have a feeling she might never read it.”
“That would be a shame. Mom obviously had things to say to us.”
Cait sighed. “I agree. I’m going to make a quick call. I’ll meet you downstairs to take on the junk room?”
“Sounds good. I’ll be right down.”
Abby stood on the hardwood floor looking at her mother’s bed, remembering too many painful nights when she and Deirdra had struggled to get their inebriated mother upstairs and had wrestled to get pajamas on the woman who should have been taking care of them. Nights of Deirdra sitting in the yard planning her escape while Abby cried herself to sleep. A lump lodged in Abby’s throat as happier memories trickled in—bounding into the bedroom and launching herself onto the bed when her parents were sleeping, greeted with tickles, laughter, and I love yous. On the heels of that memory came the one of crawling into her mother’s bed the night her father died. She hadn’t thought about that night in so long, she’d almost forgotten the way her mother had clung to her, crying so hard it had scared Abby. Deirdra had heard them sobbing and had climbed into bed with them. For the life of her, Abby couldn’t remember how soon after that her mother had started drinking. The days were too muddled with grief. Maybe she’d never even known when it had started.
“You okay, Abs?” Aiden asked as he came down the hall.
Abby blinked away tears and said, “Yeah. It’s weird to miss so much of who my mom once was and to hurt so badly for the parts of her that I don’t miss. I’m glad she’s in a better place. I hope she’s happier.”
He put his arm around her a
nd ran his hand down her back. “I can only imagine.” Pressing a kiss to the top of her head, he asked, “Do you want to talk about it?”
She shook her head. “I’m okay. I’ve been so busy, I haven’t slowed down enough to really think about it.”
“Maybe you should take a few days off and let yourself think about all of those things. The good, the bad, the happy, the sad. Or even better, do it when I get back, so you have me to lean on.”
“Thank you for not brushing my feelings under the carpet, but I think I’m okay.” She leaned her chin on his chest and said, “Cait asked if I wanted to move into this room, and I guess that sparked a few memories.”
“Do you want to?”
“Move into the room? No, but when I ship my things from New York, I’ll clear all of the old furniture out and freshen the house up, really make it mine.”
“That sounds like a great idea.”
“Speaking of good ideas, it sounded like Remi loved her gift. Has anyone ever told you how incredibly kind and considerate you are?”
“Maybe this stunning brunette who’s knocked me off my feet a time or two.” He gave her a kiss and swatted her butt. “Better get a move on before I drag you into your bedroom and make you mine again.”
“You say that like it’s some sort of threat, when actually, it’s a pretty enticing idea,” she said as he picked up a box and they headed for the stairs.
His eyes darkened. “It wasn’t a threat, just fair warning.”
Cait walked past the stairway carrying a box and stopped, giving them both a chiding stare. “I know that look, you two.”
Abby tried to stifle her smile, feeling like the cat that ate the canary.
“I’m only taking this box to the garage. I’ll be back inside in one minute,” Cait warned. “Try to keep your clothes on until we’re done.”
She headed for the front door, and Aiden cocked a brow. “I think she’s getting the hang of this big-sister stuff.”
Maybe We Will (Silver Harbor) Page 27