Good God, did those Fuller boys know how to get right into the center of a heart and turn it all around. I reached up and pushed some of my hair off of my face and managed a weak smile. “I’m not going off the rails or over the edge. Some days it takes everything I have to hold on, but I do it, Zeb. I hold on for dear life. I lost my friend. I lost my sister. I lost my way and my heart.” I shifted my feet and told him honestly. “Somewhere in all of that loss, I found myself. I’m not going to let that little boy down and no matter what, I’m not going to let myself down anymore.”
I got a terse nod, followed by a hug that swallowed me up. He was such a good man, but instead of envying Sayer for all that she had, his embrace made me long for what I didn’t have. I didn’t want a hug from a good man. I wanted a bad man to hold onto me and promise that he would never let me go. I wanted him to remind me that his bad made my bad look like child’s play and that our good was even more special than most because it had to fight its way to the surface. It did battle to survive inside the wasteland of our tattered souls.
“I’ll text you and make plans for next week. I would love to see what makes it in the ‘About Me’ book when he’s done with it. That kid has more going on inside than I ever did. He makes me feel like I still have a whole lot to learn about life and love.” I wanted to know what made him happy and see what his new life was like through his eyes. He deserved so much more than he’d been given at the beginning and I wanted to make sure all the adults that loved him were coming through for him, myself included.
Zeb snorted and turned back to the open doorway. “Join the club. I had no idea what I was capable of or how much of myself I could give to another person until he came along. It was like I was sleepwalking and the minute you showed up and told me I was a father, I woke up. I wouldn’t have it any other way because I don’t want to miss a minute of his life from here on out. We’ll see you next week, Echo.”
I turned on my heel and made my way back to the SUV with a lump in my throat. I was always emotional after I dropped Hyde off, but I’d been even more so since my return home. Zeb had told me I wasn’t alone, but the truth was I very much was alone while I waited. No one else knew about the man I’d met on the mountain. No one knew my heart was a million miles away and struggling to beat through pain and desperation. No one knew that I felt untethered and adrift, that nothing seemed worthwhile while I waited to see if I mattered as much to him as he mattered to me. I’d given him an impossible task, one that I logically knew he would need time to accomplish, but the longer he took, the more time that passed, the more I had to wonder if he’d decided I wasn’t worth the effort. No one could bide their time or wait for me, so I did it alone and it ate at me. Every day another piece was bitten off and spit out as minutes spiraled into hours that we didn’t get to have together.
Just like Zeb, I didn’t want to miss a minute of the life Ben had been given a second shot at living, but I was missing millions of them and there was nothing I could do about it.
If I hadn’t been lost in my melancholy, I probably would have noticed the very out of place sports car that was parked in front of my apartment building. It was completely impractical for Colorado weather and I didn’t live in the best neighborhood, so it was like a beacon calling for every criminal within a ten-mile radius. If I’d taken note of the car, I would have also noticed the faint hint of coconut and honey that lingered in the hallway as I trudged toward my door. My keys rattled in the lock and my breath left my lungs in a whoosh as the door swung open before I could turn the knob. Hard hands gripped my upper arms and I was pulled into my apartment with enough force that my purse went flying in one direction and my keys in the other.
I opened my mouth to scream but never got a single sound out.
Warm lips latched onto mine as those hands curled around my back and pulled me to a familiar chest that was covered in an obviously expensive button-down shirt and bisected by a super soft silk tie. I knew that heartbeat as well as I knew my own. It was the one I dreamed of at night and the one I listened for every moment that I was awake. His facial hair was much shorter than it had been the last time I saw him, neatly trimmed against his jaw and around his mouth. It was all executive and zero lumberjack, but it still felt amazing as it brushed across my chin and rubbed against my cheeks. I’d missed everything about him but the shallow part of me put his beard at the top of the list.
His hair was shorter and more severely styled than it had been in the woods and he’d traded his work wear for a suit that looked like it cost a year’s worth of rent. The heavy black boots were also gone and polished wingtips winked up at me from the dingy carpet of my apartment. The gaudy ring on his finger was now joined by another one on his opposite hand and the watch I’d been sleeping with, keeping it stashed under my pillow, was now wrapped around his wrist, looking like it had always belonged there. Everything on the outside was new and unknown, but those gleaming gray eyes and the smirk that told me he knew I was taking inventory and liking everything I saw were all the same.