When I opened the door, I blinked a few times to make sure I wasn’t hallucinating. Anything was possible given my lack of sleep lately.
Frankie was standing there with a gigantic suitcase.
She seemed shocked to see me looking like this. “What on Earth, Mack…”
Blinking repeatedly, I said, “Frankie?”
I still couldn’t believe she was here.
Abandoning her luggage, she leapt into my arms. Until I was actually holding her, I hadn’t realized just how badly I’d needed her. With the distance between us, I’d somehow been able to convince myself that I could live without her. But now, it felt like I was breathing again for the first time in weeks.
What she said to me next truly threw me for a loop.
“I know, Mack.”
“What?”
“I know about the discovery your sister made. Your mother and Michaela came to see me in Boston. They were worried about you and told me everything. We don’t have to talk about it right now. But I just wanted to let you know that I know and that you don’t need to rehash it. You don’t owe me any explanations. I’m just here to do what I can to make it better, because I love you so much.”
I just broke apart in her arms, crying like a baby for the first time since Jonah was born. How I ever thought I could get through this without her was beyond me. God had sent me exactly what I needed: her.
Once I’d calmed down, I wiped my eyes and asked, “How long can you stay?”
“How long do you want me?”
“Forever,” I said without hesitation. “I don’t want you forever. I need you forever.”
“Then, I’m here.”
“What about your job?”
“I took a leave of absence. I don’t know that I’m ever going back.”
“What about…him?”
“Things truly ended with Victor a long time ago. The only difference now is that I finally left. It was the right thing to do. Even before you and I got physical, my heart was yours. I’d just been afraid to admit it. Victor is a smart man. I think he never really held out true hope for a reconciliation even when things seemed bad between you and me in recent weeks. From the moment he found out about you, he could see how consumed I was. After your mother and sister came to see me, I was a wreck. I told Victor that night that I planned to leave for Virginia as soon as I could get my affairs in order.”
“What about the stuff with your father?”
“What about it? I have to accept it. But I feel very far removed from it all, to be honest. I don’t know him and probably never will. It has nothing to do with us…aside from your father and Torrie’s threats. Anyway, I think I have a plan for how to handle that situation. But I don’t want to get into it now. I don’t want to talk about anything upsetting today. I just want to spend time with you, get you feeling strong again so that we have the energy to deal with all that.”
I kept running my fingers through her long hair. “I can’t believe you’re really here. Last night, after I dropped Jonah off, I felt hopeless. I prayed for the first time that I could ever remember and asked God to help me. He sent me you. I’m pretty sure that was more than I could’ve hoped for.”
Frankie was overcome with emotion. “When we first met, you saw something in me that other people didn’t. You were the first man to come into my life and make me feel special. Life got in the way of our plans. But I want to take it back. Who says we can’t? When you left Boston all those years ago, you were supposed to come back to me. That wasn’t our time, but that doesn’t mean we weren’t still meant to be together. So, this is me coming back to you. Let this be the moment that it was supposed to be all those years ago, the start of a new beginning.”
“You make it sound so simple.”
“Why can’t it be? We’re not going to let fear rule our lives. We’ll figure it all out in good time.”
I gave into the sudden urge to lift her into my arms. “As long as you’re with me, I feel like I can handle anything.”
She wrapped her legs around my waist. “We just need to take it one day at a time. And today…we have only one mission.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s to get you cleaned up and shaved.”
“Are you saying I’m a beast?”
“I’m saying if I had gotten here two days later, I would be sleeping with Chewbacca.”
My laughter roared throughout the apartment as I put her down. “God, it feels good to laugh again.”
“When was the last time?”
I slid my hands slowly down her back. “It was with you.”