We spent the next hour taking turns shooting. I didn’t even get out my military grade handgun. We were having too much fun with the revolver. Eden was adorable.
“Dylan, thank you. That was so much fun.”
We were at my truck. I’d just stowed my weapons behind my seat. Eden stood in front of me, her eyes sparkling with happiness.
And I just wasn’t going to be able to resist her. Slowly, deliberately, I placed my hands on her hips and lifted her onto the seat of my truck. Her eyes widened, softened, still twinkling, but now for a different reason.
It gave me hope.
After sliding my hands down her legs, I lifted them to her face. I held her still in front of me as I plundered her face with my eyes. I never wanted to forget this moment.
“I want to kiss you, Ed.” If it was going to happen, it was going to happen because we were both on board. Because it was what we both wanted.
“Why don’t you, then?” It wasn’t sassy. It was breathless.
“You have to tell me it’s okay.” My lips were just a breath away from hers. If I spoke again, the movement would make them touch.
“Kiss me, Dylan.” Her lips touched mine as they moved to give me the permission I sought.
I tried for gentle but achieved savage. Two and a half years had been two and a half years too long to wait to kiss her again. My lips captured hers and refused to let go. Seconds felt like hours and yet it was too fast. Ended too quickly. Forever would not be long enough to kiss her.
It took some effort but finally I dragged my mouth from hers and wrapped her in my arms. Her face wiggled into my neck and I fought to recover my breath.
“Wow,” I breathed.
Eden giggled. “No kidding.”
“We should go.” But I didn’t let her go.
“We should.” She didn’t let me go.
I sighed and loosened my hold. Eden sat away from me.
“Scoot.”
Eden shifted to the passenger’s seat and I pulled myself up. Once settled, I grabbed her hand and pulled. “No way. Come here.”
With a giggle, she moved to the middle seat. I started the truck and immediately reached for her hand to hold it in my lap. She rested her head on my shoulder with a contented sigh and I began to feel as though things might actually work out.
Eden
He scared me. Dylan Coulter terrified me. Like a bulldozer, he rammed against the walls I built around my heart and knocked them down.
“Two cheeseburgers. One large fry. And one large chocolate shake,” he said into the drive thru intercom.
“Just one shake,” I pouted.
Dylan smirked. “We can share.”
I grinned, remembering the last time we shared a shake together. Dylan paid for our food and set it in the seat beside me. I took the shake from his hand and tore half the straw wrapper away before blowing on the end. The remaining wrapper hit his cheek.
“You better clean that up,” he teased.
Ha. His truck was still a mess.
Dylan drove until he got to one of the parks near my house. A small stream ran through it and he drove right to the edge. The night air had become chilly, so we remained in the truck, eating and talking of trivial things. School. My work at the salon. His physical therapy and recovery. His dislike of office work and hope of being able to get out to the construction sites soon.
“I’m sorry you had to give up the Army.” I felt bad for him. It couldn’t be easy to have that long-held dream ripped from him.
Dylan shrugged. “I was angry for a while. I guess I still am, but I don’t want to be bitter about it. It sounds crazy, but a near-death experience will change a person.”
“That doesn’t sound crazy. I’d think it was crazy if you weren’t changed by it.” I didn’t want to think about how close Dylan had been to dying that day.
Dylan’s intense gaze held mine. “Priorities change after something like that. I still think serving my country is honorable and important but so are a lot of other things.”
“Why are we here, Dylan?” I needed to know how strongly I needed to defend my walls.
Dylan glanced away with a sigh. The stream before us held his gaze for a moment before he turned back.
“I like the water.”
“Dylan.”
He lifted the shake from my hand and set it in the cup holder before reaching for me again. “I’ve thought about kissing you hourly since that night in your backyard.” His lips traced the curve of my jaw.
“Do you still hate me, Ed?” He moved from my jaw up my cheek to press a kiss to the delicate skin beneath my eye.
“I despise you,” I whispered breathlessly, feeling more than seeing the curve of his smile since my eyes slid closed the moment his lips touched me.
“That hurts, Eden.” He kissed below my other eye.
“You deserve it.”
He froze, his breath harsh against my cheek. His forehead dropped to rest against mine. “I do deserve it.”
I kept my eyes closed as I tried to reign in the feelings he inspired in me. I wanted to stop talking and just enjoy the kisses he seemed content to shower over me. Just here. Just now.
But then what? I’d made that mistake before.
No. Not a mistake.
A miscalculation.
I couldn’t have realized before kissing him how much it would hurt to know that it really had just been that night. That once he left, he would really leave me. I hadn’t been able to imagine a life truly without Dylan in it. I’ve since learned what I never wanted to, a life without Dylan was a bleak and lonely place. But to go back? To let him in again only to lose him?
I should never have come here tonight. I should never have kissed him. I should never have loved him.
“Ed.” His hands framed my face, tilting it to meet his.
I pried my eyes open, cursing the moisture filling them.
“Oh, Ed. Don’t cry.” He kissed my lids. First one, then the other.
“I can’t do this, Dylan.” Of their own accord, my hands traced the contours of his sculpted chest, betraying me.
“I’m sorry I hurt you.” His kisses became urgent.
My hands raced over his shoulders and down his biceps. Goodness, he was amazing. “You did hurt me.”
“I know. Ed, you have to stop touching me.” Gripping my hands, he set me away from him, mumbling under his breath.
He opened his door and jumped down from the seat, careful to land on his right leg. I watched as he paced back and forth, his fingers gripping his hair. As abruptly as he’d begun, he stopped in the space of his open door, his mournful eyes glued to me.
“Dylan-”
“I thought I was doing the right thing,” he interrupted me. “For crying out loud, you’d just barely gotten your driver’s license.” He turned away and I thought he’d start pacing again, but he didn’t. He wiped his hand over his face, suddenly appearing worn. “You have to understand, Eden, you were barely legal. As if that even mattered. It wasn’t right. I knew I’d be gone. Far away gone. How could I ask that of you? How could I-” With a growl he broke off, stalking to the edge of the stream where he stood, hands clenched at his sides.
I knew what he said was true. And it broke my heart again. I wasn’t much older than I had been then and probably not any wiser, but I could see that Dylan had been trying to protect me. Always protecting me, even from himself. Logically, I understood. Emotionally? Not so much. I hated him for the hurt he caused me. I felt embarrassed of the love I felt for him, that it felt he didn’t return. At least, not the kind of love I was looking for from him.
But hadn’t the last few hours dispelled that thought? Dylan hadn’t looked at me like a protective older brother might. He hadn’t kissed me with the affection of a friend.
Needing to be close to him, I hopped down from the truck and followed him to the stream’s edge. He had to have heard my steps, but he didn’t turn away from the water.
“Our letters, Ed. Man, I
looked forward to every day I got a letter from you. You have no idea how much that meant to me while I was there. It was harder than I thought to be away from home. The training was grueling. It sucked.” He turned to me then. “But I would feel so guilty. We were getting closer. I was doing the thing I’d convinced myself wasn’t right. I was falling more and more in love with you every minute and nothing had changed. You were still sixteen. You were still a thousand miles away and not getting any closer. And you still had to finish high school. High school, Ed!”
He was so agitated. I reached for his hand and just held on. I didn’t know where things were going to go from here. When Dylan pulled me into his arms, his breath sighing into my hair, I realized for that exact moment I didn’t care. Dylan was home. He was alive. And he held me like he never wanted to let go. For now, it was enough.
Chapter 37
Eden
“Prom is tomorrow, Eden.”
“Geez, Allie, news flash. I already knew that.” She was on her bed. I’d just gotten off work and was going to stay the night at her house with plans of spending the evening getting her stuff ready for tomorrow night. Right now, I was polishing her toenails. Something she was only allowing because the stunning heels we’d found to go with her dress had a peep toe.
“Hmm. Just thought I’d remind you since you haven’t done a thing for yourself to get ready for tomorrow.”
“Don’t wiggle your toes,” I admonished as I blew on the wet polish. “We’ve been over this. I’m not going.”
The girl was persistent. “You have to go! You can go with Connor and me. We can pick you up just before dinner.”
“No. Absolutely not. There is no way I’m crashing your date with Connor.” I shook my head. “Ew. No. It’s bad enough on a regular day. Being a third wheel to you two on a romantic dinner is just- no. Not happening.”
“I still can’t believe Dylan didn’t ask you to go,” Allie mused as she sorted through my collection of rhinestone jewelry. Don’t ask why I have it since I haven’t been to a school dance in ages. I just can’t get enough of the stuff.
“Dylan is a grown man. The last thing he wants to do is go Prom.” I wasn’t even sure he’d gone to his own Senior Prom. No- wait. He did. I remember. He went with that girl, what was her name? Bethany Wells. That was it. They’d doubled with Josh and his date. Who come to think of it, I couldn’t picture right now. Anyway, I think I’d hidden on the stairs while Mom took pictures before they left.
“He may not want to go to Prom, but I think he wants you.” Allie wiggled her brows over her eyes as she held a pair of teardrop dangle earrings up to her lobes. “How bout these?”
I scrutinized the choice for a second before digging through the pile. “Try these.” I handed her a pair.
“Oh, yeah. Those are perfect.” She admired them in the mirror we’d propped on her desk. “And you aren’t going to blow me off.”
Holding back the desire to roll my eyes, I replaced the cap to the nail polish. “It doesn’t matter. I haven’t even seen him in days. Now that he’s moved out of his parents’ house, he’s been busy, and I don’t just run into him.”
I wasn’t going to tell her that we texted almost every day and that I thought Dylan was just trying to give me some space. After we left the park last weekend, he told me again that he was sorry about the letter he’d send from basic. The one that had broken my heart and further broken my trust in guys. It had happened to soon after Marshall.
“Well, are you guys a thing now? Are you going out?” Allie had been beyond curious after I told her about my date with Dylan. She was determined it was the beginning of something amazing.
I wished.
Didn’t I?
“I don’t know, Al,” I admitted honestly.
“You do love him, though, don’t you?” She stopped fussing with the jewelry to focus on me.
“I don’t know.” I sighed. “I haven’t ever been able to get over him. No matter what, I still always want him.”
Allie grinned, self-satisfied. “I knew it! Just tell him for heaven’s sake. What’s holding you back?”
“Ugh. Allie, he crushed me! I don’t know if I can survive that again.”
“Who says you have to?”
“Are you kidding? Have you seen him lately? He’s even better looking than he was after he graduated. He acts oblivious but when we were out the other night, more than a couple girls, women, were checking him out.” I blew a breath that made my long bangs flutter. “What chance do I really have with him?”
Allie sat forward and took my hands in hers. “Eden, are you crazy? Not only do you have his attention now, you had it back then.”
I scoffed. She had no idea what she was talking about.
“No. Think about it. He risked a lot to kiss you before he left. He spent all his spare time before he left in your parent’s basement hanging out with you. He wrote you letters! Who does that?”
I shook my head. “He had to write letters. He didn’t have internet access.”
Allie narrowed her eyes at me. “You are being deliberately obtuse about this. If you can’t see that guy is head over heels for you, then there’s no hope for you.” She dropped my hands and crossed her arms over her stomach. “But if you ask me, you’re pushing him away on purpose because you’re scared.”
Maybe I was scared. I had good reason to be.
“You are going to throw away the best man for you because you’re afraid of losing him? Just ask yourself this- Is it going to hurt any less if you lose him later than if you lose him now because you pushed him away?”
I didn’t answer because I couldn’t. It wasn’t that Allie’s question was something new. It was all I’d been thinking about for the last few weeks. And I wasn’t any closer to discovering the answer.
“I don’t know how you talked me into this,” I whined the next night, tugging at the bodice of my sequined mermaid dress.
“Because you are my best friend and you weren’t going to leave me to go to Prom alone.” Allie’s smile was bright as we walked into the large banquet room at the same hotel as the last dance I’d gone to- our junior year Homecoming. I wondered that she didn’t hate this place since it was the exact spot she’d stood and watched Kayla, Connor’s last girlfriend, kiss him right in front of her.
“You are hardly alone,” I pointed out, glaring at Connor on her other side.
“Hey, don’t drag me into this. I’m glad you decided to show up though, Eden. Save me a dance.” Connor winked as he gripped Allie’s elbow and led her to the dancefloor.
I fought the resentment at the sight of their happiness. I was glad for Allie. I truly was. She was my best friend, and nothing could make me happier than the joy Allie had finally found with Connor last year.
Watching them, I longed for Dylan. I had wondered myself if he would ask to take me to Prom. He knew it was tonight, had asked me about it. I’d told him about shopping for dresses with Allie and that I’d planned to help her get ready.
It was during the helping her get ready part of today that Allie, with the help of Judy, had convinced me to come tonight. Once Judy had tamed Allie’s pale hair into a stunning mass of curls adorned with pearls and rhinestones, she’d insisted on doing mine. I had no intention of going to the dance still but loved up-do’s and couldn’t resist the pull of the stylist’s chair.
Once she was finished, I was so in love with the look, it was easy for Allie to talk me into picking up my dress on the way to her house where I was going to do her makeup and help her dress. In fact, I’d done her makeup while wearing the thing. While Allie dressed, I added embellishment to my own face as well as earrings and a necklace from the collection still in a container on Allies desk.
“Oh, you look gorgeous,” Allie had exclaimed wide-eyed.
I had to admit, the dress looked good.
“Allie! Connor’s here,” Mrs. Brown called up the stairs.
My friend’s face split into a happy grin. “Am I okay,” sh
e asked, glancing down at herself.
“You look amazing. Now go get your man.” I pushed her toward the door.
“You’re coming, too. I want Mom to take some pictures of us.” Allie tossed a pair of shoes at me.
Frowning, I glanced down at them. “Where’d you get these?”
“Oh. Remember you tried those on when we got mine? I went back and got them. They were destined for that dress.” Allie grinned mischievously.
I narrowed my gaze on her. “Why would you do that?”
“Just put them on. I really do want to get a few pictures of us in all our Prom glory.” She grabbed the shoes from my hand and set them on the floor. “Come on. I’m anxious to get a look at Connor.” She waggled her brows suggestively.
I couldn’t blame her.
A brief vision of Dylan in a tux flitted across my mind.
Downstairs, Connor whistled as we made our way toward him, but he only had eyes for Allie. As it should be.
“I’ll be the luckiest guy at the ball tonight,” he teased, kissing Allie briefly on the lips before turning to me. “With two beautiful dates.” He held out two boxed corsages.
“What? No.” I shook my head and took a step back, shooting a betrayed look to Allie who just shrugged, a non-repentant grin tugging her lips.
Connor opened one of the boxes after handing the second to Allie’s mom to hold onto for him. With a tender smile, he slipped the gorgeous flowers onto her wrist.
“Thank you.” Allie reached up to kiss his cheek. Connor wasn’t going to let her get away with that and kissed her lips quickly before turning back to me.
I shook my head as he advanced having retrieved the second box. “I’m not going with you guys, Connor.”
Connor removed the exotic lilies from their tissue paper bed and held it out to me. It was the most beautiful corsage I’d ever seen and looked as though it had been made just for me, and I supposed it had been. I eyed Connor cautiously. He winked and slid the flowers on the wrist I hadn’t even realized I’d extended.
He leaned forward to whisper. “Allie wants you to come, Eden. Please.”
The Perks of Hating You ( Perks Book 2) Page 19
