by Molly McLain
He gave a small smile and reached out, trailing his finger along her arm. “I don’t want to do this alone anymore.”
“I know, baby.”
His throat worked as he swallowed. “No, I mean, I don’t want to do any of it alone. I didn’t realize how one-dimensional my life had been until you came into it. And then again when you were gone.”
A rush of warmth whirled in her stomach, because that feeling? She knew it all too well. “I know exactly what you mean.”
“You’re my person, too, babe,” he whispered and she put a finger to his lips because she wasn’t sure she could hear this and keep it together before his parents came in. But he kissed her fingertip and lifted her hand away. “I go to bed at night thinking about you and all the things I want us to do together. I wake up in the morning hating that you’re not by my side and then hating myself even more for pushing you away.
“I don’t know how to say this with fancy words, sugar. I’m a lineman and a Marine, not a poet or a songwriter. But you mean something to me that no one else ever has. I feel fucking whole when I’m with you. Like you’re a part of me I didn’t know I was missing until suddenly there you were, fitting so perfectly into place.” He flatted her hand out over his heart. “I could go on doing this without you because I don’t want you to see all of my weaknesses, but the truth is...I like the man I am with you a hell of a lot better than the asshole I am when I’m not.”
Not poetic? Silly boy. She tipped her head to the side and laughed softly, emotion building in her chest. “I like you better when you’re with me, too.”
“Yeah? Well, I happen to love you, so...”
Oh, my God. She sucked in a shaky breath and closed her eyes. She’d imagined him saying those sweet words lots of times and in lots of different ways, but nothing compared to reality. The honesty in his eyes. The clarity in his voice... “You do?”
“Yep. Pretty sure I have for a while now. That’s why I did what I did.”
Ah, hell. “In that case, you’re forgiven.”
He laughed and lifted her hand to his mouth, kissing her knuckles. “Glad to hear it, sugar. Gonna keep trying to make it up to you, though.”
“You won’t have to try too hard. Turns out I’m head over heels in love with you, too.”
He cocked the eyebrow that wasn’t split. “It’s because I’m hung, right?”
Snorting, she dropped her forehead to his shoulder.
“The tats?”
She shook with silent laughter. “Try again, Superman.”
“Maybe you should help me—”
The door opened and his parents walked in. Of course, Lena started to cry immediately and Brody hung his head, blowing out a shameful breath. Jenny shifted away to give him space, but he held onto her hand, keeping her close.
“Stay,” he said simply and she was transported back to that first night when she’d asked him to do the same.
She’d stay with him forever if he asked her to, so the answer was easy. “Always.”
***
Coming clean to his folks proved to be exactly as difficult as he thought it would be. His mom sobbed through the entire confession and seeing tears well up in his old man’s eyes, too? Definitely didn’t make Brody feel like the Marine they were once so proud of.
But Jenny...goddamn. He couldn’t have done any of it without her.
“You’re very lucky to have both of them,” she said later in the evening, after they’d shared the carryout Chinese his parents had brought for dinner. Their company had been great, but their doting not so much. And, to be honest, he’d just wanted time alone with his girl.
“I am. ‘Course I didn’t take the time to appreciate that until I got older.” He watched her unfasten her hair, slowly letting the long, shiny mass fall down around her shoulders. “I’m glad they’re gone though. I’m friggin’ beat.”
“Thank you for letting me nap earlier.” She tousled her fingers through the soft waves, blissfully unaware of how damn sexy she was taking on such an innocent task. “I would’ve never made it through the day.”
“Mmm.” He nodded and kept his eyes trained on her. How was it that everything this woman did captivated him so? Gave him crazy ideas about the lengths he’d go to keep her close just so she could mesmerize him a little more.
“So, I bought some things while I was out earlier. I’m not sure if you’re up for it now...” She dropped the bobby pins into her purse and pulled out a brand new electric hair clipper. “But I thought maybe you’d want to clean up the top before we go home tomorrow.”
Home with Jenny. Yes, please. “Never gonna turn away your hands on me, sugar.”
She gave him a sassy smirk and tossed her phone onto the bed. “I need music when I’m doing hair. Find something while I get this ready?”
“Yea, ma’am.”
She busied herself getting towels and opening packaging and he snatched up the phone, staring for a long moment when he saw himself as her background picture. He was crashed out in her bed, one arm folded behind his head. There were some real sexy pillow lines on his face, too.
“You make a habit outta taking pictures of me when I’m sleeping?”
A pretty pink blush colored her cheeks as she unwound the cord of the clipper. “You looked so peaceful. I couldn’t resist.”
Fair enough. He might’ve taken some of her, too. “Did you just put this on here or...”
“No.” She shook her head, her blush deepening. “It’s been on there since I took it.”
“Even when I was an ass.”
“Didn’t stop me from caring about you.”
He scrubbed a hand around the back of his neck. “Can I ask you something?”
“Of course.”
He hesitated. Did he even have a right to know? “That night at Josh’s, you said you weren’t sure about how you’d felt about Reed. I’m curious if you ever figured that out.”
She set down the clipper and took her time unfolding a towel. “Actually, I did.”
“And?”
“You hoping I’ll stroke your ego, Superman?”
“Not at all.” But if what she had to say worked in that way, too, all the better.
“What I feel for you is a million times more potent than anything I’ve ever felt for someone else.” She turned to him, a soft, knowing expression on her face. “You fall asleep and wake up thinking about me? I dream about you. About you in my future. What our life might be like together. Our first Christmas. Our first anniversary. You asking me to be yours forever.”
She lifted a shoulder and gave an unsure smile, like maybe the last bit was too far-fetched to ever be reality. Well, he had one thought on the matter—she expected him to wait that long?
“I know that might be a lot for you to handle right now, but I need us to be real about where we’re going. I’ve never wanted anything as much as I want you in my life and, believe me, I’ve wanted an awful lot.”
“Took the words right out of my mouth.”
She shot him another knowing grin. “But the fact of the matter is...we live on opposite sides of the state.”
“We’ll make it work.”
“I hope so.” She gestured for him to swing his legs over the side of the bed so she could drape the towel around his neck and lay others out around him. “You got my music ready?”
He thumbed play on the YouTube playlist. Rock, of course, and though it couldn’t lead to anything, he chose the angsty kind that usually made him want to get naked.
“Nice.” Her eyes widened when Seether’s The Gift started to play. “I love this song.”
“Me, too. Makes me think of you.” He put his hands on her hips when she shifted between his knees, clippers in hand.
“Really?” When she feathered her fingers through his hair, he shivered. Fucking hell, he loved her hands on him. “You okay?”
“Mmm-hmm. Just ready for you to work your magic on me, baby.”
A sweet smile curved her pretty lips, a
s she flipped on the clippers. With gentle, confident hands, she began sliding it back through his hair. She worked her way around his stitches, carefully turning his head this way and that. Every caress of her fingers, stroking him here and brushing away hair there, felt like fucking heaven. In no time, he was hard as a rock.
She noticed. “Do you get turned on every time someone cuts your hair, handsome?”
He didn’t answer. Instead, he lifted his hands and covered her breasts, loving how quickly her nipples peaked beneath his thumbs.
“You’re gonna make it hard for me to work if you keep doing that,” she whispered, so he kneaded them again. And again and again, until she stopped cutting and gripped his shoulders with trembling hands. “God, Brody.”
“I can’t get enough of you,” he murmured, tugging the tie of her wispy top loose and baring the pretty skin plumping out of her bra. Another jerk and one nipple popped free, dark and beaded and beckoning his mouth.
“We can’t do this here.” Jenny dropped the clippers onto the bed and rolled forward at the same time he leaned in and sucked her puckered flesh between his lips. “You’re hurt,” she panted, even as her hands drifted up his stomach, bunching the hospital gown so she could get to his skin. Her palm grazed his cock through his underwear and a tremor rocked his body.
“I love this,” he rasped, his hips lifting greedily toward her touch. “You touching me. Taking care of me.”
She cast a glance at the door while she freed his shaft and began to stroke. Soft and slow, then hard and tight, driving him fucking wild every time her thumb circled around the crown and his piercing.
He licked at her nipple again, thrusting into her hand with abandon as the pressure at the base of his spine built like a raging inferno. Desperate for more, he yanked her mouth down to his and let the sweetness on her tongue stoke the fire until it was white hot. He came hard, jetting over her hand and against his stomach while she kept at him, wringing out every last drop and shudder he had.
“Jesus Christ, I love you,” he murmured, burying his face in her chest and absorbing her addictive essence, breath after ragged breath.
She laughed and kissed the now-short hair on the top of his head. “I love you, too.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
“The man sitting across from me right now is not the same man who sat in that very seat four months ago.” Dr. Sherman set his notes to the side and smiled. “Minus the scuffed up face, I’m happy with the progress you’re making, Corporal.”
Brody nodded. “I’ve slept a solid seven hours three times this past week.” Not because of the pain pills either, because he hadn’t taken those beyond the first day.
“That’s great. Is Jenny still helping to put your mind at ease?”
He nodded. “Yeah. She’s been my biggest supporter. I couldn’t have done this without her. I almost screwed that up, though.”
“How so?”
“I cut her loose. Told her I needed some space, because I didn’t want to bring her down with me when I hit bottom. Turned out I crashed a lot faster without her. It sucked.”
“So things are better now?”
Another nod. “Yeah. I mean, I have some decisions to make, but already the load seems lighter. I’m not sure what happened, but I’m not complaining.”
“Building trusting, supportive relationships can often be the best solution for trauma survivors, but you have to be sure you’re not using that support as a crutch. Or like a Band-Aid, for the lack of a better term. Maybe you’ve accomplished that.”
“That was some of my worry, yes.” He had to be sure that if things didn’t work out with him and Jenny, he wouldn’t end up back at square one, floundering like a guppy. “Now that I’ve gotten to this point, how do I sustain it? I know Jenn’s got my back, but I don’t want to depend on her, either.” Even though she’d let him in a heartbeat.
“When you’re practicing your meditation, try to focus on your family and other accomplishments you’ve had. Your work—”
“I hate my job,” he interjected, and the doc arched an eyebrow. “I can’t stand the travel. I have family I don’t see nearly enough because I’m either on the road or too damn tired from being on the road.”
“Is this a new development?” The doctor eyed him in that microscopic way that usually made Brody squirm. Not this time.
“No, but I’m not gonna lie—it’s definitely on my mind more now that Jenny’s in the picture.”
“Family is important to you, then.”
“Damn important. This past year has made that very clear.”
“How so?”
Yeah, that’s where it got tricky. He shifted in his seat, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees. “I think we’ve already talked about that in a round-about way.”
Dr. Sherman smiled. “I like that you’re making these connections without me having to point them out to you. That awareness is key.”
He nodded again. “I hate that Ernie and Troy will never have the opportunities that I have. I can’t shake that guilt, and I’m not sure I ever will. Hell, Ernie would have been a better father than I could ever dream to be.” He scrubbed his hands over his face, not letting the mental image of his buddy tossing a ball with a couple kids linger too long. “But that’s what I want. To be a dad. A husband.”
The older man’s smile stretched even wider. “You see a future for yourself. You’re not stuck in the past anymore.”
He wasn’t, was he? Was that because of Jenny and the prospect of making something real with her, or was it his individual desire for something more?
“That’s a phenomenal breakthrough, Brody. It may take some time to fully wrap your head around it, and that’s okay.”
He sucked in a deep breath and tried to organize the thought that had been kicking around in his head for the past several days. “I’ve never been one of those people who’s into that hocus pocus fate bullshit. But I can’t help thinking that meeting up with Jenn like we did was some weird universal twist or something. Like she was put in front of me for a reason.”
“Go on.”
“I don’t know what else there is to say. It’s just...we were both in such shitty places in our lives. I was determined not to involve myself with any more complications, but I couldn’t resist the pull to her either. I wanted to, but something wouldn’t let me walk away.”
“What do you think that something was?”
“Ernie. Which sounds totally fucking crazy, I know. But the thing is...she’s exactly the kind of woman he’d go after. Smart, stable, beautiful inside and out...” He scratched a hand around his neck. “She’s everything he wanted and everything I needed, but didn’t know I needed. Hell, if I hadn’t been thinking about him, I would’ve completely missed the deeper connection with her. I would’ve acted on instinct and I would’ve slept with her and fucked it all up. But I didn’t. I stopped and thought about what Ernie would have done.”
The doctor nodded. “Is that what you’re doing now?”
“No. Those first few moments aside, it’s been all me. I’m too damn selfish to let another dude get between me and my girl. I mean, I love Ernie like a brother, but I love her more. Not to mention, the fucker would probably haunt me ten times worse if I let her get away.”
Dr. Sherman threw his head back and let out a roar. “That’s one way of looking at it.”
“I’ve got a second chance here, Doc. A lot of guys don’t get this opportunity. Took me a while to accept that it was mine for the taking, but I finally see it for what it is. My life. My future.”
“Your fate?”
Brody shook his head and grinned. “My choice.”
***
“Ohhh, how about these, sweetie?”
Jenny looked up from the tray of orange geraniums she’d just set in the cart to see her mother fawning over some kind of delicate purple flower. It was gorgeous, but it didn’t look like it’d stand a chance in a single Nebraskan rainstorm, let alone a whole season.
> “What is it?” She strode over and fingered the tiny petals. “It smells incredible.”
“I’m not sure. There’s no tag.” Helen lifted a potted square and checked the bottom. “Hmm. Nothing. Take out your phone. Google it.”
Jenny laughed. “I think it’s time we get you a phone of your own.”
“I do like the Facebook.”
Oh, for God’s sake. Maybe a cell wasn’t such a great idea. She glanced around the greenhouse. “I’ll find an attendant. We’ll ask.”
“Ask what? Maybe I can help.”
Jenny’s heart jumped. That sweet voice... She turned and came face to face with Brody’s Grandma Caroline. She looked fabulous in a pretty floral dress, with her silver hair done up in soft curls. “Mrs. Brekowski. Hello.”
“Hello yourself, dear. You’re looking as beautiful as ever.” She extended a hand and Jenny took it without hesitation. Then she wrapped her arms around the petite woman’s shoulders and hugged her tight. “The flower is purple aubrieta, by the way. Very hearty. If you don’t watch it, it’ll take over your entire flower garden.”
“In that case, I’ll take it. I’m not much of a green thumb.” Jenny smiled and stepped back, waving a hand between the two women. “Mom, this is Caroline Brekowski, Brody’s grandma. Caroline, my mother Helen Riley.”
The two women shook hands and made small talk about their selections, the weather, and of course how Jenny looked like she’d lost weight.
“I haven’t. Truthfully.” She rolled her eyes and thought about all the food she’d made at Brody’s last weekend. Most of it she’d froze, so it’d be easy for him to thaw and reheat, but she’d done plenty of sampling. “How are you doing?” she asked Caroline. “I think about you all the time.”
“Well, you know where I live, dear. If you think about me so much, I don’t see why you don’t just come over and check in on me.” The elderly lady winked and Jenny’s cheeks flushed.
“You have a point.” And now that things were looking up for her and Brody, she really had no excuse.
“In fact, since you’re already in town, why don’t you ladies join me for lunch? I haven’t figured out how to cook for myself yet, so I have a big pot of gazpacho I’ll never finish on my own. Jenny, dear, you could grill us a couple cheese sandwiches and we’d be set.”
