Into the Blue (A Wild Aces Romance)

by Chanel Cleeton

  “You owe me a date.”

  “Dinner followed by dessert. If you’re lucky, I’ll put a blowjob on the table. No Harvest Dance.”

  “You love the Harvest Dance.”

  “Correction. I loved the Harvest Dance. I haven’t been in a while. It’s not the kind of thing you go to single.”

  His voice went a little funny. “But you said you’d dated.”

  “In a decade? Yeah, I wasn’t sitting at home knitting.”

  “But no Harvest Dance dates?”

  “It just never worked out.”

  Because the Harvest Dance was ours. Because all of my memories were inextricably tied to him, and the one year I had tried to go, I’d ended up freaking out before I even saw the white lights and wound up on a date at a fast-food restaurant.

  “Come with me.”

  I put my head in my hands. “Did you just decide to call me to be annoying today?”

  “Um, you called me.”

  Shit. So I did.

  “Becca?”

  I groaned. “You’re not going to let this go, are you?”

  “Not a chance.”

  “Why? Why is this so important to you? It’s just a stupid dance.”

  “It was never a stupid dance.”

  No, it wasn’t.

  I sighed, already feeling exhausted. “Fine. I’ll go.”

  I hung up the phone before he could get the last word in. Somehow it still felt like he already had.

  * * *

  Oh God, I should have just gone with a mix. I was wearing more flour than had made it into the stupid bowl, Dylan was jumping around playing with some kind of faux-medieval sword, the TV blaring in the background, I had the migraine to end all migraines, and I was about to cry.

  I’d forgotten how exhausting these babysitting nights could be, and honestly, considering I only had to watch him for five hours and then I could hand him back to his parents, I had no clue how Lizzie did it. I was getting her a spa day for her birthday along with a giant bottle of wine. She was my freaking hero.

  “Dylan, buddy, can you sit down for a second?” I called out. “Do you want to watch me make the pancakes?”

  I figured “watching” was better than “helping,” considering he was definitely responsible for a solid third of the flour caked on me. The other two-thirds were the result of my own ineptitude with cooking, which somehow made it worse.

  “Can’t. I have to kill the dragon.”

  God, he was a bloodthirsty kid. He was smart as a whip, but definitely a handful.

  The doorbell rang, mixing with the cacophony of the blaring TV, and I looked down at my clothes again—thanks to the flour, I’d channeled either a zombie or a ghost—wondering if the neighbors had finally given in and called the cops to report the chaos. And then another thought hit me—I really hoped it wasn’t Lizzie saying she’d forgotten something, because I was pretty sure she would freak if she saw the destruction I’d wrought to her normally clean kitchen. I figured I had four hours to somehow get it back to the state I’d found it in.

  I padded through the living room, wincing slightly at the sight of flour falling onto Lizzie’s pristine carpet. I was definitely going to have to vacuum later.

  Shit.

  The doorbell rang again.

  “Coming,” I shouted, rounding the corner and colliding with Dylan, sword in hand.

  “I got you!” he yelled.

  “Am I the dragon?” I was strangely hurt by that.

  He shook his head emphatically. “Nope.”

  Okay, I gave up. I had no idea what game we were playing, but I went with it.

  “You did. You’re the fiercest knight.” I really needed to get that sword away from him before dinner. It was plastic, but it could do some serious damage to Lizzie’s house.

  “Does your mom usually let you play with that inside, buddy?”

  He shook his head again. “No. Last time I did, I broke something and Mommy got mad.”

  Fuck.

  I scooped him up on my hip, my knees buckling a little at his weight—he’d definitely grown since the last time I’d done this—and tried to pry the sword out of his hand before he could realize what I was up to.

  The doorbell rang again.

  I groaned. “I’m coming!”

  Dylan laughed. “You’re getting mad like Mommy.”

  I couldn’t help grinning. “Sort of. Yeah.”

  He cuddled into me, and something inside me melted. I forgot about the stupid flour, and the sword, and the headache, and the blaring cartoon.

  I opened the door, a smile on my lips, and my gaze connected with Eric, standing on the other side of Lizzie’s doorstep, a bag in one hand and a bouquet of flowers in the other.

  TWENTY

  THOR

  I’d never seen Becca look more beautiful than she did now, covered in flour, a little boy trying to hit her with a plastic sword with fake jewels on the hilt, a goofy smile on her face.

  “Bad time?”

  “Are you a dragon?” the little boy asked at the same time.

  I grinned. “Sometimes.”

  He cocked his head to the side, considering, likely assessing whether or not I’d make a worthy opponent. Finally, he nodded.

  “I’ll chase you with my sword.”

  I laughed. “Best offer I’ve had.” I leaned forward, pressing a swift kiss to Becca’s cheek, her expression still stunned.

  “What are you doing here?” she sputtered.

  I shrugged. “I talked to Lizzie. She said it was cool. Besides, I heard a rumor that this was the best place to get zoo animal pancakes.”

  “It is,” Dylan interjected, wiggling around in Becca’s arms before she set him down and he took off running, sword in hand.

  She faced off against me, her hands on her hips, the movement leaving a cloud of white powder in its wake.

  “What is that?” I asked, not bothering to hide the smile.

  “Flour. I was trying to make the pancakes from scratch, which was a terrible idea.”

  “I bet.”

  We’d both been hopeless cooks, topping each other with inedible concoction after inedible concoction.

  “Why don’t you get back to the pancakes and I’ll hang out with Dylan? You’re channeling ghost more than dragon right now anyway.”

  Her eyes narrowed into slits. “How about now?”

  I grinned. “Well, you got the fire-breathing part down. Nicely done.”

  I hooked an arm around her waist, bringing her against me for a quick hug that left a trace of powder in its wake, and then I released her, going in search of the knight who wanted to slay me.

  * * *

  I died twice before we all sat down at the big dining room table, animal-shaped pancakes stacked in front of us. Something tightened in my chest at the sight before me, at the realization that this—or a variation of it, at least—could have been my future.

  Dylan talked the whole time we ate, in between shoveling forkfuls of animal-shaped pancakes, shifting topics with a lightning speed and randomness I couldn’t even begin to follow. I’d thought the dragon game was exhausting, but I hadn’t known exhausting until now. Becca kept shooting me tired little smiles and I had a strong feeling she was pretty used to this.

  He began to slowly wind down as the evening wore on, after Becca read him a story in bed, changing her tone to do funny voices for each of the characters. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d laughed so much.

  We closed the door softly behind us after many protests from Dylan saying he wasn’t sleepy, he needed a glass of water, he wanted to stay up longer, until finally his eyes closed and dreams overtook him.

  Becca sagged against the wall in the hallway. “I could sleep for a year.”

  I laughed. “How does one kid have so
much energy?”

  “No idea.” Her voice softened. “He’s adorable, though, isn’t he? And I’m not just biased because he’s my godson.”

  I grinned. “Boys don’t like being called ‘adorable’ as a rule, but he is pretty cute.” I surveyed the living room. “So what do you usually do now?”

  “Collapse on the couch with a glass of wine until Adam and Lizzie come home. They’re usually back around eleven.”

  “Sounds like a plan to me.” I nudged her toward the sofa. “I’ll bring the wine. Sit. You made like twenty pancakes tonight.”

  She didn’t fight me, walking to the living room while I went to the kitchen and poured us two glasses of the moscato Lizzie had in her fridge with a Post-it Note that said, “Drink Me.”

  I walked back to Becca, handing her the glass and taking a seat next to her on the couch. She looked exhausted, her body bundled up in one of the blankets Lizzie had strewn over the arm.

  “Do you want to watch TV?”

  I shrugged. “Sure, if you want. I’ll probably just stare at it with a catatonic expression for a while.”

  She laughed. “Me, too. He saps me of my energy.”

  “He’d sap anyone of their energy. How do Adam and Lizzie do it all the time?”

  Becca took a sip of her wine, making that little sound she made in the back of her throat when she thought something was good. “Hell if I know. They’re so good with him, though.” She hesitated for a second before continuing. “Lizzie was so nervous when she found out she was pregnant. They’d been trying, but I think the reality of an actual kid hit her hard. But the second he was born, it was like something just clicked inside her. She’s an amazing mom.”

  I swallowed a big gulp of wine, wondering if I was picking at an old wound, but curious just the same. “Do you still want to be a mom?”

  “Yeah, I do.” She sighed. “I’ve actually started thinking about having a kid on my own, or adopting, or something. It’s exhausting, but it also feels really rewarding. And I want to have that experience.” She gave an embarrassed laugh. “It’s stupid, but I want to do the little things—bedtimes and doctor’s appointments. I want my ankles to swell up and I want my belly to get bigger. I want all of it, and for the longest time I thought I had to have the right guy to have it, but I have a good job and benefits, and even though I work a lot, I’m starting to think it might just be something I end up doing alone. I mean, think of how many two-parent households fuck up a kid. I figure my odds are decent. I think—hope—that I’d be a good mom.”

  “You’d be an amazing mom.” A knot formed in my chest, born of guilt and regret over the decisions I’d made years ago. Would she have had the family she wanted? Would we have had that if I’d stayed? It was so easy to imagine that it was our son sleeping in the next room, our son filling dinnertime with stories about his day.

  I took her hand, entwining our fingers, holding on to her now to make up for the fact that I’d been so fucking stupid to let her go.

  “I fucked up with you. Spectacularly so. I hurt you and I hurt myself, and if I could undo all of the wreckage I caused, I would.”

  “Do you regret it?” Her voice was so quiet, I barely heard the words. Or maybe they just sounded quiet in comparison to the pounding in my chest.

  “Yes.”

  She exhaled, her fingers curling around the stem of her glass, staring into the crystal as though it contained some answer that eluded her. I didn’t want to screw with her. Didn’t want to lead her on. All I had to give right now was the truth, and I’d be lying if I didn’t admit the breadth of my regrets.

  She tilted her chin to face me, her eyes wary. “I don’t know what I want here. I don’t even know what you’re offering.”

  “Me, either.”

  “When we ended things before . . .” Her voice trailed off again as she looked down at her hands. “I’m not sure I’m okay with going through that again. Even the possibility of it. I’m thirty-one. I feel like I only have so many fresh starts left in me. It took me years to get over you and I don’t want to do that again.”

  I nodded, even as the lump in my throat grew boulder-sized. “I get that.”

  “I threw the ring in Cranberry Lake.”

  “What?”

  Her lips twitched, her eyes watery, looking like she was somewhere between laughing and crying. “I was so angry when you broke off the engagement that I threw the ring in the lake. Not right away, but later when I realized you weren’t coming back. I got drunk and made Lizzie drive me out to the dock and I just chucked it.”

  I didn’t blame her.

  “We’re a disaster,” Becca muttered, taking another big gulp of her wine.

  I draped an arm around her shoulders, pulling her closer to me so she rested in the curve of my body.

  “Do you regret this? Us starting up again?”

  She met my gaze this time, her voice even. “In the moment, this always feels like the best decision I’ve ever made. It’s the after that’s the problem.

  “One of my first cases was a kid who stole a car and took it for a joyride through some fields. He wasn’t even legal, but he drove that car all over until he was caught. When I talked to him afterward, he was so scared, his skin pale, his voice trembling. I asked him why he took the car and he said that he just wanted to feel free. Just for a moment. He had prior offenses, and he ended up in juvie for a bit, and it always stuck with me that he’d had his hour or so of freedom, just to spend months essentially locked up.”

  “Are you comparing me to a prison sentence?” I asked, not sure if I should be offended or acknowledge the fact that she’d hit pretty fucking close to home.

  “No,” she answered after a long moment. “A joyride.”

  TWENTY-ONE

  BECCA

  Eric held my hand as we got out of the car and walked toward the old metal barn where they held the dance. He held my hand while my palms grew clammy, butterflies in my stomach, a lump in my throat, my knees weak. I told myself this shouldn’t feel like such a big deal, that it shouldn’t matter so much, but I would have been lying if I attempted to deny how much it did mean.

  Before, I could convince myself that we were a secret, that whatever happened between us could exist in the cracks and crevices where you hid the most vulnerable parts of yourself. But now, Eric had scooped those parts out of me and put them on display, illuminated with twinkling white fairy lights and the giant harvest moon that shone down on us.

  You couldn’t make this stuff up. The night was just . . . magical. And I wasn’t necessarily a romantic person by nature, but the simple beauty of a night like tonight could make even the toughest cynic a believer.

  Eric squeezed my fingers, dipping his head to smile at me, and my heart lurched for what felt like the millionth time tonight.

  He wore a slate blue cotton button-down shirt, the sleeves rolled, and a pair of worn denim jeans with equally worn brown leather cowboy boots. He’d clearly stopped shaving at some point in the week, because he now had a nice buildup of scruff that made a girl go rawr, and there was definitely some kind of sorcery going on with his cologne because he smelled amazing. I’d spent the car ride over taking discreet whiffs and hoping he hadn’t noticed that I might just be a little crazy.

  There was something about Eric, something beyond the obvious physical characteristics, that drew me to him. I didn’t know if it was the pheromones or something less scientific—the feeling that he was mine on some primal level. Whatever it was, I felt the rightness of this, even as nerves filled me the more steps we took.

  It was an exaggeration to say the entire town of Bradbury had come out tonight, but it definitely felt like they had, and all of their eyes were trained on the point where my flesh met Eric’s, our palms pressed together. I tried to jerk my hand away, but he held steady as if he’d anticipated it, his lips quirking slightly before bringing
my fingers up to his mouth and kissing them softly, his breath tickling my skin, sending a whole other host of sensations through my body.

  Aww hell.

  “This was a bad idea,” I hissed, no easy feat while forcing a smile for the crowd at large. “Everyone is staring at us.”

  “Everyone’s staring at you,” he countered, his voice going oh-so-sweet, “because you’re stunning tonight.”

  He didn’t say it like a line, like he was trying to flatter. No, he said it like I was beautiful to him, and that made all the difference.

  “But if it makes you feel better,” he added, his voice going lower, his words for me alone, “pretend they aren’t even here. Tonight’s just for us. To hell with everyone else. If people want to speculate about what’s going on here, let them. We’re the only ones that matter.”

  I didn’t answer him; instead, I leaned up on my toes, fusing my mouth to his, wrapping my arms around his neck and pulling him closer to me, the harvest moon a spotlight over us, the twinkling lights flashing a giant I-told-you-so, and I didn’t care who saw. So yeah, I guess I gave him an answer after all.

  I just hoped it was the right one.

  THOR

  “Want to dance?”

  Becca pulled back a few inches and nodded, her lips puffy from my mouth and her cheeks pink from the cold.

  I led her out to the dance floor, the familiar strands of a country song playing over the speakers. I was a pretty shit dancer, but we’d been to enough high school dances and clubs and parties in college for Becca to be fully aware of my skills or lack thereof. I didn’t step on her feet or anything, but my signature move was my arms wrapped around her body, her cheek on my chest, our feet shuffling next to each other.

  Then again, it wasn’t a bad move to have.

  When we were younger, before things had grown serious between us, I’d lived for the school dances she wanted me to take her to, the ones I never would have attended if not for her on my arm. Those excuses to touch her had been like air to me.

  In the beginning, our relationship had progressed slowly. She’d never had a boyfriend, had been shy at first, but the more we’d talked, the more time we’d spent together, the farther I’d fallen. It had just been so easy to talk to her; she always seemed to get it the way other people in my life didn’t. Or maybe it was the fact that I trusted her in a way that I didn’t trust anyone else.