62
Beck
I’d been at my tiny kitchen table for hours. I had tossed copy after copy of the application, scribbling through sentences. It was harder than I thought, forcing my words into a kind of sense. Making them match, even slightly, the feelings that I had. I’d never been good at this, and as I sweated and erased and crumpled up paper, I hoped that it would be clear.
It was all I had.
So when there was a knock at my door, I was completely startled. Other than Elián, not many people had been to my run-down apartment.
Imagine my surprise when it was Luna da Rosa in a white dress and a crown of flowers.
And she was clutching a stack of papers to her chest.
“Luna,” I said, like she was a dream.
“May I come in?” she asked. Her smile was shy.
I blew out a breath. My heart was trying to climb out of my chest. “Uh, what are you doing here?” I was trying to figure out how clean my apartment was. I never had visitors.
“I brought you a gift,” Luna said. And I wanted to kiss her so badly I forgot how to breathe.
“I, uh… I have a gift for you too,” I said, stepping back to let her into the small space. I was barefoot, in old sweatpants and an undershirt. She slid past me and I inhaled her sunshine scent like an addict. Watched her look at my kitchen, my tiny living area, peek her head around the corner toward the bedroom. My furniture was thread-bare and not a single picture hung on my walls. But she had no judgment, just curiosity.
Then she sat in one of the chairs, kicked off her sandals. I had spied on her Instagram feed for the first time in two weeks last night. She was sad. Really sad. It was painful to see.
“I was thinking about ways that I could show you how much I love you,” she said, voice clear. “To dissuade you from having any doubts about me or my intentions or my feelings. And so, with the help of my friends, I did a little digging. Talked to some people. And uncovered a mystery for you.”
“A mystery?” I asked, hung up on the fact that Luna had said the words how much I love you.
I assumed she’d abandoned our love. Yet here she was—surprising me, as usual.
“With some keen internet sleuthing, I tracked down the program coordinator from your class at Positive Results twenty years ago. He’s still there, and he’s still amazing. In fact, I think the foundation might be considering them for a gift soon.” She gave me a fun wink and I couldn’t help but smile.
“Wait… you mean Eric?” I asked.
Luna nodded. “He remembered you.”
“But he’s worked with thousands of inmates at this point,” I said.
“He remembered you,” she said, “because of how gigantic your heart is. And he remembered Willow and looked up the family that had adopted her. I know you said they’d never written you back, that you never knew how her life had turned out.”
My heart was thudding loudly in my chest.
“Eric called them, asked if they’d be willing to send any pictures. Of course, they were. There was some mix-up with their address way back when you’d been trying to contact them. They’d moved, never got your letters. It was never because they didn’t want you to be involved.”
“I thought…” I started, but couldn’t continue. I thought they didn’t want me.
“I know,” Luna said kindly.
She placed the pages down and slid them across the table toward me with a delicate reverence. “Willow passed away in her sleep when she was thirteen years old, about nine years after she was adopted by the Harrison family. Who, according to Eric, loved her to pieces.”
They had. Even the scanned, older pictures I held in my hand showed Willow sitting by a Christmas tree wearing a Santa hat. On a hiking trail on a leash. Running at the beach, sleeping by a fireplace. Humans, her family, were in every shot—petting her, holding her, running with her. They were photos of love and devotion between human and animal.
“Eric spoke with their son, who was a kid when they got Willow. He told Eric to thank you, profusely, for bringing such a loving dog into their lives.”
I wiped at my eyes, which were suspiciously wet. “She was happy.”
“She was very happy, Beck. Very loved. Very cherished. You gave that to her.”
I couldn’t speak for a minute, was too fucking overwhelmed with everything. When I could finally clear my throat, I said, “Why did you do this for me?”
“This is who you are, Beck,” she said, tapping the pictures. She placed her hand over mine, threaded our fingers together. Her touch, after missing it for so long, felt euphoric. “This is what I see when I look at you. This is why I love you. I’m sorry, so very, very sorry, if I ever made you feel used. Or like a charity case. I’m sorry if you ever felt like my time with you was just to rebuild my reputation. Nothing could be further from the truth. All this time, I thought Lucky Dog was my happy place, a shelter from the storm. A refuge.” She leaned over, brushed our lips together. “You’re my happy place, Beck Mason.”
I didn’t even think—just acted, as usual. I wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her into my lap. Our faces were still close as I brushed the hair from her forehead.
“Thank you,” I said. “Thank you for… I never knew, you know, and I thought maybe they were ashamed of where Willow came from.”
“They weren’t,” Luna said, stroking my hair. “They couldn’t have been prouder of where she’d come from. Couldn’t have been prouder of the work you had done for her.”
I pressed my forehead against hers, palm between her shoulder blades. “We got the money, Luna. From the foundation.”
“I’m so happy to give it to you.” She smiled. “It’s for you. And Lucky Dog. It’s for more dogs like Willow.”
Trust. No more walls. No more fear. My heart was wide open.
“I wrote this for you,” I said, handing her the piece of paper. My fingers were shaking slightly.
“For me?”
“For you.” I locked my arms tight around her. Now that she was in my lap, I wasn’t ever going to let go of her.
“Lucky Dog assessment for Penelope’s adoption,” she read. Stopped, eyes flying up to mine. “Jem told me she was ready but I… I never said. I figured, you know, you would have given her to someone else.”
“Keep reading,” I nudged.
“As a staff member at Lucky Dog, please give your assessment of why you think Luna da Rosa is the right home and family for the dog in question.”
I hadn’t written much—wasn’t my style, and it was too hard. But what I’d put was all feeling.
She cleared her throat. Read the truest words I’d ever written: “Before I met Luna, I lived a life based in fear. Fear that I would never be more than my past. Fear that I would never be the leader I knew I could be. Fear that I would never know love. I know better now. Luna da Rosa sees the value in all and she sees the value in me. Which means, as an adoptive dog parent, she would give Penelope a life of love, and organic dog food and kombucha. Most of all, Luna would love her with an open heart. Anyone would be lucky to have that kind of love in their life. I only hope she still loves me back.”
Beneath that was a box—I checked approved for adoption.
“I’m sorry for what I said, Luna,” I said. “I’m sorry for letting all of those old habits get in my way. I’m sorry—”
She put a finger on my lips. “No more apologies. I love you, Beck. So much.”
“I love you, Luna,” I said, “so very, very much.”
And then she was kissing me, and laughing, and my hands were in her hair, and holding her tight, and I didn’t realize that love could fill a room but it could. It was everywhere. Luna was my magic, my transformation. If any woman was my alchemy, it was the rainbow billionaire, shining on my lap like the rays of the sun.
“If you look in that fridge,” I said, nuzzling her neck, “you’ll find six bottles of ginger-peach kombucha.”
She laughed, kissing my cheek ten times in ra
pid succession. “I knew you loved it. Also, I’ve been drinking Heineken all week.”
I kissed her—hard. Threaded my fingers through all of that hair. Scooped her up and carried her into my bed. It was too easy, too perfect, to shift all of those layers away so I could kiss every inch of her legs. Lick and tease her sex until she was arching off the bed, fingers in my hair. Let her guide me inside her body so I could take her, fuck her, show her how much I missed her. We were nothing but gasping mouths and hands and a pleasure so strong my body trembled. Hours passed and we didn’t stop—didn’t stop kissing. Didn’t stop touching. Exploring. I gave her every single thing that I had, every vulnerability. Every feeling. And when she came for the final time, tears rolled down her cheeks.
As the sun set, we lay curled around each other. Sweating, out of breath. Happy. She cupped her hand over my heart again. I held it there.
“Thank you for showing me love,” I said.
Luna entwined our fingers. Kissed me sweetly. “This wild heart will always be yours, Beck. Now can we go get our dog?”
Epilogue
LUNA
Six months later
Beck and I were preparing to be on camera.
We were sitting in our living room, squished onto a couch by the fireplace. Penelope was sitting on Beck’s lap, tongue lolling, looking happy and adorable and clearly obsessed with her dog dad.
I was obsessed with him too.
“You two cuties just hang for a second while Wes and I get set up,” Jem said, mohawk dyed electric blue to match the blue engagement ring on her finger. Wes had popped the question on the campus at Lucky Dog, placing the ring on the collar of a puppy Elián had rescued a week ago.
A puppy that Wes and Jem were now planning on adopting.
“Boss, this video is going to be tight,” Wes said, bobbing his head and scoping out the visual logistics of the room. Ever since Wes and Jem had taken over Lucky Dog’s social media presence, their beautiful videos of dog adoptions had become viral hits.
Penelope laid her head against Beck’s chest. He smoothed a palm over her fur, watching me with playful eyes.
“Whatcha thinking about, Mr. Mason?” I asked.
He reached over, curled a strand of my hair around his thick finger.
“I think you know,” he said, the words a quiet growl. I felt myself flush. Six months into our relationship and my big, bearded, meat-eating, beer-drinking boyfriend continued to fuck me with a passion I was addicted to. I’d woken this morning with his head between my legs—not an unusual occurrence—and after two blinding orgasms the man had flipped me over and fucked me literally senseless.
“I might need reminding later,” I said, tapping my lip with a fake quizzical look. “Perhaps in the hot tub?”
Beck’s grin was wolfish. “That can be arranged, sweetheart.”
I leaned in for a kiss but Penelope got there first, licking us both on the cheek. I laughed, wiping her slobber off, before giving her a huge hug. Penelope had moved in with me immediately and brought me so much joy it was impossible to categorize. She came to Wild Heart with me every day, hanging out in different offices, running on the beach and getting fed way too many baby carrots by Sylvia. She was calm, gentle, curious and I worried my heart would burst from loving her.
The only thing I loved more was Beck.
Beck had moved in right after Penelope. I’d been worried, since my mansion and the ostentatious wealth of Bluewater had always made him wary. But Emily, Cameron and Daisy—not to mention their husbands and boyfriends—had become our family, showing Beck every day that he was valued and loved and welcome. Beck had even taken over feeding Steve, who adored him—as much as a three-legged alligator can show his adoration. And Brutus spent more time at my mansion than any other—I often came home to find Beck napping on the couch with Penelope, Brutus sprawled out on the loveseat.
His motorcycle was parked in my garage and our fridge was stocked with beer and various meats. Although I made him eat vegan dinners with me half of the week.
I filled our walls with pictures of Beck and Elián, Jem and Wes, Willow and her family. And now, our walls were slowly filling with pictures of Beck, Penelope and me—our little family on our many, many adventures.
“Thanks for making time for this,” Jem said, sitting down about ten feet away with a video camera and some note cards. Wes stood next to her, hand on her shoulder. “I know you two have been crazy busy.”
“All in a day’s work,” I said with a shrug. “This is what’s important.”
Jem smiled. “I can’t get over how cute you three fucking look.”
I bit my lip as I grinned over at Beck.
“Yeah, yeah,” he said, faux-grouchy. “We can get on with it.”
“He’s a four on the grumpiness scale today,” I stage-whispered to Jem.
He responded by leaning over and kissing me on the cheek.
“What does Penelope mean to you?” Jem asked.
Beck nudged me to go first.
“Okay,” I said, scratching behind her ears. “I first saw Penelope more than a year ago. She was a stray dog living behind my offices at Wild Heart. She was, um, pretty skinny.” My throat tightened. “Scared. Didn’t trust me or anyone else. I think she was really, really afraid.”
Beck shifted next to me, entwining our fingers together.
“She needed love,” Jem said, nodding.
“She needed a lot of love,” I said. “I started feeding her. Gaining her trust. Showing her that I was…” I glanced over at Beck—“that I was the person that I said I was. This was during a time when I’d… lost my way. Penelope was the first step in finding myself again.”
Jem beamed at me from behind the camera. I’d been donating ninety percent of my salary to the Wild Heart Foundation for six months now and I’d never felt more purpose in my entire life. The foundation was thriving—the first round of grants would go out soon—and every time I visited a nonprofit, my heart glowed and glowed and glowed.
Wild Heart was rebuilding—slowly. But our products were back to being cruelty-free and Ruby’s Closet had ended up being the perfect partner for us.
I was matching my values, my business, my money, my time—having them reflect the world we all wanted to see.
A better one.
My life was less focused on image and always focused on integrity. And if I ever got anxious, or concerned, Beck was there to remind me of who I really was.
“And, Beck, you were working with Penelope too, right? Without Luna’s knowledge?” Jem asked.
He nodded. “The first day I met Luna was the first day I brought Penelope to the rescue. We hadn’t known that we’d both been feeding her.”
“I remember that day,” Jem said.
“So do I,” he said, smile secretive. “We, uh… well, Luna and I had been at an impasse. Penelope helped us get past it.”
Lucky Dog was thriving too. Beck was building more kennels, hiring more staff, expanding to their second location. I’d gone to see him speak at an event the other night and had been blown away at his quiet confidence, the way he captured the audience’s attention and demanded they consider Lucky Dog. He was a leader—he just hadn’t seen it.
“Why rescue?” Jem asked.
“Because even a skinny beach mutt that is terrified to trust people has value,” I said. “We all do. Sometimes it takes a while to earn that trust. To show them your love.”
Beck was silent but squeezing my fingers hard. He’d let his chin rest on top of Penelope’s head—and when he turned to look at me, his eyes were shining.
“How’d you know Penelope was your match?” Jem asked. “And I should mention that Beck has a unique talent for matching dogs to humans.”
“Penelope…” I paused, looked at the man next to me. My opposite in every way. “Penelope made me work to earn her trust. It didn’t happen overnight. I think that makes our connection stronger.”
Beck kissed my shoulder, chuckling softly.
“Penelope is everything to us,” Beck answered. “We’re very happy to give this dog the home she deserves.”
“And I think she’s settling in well,” I mused, laying my head on his shoulder. “Beck thinks I don’t notice that he feeds her food from the dinner table.”
“I would never,” he said.
“He’s a softie, just like you told me,” I said to Jem.
He pulled me in close, lips on my hair.
Click went the sound of a camera—it was Wes, looking especially excited.
“Can I post this picture of you three?” he asked. He flipped the phone around so I could see it: I was laughing, Penelope looked calm and content, and Beck was looking at me with a gaze of astonishment.
“Of course,” I said, remembering how hard that had been even six months ago. But when you were this happy, the opinions of strangers really couldn’t touch you at all.
“Here, can I see that?” Beck asked. Wes handed him the phone. Beck’s smile was mysterious as his fingers moved over the keyboard. I petted Penelope and snuggled in closer to my gentle giant. My happy place.
“What do you think about this caption?” he asked, lips at my ear.
Beneath our photo, he had written:
It wasn’t obvious, at first.
People wouldn’t believe it.
But I knew a match when I found one.
Want More Beck and Luna?
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Up next:
Nightlife-loving Daisy is forced into the mom life when she inherits a baby… and the baby’s other broody, serious, sexy guardian in Pippa Grant’s Crazy for Loving You.
WILD OPEN HEARTS: A Bluewater Billionaires Romantic Comedy Page 30
