A few signs remained, in the heart of town, sunk at haphazard angles into the winter lawns. A few last protests; a residual enmity that Ava knew would take months, maybe even years to fade. Knoxville wasn’t anti-Dog, but it was frightened, and the road to reconcile was a long one, paved with setbacks. For now, the scandal of the mayor was still making front pages and circulating through ladies’ luncheons. Next month it would be some other minor social uproar, and so on and so on, the Lean Dogs fading back into the tapestry of the city.
Mercy pulled over at the bakery, took the turn into the alley, parked in an old familiar spot that set Ava’s heart to pounding. Her eyes went up the iron staircase to the door at the top of the landing, the small apartment with the under-window bookshelves and the ever-present smell of baking bread.
“Your old place,” she breathed, as he swung off the bike and held it steady for her. “You didn’t–”
“I did,” he said. “For now. Until we can afford someplace big enough for a family.” He withdrew the keys from his cut pocket. “You wanna go up?”
“Yes.”
The steps rang under their boots in the old way that she remembered, clanging metallic sounds she knew so well. He handed her the key, let her unlock the door and send it swinging inward with a gentle push of her fingertips. Ava braced herself for change: some hideous wallpaper, vivid paint, an overhaul, badly patched holes in the wall, evidence of vandalism. She had no idea what the tenants during the past five years had done to the place. They might have ripped out the bookcases, renovated the old bath. They might have…
Sunlight streamed in through the bare window, lighting on the old warped boards, a helix of dust motes lifting as the incoming air disturbed the peace. It was the same. It was exactly the same.
The bookshelves, waiting for their collections of paperbacks, the claw-foot tub in the bath, the old kitchen stove, the white walls, the ancient wall sconce lighting. Empty, holding its breath, waiting for them.
The same.
Ava whirled to face her husband, his face golden in the wash of sunlight, his brows drawn together with concentration as he studied her.
“It’s like you just left it,” she whispered, tears coming up in her eyes that she didn’t understand. “It’s the same.”
“Ava.” He went very slowly down to one knee, the good one, grimacing as the bad one pulled with this ill-advised movement. She was thankful for the warmth of his big hands when he pulled both of hers into his. “There were other apartments, but I wanted this one for a reason.”
“What are you doing down there? We’re already married, you dork,” she said, laughing through the tight knot of tears in her throat.
“Yeah, but…” She saw his pulse flickering in the hollow of his throat, the strange earnest softness of his face. “The thing is, I wanted to marry you before. When you were seventeen. Before all the bad shit happened. It’s good you got to go to school – that’s what you deserved – but damn it, I wanted you then.”
“I know,” she said softly, sweeping his knuckles with her thumb. “We don’t have to go through it again.”
“We do,” he insisted. “Because I want us to have a chance to do it the way we wanted to, the first time around. I think it was always supposed to be this way, and I want to do it right.”
Ava tugged on his hands, trying to pull him to his feet, and when that didn’t work, she dropped down to his level, caught his face in her hands and kissed him. “In that case,” she said when she pulled back, still crying, smiling too, so full to bursting she couldn’t stand it. “Will you put me up against the wall, like you want me too bad and you can’t help yourself?”
She shrieked with laughter when he surged to his feet, swinging her up like she weighed nothing, lifting her under her arms and pressing her back to the wall. She wrapped her legs tight around his waist, her arms around his neck. Her mouth was open to meet the fall of his, the wet, demanding kiss. His lips forcing hers wide. His tongue plumbing deep, searching all the deep corners, as his hips pinned her to the wall. He moved against her, a light grinding, letting her feel that he was ready, that all she had to do was make a suggestion, and he would go all Cajun loverboy in a heartbeat, purring in her ear and making her limp as a doll.
They were both struggling to catch their breath when he pulled back a fraction. “One question,” he said, and his voice brought a low, desperate sound up the back of her throat that made him grin wickedly. “Those stories you write. Are they about me?”
“Every word.”
He said something dark and sultry in French, and kissed her throat, tracing her pulse with his tongue.
Ava gasped and arched up into him, nails digging into his neck. “What does that mean?” she asked.
He laughed a little. And then he kissed her once more, one of those languid, thorough kisses that tasted like delayed gratification. “It means,” he said, his lips brushing against hers,
“ ‘I think you’re wrong, fillette, because you’re the fearless
one.’ ”
He kissed her again, in their room full of sunlight, and treasured memories, and possibilities.
THE END
~*~
The Dartmoor Series will continue in Book 2, Price of Angels, expected Spring 2015.
Keep updated at:
hoofprintpress.blogspot.com
@lauren_gilley
facebook.com/Lauren Gilley – Author
[email protected]
To read more about the Lean Dogs, you can find them in novels II and III of the Russell series:
God Love Her
and
Keeping Bad Company
Other Titles From Lauren Gilley
Shelter
The Walker Series
Keep You
Dream of You
Better Than You
Fix You
Rosewood
Whatever Remains
The Russell Series
Made for Breaking
God Love Her
“Things That Go Bang In The Night”
Keeping Bad Company
“Green Like The Water” (Coming Soon)
Dartmoor Series
Fearless
Price of Angels (Spring 2015)
Hoofprintpress.blogspot.com
[email protected]
@lauren_gilley
Fearless Page 81
