“You aren’t supposed to sweep me off my feet, Stranger,” I whispered.
“Third hardest,” he began in a low, rumbling voice, and stepped up behind me. “Not being able to stop myself from telling Keith that I love him after seeing him for the first time in four weeks—”
My chest hitched with a silent sob. One of my hands covered my mouth while the other pressed firmly against the bed to help me stay standing.
“—and realizing that I might not ever get the chance to tell you that I love you.”
Deacon’s large hands slid around my waist and shoulder to turn me, and my first glimpse of him after all this time made me want to crumble into tears and scream at him and kiss him and apologize and a dozen other things.
“I couldn’t figure out why it felt impossible to walk away from those conversations. But it’s because it was you. Always you, Charlie. Only you.”
All I managed to get out was a weak “Deac—” before my voice gave out, and he pulled me into his arms, his mouth crashed down onto mine.
“We can’t. I can’t,” I said against the kiss, and pressed against his chest.
He pulled back just enough to look into my eyes. Fear swam through his light brown ones as they bounced back and forth, taking in mine. “Don’t say that.”
“How do we trust each other after this? How do we get past this?”
“One day at a time,” he said with all the confidence in the world. “We both fucked up by not walking away from those conversations long ago. I hurt you that night I walked away, I know.” He pressed his forehead against mine, and asked, “Charlie Girl, did you give me your heart?”
The tremor in his voice, as if he was afraid of what my answer would be, made my chest ache. “Yes, but—”
“Do you regret it?”
I stared into his eyes for long moments, then slowly shook my head. No matter how much I wanted to, I couldn’t. “You caused so much chaos in my shattered heart for years, and I always shied away from it, and then hated you for it when I moved back. But you—Stranger—put my heart back together so I could give it to you. It was always meant to be yours.”
His eyes seemed to burn, and his hands moved to curve around the slope of my neck and tilt my head back until our lips brushed. “An hour ago, I was still so sure that I didn’t know what love was. That it didn’t exist. Then Keith . . . that kid . . .” He trailed off and his chest moved with his silent laugh before the amusement suddenly left his face. Almost absentmindedly, he shook his head. His thumbs brushed along my jaw. “Things can change in just a couple minutes when you think you’re losing everything . . . yeah?” he asked, bringing up our conversation from our last night together.
I nodded slowly.
“Funny what suddenly becomes clear in an instant when even half of what you’ve lost comes running back to you.”
I didn’t know where he’d seen Keith, but I was thanking God for that reunion.
“We have a lot to get through. We have a lot of trust we have to build back up, but I won’t give up until we do. Because I want my days to consist of superheroes and powers, and ladybugs and Darth Vader, even though the last two have nothing to do with Marvel comics.”
A muted laugh escaped my lips as I attempted to contain my smile.
He backed me up until my legs hit the bed, and laid me down as he crawled on top of me. “I want my mornings to begin with you in my arms, and my nights to end with me inside you.” His mouth brushed against the base of my neck, then my jaw and both of my cheeks. “I can’t promise I won’t hurt you again. I can’t promise I won’t fuck up. I can’t promise I won’t say something wrong. But I promise I’ll take care of your heart for the rest of my life, Charlie Girl. You’ve shown me what it means to love someone, and I swear to Christ I love you.”
“I love you too,” I choked out past the tightness in my throat.
He dipped his head, but stopped just above my mouth. “Is this the part of the story where the hero kisses the girl?”
A soggy laugh burst from my chest, and I nodded even as I said accusingly, “I thought you weren’t a hero.”
“Superheroes get the girls too.”
His mouth captured mine with the kind of force I’d come to expect and crave from Deacon, and my body melted beneath his when he gently prodded my lips with his tongue.
Always asking, always devouring when I gave.
Always perfect.
Deacon tensed when shouting came from the front of the house, and seconds later, the door to the bedroom burst open.
We barely had time to stop kissing before the sound of light feet met with the scream, “Superman!” and then there was nothing at all.
Crap.
Deacon let out a low oof, and I grunted with the weight of Keith landing sideways on top of him.
We both looked over at the cheesy grin lighting up my son’s face as he watched us. “Are you pissing Mommy?”
“Oh gosh. Bud, it’s kissing. He was kissing Mommy.”
Keith sighed dramatically. “That’s what I said!”
Deacon’s smile matched Keith’s. “I was.”
My eyes stopped mid-roll when I realized what had just happened. I pulled in a soft gasp. “Baby, who are you?”
Blue, blue eyes found me, smiling just as much as the rest of his face. “Mommy, don’t be silly. I’m Superman!”
My chest felt heavy with every emotion, the most prominent of which was all the love for my little man. “You are?” I asked as I wiggled out from underneath Deacon, my voice thick with my surprise and excitement.
“Who else would I be?” Keith started to ask just before I pulled him into the tightest hug.
“Whoever you want to be,” I whispered against his head as I peppered it with kisses.
I glanced up at Deacon as my mouth split into the widest smile. Holding Keith tighter to my chest, I covered his free ear, and whispered to Deacon, “He’s only been Keith since you left. Wouldn’t even talk about it. Any of it.”
Pain and acceptance flashed across Deacon’s features. He nodded once, then ran his hands over his face and through his hair. Pinning me with his stare, he mouthed, “I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t apologize. Can’t you see how happy I am?” I released Keith, and said, “Hey, buddy, are Aunt Grey and Uncle J still here?”
Keith nodded enthusiastically. “We brought dinner!”
“Okay, why don’t you go back out there, and we’ll follow you right out.”
Deacon waited until Keith was running away screaming to say, “I never should’ve walked, Charlie.”
“We both shouldn’t have done or said what we did.” I traced his handsome face, and let the tips of my fingers linger on his lips. “Deacon, I don’t want Graham. I’ve never wanted Graham.”
“I know.” He nodded toward the door. “I heard you.”
That didn’t surprise me. As soon as I’d heard him walking up behind me in the room, I’d known he had to have heard everything.
“And the song . . . you have to understand what happened with the song on that last night.” I grabbed the notebook where it rested beside me, and flipped quickly to the finished song. “Look at the chorus. Read it.” I waited for a few seconds, before I asked, “Do you see it? ‘When I look at you like that’ . . . Deacon, when had I ever knowingly looked at Stranger before I finished the song? The chorus was about you. I was only falling in love with you.”
His eyes met mine and flashed with understanding and awe. “Charlie Girl,” he murmured, his voice weighed down.
“And that last message . . .” I trailed off and shook my head. “I don’t know if you’ll ever believe me, but I was going to tell Stranger good-bye that night. I thought he deserved to see the full song. Once he—once you responded, I was going to explain the chorus and tell him that I was done. But ther
e was no response, and then you were back in my room.”
There was a short hesitation before Deacon sighed. As he spoke, he moved to sit on the bed and pulled me into his arms. “All I saw that night was that you messaged him and I saw the words heart and love, and I lost it. I didn’t even fully grasp the other words; I didn’t understand that it didn’t fit for someone you’d never seen. But it makes sense now.”
My eyes landed on the phone resting forgotten at the foot of my bed. “That phone . . .”
Another long sigh. “I never thought I would hate that I had that phone.”
“It went off a lot that first week before it finally died.”
Deacon’s forehead landed on my shoulder, and for a moment, he didn’t speak. “I had it for the girls I slept with. I didn’t want them to have my real number. I gave it to Words because I was trying to figure out if she was one of them . . . if she was someone I should stop talking to immediately. Didn’t know the number when you messaged me, obviously. Didn’t even recognize yours when Grey sent it to me.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah.”
My stomach churned and chest ached, but I tried to push those feelings away. I knew this was from a different Deacon. A lifetime ago.
“After that day I forgot to pick you up from work, I have only used that phone to talk to Words. No one else. Graham knew I was still using it, and he and Knox about lost their minds because they knew I was seeing you. But I didn’t tell them about Words until after the Fourth.” He nodded in the direction of my door. “Graham’s waiting to set the phone on fire.”
“I’ll help.”
Deacon’s fingers curled around my jaw to turn my head to face his. He was smiling sadly. “I’m so damn sorry.”
“One day at a time?” I asked hesitantly.
“One day at a time,” he agreed, and pressed his mouth to mine. “Only you, Charlie Girl.”
My body warmed with his words and his kiss, but it ended soon after when we heard Keith yelling in the front of the house.
After another lingering kiss, I pushed against his chest. “Come on, let’s go destroy this phone and eat with everyone before Keith comes storming in again.”
“That’s why Jagger tried to keep us apart,” he mumbled as he helped me off the bed. When I looked back at him with a confused expression, he clarified, “Graham told him about the phone. Everyone thought I was sleeping around on you.”
“Oh.” My eyes shut, and I released a slow breath as we walked toward the door leading to the hallway. “That’s something else we’ll have to deal with later.”
“What, your brother?”
I arched a brow when I looked back up into those light brown eyes. “Yeah. He’s not going to believe you as easily as I did.”
“I don’t know about that.”
“What do you mean?”
He shrugged. “I told him earlier that I was spending the rest of my life with you and your son.”
I faltered, then stopped. “You what? What did he say?”
A mischievous smirk flashed across Deacon’s face as he bent to kiss me. “You found me in your room, didn’t you? He wouldn’t have helped me through the window if he wasn’t okay with me marrying you someday.”
I stared openmouthed at him for long seconds after he pulled away, and that smirk on his face grew.
“You and your words, Charlie Girl.”
Epilogue
Deacon
A year and a half later . . .
“HEY THERE, LITTLE stranger,” I whispered, and settled into the recliner next to Charlie Girl’s bed. “Looks like it’s just you and me now.”
Wide, dark eyes stared up at me. Eyelids heavy and blinking slowly.
“Your brother’s gonna come see you soon. He’s going to give you a superhero name. But don’t worry, you have a few years to grow into the name, and we’ll keep the ladybugs away from you until then.”
“Pink looks good on you, Deac.”
My eyes flashed up for only a second, to see Knox and Harlow standing in the doorway, before I was staring at my daughter again.
“Considering you were still running away from Jagger and Grey’s kids just two days ago, I didn’t expect to walk in and find you like this,” Knox teased as they stepped into the room.
“Shut up, man,” I said halfheartedly.
This was different. I didn’t know if I was ever going to be able to put her down.
I glanced up at Harlow, and something in my chest pulled uneasily when I noticed her watery eyes.
For her . . . for the people I thought of as my family, I would figure out a way.
It turned out that Harlow wasn’t able to have kids from the intense physical abuse that her first husband had put her through, but she and Knox were just waiting for the call from the adoption agency saying that they were chosen for a baby.
Harlow always acted as if it didn’t affect her, but we all knew differently. And when Graham’s fiancée found out she was pregnant just after Grey had her second baby, followed quickly by Charlie, it wasn’t hard to miss the pain that Harlow tried to hide.
“You want to hold her?”
The tears that had been filling Harlow’s eyes immediately fell down her cheeks, and her jaw trembled as she nodded. “Please.”
I reluctantly let my world go, and met Knox’s thankful look.
Today was already emotional enough. I’d cried as soon as they’d put my daughter in my arms. I didn’t need to cry watching my warrior break down, or one of my best friends looking like he was on the verge of joining her.
I cleared my throat, and asked, “Kate?”
Knox swallowed thickly, and shrugged. “Caught Jagger and Grey headed over to the room. We were going to head over there next.”
“Do you know what time she had him?”
He laughed softly, trying not to wake Charlie. “No, man. But I got the money ready.”
“You’re all ridiculous,” Charlie murmured, and I looked quickly over at my wife to see her cracking her eyes at us. She sent me a mock glare, then looked to Harlow and Knox. “He was asking if I could hold off on pushing.”
Knox laughed.
Harlow gave me a less-than-amused look through her tears. “Deacon.”
“What?” I smiled wryly at Charlie, and wrapped my hand around one of hers. “I thought we’d had it in the bag. I didn’t expect you to go into labor while we were waiting for Kate to have her baby.”
“Terrible,” Charlie murmured.
“Not my fault. He’s the one who made the bet.”
“And I’m coming to collect!” Graham said breathlessly. “I have about five seconds before I need to run back to our room. Time,” he demanded.
Charlie answered him before I could. “Two fifty-four P.M.”
“Damn it!” Graham groaned, and let his head fall back. “Couldn’t you have pushed faster?”
Knox dug into his pocket and pulled out two wads of cash. “Two thousand to—”
I started to refuse Graham’s half, my head already shaking, but Charlie and Harlow suddenly hissed, “Two thousand!”
Charlie glared at me. “You bet two thousand dollars?”
“I bet a thousand. And, technically, it was before we started dating.” Her glare deepened. “I’m not gonna take his money, Charlie Girl. I’m just taking my half back.”
“I would’ve taken all of it,” Graham said unapologetically.
I snatched my half from Knox, and pointed it at Graham. “Exactly why I wanted my baby to come after yours.”
Graham grinned like a bastard and stepped over to Charlie to kiss her head, then did the same to Harlow. “Charlie. Warrior.” He peered over Harlow’s shoulder at my daughter, and whispered, “Hi, sort-of niece. I’m gonna come back later with your sort-of cousin so you can meet him and
I can hold you.” He smiled at Charlie again, and said, “She’s gorgeous.” With the wadded-up money, he pointed at me. “Deac . . . dad looks good on you.”
It was my turn to grin like a bastard. “You too. Then again, it’s looked good on me for about a year and a half now.” I slipped my money into my pocket, and shrugged when Graham’s face fell as he finally realized his mistake. “Not my fault you didn’t think to apply the bet to kids already born.”
Graham laughed humorlessly. “Again . . . damn it.”
The girls shared a look and rolled their eyes before Harlow went back to cooing at my new girl.
“So now that she’s here, what’d you name her?” Knox asked as he stood behind Harlow, looking down at the baby.
I looked at Charlie, and she smiled through her exhaustion. “It wasn’t my idea,” she finally said when I didn’t volunteer anything.
“Charlie Girl, you can’t break the tradition.”
“That my mom started,” she argued gently.
It was an argument we’d had a hundred times. She hadn’t won, obviously.
“This is Brianna,” she told them with a soft smile. “Named after Brian Jones, one of the original members of the Rolling Stones.”
“Hate to say it,” Harlow began, “but I agree with Deacon. No way you could’ve broken that tradition. She’ll fit in perfectly.”
“Dad!”
My smirk grew into an unrestrained smile when I looked at Grey standing in the doorway with Keith. I stood to go to them, and tuned out Harlow and Knox saying their good-byes as he smashed into my legs. “Hey, bud.”
“My parents just got here with him and Aly,” Grey said quietly. “Are you ready for him?”
“Oh yeah.” I pressed a hard kiss to her head, then nodded toward the hall. “Go back to Graham and Kate. I’ll make my way there later.” Once Grey was walking away, I took Keith over to the sink so he could wash his hands, and reminded him softly about being gentle and quiet with his new sister.
Things we’d been going over for months, and things I was sure I would be going over again in about a minute. He was shaking, he was so excited.