30 30 When I near Whitney’s driveway, the afternoon sun is starting to dim behind the ridge of mountains that skirt her property. I pull in slowly, doing my best not to announce my arrival by way of a Cummins motor salute, because with all that’s happened since I last saw her, I need a moment to get myself together before walking in there.
She sent a text yesterday—nothing definitive, just letting me know that she had made her decision. No hints, nothing but a request to see me. I left Texas this morning and rerouted my usual way home by jumping on Highway 50 outside Pueblo, then linking up with Highway 92 to Hotchkiss. A few hours later, and here I am. Cautiously hopeful, but anxious enough to wish this were already over and that I knew whether I was about to start a new chapter or lose everything I truly wanted.
Frost covers the rows of apple trees and with the late afternoon light waning, the limbs practically glow in the haze of the setting sun. That sight reminds me of every reason I had for doing what I did. No question, Whitney deserved another chance to make this work.
I step out of the truck and give my knee a stretch, then make my way up to the porch and pause for a moment, taking a deep breath before knocking on the screen door.
“It’s open! I’m in the kitchen!”
Jesus. Christ.
I close my eyes and count to ten. Storming in there and reading her the riot act is not the best greeting, but the woman refuses to follow the basic bylaws of home safety. Like locking the fucking door. Or not inviting people in without getting eyes on them first. Simple, straightforward shit.
When I shove open the door, I don’t bother to stop and take my boots off—my mom would kill me, but I have bigger issues. I halt in place just beyond the threshold to the kitchen.
“How many times do I have to tell you not to do that? You don’t know who’s at the goddam door. I’m begging you to demonstrate some sense of self-preservation. Please.”
Whitney peers out from behind a large cardboard box that’s set atop her kitchen table, from which she’s unpacking dinnerware. In front of the box is an old television set, and I mean old. We’re talking 1980s at best. It has rabbit ears and dials, for Christ’s sake. I point at it.
“What the fuck is that?”
Her hair is up in a messy knot on the top of her head and she’s wearing my favorite sweater. The black one with the deep V-neck, and maybe it’s the angle or the lighting—shit, I don’t know—but I’m almost positive her tits look bigger. Maybe it’s just because I haven’t seen her in a couple of weeks and my hands have barely survived the deprivation of touching her. Or maybe I’m just a lovesick fool who will always see her, want her, and do my best to catalog every plentiful inch of her body.
She tilts her head and narrows her eyes. “It’s your welcome-home present.”
“My what?”
Whitney lets out a huff. “OK, you’re ruining this. I wanted you to come in here and do your grumpy silent thing for a second. That way I could tell you I made a decision, that I love you and want to be your partner in everything. Then I would show you this symbolic gesture of my love.”
She sweeps her hands open in a ta-da gesture at the so-called television. “That I’d wanted to make sure you’d never have to stream football on Thanksgiving again. So I drove to a biker’s house in Crawford to acquire this free TV he had on craigslist.”
The only thing I really hear is that my beautiful Whitney drove to some greasy guy’s house, a dude who had an ad on craigslist—also known as the best way to lure unsuspecting women into your evil chamber of secrets—to acquire this . . . thing.
“You went to a fucking biker’s house? Alone?”
She sweeps her hands wide again, all but saying duh, while also being adult enough to not actually say it. I raise my brows.
She lets her arms drop, props her hands on her hips, and tilts her head.
“First off, my dad was a biker, so you should tread lightly here. But we can discuss that later. Let me repeat the important part again, just in case you didn’t hear me the first time around. I love you, Cooper. I choose you. I want this.”
The room is so quiet I can hear every creak in the house and I’m suddenly able to process what she just said. She wants this. She wants me.
Whitney lays one of her hands against the amber-colored pendant she’s wearing, pressing the stone to her skin. A flush rises across her chest and then it becomes hard for me to remember who I was before she shuffled her way into that drugstore, and into every part of my heart.
I clear my throat but it doesn’t help. My voice still breaks. “You’re sure?”
She nods once. “Yes.”
I take a step closer, desperate for the feel of her. She closes the distance and puts one of her hands to my chest. Then there’s nothing but the ease of my body finding hers.
“All of it? Marriage, babies, apple trees, and dogs?”
She curls up her lip. “Um, no. You didn’t mention marriage before. We aren’t getting married.”
My lips curl up just the same. “The fuck we aren’t. That’s how it’s done.”
A scowl from her. “Marriage is just an archaic, patriarchal smokescreen. It doesn’t mean anything.”
My hands find her hips and I give them a rough jerk into mine. Her eyes flare.
“It’s also a way for two people to show how much they love each other. How committed they are. In my case, it’s also the best way to keep from breaking my mother’s heart.”
Whitney draws her hands down my chest and works them between us, teasing across the fly of my jeans. The move means my heart starts to thump wildly and my dick starts to wake up from his depressed slumber of the last few weeks. She brings her voice down a notch and slows the delivery of her words, because she can feel it all.
“I’m on board with everything else. The orchard, the dogs, the kids. Even though your high-handed genetics probably mean I’ll eventually end up trying to corral a passel of boys who are into rolling coal in their big, obnoxious trucks or mudding in some farmer’s field while listening to terrible bro-country songs. Plus, they’ll be all brawny and stubborn—”
I step forward and take her face in my hands. I kiss her. Hard and fierce, long and heated, the way we both need and deserve. When I pull back, her eyes stay closed. I brush a few tendrils of hair off her forehead and kiss a spot there.
“Our kids will be awesome. Rolling coal or mudding, playing ball or trying to save the world one tree at a time, they’ll be perfect. Don’t worry about that.”
I kiss her again, softer this time. Once we both retreat, I take another glance around the kitchen. I need a notepad. So many things to do.
Whitney pinches my side. “Hey, don’t do that right now—disappear on me and into your head. Speak, Cooper.”
“I’m thinking about all the things we need to do. I mean, we can’t raise kids in this house—it’s too small. We have to remodel. Or, shit, we’ll build another house, one for us to live in, and keep this as base for the orchard. Maybe we can set up a retail store here and really focus on agritourism endeavors. Tours, a gift shop, a farm stand—”
Before I can catch her, Whitney is slumping out of my arms and landing softly, cross-legged on the kitchen floor. I panic, thinking she just executed the world’s most graceful fainting episode, but when she lazily drops her head into her palms, I realize she came to sit on the floor on purpose. I do my best to find the floor right in front of her, albeit less gracefully.
My hands come to her shoulders and I give them the gentlest shake I can offer. “Babe, what’s wrong?”
Her head rocks back and forth in her upturned palms. Finally, Whitney lifts her head to face me and her eyes are worried.
“This is enough for you, right? I don’t want you to leave football unless you’re sure. Don’t do it for me, or this place. All of it will be here when the time is right. Do it when you’re ready.”
My fucking amazing Whitney. Checking in to be sure I’ve made my own decision the right way. If I’d had any reservations, this would have sealed the deal. She’s the best person I could hope to share a life with because she understands why I am the way I am—the traits that I built my success on are the same traits that make moving on so hard. But Whitney is generous and funny, full of fire and heart—and she’s made me want to find the same in myself, here, with her.
“I’m ready. This is the right time; I’m sure of it.”
I urge her closer, and Whitney crawls into my lap, straddling her legs around my waist and wrapping her arms around my shoulders. My dick immediately registers the position of our bodies, and he’s quickly able to deduce how easily we could make this scene less about emotion and more about some serious makeup fucking. The front of her body presses to mine and my hands itch to perform a complete inspection of her tits, of size and weight and softness, but I force myself to keep them around her waist. She draws back and taps her index finger gently to the center of my forehead.
“You’re doing it again. Disappearing into your head.”
I blink. “I was thinking about your tits.”
Her mouth drops open slightly, her face blank for a moment. Then she laughs, sounding light but exasperated. Maybe I should apologize for objectifying her. Gently, I press my lips to her temple.
“I was also thinking about how from damn near day one, I think you got what makes me tick. And you never asked me to be something else; you just loved me anyway. I just want to make you feel the same way.”
Whitney puts a soft kiss to each of my now-closed eyelids. Voice lowered, she nearly whispers. “You do.”
Another kiss, this time to my forehead.
“But I don’t love you anyway. I love you because. Because you’re a grouch, because you’re determined, because you’re a good man. Because, Cooper.”
I stifle the contented sigh that wants to escape. I am not an adolescent girl. I do not swoon or sigh, unless that sigh is to express my exasperation or irritation. But on the inside? I’m an almost-retired pro football player who’s doodling hearts and kittens in my Trapper Keeper.
Whitney shifts her weight and my dick gets us back on track. I use one of my hands to trace the V-neck of her sweater, then tug the neckline down far enough that the lace of her bra comes into view. She takes a slow, deep breath in.
“You do realize I can’t actually watch a game on that TV, right?”
Whitney makes a half-hearted questioning sound and arches her back, moving all of her softness closer to my hands. Screw it. I think she missed this part almost as much as I did. I tug the sweater and the lace cup down until she’s on display. She releases a soft moan as her head drops back. I haven’t even really touched her yet, so now’s probably the time to let her in on what needs to happen. Pretty sure if I do this right, I’ll get my way.
“I’ll need a big screen. Like a seventy-five-incher. With 4K.” She groans. “Ultra HD.”
I let my palm hover just over her flesh. Whitney lets her head drop forward enough to lock her eyes on mine.
“I don’t know anything about what you just said, but I love you because, Cooper. That includes the big screen and the video games.”
I grin, cup her flesh, and she rewards my touch with an impatient twist of her hips. Maybe now’s the time to push my luck just a tiny bit more.
“Marry me.”
“No.” Her voice is light and breathy, but her tone is decisive.
Huh. I’ll have to keep working on that one. No worries; I have plenty of time. Whitney knows exactly what she’s getting into with me and I have every day of forever to work on convincing her—and all those nights to go along with them.
If it takes a hundred years, no matter. I’ll keep asking. Keep proving myself to her and to what we are together.