“I’m sorry,” I repeated, looking up at him.
His eyes darted sideways as I touched his arm. I could feel the tension in his muscles, how badly he wanted to move away from me and it broke my heart. How had I misjudged him so badly? Was I so damaged that I’d thought the world was damaged with me?
Was I really going to give Killian that power over me?
“I’m sorry,” I said again, then let a ghost of a smile play about my lips. “But that’s just talk. I know what will make you believe me.”
“Aria,” he warned.
But I was already sinking to my knees there on the kitchen floor. His hips twitched as I undid the button on his jeans, but I could already see the shape of him lengthening underneath.
“Derek, I do trust you.”
He looked down and something flickered across his face. “Get up,” he ordered.
“Don’t you want me to…?”
“Of course I do. But not right now. Get up,” he said again. “I’m sorry too. For keeping secrets. I’ve gotten far too used to them. I forgot what it was like to be….” He trailed off.
I looked at him. “To be?”
He smiled and his eyes softened. “Open. Comfortable.” He reached down and lifted me up, pressing his hands to each side of my face. “Happy.”
I threw myself against him, sending him stumbling back against the cupboard. “Oof,” he groaned as the lip of the counter caught him in the small of the back.
“Sorry again.” I grimaced. “I just keep messing up, don’t I?”
He sighed and touched my face. “That wasn’t a mess up. You can’t mess things up with me.” He pressed his lips together. “Unless you go back on that promise you just made me.”
I swallowed hard. The idea of visiting my parents was terrifying, but I felt like it was the only leverage I had.
Like the only way I could help Derek re-connect with his loved ones was if I showed him I could too. “I won’t,” I promised.
I rested my head on his chest a moment. Then spotted something moving out the window. I straightened up. “Did you order a plow?”
Derek turned around. His confusion melted away into a disbelieving grin. "Holy shit.”
“Who is that?”
“My idiot brother and his brand new toy. This should be interesting.”
The shiny, brand-new pickup truck dropped its plow with a bang, and then roared forward, angling away from the house so that all the snow piled to the left side. Then he backed up, and did the same thing again.
In the span of about thirty seconds, he'd clear the entire driveway.
"Well then…" Derek muttered, and went to the door.
The driver’s door opened, and out slid a darker, more polished version of Derek. His brother was slimmer, with darker hair, and narrower nose. I remembered him, especially when he surveyed his work with the same smug look of satisfaction he wore in the hallways of Reckless Falls High.
“Not bad, huh?” Cole Granger crowed.
"I never thought I'd say this, but you actually know how to use that thing,” Derek called from the porch. It sounded like it pained him to admit this.
His brother trudged up to the porch to slap him on the back. Then punched him in the arm. "I knew you'd be too stubborn to hire a service for yourself. I’m surprised you’re not trying to shovel all that by yourself."
"He was," I interjected.
Cole looked over, then did a double take to see me standing in Derek’s doorway wearing Derek’s shirt, while Derek wore none. I could see the gears in his head turning, and started to blush. But I decided I didn’t care.
"Hey Cole, I remember you," I said, extending my hand.
“Hey Aria, I remember you too.” He accepted my handshake while grinning at his brother. "I went to a couple of your shows, actually. Back when I was living in New York. Fancy seeing a big star like you here with my hermit brother.”
Derek shoved his hands in his pockets. “Shut up, Cole.”
I laughed. "I just put a pot of coffee on, Cole, do you want to come in?”
Cole raised an eyebrow at Derek. “See how she’s inviting me in? That’s how normal people do it. Take notes.”
“I’m trying.”
Derek and I shared a private smile.
Cole followed me into the house. He shed his snowy coat, then ruffled his hand through his hair. "You know how I can tell you two are just starting to get to know each other?"
"Watch it," Derek warned.
Cole spread his hands innocently. "What? I was just going to say, it's because Aria here is up while you shovel. Autumn got the call that school was closed and she just rolled back over and stayed in bed. She's been asleep about fourteen hours now.”
I shared another private glance with Derek. If Cole knew how much we’d been through this morning, he wouldn’t say anything about us ‘just starting out.’
I reached out and grasped Derek’s hand and he squeezed it tightly. Then I smiled at Cole. “Autumn, you said, right? Autumn Melton?"
"The very one.” Cole looked so proud that I smiled even wider.
“You two were together back in high school too, right?"
He shook his head ruefully. "And we should have never been apart."
"It all worked out though, right?” I asked. I felt suddenly nervous as a plan began to take shape. There was no time like the present to keep my promise to Derek. “So Cole, thanks for coming over. Where are you headed next?"
Cole sipped his coffee, and then shook his head. "I was gonna just head back to the house."
"Do you know my parents?"
"Not very well, no. They’re on the eastern side of town, right?"
I nodded. "My dad’s probably out trying to shovel right now.”
Cole set at his mug down. “Want me to head over there? It’d be no problem. I need the practice, actually."
I squared my shoulders. ”Actually, would you mind if I came with you? I'd like to check in on them.”
Derek looked at me sharply. I nodded. He widened his eyes…
And he nodded back.
Derek threw a shovel in the back of Cole’s pickup, then all three of us piled in.
The ride over the back roads was a more than little hair-raising after my accident. But I found that if I closed my eyes, I could pretend I wasn't about to die every two seconds.
Unfortunately, when I closed my eyes, I saw my parents faces.
What had it been like for them, losing one daughter and then the next? For ten years, I was as unreachable to them as my sister was.
I’d found another thing Violet and I had in common.
I opened my eyes. I’d rather face down the treacherous roads than my treacherous thoughts.
Wherever the snow drifted over it, Cole stopped and dropped his plow to clear the road. Derek mumbled at him to stop being such a damn show off. Cole cheerfully told him to get out and walk if he didn’t like it.
“Is this how brothers are normally? Or is this just how you two are?” I wondered. Sibling relationships were weighing heavily on my mind.
“I’d never make the mistake of calling us normal,” Cole chuckled. “We’re still kind of figuring it all out.”
I looked at Derek. He squeezed my thigh and nodded at me again. “I’m proud of you,” he murmured.
“I haven’t done it yet.”
“But you’re about to. This is a huge step.”
“I might need you to give me a push.”
“Whatever you need, baby.”
My hands shook in my lap and I tried to steady my breathing.
It took longer than normal to reach my parents’ house, but we arrived in one piece.
And all the nervousness I’d been feeling the whole ride over suddenly exploded.
“Yeah, help?” I looked around wildly.
Derek’s hand rested lightly on my shoulder. “Ready?”
I bit my lip and nodded.
He reached over and yanked on the door handle.
Then gave me a hard shove.
I stumbled out of the cab, half gratefully amused, half shocked he’d actually done it. Then I looked around at a place that felt alien, but so very much like home.
The curtains fluttered in the window. They were inside. I breathed a sigh of relief that my father wasn’t outside struggling with the wet heavy snow.
Derek closed the door, and Cole had driveway cleared in about ten seconds flat. I took a deep breath and went to the window. Derek rolled it down. “Kiss me?”
His lips brushed lightly against mine. I pouted. “I want more.”
He tapped me on the nose. “No more procrastinating!”
"Time to get our shit together, right?” I said, low so that Cole couldn't hear.
Derek said nothing, but he kissed me, hard and insistent. "Good luck.”
"You too," I whispered. Then I shut the door and waved as they drove off.
The curtain at the window fluttered again. I took a deep breath, and then went to my parents’ door.