“Can you believe they just give you this shit for free?” Tanner smiled broadly down at me as he returned from the bar in the first-class lounge. His arms were filled with all the complementary snacks they offered with this airline. Leo sat next to me with his head leaned back against his seat as he squeezed my thigh. He was tired, we all were. I flashed him a small smile as I resumed looking down at my phone.
I wasn’t really looking at anything important. I just didn’t feel like speaking. The last twelve hours had left me exhausted, to say the least.
After the authorities showed up to take Peter and Isabelle to the hospital, we had a lot of phone calls to make. Tanner and I stayed with Leo as he coordinated with the police to get Peter transferred to the States to one of the best psychiatric hospitals in the country. Just because the man had a mental breakdown and tried to kill all of us, that didn’t mean he didn’t deserve the help he desperately needed.
Tanner said he would be taking full financial responsibility for Peter while he was receiving his treatment. I didn’t bother asking how he planned to pay for it.
We had stopped by Isabelle’s room in the hospital after she woke up. Apparently, Peter had gotten the jump on her as she was trying to search the apartment she thought had been empty. She said she’d seen them both enter the complex and immediately called Leo. While she waited for him she’d knocked on their apartment door. When no one answered, she’d quietly snuck in to investigate—a poor decision she wouldn’t make again in the future. Peter proved to be quite sneaky as he crept up behind her and hit her over the head with a dirty pan. She’d fallen into the mirror by the entrance and shattered it on the way down.
She was sore and had to stay for observation because of a possible concussion, but other than that she was fine. How Peter got the jump on Leo was another story altogether.
When he’d gotten to the apartment complex, he had gone looking for Isabelle. When he found her on the floor in the unit, he rushed in without really thinking it through. Peter was waiting with Isabelle’s firearm and held him at gunpoint before knocking him out with the butt of the gun. The rest was history.
Even though the thought of the whole experience terrified me, I still couldn’t stop teasing Leo about it. How a scrawny little boy like Peter got the jump on a big guy like Leo was truly astonishing. I didn’t bother hiding my giggle every time Leo grumbled about being in the moment.
After we left the hospital, Leo had driven us in an all-too-silent car back to the resort. Once there, we packed up our things and headed to the airport. We were on the first flight out of Columbia within the next hour.
Hours later, here we sat, in the first-class lounge in Miami, waiting on our connecting flight to JFK. I was happy to be back in the States, but I was still not looking forward to seeing my family again in the next four hours. I wouldn’t wish that mob upon anyone.
Tanner plopped down in the seat next to me and I did my best to ignore him. The truth was I was still angry with him and rather than thrash him like I wanted to, I bit my tongue.
He was doing a pretty good job at hiding the fact that he was coming down from some sort of drug, but I could tell. He seemed jumpy like his nerves were firing off of their own accord and he couldn’t stop them. That, and he was sweating like a whore in church. When we got him back home I would personally be taking his happy ass to rehab. My only hope was that this time he would take it seriously.
“Da-ym,” he stretched the word as he riffled through his treasures. “They even give you the name-brand shit on this airline.” I could hear the grin in his words.
I resisted the urge to roll my eyes as I scrolled my social media. Not really seeing anything I was looking at.
“You definitely don’t get this kind of shit in economy seating,” he said as he nudged me with his elbow. I squeezed my lips tight together to keep my mouth shut.
“All they gave me and Pete on the way to Columbia was one bag of stale fucking peanuts.” Tanner’s voice seemed to be getting louder and louder the longer he spoke. All the other people in the lounge were starting to look at us wearily.
“We had to share that bag of nuts too. Can you believe that? Fucking billion-dollar airline and all I got was one bag of nuts.” He laughed at himself causing more people to look in our direction.
“The only thing that made the whole flight worth it was the sexy-ass flight attendant. Oh yeah, I liked her. I even offered to give her my bag of nuts if she met me in the little bathroom so she could suck my c—”
“Would you shut the fuck up!” I broke my silence and glared at my big brother. Anger built in my gut like liquid lava as he grinned at me.
“Finally. There you are.” He laughed at me as my eyes flared. “I was just joking, they didn’t really give us anything to eat.”
“Well, I believe I need to use the restroom,” Leo grunted as he stood suddenly from his seat beside me. He kissed the top of my head before making his quick exit. I kept my heated scowl on Tanner.
“Is all of this a big fucking joke to you?” I asked behind clenched teeth.
Tanner shrugged. “I mean, it’s kind of funny. I take a vacation and Patricia suddenly acts like she cares about me. That alone is hilarious.” He resumed looking through his snacks as though what he said made all the sense in the world.
“Tanner, you were gone for months. You said nothing to anyone at all and you just disappeared.” All my blood rushed to my ears. How could he treat this with such little care?
“What the fuck does that matter, Em?” He looked up at me before he used his teeth to open a bag of chips. He shoved a few in his mouth and chomped down before leaning back in his seat. He looked so unbothered.
“What does it matter?” I repeated with a screech. “Nobody even knew if you were dead or alive.”
He snorted at me. “Right, even so, who cares? Everyone has moved on with their lives. Frank and Patricia are still just as terrible as ever and you moved across the country and seem to be doing just fine. So who does that leave?” He looked at me with sad eyes. “No one needs me, so why does it matter what happens to me?”
“I need you, you fucking idiot!” I screamed. If there was anyone in the lounge that wasn’t looking in our direction before, they sure were now. Not that I cared.
Tanner stopped chewing and swallowed hard as he looked at me. He sat up in his seat before clearing his throat. “You’re just s—”
“No, I’m not.” I practically vibrated with rage as I stared at my big brother. The one person who was always there for me growing up. My first protector, my first best friend. How had either of us let our relationship stray so far apart?
“Em … you have your own life. You don’t need me in it to fuck it up for you.”
“Listen,” I cut him off as I sensed Leo approaching us. “I know this is mostly my fault. I should have been there for you. I shouldn’t have left you like I did.”
“No,” Tanner said firmly. “You’re not going to apologize for getting away from that cocksucker of a husband you had. You needed to leave.”
“I should have taken you with me.” I choked on the emotion clogging my throat. “I should’ve and I didn’t and for that I’m sorry.”
Tanner sat silently as I searched for my next words.
“You say nobody needs you, but that’s the furthest thing from the truth. I’ve always needed you, Tanner. I still do. I need you to help me with this part of my life because it’s all really fucking scary. I don’t know how to be this person. How to jump first and ask questions later. But you do. You’ve always been able to let your heart take you wherever you need to be and trust that you will come out whole on the other end.”
I took a fortifying breath before continuing. “This man behind me is going to be my husband one day and I need you to walk me down that aisle. To hold my hand while I make the biggest leap in my life.” Leo gripped my shoulder as I said the words. I could feel his deep love practically flowing from his body for me at that moment.
I’d never leapt into love the way I did with Leo. I had married Chris but that had been a thing to do just to survive, to escape my shitty life. It had never been a decision made with my heart.
I glanced up at the man that reminded me what it was like to truly love. “And I want babies.” I smiled as his grin widened. “At least two, to raise the right way. We will show them what it’s like to grow up with parents that would do anything for them and each other.” I glanced back to Tanner who was looking at both of us with indiscernible emotion in his eyes. “And they are going to need their crazy uncle Tanner to get into trouble with. They are going to need you to love them just as much as I do.” Tears dripped from my eyes down my cheeks as I gripped Tanner’s hand in mine.
“Now boarding flight 203 to JFK. First-class ticket holders, please have your tickets ready to scan. I repeat, now boarding flight 203 to JFK,” the man over the intercom recited as I stared at my brother
“So can you please get your shit together? If not for me, for your future niece and nephew?” I said with a watery smile.
Tanner snorted before he wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. He grinned at me. “Yes, Em. I will try to get my shit together.”
We both laughed and leaned into one another. Our foreheads touched before I spoke. “I love you, you asshole.”
“I love you too, you crazy bitch.” He laughed.
The final boarding call for first-class came over the intercom and we separated. Tanner grabbed his bag and walked toward the plane while wiping his eyes. Leo helped me stand and pulled me in for a brief kiss.
“Was that your way of proposing?” he teased.
I snorted before grabbing my carry-on. “Only if you’re saying yes,” I said as I looked up into those honey eyes.
He wrapped his arm around my lower back and pulled me toward him. I gasped softly as he ground his thick excitement against me. “That’s definitely a yes,” he murmured right before he sealed his lips to mine again.