Wide Open (20 page)

"Yeah."

"But not today," he reminded.

"Yeah. Not today."

His arms wrapped around my waist and his mouth closed over mine gently before pulling away. "Come on, baby." He pulled me with his arm behind my back. "I'm beat."

We lay facing each other, and I couldn't believe I was in the house Milo grew up in. I couldn't believe his mother was in the other room. I couldn't believe I'd met his brother, and he was as sweet and adorable as Milo was. Then a thought hit me. "Why aren't we sleeping in your room?"

"It's not my room anymore," he said simply.

There was a bizarre peace in that statement. An understanding of one's new place in the world he created for himself.

His fingers skated across my cheek. "Even in the dark, I can see your brain working a mile a minute." His nimble fingers turned me, putting my back to his front, and he nuzzled into my neck, pulling my bottom to be snug with his hips. He put his lips to my ear and whispered, "Turn it all off." His hand swept down my hair and scalp.

"Don't worry. Even if I can't sleep, I'll still be on my game tomorrow." He gave a short snort of a laugh. "I'll still be here for you no matter what. It's why I came."

"You didn't come to learn all my secrets?" he asked in a joking, conspiratorial whisper.

"Maybe a little," I stage whispered back. "But mostly I came for the free food."

He laughed softly into my ear, my back shaking with his chest. "I knew it." He kissed my hair. "Just don't think. Sleep."

"You're so good at that," I confessed, even as my eyelids obeyed his command.

"At what?"

I turned my head to rub my cheek against his nose. "Making me feel like no matter where I am, I'm right where I belong."

"You
are
where you belong," he growled and tugged me closer.

I heard his name sighed from my lips before his hand reached for my chin. He pulled my face around and his mouth latched on mine. His fingers were so gentle, even as his mouth commanded and demanded, almost as if he was taking what was already his.

He stayed where he was behind me on his side and kept me on my side as well, knowing that the awkward position would be a barrier in and of itself.

He urged me to open for him. I knew that our night was just beginning and it was going to be torturous in the best way.

After my lips ached and my breathing was so hard, it beat against his lips, he pulled back just enough to pant his words. "I can see you in my life so clearly, just like this. Us, after a hard day, just wanting to be together, wanting to get lost in each other in the dark."

I couldn't breathe. I couldn't imagine anything better. "I've never been able to imagine my future before. Never could see what that would look like because I knew Will…" I caught the sob right on the edge. He put his forehead to mine and smoothed my cheek with his thumb. "But right now? I could totally see this," I whispered.

"This would be so easy to fall into and never want to come back out of."

I nodded. He was right. I had never even wandered near the L word, let alone thought about saying it. It was scary territory, but I knew he wouldn't leave me alone there. I knew he wouldn't take me for a ride and then dump me off somewhere with a broken heart.

This all seemed to happen so fast, even though it had been months, it seemed like minutes. I guess in the grand scheme of my life, it had been.

"Get some sleep, sweetheart," he ordered against my neck and nuzzled in for the night.

Milo

Heaven.

I was in it.

Surrounded by it.

Smelling it.

Feeling it.

Touching it.

Her behind was still so snugly fastened in the crook of my hips when I woke I thought I had woken in hell and this was my torture device for the rest of my life—the thing always out of grasp to taunt me and tease me…but there she was, under my hands.

I breathed in her neck and groaned at the smell of us mixed together—her in my shirt that was too big, her in my
boxers
that were too big.
Good night.
She was a walking, talking heap of adorable sexiness. I could have stayed in that bed all day, but I gently picked up her arm up to find on her watch it was already a little after one in the afternoon. I was sure she wanted to get home to her brother. If this baby didn't come soon, we were going to miss it.

I nuzzled my way into her neck, kissing and nibbling. "We've got to get up, beautiful."

The giggle. Oh, my good Lord, help me. "Why? It's warm under here."

"You want to see a baby, don't you?"

"Did they call?" she asked, sitting up excitedly. Her hair was swept over half her face.

I smirked. "No. Not yet."

"Then that baby apparently doesn't want to see us." She plopped back down on her side, away from me.

"You're forcing me to use extreme measures."

"Don't do anything you'll regret."

"Last chance."

"Milo!"

"Here goes." I pulled her over to face me, her giggling the whole time, and started kissing her neck and sucking dramatically. When she started squealing, I knew I'd won.

"Um, excuse me, Milo?" we heard at the door.

We looked at each other and laughed like we'd been caught. "Uh, yes?"

"Your mamma says to bring out that giggling girl she can hear you done brought home with you right now and come have some dinner with her."

"Ohp!" Maya said and pressed her lips together. "It feels like high school all over again."

I smiled but knew our little fun morning-slash-afternoon was coming to a halt. She was about to meet my mom; my mom who wouldn't remember her twenty minutes later. I'm sure she would love that. And to know I had completely left my family when they needed me most—spazzed and did nothing but care about myself and ran away—that was really going to make her just fall head over heels for me.

"Hey," she said softly, her cool hand pulling me from my memories. "I'm not going anywhere, remember?"

"Yeah," I said, but didn't know if I meant it.

"Come on." She tugged on my arm. "I want to meet your mom."

I didn't know if I should warn her or not. A part of me wanted to let her be ambushed with it, that way she'd be angry about it. That way she'd have something to want to leave me over, but I had already seen what the future looked like with her in it, and I was done with pushing her away and running from my past. "Okay, but, uh, one thing."

"Okay."

"Without going into too much family history, my mom was in an accident a few years ago."

"Okay," she said softer, more sympathy seeping through.

"Her…short-term memory doesn’t work anymore. She remembers me and her life and everything, but she can't remember anything after the accident." Maya looked confused, but took my hand in between hers. She had no pity in her eyes though. That was a first. Usually, the few people I had told—because I had to tell—they looked at me like I was a kicked puppy. "So she'll remember you when she meets you, but only for a few minutes. And she only remembers me from when I was a teenager."

"I'm so sorry."

"She's doing well. Mason takes good care of her."

I waited for it, for her to break her promise and bombard me with a million questions. At this point, I wouldn't blame her, but she didn't. I could tell she wanted to, but she didn't.

"Okay. Let me get my clothes on and my hair finger-combed, all right? Thanks for letting me wear these." She fingered the collar of my shirt she was wearing.

"Of course. I'll borrow some clothes from Mason."

She leaned up and kissed my forehead as she stood. "Don't peek," she whispered as she went behind me and I heard the rustling of her clothes.

Good. Night.

"Mamma?"

She turned and smiled, but it quickly changed. It was practically a carbon copy of the reaction I had gotten last time - so happy to see me and then so confused at what she saw.

"Milo…"

"It's okay, Mamma." I bent down on my haunches in front of her and took her hand in mine. "It was an accident. It messed with your memory. I'm a little older; you just don't remember." I looked back at Maya and she knelt on the floor next to me. "This is Maya. She wanted to meet you."

"Oh, my gosh," Maya whispered under her breath. "The fact that you
actually
call her Mamma makes me fall in love with you a little bit."

I stared, slack-jawed and amazed. She straightened and smiled at my mother as she proceeded to charm the smiles right out of her and the nurse, too. Before I knew it, they were all drinking hot tea and eating cookies. Maya had explained who she was several times with the patience of someone way beyond her years and I was falling in love more than a little bit.

That should have scared me, but I got a freeing sensation from it. I'd never seen binding yourself to someone as being freeing before, but that's what it felt like. With her, just us, together, it felt like we might could take on the hard road of addiction and not knowing what the future held for us.

After lunch, I asked if I should take Mom to the hospital, but the nurse thought she should stay and see the baby at home. Maya and I headed back. We hadn't heard from Mason, so I didn't think we'd missed anything.

And we hadn't. When we arrived, Mason looked like hell warmed over. The bags under his eyes were dark and he was so tired. The doctor had told him the first babies sometimes fought hard, and this one was taking his sweet time, but at least Emma was almost ready now. She had almost fully "dilated" overnight, whatever that meant.

Emma's parents weren't there yet since they went home to get some things and showers, so Mason wanted us to go in and see Emma while we could. I didn't really want to, to be honest. Emma was this angel that had been stuck between Mason and me while he had rescued me. She had seen me at my absolute worst, literally seen me with track marks in my arms and a girl having her way with me, called me on my crap, brought my brother back from his self-loathing that I inflicted on him, and was now giving him the only thing that he really ever wanted. And she was this weird copy of our mom, too, with her memories gone.

She was too good for the likes of me.

So was Maya for that matter.

This whole thing was bringing up all this stuff that I knew it would, but it physically hurt to feel. It hurt to know that Maya was better off without me. That I didn't deserve to be within twenty feet of her, let alone be
with
her. And Mason. God…how did he forgive me so easily? Maybe he hadn't. Maybe he hadn't had time to think about it yet. Maybe he didn't want to fight at the hospital. Maybe he didn't want to fight at all, but would always hold a grudge. Could I blame him? Of course not.