Bittersweet (Redemption #3) - Jessica Prince Page 0,68

would make or break our situation.

His eyes went cloudy, hesitance keeping him silent for several beats before he finally asked, “You on the schedule to work Wednesday night?”

“No. I’m off that day.”

“Think you could find someone to watch Brantley for a couple hours Wednesday night?”

The relief rushed through me so hard and fast it was a wonder I’d been able to stay standing. “Yeah. Yeah, I think I can figure something out.”

“How about dinner at my place? I’ll order something in, that way we can have some privacy so we can talk. That work for you?”

My smile was so big it made my cheeks pinch as I nodded my head. “Yeah. That works.”

“All right then. Wednesday. Now go on back inside before you get sick again.”

“Okay, Jensen.” I nearly called him bunny but caught myself before the endearment fell past my lips.

He leaned in, brushing a sweet kiss against the corner of my mouth before climbing into his truck and starting it up. I moved back to my front porch and stood in the opened doorway, watching as he backed out, thinking that I’d really missed that truck over the years. We’d has some seriously good times in it. Then I went inside, shut everything down, and checked on Brantley one last time before climbing back into bed.

And when I fell asleep a short while later, I did it feeling lighter than I had in a very long time.

Chapter Nineteen

Shane

Nineteen years old

I barely heard the sound of the front door opening and closing over the blood rushing through my ears.

“Sunshine, I’m home.” The thud of Jensen’s boots sounded through our tiny apartment as he made his way toward the bedroom. Our place wasn’t anything fancy. Compared to Jensen had grown up, it was pretty much a pit. The one bedroom/one and a half bath apartment was only a little over six hundred square feet in an older building on the outskirts of town, but we loved it. It was our home, at least for now, and we were happy here.

After Jensen showed up on our doorstep beat to hell and nearly unconscious, my aunt and uncle had insisted he stay with us for as long as he needed.

He’d crashed in the little apartment my uncle had built above the detached garage while he went to trade school to become a mechanic. He got his certification a few months after his nineteenth birthday and got on as an apprentice over at Banks Body and Auto Repair not long after. Once he had a steady paycheck coming in, he’d saved up and put a down payment on this place. I’d followed after as soon as I graduated. It wasn’t always easy, we were still young and trying to find our place in the world while scrimping and saving to pay bills, but we made it work.

My aunt and uncle sat me down shortly before graduation and explained to me the stress that came with moving away from home and living with someone else, but my heart was already in it. My mind was made up. Knowing I was smart and had a good head on my shoulders, they’d let it go, giving me their blessing. I worked part-time as a waitress and went to school part-time at the local college, working my way toward my degree. It wasn’t the course I’d originally jotted out for what my future would look like, but that was okay, because I had Jensen. We were happy, and that was all that mattered.

There were fights, a good number of them considering my boyfriend was a hothead, but they never lasted long. As soon as they were over, we were back to being us. He’d been working hard over the past couple years to control his anger, and now that he was out from beneath his bastard of a father’s thumb, he was making good strides. There was still the occasional fight, but he had more control, and he always pulled himself back before it went too far.

Sure, we could have afforded more . . . a whole hell of a lot more seeing as Jensen’s grandfather created a trust fund that became available to him on his twenty-first birthday, but Jensen refused to touch it, saying that his grandfather had been just as bad as his dad, and he wouldn’t have anything to do with those people’s money.

Now knowing what I knew about his parents, I didn’t blame him one damn bit, and I never made mention