… I do have it bad. Always have, always will, and I’m no longer afraid to admit that. In fact, I’m downright proud of it.
It’s as if everything that existed before, the hurt, secrets, heartbreak, loss … it all got erased that night in the gazebo. There was an unspoken agreement between Lily and me that from here on out, we were moving forward. The storm clouds that had occupied the space above our heads, and in our hearts, were finally gone.
And I might be riding the high of our makeup sex, which had been going strong for the last week, but this was the happiest I’d been in my entire life. Even more than our glory days when I still had a chance at going to the majors. This was better than that because this was real. Back then, we thought we were wild and free, but we didn’t know anything.
We were grown-ups now, and Lily and I could do whatever we wanted. Have sleepovers every night. Move in together. Get married. Have babies.
Of course, I hadn’t proposed all of those ideas yet, but I had a feeling she wouldn’t want to wait. Just as much as I didn’t want to wait.
We’d lost enough time. We had a lot of catching up to do.
39
Lily
The weeks leading up to Thanksgiving are chock full of quality time with Bowen.
Friday nights at the Fawn Hill movie theater, nighttime walks to our gazebo, Saturday mornings spent in bed and him driving me to work more than once or twice a week. We spend every night and day at each other’s houses, and by the Tuesday before the holiday, Bowen is trying to convince me to move in with him.
“But … I like my townhouse better. Look how cute it is. How about you just move in here?”
“Well, for starters, I have my punching bag set up in my basement. And I need that. Plus, I have more room.” He adjusts on the couch, pulling me farther into him.
Even though we are basically already laying on top of each other.
“I’m not crazy about your setup … and those floors, yuck.” I place a chaste kiss on his cheek.
Bowen shrugs. “So gut the place. Room by room. Do whatever you want. Just move in with me.”
I’m a little shocked as I turn to him. “You’d really let me do that?”
“Yes. All I care is that I go to sleep next to you every night and wake up to you every morning. I don’t care what the walls and carpets surrounding us look like. But if you do, then change them. I want you to be happy, that’s all I want.”
And because I’m saying yes to everything these days, especially when it comes to Bowen, I agree. “Okay. When can I move in?”
He jumps up. “Right now. Let’s go out and get some boxes.”
That makes me giggle. “Hold your horses, speed demon. I have to sell this place.”
“And you can move in with me while we list it. It’ll make it a hundred times easier to show if no one is living here. Come on!”
A sound from the front hallway has my words freezing in my throat. Because I can swear that sounds like a key.
Bowen’s eyes take in my body language, he hears the noise, and I watch him go into full protection mode. If I wasn’t so freaked out myself, I’d be in awe of this pure show of masculinity.
“Lily.”
I suck a breath in because the voice coming from the entryway of my townhouse is one I know.
Even if it’s one I never wanted to hear again.
“What are you doing here?” My tone is ice as I stand, and my father enters the living room.
He holds up one hand, a smug, almost condescending look on his face. “I just came to talk.”
“He still has a key?” Bowen growls, his eyes never leaving mine.
“I forgot.” Which only makes me feel unsafe.
Imagine that? Feeling unsafe when it comes to your parent, your blood relative.
“Get out,” Bowen tells him now, moving in front of me.
Protecting me, as he has always tried to do.
“You get away from my daughter!” Dad sneers, rounding my coffee table and storming toward Bowen.
My father is not a man who likes to be told what to do, and from the moment he waltzed in here, uninvited, you could feel the shift in the air. He was looking for a fight.
“Dad! What are you doing?” I shout, trying to throw myself in front of