Total pages in book: 79
Estimated words: 75656 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 378(@200wpm)___ 303(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75656 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 378(@200wpm)___ 303(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
My first instinct is to reach for logic. Grief does strange things to people. It opens doors in the mind and makes patterns where maybe there aren’t any. I’ve seen it in widows at funerals and fathers standing over flag-draped coffins. I’ve experienced it myself when I’ve spent nights staring into the dark and wishing for one chance to go back and do something differently.
But this is Elena. Tyler’s wife. A woman who has every right to decide what peace feels like if it’s finally found her.
I drop a kiss to her temple. “I’m skeptical as hell.”
Her laugh is soft. “I know.”
I lean down so I can see her face. “But if anyone was stubborn enough to find a way to communicate from beyond the grave, it’d be Tyler.”
That gets a laugh out of Weston and a low snort from Calder.
“Man never knew how to quit,” I say with a faint smile. “If there’s any way for him to get a message through, he’d have figured it out just so he could feel smug about it.”
Elena’s eyes shine, but she’s smiling, too. “That does sound like him.”
“Damn right,” Weston murmurs.
Things go quiet after that, and Elena’s body is soft against mine again, but my mind won’t settle.
All this time, I’ve felt like I was stealing something from Tyler by being with Elena. Like I was failing him twice.
Elena must feel a change in my body, because she twists to look up at me, flattening a hand against my chest. “Buck? You okay?”
I catch her hand and hold it there, while I collect my thoughts. When I speak, my voice is so thick, I barely recognize it. “I couldn’t save him. That truth doesn’t change, and I’ll carry it ‘til the day I die.”
Elena’s hand squeezes a handful of my shirt, then she rubs my chest, like she’s trying to comfort my heart.
“You’ve got me thinking, though, that maybe I don’t have to punish myself forever, and it sure as hell doesn’t mean I’m dishonoring him by loving the family he left behind.”
“It doesn’t,” Elena says softly, but firmly.
“It’s about time you figured that out.” Weston’s tone is gentle, but there’s no humor there.
“You already knew it?” I challenge.
Weston shrugs. “I kept thinking the guilt would catch up with us, like if we got too happy, we’d have to answer for it.” He looks at Elena then. “But I’m done with that. I loved him, and I love you.” His familiar smile comes back. “And apparently I tolerate these two.”
Calder snorts.
“On a permanent basis,” Weston adds.
Elena makes a sound that’s halfway between laughter and tears.
I look over at Calder. “You in?”
Calder looks back at me for a long second, then he looks at Elena, and whatever he sees in her face seems to settle something in him, too. “I was in before I knew what hit me.”
“Me too,” Elena says. “With all of you.”
Calder nods once. “Permanent. No backup plan.”
“No half measures,” Weston says.
Something deep and quiet clicks into place for me.
When I moved to Moon Ridge, I told myself it was going to be home, but it never fully settled in my bones that way. I put down roots, took the job, and built a life, but some part of me stayed separate from it, like I was living in the aftermath instead of the present or future.
Sitting here now, with Elena warm against me and my teammates looking more like family than brothers-in-arms, I finally understand the difference. Home was never the place, it was the people.
Weston leans forward and takes Elena’s hand, then Calder comes over and kneels beside her. With a hand on her waist, I hold her steady in the center of us.
Elena looks around at each of us. “No more guilt.”
“No more guilt,” Weston agrees.
Calder nods.
I press my mouth to the side of her neck. “No more guilt.”
Her breath catches, she tips her head back against my shoulder, and the air in the room changes. A warmth settles in that makes my blood move lower and slower. It makes me more aware of her mouth, the line of her throat, the way Weston’s thumb strokes over her knuckles while Calder’s hand settles onto her knee.
It’s not just desire. It’s trust, commitment, and a feeling so deep it has nowhere to go except into touch.
Weston brushes his fingers under her chin, then kisses her, slow and unhurried. Calder’s hand slides up her thigh, reverent. I spread my palm over her stomach and hold her against me as I kiss a tender spot beneath her ear and send a shiver through her.
She makes a helpless sound into Weston’s mouth.
Then a small voice drifts out from the hallway. “Mom?”
All four of us freeze, and I close my eyes briefly against a laugh.
Weston and Calder sit back, and Elena calls out to her son, a little breathless. “Come in, Bug.”