He laughed. “That’s one of the perks of being married, sweetheart.”
Married. The word zinged through her, sang in her bloodstream. He was her man – he’d always been – and he was her husband, too, and she didn’t know if she wanted to cry or laugh, or maybe both, because she was so purely happy.
She tipped her head back, as his face lifted, so she could look up at him with a wry smile. His face was upside down to her, and the sun struck his high cheekbones, tanning them a rich gold. “Any other perks?”
He kissed her, his chin against her nose, the stubble tickling her skin. His tongue played between her lips and she brought her hands up to frame his jaw, holding him down against her as she opened her mouth.
The guy gassing up his truck at the next pump over cleared his throat loudly and Mercy lifted his head, shooting him a glare.
Ava bit back a laugh. “Weareobnoxious,” she said. “We’re like those handsy people waiting in line at the ferris wheel.”
“Which ferris wheel?” he asked, distracted as he murder-stared the truck owner back around to the other side of his pickup.
“Every ferris wheel in the entire history of state fairs.” She tugged at the front of his sweatshirt. “Don’t scare the man.”
He made a snorting sound, but backed off, stepping to the pump and pulling the nozzle off the rack so he could fill the bike. “Did you talk to your mom?”
“Yep.” She swung her legs around so she faced him.
“Did you…?” His brows went up and she understood.
“No, I didn’t tell her.” Her eyes went to the ring. The fingers of her right hand went to the ring too, the tips running across the smooth gold circle. “I just…” She shrugged. “Want to enjoy it first for a little while, I guess.”
“Enjoy it while it lasts, you mean?” There was a bitter twist to his smile.
“No.” She was firm. “I mean, if this is our honeymoon” – she gestured to the gas station, the customers filling their cars, the two kids screaming over dropped ice cream sandwiches at the sidewalk – “then I don’t want to hear my dad bitching us out over the phone for half of it.” She gave him a wide, bright smile, too full of exuberance to let his doubt about her sincerity slow her down.
He studied her as the pump ticked, ticked, ticked.
“Don’t look at me like you’re waiting for me to regret it,” she said. “Because that’s not going to happen.”
His smile was small, but more true this time. “I know.”
Ava didn’t want him going down this rabbit hole any further than he’d already gone. “So where are we going from here?”
“Cartersville,” he said. “We’ll get something to eat, catch a few hours of sleep, and head out while it’s dark.”
She nodded. “The people we’re staying with – they’re club-friendly?”
He nodded. “Guy went to London with us. I trust him.”
And he didn’t trust easy. His word was more than good enough for her.
Ava got to her feet and put her back to the gas pump, so she stood alongside him.
He watched her. “What?”
She slid her arm around his waist, inside his jacket, leaning into his side, breathing the smell of road and wind off of his clothes. “I needed to do this,” she said, smiling against his flannel-covered chest.
His free hand came up, settling against the back of her head. There would always be something reverent and paternal about the way he touched her, her little girl self always in his conscience. His voice dropped to the barest whisper. “Do you wish–”
“No. Hush,” she admonished, the way he always did with her. “I don’t wish anything but this.”
“No. I don’t believe that.”
In the mid-afternoon, with the blinds shut, the chapel gave the dark, deep impression of an English study, a shuttered library, the smell of wood polish thick as smoke. It was the first chance Aidan had had to be alone with his father, and they’d needed to be alone, because what Greg had shared that morning didn’t belong out in the open air.
Aidan took a hard drag on his smoke – how many cigs was this for the day so far? – and said, “That’s just what he told me,” on the exhale.
