Page 224 of The Reason I Married Him
“Do you know what a stepping stone for you to becoming a great wife could be?” I ask.
Her eyes narrow. “I’m afraid to even ask. Knowing you, you’re going to say something idiotic like blow jobs every night.”
“Babe, that’s just expected, the standard.”
“In your dreams.”
I laugh and push back from the table slightly. “I wasn’t going to say that, but you know, if you want to make that a ritual, I’m all for it. Totally up to you.” She rolls her eyes. “I was going to say sitting on my lap.”
“What is it with you and using your body as my own personal seating device?”
I chuckle. “I like you on me. I like you near me. I like touching you. Feeling you. Is that such a crime?”
“When you put it that way, no,” she says as she stands from her chair and brings her plate next to mine. Then she sits on my lap, and I wrap my arm around her waist and rest my chin on her shoulder. “Better?” she asks.
“Much. Such a good wife.” I kiss her shoulder and sigh into her back, feeling fully content, like this is what it was supposed to be all along.
Me and her.
It feels so right. And if I have to address the elephant in my room, not hers, this connection I have with her feels significantly stronger than the one I had with Cadance. Looking back on that relationship, it almost seems like she was a stepping stoneas well because without her leaving me the night before our wedding, I never would have felt the pressure to come to Almond Bay. I never would have sought out Aubree. I never would have reconnected with Ryland and Hattie and especially Mac.
I’m ashamed to say it, but it was hard to keep in touch when Clarke passed. It makes me wonder if that’s the reason he made me part owner of the farm . . .
“Hey, Aubree?”
“Hmm?” She turns to look me in the eyes.
“Do you ever think about why Cassidy and Clarke left me part of the farm?”
She takes a sip of her drink quickly and then answers, “When I first found out, every day. I constantly thought about how it was such a huge inconvenience to me and didn’t quite understand why they would do something like that.”
“Do you have an understanding now?” I ask.
“I have a thought.”
“What is it?” I ask.
“Well, this might sound a little morbid, but a part of me thinks they did it for this exact instance, where something happened to the both of them, and they wanted to keep us close together. I know they made the change after Mac was born. The lawyer told Ryland and me, so maybe it was their attempt to keep the families bonded.”
“That’s what I was thinking just now.” My grip on her grows tighter as I say, “I’m ashamed to admit it, but I don’t think I’d have stayed connected if it wasn’t for the farm.” I drag my hand over my face. “Jesus, I’m such an asshole.”
“You’re not,” she says.
“No, I kind of am.” I lean back in the chair, guilt swarming me. “Clarke and I were never that close. We were there for each other when we needed help, but we were very different. I was immersed in the world of fiction. I was enamored by crimesand murder and suspense, whereas he had a helping heart, one of pure gold, and wanted to spend his life serving as a humanitarian. I was proud of him, and he was proud of me, but that was as far as it went. I know when he got Cassidy pregnant, it was a kink in his plans. He grew slightly more distant after they moved in together, and I know it was because he struggled with his goals and responsibilities. I should have helped him. I should have been there for him more.”
Aubree forces me to look her in the eyes when she says, “Trust me when I say this, Wyatt. Playing the would have, should have, could have game about a lost sibling will get you absolutely nowhere. I played it for months after we lost Cassidy. I still play it on occasion, and it’s done nothing but made me increasingly more frustrated. You can’t expect yourself to change the past with thoughts in the present. The best thing you can do to honor your brother is to do what you think he’d have wanted. If that means staying connected with the Rowleys, with Mac, then that’s what you do.”
“But it took my own selfishness to finally connect. Clarke never would have acted the way that I did.”
“Probably not,” Aubree says as she lifts my head and lightly runs her thumb over my cheek. “But it shouldn’t matter how you got here. What matters is that you are here and you promised you would keep in touch, even after . . . well”—she grows quiet—“after all this ends.”
And there it is, the shared elephant in the room.
Because we said this is for a year, but now that we’re dating, what does that all really mean? Hell if I fucking know, and I’m pretty sure she has no clue either. We’re both at a disadvantage and unsure of where to go from here. But I do know one thing. I like her and don’t want to think about an end.
“Maybe it doesn’t have to,” I say.
“What do you mean?” she asks, looking confused.
