Page 43 of From the Embers
Including risking it all.
My heart raced as I lifted my shaking hand. “Because he doesn’t matter anymore and you still do.”
His eyes flashed dark when I curled my fingers around the back of his neck. One single movement made my intentions clear.
“What are you doing?” he rumbled.
“What I should have done weeks ago.”
His eyes flared, but he didn’t move.
“Eason,” I gasped and he was right there, inches away, swallowing my desire as I pleaded for his.
His mouth hovered over mine while he searched my face. “You’re all I have left, Bree. And dammit, you were his too.”
As he straightened, I fisted a hand in the front of his shirt. “No, I wasn’t. You know it as well as I do. I was a fucking puppet in his show, and I’m done wearing the strings.”
I pressed up onto my toes, done with so much more than just Rob Winters.
I was done hurting. Done burning at the stake for a man who had never given a damn about me. But most of all, I was done pretending I didn’t want Eason on levels that had not one fucking thing to do with our shared tragedies.
As his mouth came down on mine, his lips parted, and our tongues shared their first dance, Eason made it clear he was done too. Slanting his head, he took it deeper, sealing our mouths together, but even better, he sealed everything else out. He tasted like nothing and everything as we desperately warred, seeking the control neither of us was willing to surrender.
Wrapping my arms around his neck, I tried to get impossibly closer. As if we were sharing the same thoughts, he palmed my ass, lifting me off my feet. My legs circled his hips as he carried us forward, my back hitting the wall with a loud thud.
After all the yelling he’d done, the cussing, the candles shattering—all of it—somehow it was my back against the wall that woke her up.
“Daddy!” Luna cried.
His head popped up, both of us panting, but reality slapped Eason the hardest.
“Oh, God,” he breathed, squeezing his eyes shut and lowering me back to my feet.
“It’s okay. It’s okay,” I chanted, framing his face with my hands. “Look at me.”
He shook his head but dipped to rest our foreheads together.
“It changes nothing—do you hear me? We don’t even know for sure if Rob got Jessica pregnant or not. What we do know, no matter what happened, you are her father. She loves you, and biology, one way or the other, will never change that.” I tapped my finger over his heart. “Luna is yours in the only way that truly matters, okay?”
“Yeah,” he replied, but it was neither convincing nor confident.
Luna let out another cry, and like the good father he was, Eason didn’t keep her waiting.
“Shh, baby, I’m right here,” he cooed, opening the bedroom door. “Did Daddy wake you up?”
She babbled something I couldn’t quite make out, but Eason had no trouble.
“No, nothing to be scared of. Come here. We got a visitor while you were sleeping.”
I made quick work of straightening my shirt and smoothing down the top of my hair as he carried her out.
“Look, it’s Aunt Bree,” he told her.
Taking her hand, I brought it to my lips. “Hey, sweetie.”
She leaned into Eason’s shoulder and glared at me, less than thrilled to have been woken up by the sounds of me mauling her father. Okay, fine, so she didn’t know that part, but she was still sleepy and pissed.
Something in my chest had my eyes darting away from her sweet, chubby face because I didn’t want to see it. I hadn’t been lying to Eason when I’d sworn that it didn’t matter whose DNA ran through her veins. But just like with all those pictures on Rob’s phone, with fresh eyes and the whole truth, I could see some very compelling details.
Through the years, Jessica and I had been asked countless times if we were sisters. We had different eyes—hers blue and mine green—but they were both light. We had fair skin, but we both tanned in the summer. And while we each straightened our chestnut-brown hair, we shared similar naturally wild waves.
I’d been further along than she had, but we’d been pregnant with the girls at the same time. We used to joke that they would probably come out looking like twins. Jessica was obviously working with slightly more information than I was, but there was no denying Luna and Madison looked alike.
Whether it was because of their mothers’ similarities or the fact that they shared a father, I had no idea. However, it was up to Eason if we would ever find out.
“Do you need to get back to the kids?” he asked, snapping my attention back to his.
I cleared my throat, praying he couldn’t read my mind. “I can if you want time alone.”
