Page 91 of The Fix Is In (Torus Intercession 4)
“It just hit me all at once,” he confessed. “All I could lose.”
“No.”
He was quiet a moment and then tipped his head up to look at me. “Would you like to expound on that a bit?”
“I just mean I’m not leaving you. I’m not doing that. No. Just no.”
He lifted up to wrap his arms around my neck, and I bent so he could. “I love you, Shaw James. I do. I truly do.”
“Yeah, well, I love you back,” I rumbled, kissing his cheek as Justin lay down on his side and curled up into the fetal position. “And what the hell,” I said, gesturing at Justin. “Have you always had bad taste in men?”
“Yes,” he assured me, smiling wide. “I had very bad taste in men until you.”
“Well, thank God I showed up, then,” I groused at him.
“Yes, thank God.”
15
I was on my mother’s roof with Killian, Niall, and Oran looking for the one burned-out light bulb somewhere on Santa and his sleigh that was making one whole side—including Dasher, Prancer, Comet, and Donner plus Rudolph—not be illuminated. How my mother knew which reindeer were which was a mystery, but I suspected, as Cormac had pointed out, that she was probably just alternating their names. Regardless, we needed to find the one bulb out of a billion that was out.
“Didn’t I say we should change the lights out last year so this would never happen again?” I asked everyone who was on the roof with me.
The chorus of yes and fuck you was equal.
After a while, of course, as it was the weekend before Christmas at another Sunday dinner, other members of my family started to come out and, regrettably, offer suggestions.
“Check Santa’s mitten!” Rory was trying to sound helpful, but it came out as an order. “That was the problem last year.”
It couldn’t be that easy.
“Try the reins,” Nuan shouted up. “Two years ago, it was the one right by Dancer!”
“Which is where?” I bellowed back.
“On the left! The left!”
I checked the entire length of the reins, because why not?
It got cold, so everyone got down but me. I was the youngest and so had been raised to be the most hard-core. And I was a Marine, for fuck’s sake. We never gave up.
As I continued to look, I thought about Justin McNair, who was being extradited back to Oregon because the bulk of his crimes had been committed there. Illegally buying dynamite—which along with the gas was what blew up half Benji’s house—attempted murder, stalking, harassment… it was a whole laundry list of crimes. Since I had basically taken a gun away from him, sprained his wrist and broken his nose in the process, Illinois allowed Oregon to have him. One less person to prosecute had to be a good thing.
I was surprised when my phone rang. The picture of Benji on my screen was pretty cute. In it, he was puckering, ready for a kiss, and it made me smile whenever I saw it.
“Hi,” I greeted him, breathing out any drop of aggravation. He had a soothing effect on me; it was grounding and good. “Whatcha doin’?”
“Coming up there,” he announced and was suddenly walking across the snow-covered roof to join me.
“No, no, no,” I warned him, pointing back the way he’d come. “Get back inside. I don’t want you to fall. You’re not all that coordinated.”
He gasped dramatically. “You wound me, sir,” he said, but he was laughing. “And I have an idea.”
“Then come over here by me, willya please?”
He shook his head as though I were ridiculous, but did as I asked. When he reached me, I caged him against me, making sure I was between him and the edge of the fifty-foot drop.
“What’s your idea?” I asked, pushing his beanie back and smoothing my thumb over his beautiful, expressive eyebrows before I kissed his nose and then his mouth.
“I forget,” he sighed, smiling up at me dreamily.
He said often that he could look up and always spot me, staring at him with blatant possessiveness. With him, it was this absolute adoration. The love rolled off him in waves. I’d never been so happy and content and settled in my own skin. There had always been a great big hole in my heart. Who knew the fix for it was there as soon as I first locked eyes with Benji Grace?
“Tell me,” I prodded him.
“Let’s take a picture,” he told me. “Whenever Sian and I were trying to help Chris find a burnt-out fairy light in the pub, we took a picture and it helped us see the dark spots.”
“Oh, that’s a great fuckin’ idea,” I praised him, realizing I was turning into a popsicle.
Once we took it, I saw that one of the reindeer’s oversized booties—they were not anatomically correct, with their spindly legs, thick hips, and tiny heads—did in fact have some lights out. It turned out to be seven or so, and once I got those changed out, hallelujah, Rudolph was leading the sleigh again and all was right with the world.
