“Bowen, you don’t need to give me a pep talk. I’m cool now. It was hard at first, but I have my dad and some pretty amazing friends. My dad’s wife is awesome too. She has kids of her own, but she’s always gone out of her way to include me. That’s all the family I need. I don’t even know why I brought it up. I’ve never told anyone about that trip before. Honestly, it’s embarrassing to even think about.”
He kissed me again, his lips gentle and filled with gratitude. “Well, I’m glad you told me. I may not always have the right thing to say, Remi. But you’ll never catch any judgment from me.”
That was the exact moment when I should have told him about my memory loss. Rip off the Band-Aid and get it out there once and for all. It wasn’t necessarily a secret. I just wasn’t ready to tell him yet.
He wouldn’t have cared. I knew it with every fiber of my being.
But he would look at me differently. He’d ask questions about how I was feeling. Daily curiosity if I’d remembered anything new. The answer was always no. But God, it was a lot of pressure to fake it sometimes.
And if that weren’t bad enough, he’d start treating me different. The way Mark and Aaron did. I appreciated both of them more than words could ever convey. I didn’t know what I would have done without them after the plane crash. But I felt like a kid with two overprotective brothers who would flip their shit if I so much as got a headache.
I adored the way Bowen looked at me. Like I was a whole independent woman and not a porcelain doll who’d been glued back together, yet still missing a few pieces.
Honestly, when I was with him, it was the only time I felt like my old self again. And for a woman who had lost almost a year of her life, that was far too precious to gamble with.
So, instead of spilling it all, I smiled and nipped at his bottom lip. “Well, this has been a big night. You got a garden table and the sob story about my mom.”
He smirked. “You left out the blow job. And the fact that I somehow managed to make you fall in love with me. Not a bad night if you ask me.” He cut the water off and then grabbed two towels off the rack. Passing one my way, he said, “It’ll be even better if you let me skip out on finishing the table tonight so I can take you to bed and bury my head between your thighs.”
I laughed.
But I did not say no.
Remi
“Surprise!” we yelled when my dad walked into the private bar area at The Rusty Nail.
He stumbled back several steps, but Mark was behind him, keeping him upright.
With wide eyes, Dad scanned the room, his hand clutched over his heart. “Good lord, you can’t do that to an old ticker.”
Everyone laughed, including Bowen, who was standing beside me with his arm draped around my hips. Aaron was on my other side, grinning like the cat who ate the canary. Trust me, no one was more surprised than I was that he’d actually been able to keep a secret from my dad for that long.
After a few handshakes and back pats, Dad made a beeline over to me and dragged me into a hug. Thoroughly rattled, he whispered into my ear, “Jesus, kid. You could have given me a little warning. I thought I was coming to fix a fryer. I didn’t even comb my hair.”
I giggled. “You don’t warn people about a surprise party, Dad. If you do, it just becomes a plain old boring party.”
“Plain old boring is my middle name.” He released me and hauled Bowen into a hug, asking, “Did you know about this too?”
My dad was friendlier than most. He adopted anyone and everyone who walked into his restaurant, so it wasn’t out of the ordinary to see him doling out hugs to virtual strangers. Though Bowen’s stiff posture and look of horror made it significantly more amusing than usual.
I slapped a hand over my mouth to stifle my laughter.
“Uhhh,” Bowen drawled, cutting his gaze to me over my dad’s shoulder. “Nice to meet you too, sir.”
As though the awkwardness had been contagious, my dad’s back shot straight. “Oh shit.” He dropped his hands and stepped away. With his furry gray brows knitting in the middle, he planted his hands on his hips. “Wait a minute. Who the hell are you, young man?”
Laughter bubbled from my throat as they stared at each other, one equally as confused as the other.
“Daddy, this is my boyfriend, Bowen Michaels. Bowen, this is Jack Grey, the man who made me the awkward, bumbling train wreck I am today.”
