Page 106 of Starting Back
“And we could set everything up by the time you’re done.” Emma tapped my arm for me to set her down and raced toward the bags.
“This is all great. Thank you.”
Chloe smiled at me as she scrolled through her phone. She still wasn’t all that talkative, but I attributed most of that to her being a teenager.
The tension between us had dissipated, but every smile she gave me still felt like a win. I loved the idea of her spending the afternoon with my aunt just to learn how to bake cookies for me.
“We can have pizza or burgers. Both say they deliver here.”
“Pizza!” Emma flung her arms in the air.
“It’s not your birthday,” Chloe told her, rolling her eyes.
“Pizza sounds great to me. Order whatever you want.” I slid my palm against Kristina’s. “Can I talk to you for a minute?”
Kristina nodded, her brow furrowed as I led her into my bedroom and shut the door.
“I know I probably overstepped.” She winced when I turned around. “But maybe if you don’t think of today as your birthday so much as all of us wanting to—”
I pulled her to me and cut her off with a kiss, backing her toward my bed until she fell onto the mattress.
The need to touch her and claim her was visceral. My blood roared in my veins as I hooked her leg over my hip, so keyed up to take her right here and now, but I had to find a way to stop with her daughters awake and only a couple of rooms away.
I tried to make every stroke of my tongue and thrust of my hips count until we could be alone. She ran her hands up and down my back, her light touch sending chills along my spine until she dipped her finger into the waistband of my sweatpants.
“Sorry,” I panted as I tore my mouth away from hers. “I needed my mouth on you before I lost my mind, but we can’t gotherewith company.”
She laughed, her swollen mouth spreading into a dazed smile.
“I know,” she sighed as she drifted her hand across her lips. “Not used to the extra stubble. It’s hot.”
“Is it?” I rubbed my hand along my jaw. “Noted.” I pressed my hands against the bed and lifted myself up, hating to hover instead of being right on top of her.
“I don’t like my birthday for the same reason I never liked talking about my life before my parents died or staying with anything long enough to get attached. But today, as birthdays went before I started ignoring them”—I cupped her cheek, gliding my thumb back and forth across her cheekbone as her eyes held mine—“this one is already one of the best, thanks to all of you.”
Her eyes watered as she sank her teeth into her bottom lip.
“I’m glad,” she said in a shaky voice.
I kissed the corner of her mouth and pushed off the bed.
From the second we met, it felt like I’d found something I was too scattered to know I was looking for. I wanted to tell her that, and that I loved her more than I ever imagined I could love anyone, but I could never find the right words.
Kristina was a miracle in so many ways. I wasn’t thinking about my next destination, because for the first time in my life, I felt like I was right where I was supposed to be.
THIRTY-EIGHT
KRISTINA
“I’m not used to having you here on a weekday and in the daytime,” Buck mused as we ate lunch in the break room.
“Dr. Baker closed for the week, so I offered to come in if they needed a tech. Sorry to cramp your style now that you’re on days,” I teased and took a bite of my sandwich. “Plus, now I can sneak off to the nursery on breaks, so it’s perfect timing.”
Baby Keely had finally come into the world last night, a week overdue. I made sure to get in a half hour early so I could head over to see her and Peyton. Visiting hours started at ten, but no one stopped me, thanks to my hospital ID.
Keely was as gorgeous as her mother, and Jake had been a mushy puddle of love when I’d left them this morning.
“Imagine going back to the baby days?” Buck winced. “Don’t get me wrong, I loved being a new dad, but now that Mackenzie and Noah are older, I’m not sure if I could do it again. Doreen and I were talking about that the other day. We’re too old.”
