Page 38 of Walkoff Wedding

Her art is everywhere—on the walls, on the massive easel near the window, in frames along the shelves, and I can’t stop the smile that tugs at my lips.

“That’s beautiful,” I say simply, eying the half-finished canvas that sits on the easel before looking back at her.

That delicious pink flush is back, and now it’s traveled down to her neck at my compliment.

“Thank you,” she whispers, holding my gaze for a beat longer before turning and walking toward her makeshift closet.

Seeing everything she’s done to her room, making it an extension of herself, makes me wonder what she’ll do to make my apartment hers too.

Even though our arrangement is temporary… we didn’t set a time limit, but it will at least be as long as it takes to get through probate. In the meantime, I want her to feel comfortable there too. It’s just as much hers as it is mine now.

“You should paint something to hang above the couch,” I say as I sit at the edge of her bed, watching her packing things into a suitcase.

“You want me to paint something for your apartment?” I can hear the disbelief in her voice, like me asking her that is so hard to believe.

“Our apartment,” I say playfully.

She looks up, laughing softly, “Okay, our apartment,” before going back to her packing. She’s moved on from clothes to smaller belongings, shoving them into the zipper pockets. Pencils, notebooks… underwear.

I try not to think about what they look like on her and drag my gaze to the canvases on her wall.

“Fuck yeah, I want you to paint something. Whatever you want.”

There’s a stretch of silence, and then she says, “Okay. Maybe.”

And that’s better than no.

True to what she said in the truck earlier, she doesn’t have much. Most of what she’s packed fits into one large suitcase, her backpack, and an oversized duffle bag.

I know there’s probably no love lost moving out of here, but I still give her a moment alone in her space and carry everything down to my truck. It fits easily into the bed.

I turn toward the staircase just as Addie appears, no longer in the dress she wore to our wedding but in a pair of jeans with a cropped top covered in daisies. Of course, she’s in her Mary Janes. She looks cute as fuck.

“Hi,” she whispers, staring up at me.

“Ooooh. She’s back with the Mary Janes,” I tease with a wink.

Suddenly, I hear the front door violently slam shut, and when I look over, I see a man barreling toward us. His posture is tight and his expression furious, which has me stepping in front of Addie, pushing her behind me protectively.

It dawns on me that this must be her asshole stepfather.

He’s tall, but not quite as tall as me, with salt-and-peppered, graying hair that matches his beard. I know from the second I lay eyes on him that he’s every bit of the piece of shit that I figured he would be.

Addie’s body goes taut behind me, and she reaches out to grasp onto the back of my forearm. Her nails dig into my skin, and I realize that she’s fucking scared.

She’s scared of him, and it makes me see red. The fact that she’s cowering away from him makes me want to protect her from him.

“Where the hell have you been?” he spits when he makes it to us, his seedy gaze moving between me and Addie, who’s standing still slightly behind me.

I hope he knows that he’s not going to disrespect her with me here, and if he doesn’t… well, he’s going to learn really fucking quick.

“I… I just needed to grab my things, Brent. I’m moving out,” she whispers timidly. So quietly that I wonder if he’s missed it until I see the muscle in his jaw tick as he grinds his teeth together.

He steps toward her, and I move directly in front of him, blocking him from getting any closer. “That’s far enough. You can talk to her from here.”

“Yeah?” He laughs humorlessly before dragging his attention to Addie and then back to me. “And who the fuck are you?”

“Her husband,” I retort with finality.

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