Page 70 of Back To You

I round the kitchen counter with our dinner and sit down. “All the more reason to go full steam ahead.” I pat the seat to my left for her to join me.

“Luke, I don’t know. We still have a lot to figure out.”

“So, we’ll figure it out together,” I answer. “Come sit down. You need to eat.”

I can see the conflict in her eyes. She doesn’t want to accept that she doesn’t have to do it all on her own anymore. I’m here for her to ask for help, and I’m going to help her even when she doesn’t ask.

We eat in a comfortable silence; the only noise is the TV playing in the background from when I was watching before Annie got home.

I keep an eye on her as we eat, and she looks like she’s miles away. I can almost see the wheels turning in her head, so I don’t even bother saying anything.

Still, she doesn’t say anything as I grab her empty plate, rinsing both our plates and silverware in the sink before putting everything into the dishwasher.

I grab each of us a brownie, one with chocolate frosting for her and one with powdered sugar for me. Putting each of them on a paper towel, I push herstowards her, knowing she’ll want to get to bed soon but always needing a sweet treat after a meal.

There’s a soft smile on her face when the brownie is in front of her, her features not as tight and drawn as they were before. Whatever spiral she was in before is starting to unwind in her mind, and I hope she talks about it instead of rushing off to bed like she did with the shower.

She breaks a piece off and popsit into her mouth and chews slowly, her eyes on the counter in front of her.

We’re both finishing our last bites when she finally says, “A lot has happened in the last few days, we aren’t the same people we were when we did this the first time.” She looks down at our hands in her lap before looking back up at me.

“Trust me, I know that better than anyone. I knew from the moment I found you at Lenny’s all those years ago that you were not the same girl I knew four months before.”

I’ve never told Annie how I watched her for longer than I’d like to admit before she saw me that day. She doesn’t know how surprised I was to see her or how I felt frozen in place when I heard her tell that old guy at the bar to fuck off. She has no idea that I recognized her from the outside but felt like she was a stranger on the inside—one that I wanted so badly to get to know.

“And I knew I was going to fall more in love with you the more I got to know this new version.”

“I treated you like shit foryears, Luke.” Her voice is raw with emotion, it’s laced with anger as she raises her voice.

She balls up the paper towel her brownie was on and throws it onto the table, bringing her knees into her chest, her eyes on the counter in front of her.

“I pretended that everything that happened between us meantnothingto me. I threw it all away without going to you first.You. The person who I trusted more than anyone. I just ran away from it all, only to waste all this time over something that wasn’t even your fault.”

I lean forward on the counter, reaching to tuck a piece of damp hair behind her ear. My fingers trail down her neck, around her jaw, until my fingers find her chin, and lift her face so I can make sure she looks at me when I say, “You and I both know that you did what you did to protect yourself. I will never blame you for that.” I press a kiss to her forehead. “You are so strong, Annie girl. You built walls around that heart and pretended like it didn’t exist, and I will never fault you for that.”

She shakes her head, and I drop my hand. I need her to look in my eyes when I tell her all of this. I round the counter and sit back down in the chair next to her, pulling her hand into my lap. “Look at me, honey. I want you to seriously listen to what I’m about to tell you.”

I can tell she wants to scoff at me, but she doesn’t. Instead, she looks up and finds my eyes. “You did not waste any time. Things happen the way they do for a reason, and now we have our second chance. A second chance that I have no intention of wasting.” I squeeze her hands in mine, giving her a soft smile. I watch as her lips curve upwards, and she squeezes back. “So, I’m going to say this one more time—move in with me.”

Her smile fades, but she doesn’t let go of my hands. I take that as a good sign. “I want to say yes, but—”

“But what? There’s no buts. Say yes.”

“What about rotations? How are we going to make it work? I’m barely home, working over 40 hours a week, plus research and reports, and all my additional requirements for evalu—”

“We’ll figure it out.”

“What about what you’re going to do? You have your own life and your own decisions to make with what to do with—”

“Annie.” I stop her because she’ll keep going until she tires herself out, trying to think of all the reasons this won’t work, even though I know that it will. “Say it with me, ‘we’ll figure it out.’”

“No, because you’re just saying that we’ll figure it out so I move in with you.”

“So, it’s a yes? You’re moving in with me?”

“No, I did not say that.”

“But you want to.”

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