Page 77 of Long Road Home

A thunderstorm raged in his eyes, in the fierceness of his expression. “What’d you say?”

It’d been a mistake. Too soon. I shook my head. “Nothing—”

“Love me. That’s not nothing, Des.”

My name on his lips. The quirk of his. “You love me.”

The urge to flee, to run and escape to a safe space clawed at me. I shoved at his chest, wiggled beneath him, but he had me pinned. He must have seen the panic in my eyes setting in because his jaw went tight.

“Destiny—”

“I shouldn’t have said it. Not yet. Not then.”

“No better time to say it than when you’re so overwhelmed with it you can’t hold it in anymore.”

Oh God. A heavy breath fell from my lips. And it hit me. His expression wasn’t jaded and filled with fury I’d done something wrong. It was filled with the same burning need I had to speak it, only he’d had the control to hold it back.

And again, another realization.

There was no reason to run from him and flee when he was the person, the only person outside Toby and Tillie I’d ever want to runto.My backbone unfurled and strengthened one vertebra at a time.

I licked my lips and looked him square in the eye. “I love you, Jordan Marx.”

Twenty-Five

Jordan

She loved me.

I didn’t know until she said it how much I’d been holding back, not knowing I’d needed her to say it first.

With my cock still inside of her after making her come a third time, my heart thumped so harshly if it exploded from my chest I wouldn’t have been surprised.

“You love me,” I repeated. It was more to myself than her. I needed to hear it.

I desperately needed to hear Destiny tell me she loved me because I’d been in love with her since I was sixteen years old and until she returned, I didn’t realize that feeling for her had never faded. Not once. Even with the anger I still felt at what she’d done, but hell I understood it so much better now.

“You don’t have to feel it,” she said, her eyes still held that panicked look but fuck, she was majorly misunderstanding me.

I still couldn’t gather my thoughts enough to say it back even though I felt it. Knew it to the depths of my bone marrow this woman beneath me was the only woman I wanted beneath me for the rest of my life.

“Jesus,” I whispered, laughing lightly. “Give me a minute to catch up.”

I bent down and kissed her. I kissed her like we had all the time in the world and ten years to make up for and when I pulled back, we were both out of breath.

I slowly pulled out of her and curled her toward me into my side.

She’d kissed me back, took everything I give, but her body had shaken like she’d been fighting back tears at the same time. “Destiny.” My hand went to her hair, pushed it back and down the length until my hand was at the curve of her waist. She was so slender. So perfectly beautiful she stole my breath every time she walked into the room.

“It’s okay,” she said, her face coming to some answer. It was the wrong damn one. She spoke before I could tell her. “It’s okay not to love me. It’s okay. It’ll take time, I know.” Her hand pressed to my cheek. “I’m willing to wait, Jordan. For however long it takes. I get it.”

“You don’t get shit,” I said. This woman. Always so sure shit was going to go bad for her. It was frustrating as hell but put me up to the challenge of being the man who could ensure her how wrong she was at the same time. “I’m not going to lie and say it doesn’t bother me that Toby calls me Jordan and not dad. I can’t say I don’t still watch him, that ache in my chest when he does something, and I wonder if he’s always done it, is it a mannerism, and the fact that if it is…it didn’t come from me. That shit still burns, but it hasn’t been that long.”

I had him now. And like Destiny and I had the rest of time to get past what she did, Toby and I had the rest of time to create our own bond and relationship.

It stung, but it was hard to hold it against her when my son was so damn awesome.

“Sweetheart, you’re the only woman I’ve ever loved. And blink away all your fear and worry. I do love you. I’ll love you for the rest of my life. I needed to hear you say it first. I needed you to give that to me, and I’m shocked it came so soon.”

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