Page 30 of Ansel

“You think I have to let my fear pass through me?”

“Yes, I do. When I met Devlin, I thought,oh my God, he’s a cop, he’ll get hurt, and my life will be ruined. But I love him, so I wasn’t going to let the fear of something thatmayhappen fuck up my happily ever after,” Sanya said sagely. “I can guarantee you that no matter how much you try to protect yourself, you will get hurt and sometimes you will hurt someone else. You just have to do the best you can.”

Devlin called from the dining room, “Are we eating, or are we solving Neha’s love life all night?”

Sanya rolled her eyes. “Both!” she shouted back before nudging me toward the table. “Come on. Eat first. Overthink later.”

I helped Sanya bring sambhar, eggplant fry made like my mother used to, rice, and masala yogurt to the table.

After dinner, and kissing my niece and nephew goodnight, I headed home, with Sanya’s voice in my head. By the time I was in bed that night, ready for Ansel and mygoodnightphone call, I was anxiousandnervous.

“How was dinner?” he asked as he knew I’d been with Sanya.

“Good. Real…Ansel, I was…ah…wondering if you’d like to….”Fuck! But this was hard.

“Baby?”

He’d started calling me baby, which I loved so much. It was romantic without being too weird.

“I was wondering if we could…you know date…likedate-dateinstead ofdate-not-date.” Okay, that was so much blabbering, I wasn’t sure it made any sense.

I waited for a response but got…silence.

And, then, more silence.

“Ansel?”

I heard a choked whisper. “Yeah, baby, we can date.”

“Are you…crying?”

I heard a sniffle. “Men don’t cry.”

I smiled. It was hard not to.

“Thank you for trusting me again,” he whispered.

My heart broke for him. “I don’t want you sad.”

“I know.”

“You do?”

“Yes, Neha. I hate it when you’re sad because I love you. When you hurt…I do as well. In fact, I’d rather I hurt, and you didn’t.”

My heart slammed in my chest. “What did you say?”

“I love you,” he repeated.

“Oh…I wasn’t sure if you….”

“I do love you, Neha. Very much.”

I changed the topic real fast because I couldn’t give him the words back, the three little words that had been tattooed on my heart for years because,fear was a motherfucking mind killer.

14

BE MY BABY, TONIGHT

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