Page 73 of Finding Romance
Piper’s head whips around toward me, her eyes wide and glimmering with tears. I reach out wiping a few away from her cheeks.
“Kasen?” she says, her hand coming out to touch my jaw as if she thinks I’m a mirage.
“Yeah, illustrator,” I state as I search her eyes.
“What are you…why are you…how are you here?” she stammers.
I caress her cheek and smile. “I realized that you don’t need to go to Seattle to figure out your life.” I pause and restate what I’m thinking. “I don’t want you to go to Seattle. I want you right here. I want to wake up and smell your shampoo. I want to watch you talk to my fish while you feed them. I want to sip whiskey with you. I want to sit in the park while you paint frogs. I want to drink coffee at Cam’s café with you. I want…you.” I trail off and search her eyes.
“You want me?” she asks as she frowns in confusion.
“Yes, I just want you, Piper. I never intended to find the one person who completes me. I know we were pretending but…somewhere along the way, I just…I fell in love with you. I didn’t mean to. I didn’t think I was good enough for you. But I want to be. You make me want to be better. I went to therapy because of you. I’m trying to fix myself because of you. I’m better because of you and if you give me a chance…” I trail off again overcome by emotion and my racing thoughts.
She places a finger over my lips. “You had me at you fell in love with me.” She smiles. “I love you too, Kasen. I’m not exactly sure how that happened in a matter of weeks, but…it did.” She has new tears falling but her smile tells me these are happy tears. “I’m a little scared,” she admits.
“So am I,” I admit.
“So…we’re, like, going to give this a real try?” she asks.
“If you want to,” I answer.
She grins and throws her arms around my neck. “Let’s deboard. And go home.”
“Home?” I ask.
“Yeah. Home,” she says. We both get up and leave after a long discussion with the gate agent and having to get her bag out of the plane; thank God they were just loading it and Piper faked a sob story about her aunt which was sort of true but also sort of a lie since she broke her ankle nearly six weeks ago.
“How are we getting home?” Piper asks as we walk out of the airport. I point to Bray’s car.
“I called in a favor,” I state as Hutch opens the passenger seat and takes Piper’s suitcase while the two of us slide into the back seats.
“Welcome back, Piper,” Bray says as he steers us home.
I breathe in the floral shampoo smell in her hair. It’s been two weeks, and I feel like the whole world has changed. Piper moved in officially last weekend. I went and got her things from her mom’s house. She keeps saying this is a trial thing, but I think that’s just her defense mechanism. She doesn’t want to end up like her parents and I totally get that.
Her business is booming. She has a dozen contracts with authors right now and she’s also working on pieces for her first gallery showing next month. And in her spare time, she’s decided to illustrate her own children’s book about frogs that live in a pond in a park in a city.
I squeeze her a little, drawing her tighter against me.
“Good morning,” she murmurs as she slides her leg between mine. Her hand goes up to my hair and she runs her fingers through the strands.
“Morning, baby,” I say, adding a kiss to her head.
She sighs contentedly and kisses my chest, and I feel…at peace.
This is how happiness is supposed to feel. I’m still working on being happy and accepting myself, faults and all, but I’m getting there, slowly, very slowly.
“You’re overthinking,” Piper says with a laugh. “Get out of your head.”
I smile and kiss her head again.
“I can be persuaded to get out of my head,” I tease as I push my morning wood against her leg.
“You’re insatiable, Kasen Saddler,” she says and then sits up. “Oh God, I’m a terrible girlfriend.”
“Why?”
“I don’t even know your middle name,” she says aghast as if that’s a crime.
