Page 221 of Wild Then Wed
“You don’t just love the parts of someone that are easy. You don’t get to sayI’m inwhen things are light and happy and then check out when they get complicated. You love the grief. The mess. The history. You love the people they used to be and the people they’re still becoming.”
I feel my voice catch in my throat, but I don’t stop.
“And I look at you—allof you—and there isn’t a single part I’d walk away from. Not even this. Especially not this. I think the dark parts of you are just as worth loving as the rest.”
He closes his eyes, and I feel his shoulders fall, like something in him just let go.
“You talk about this like it’s the worst part of you,” I say quietly. “But it’s not. It’s the part that proves how much you loved them. The pain’s just what’s left of that love that didn’t have anywhere to go.”
He opens his eyes again, and they’re red and swollen. And then he leans in and kisses my forehead, holding his lips there like he’s trying to say something he doesn’t have words for.
Then he kisses my lips and when he pulls back, his hand comes up to rest on the side of my neck. He presses his forehead to mine.
“I don’t know what I did to deserve you,” he says quietly.
I kiss him again, with both hands on his face like I’m reminding him—you’re here, I’m here, we’re okay.Then I pull back just enough to look him in the eye.
“You’re just you,” I whisper. “That’s all you ever had to be for me.”
He blinks like he doesn’t know what to do with that, and maybe he doesn’t. But he doesn’t pull away. He just lets it land.
I hesitate, then ask, “Do you mind telling me how they…?”
My voice trails off. The word gets caught somewhere between my throat and my heart. I swallow hard and try again. “It’s just…you’ve never actually told me before.”
He lets out a long, slow breath, and I feel it in his chest, pressed against mine.
“It was a car accident,” he says finally, voice flat at first, like he’s said the words before but learned how to strip the feeling out of them.
He pauses. Like the next part is harder to say.
“We had this Christmas party at the clinic. There were going to be some top-tier vets there, ones you don’t really skip out on when they say they’re stopping by your clinic.”
He exhales again, eyes darting past me, not really focused on anything.
“Julia was five months pregnant at the time. She got tired pretty easily, especially in the evenings. She didn’t want to stay at the party all night, and she knew I couldn’t leave early, so she suggested driving herself. Said that way she could head home whenever she felt like it.”
His jaw tightens. His throat works against the words.
“I tried to talk her out of it. God, I tried. But trying to talk Julia out of anything was futile and useless. She was so damn stubborn.”
He shakes his head, tears filling his eyes again. His hand is still on the back of my neck, but it’s shaking now.
“So I followed her. Drove behind her, thinking maybe that was the compromise. Still with her. Just…not in the same car.”
I already feel my own eyes stinging. My stomach knots, because I know what’s coming. Not the details. But the pain. The pain that doesn’t live in the telling, but in the remembering.
“We came to this four-way stop about ten minutes from the clinic. It was her turn to go, so she did.”
His voice breaks completely.
“And this semi truck…out of fucking nowhere, it just blew through the intersection and slammed right into the side of her car.”
I can’t breathe. I don’t even realize I’ve stopped until my chest jerks and I suck in a shaky inhale.
“I watched it happen,” he says, barely getting the words out. “From the goddamn stop sign. I wasrightthere. I saw everything.”
He looks down, more tears streaming down his cheeks.
