Page 114 of Single Dad Dilemma
His eyes were red rimmed, but he simply listened.
“The smallest star is for my little brother,” I whispered raggedly, a sob climbing up my throat. “Aaron. He was eight.” I had to stop and try to catch my breath, tears flowing down my face again. “They were on the way to the airport to pick me up from a trip I took when I turned eighteen. A drunk driver crossed into the middle of the road.” I stopped, rolling my lips in and letting his perfect little face fill my mind. Gap between his teeth. Freckles over his nose. Black hair, just like mine. “Aaron never saw snow before he died. He always wanted to. H-he told me that it probably looked like magic in the sky.”
Barrett’s eyes were glossy with unshed tears now, too, and the sight of them was the only thing holding me together. I’d been alone in my grief for so long. Beenalonefor so long.
He kept using the edge of his thumb to wipe my tears, even when it was clearly a losing battle. He never stopped.
“Larry was his dog,” I said, my voice wet and full and thick. “My parents got him as a puppy right after Aaron turned three. My dad named him after Larry Bird because the Celtics were his favorite team. He and Aaron ... they were inseparable. Only person that fucking dog ever really loved.” I pinched my eyes shut as the loss of that little furball turned my chest inside out. “He was all I had left of them.”
“Oh, baby,” he breathed, tucking me against his chest while I wept. Grief, kept locked away long enough, had a devastating consequence when it was finally given a chance to breathe. My entire body shook as I cried. Saying their names, telling their story, was like breaking my head through the surface of the ocean. I’d been drowning for years, without really trying to reach out for help.
I wrapped an arm around Barrett’s back and held him as tightly as he held me. When I finally pulled back, he got another tissue and I managed a tiny smile before emptying my nose of the ungodly amount of snot blocking my breathing passages. Barrett finally pulled his arm out from underneath me but wove his fingers through mine so he could bring my knuckles to his mouth.
He shook his head and simply breathed me in. “I am so sorry. I can’t ... I can’t imagine, Lily.”
“There’s nothing you can say.” I tightened my grip in his. “I don’t like talking about it, as you can imagine.”
He pulled one hand from mine and smoothed it over the top of my head. “This is the third time you’ve finally told me about one of your tattoos.”
I exhaled a quiet laugh. “Yeah, it is.”
“You going to tell me why now?”
His eyes were soft, full of understanding. And I had a terrifying moment where I thought,I want to look at them forever.
“I’ve never met a man like you, Barrett King.” I adjusted my head on the pillow, tangling my legs further with his as he kept our hands anchored tight against his chest. “And you keep surprising me. I guess I felt like you deserved a piece of me no one else has ever had before.”
Oh, he liked that. His eyes did this warming thing, and his lips curved, and I wanted to lean forward and kiss them. A soft, sweet kiss, just because I could. Because he was close enough and would let me.
This wasn’t the moment for a kiss, and we both knew it.
“And that scares you?”
I let out a short, dry laugh and nodded. “The thought of putting my heart anyplace where it might get hurt again is the most terrifying thing I could imagine.” I licked my lips. “I don’t know what to do with you.”
With his free hand, Barrett cupped the side of my face, gently tracing the shell of my ear with the tip of his finger. “You don’t have to do anything.”
“No?”
He shook his head and gathered me close again, laying a gentle kiss on my forehead. “No. Right now, you just let me hold you. Okay?”
“Okay.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Lily
“You’re terrible at this.”
“You were a lot more patient of a teacher with my daughter.”
I swatted his hands away from the mixer. “Yeah, because she wasn’t terrible.” Barrett didn’t budge, even when I tried to shoulder him aside. Like moving a fucking tree. I gave him a brief annoyed look, and he conceded a few inches of space, allowing me to glance inside the mixing bowl. “Quit hovering over my shoulder like a creep; you’re not going to intimidate me.”
“Not trying to.”
I snorted, then used the spatula to scrape down the sides of the bowl. “See? You’re missing half the ingredients here. I told you to do this while I was getting my socks.”
“You’re already wearing socks,” he pointed out.
