hell of a lot better in the morning. We both woke up before the rest of the house, meeting in the kitchen like we’d done my whole life. She made a batch of pancakes just for us, another for the sleeping men. We sat together, eating and talking, while it drizzled outside.
“So”—she raised her eyebrows—“are we ever going to discuss the fact that your ex-boyfriend drove you down here, and if I’m not mistaken, shared a bed with you last night?”
I sighed, scraping my fork through my syrup. “It might be better if we didn’t. I don’t know what to say.”
She crossed her arms. “Since I don’t know exactly why you broke up, I can’t really offer advice. But from a mother’s perspective, I can’t help wondering if maybe he deserves a second chance. He obviously loves you, Zadie.”
That was the thing, wasn’t it? The thing that kept breaking my heart. “I love him too. We just…had a difference we couldn’t get around, and I don’t know if anything’s changed.”
“And have you spoken about this difference?”
“No.” I pressed my lips together, knowing what was coming.
“Why not?”
“Because…” I shook my hands out, “I still have this tiny seed of hope. What if what he has to say kills it? I don’t know if I’m ready to face that.”
She tucked my hair behind my ear and grazed my cheek with the back of her hand. “That doesn’t sound like my Zadie. You don’t hide. And from the way Amir is with you, I really doubt you have anything to worry about. He adores you, baby.”
“I know he does. But sometimes that’s not enough.”
“And sometimes it is.” She leveled me with her mom stare. “Take it from me. I messed up a lot with your dad and Max out of wanting to do the right thing. But when it came down to it, I couldn’t live a life that wasn’t mine anymore when the alternative was to be loved and love out loud. I think you’re making a similar choice now, baby. I want you to experience love that is so aggressive, you never once question it. That might not be with Amir, but if it is, don’t walk away unless that’s truly the only choice you can make. Fight for it.”
“You’re right.” I sucked in a deep breath, taking in everything she’d said. “God, you’re right. I’ll talk to him.”
“I’m glad you’re going to give him at least that chance.” She kissed my temple. “Thank you for coming down here. I think a visit from my girl was exactly what I needed to reset.”
I rested my head on her shoulder. “You can’t kill yourself taking care of Max.”
“I know. Max and I talked. We’re going to come up with a plan to ease some of my load. The last thing he needs is to worry about his wife.”
A throat cleared. Amir stood at the doorway of the kitchen, glancing back and forth between us. “Good morning. Felicity. Zadie.”
Mom pushed back from her seat. “Good morning, love. There are pancakes keeping warm in the oven and coffee in the pot. I’m going to run upstairs and shower and check on my hubby.” She dropped her plate in the sink, squeezing Amir’s arm as she hurried out of the room.
I giggled. “That wasn’t obvious.”
He dropped into the seat beside me, gripping my legs to spin me sideways so my knees were between his. Then he held my face and crushed his mouth to mine, kissing me like we’d never stopped last night. My fingers curled around his T-shirt, holding on as he devoured my mouth.
He pulled back, but only enough so he could speak, and even then, his lips were touching mine. “It’s raining, mama.”
“Yeah, it is.” More than a drizzle now.
“I’m never gonna experience the rain the same again.”
“Neither am I.”
“Are you ready to talk now?”
“I’m ready.”
He took my hand in his, leading me outside to the covered veranda. The rain patted the ground gently, tinking off the part of the tile patio that was exposed, making indents in the otherwise still surface of the pool. He pulled a padded lounger to the edge of the covered area, pausing to stick his hand out into the rain. Then he traced my lips with raindrops and licked them away with a slow caress of his tongue. My knees had already been weak from nerves, but he knocked them out from under me then.
He fell down beside me on the lounger, tucking me under his arm. He didn’t seem to be in a hurry to speak so we watched the rain together.
“I love you, Zadie. I’m angry as hell you walked away from me, but I love the hell out of you too.”
Heart caught in my throat, I twisted my head to peer up at him as he stared down at me. His words were harsh, but his eyes were nothing but soft.
“I love you too, Amir. I’m not mad at you, but I’m really sad we couldn’t work this out so we could be together.”
He clicked his tongue on his teeth. “Don’t like that attitude, mama. This isn’t us ending. You know that, right?”
“No, I don’t know that. I know what I want, but I also know what I won’t accept. I really, really thought I could live with it, but I just can’t. And after seeing you at the fight—”
“You don’t have to give me up.”
“I don’t?”
“I’m not letting you give me up. Let me tell you what I’ve been doing the last three weeks.” He took my hand in his, waiting until I nodded for him to continue. “I’m not gonna lie and say I saw your side right away. It took me a few days of wallowing and getting drunk off my ass to come around. It was finally your words that did it. Cognitive dissonance.”
I sucked in a sharp breath, remembering exactly what he was talking about. “Marco and Julien.”
“Marco pointed out the truth I’d been convincing myself was a lie because it fit my narrative. No matter how many times I said that life was separate, it wasn’t true. Everything I did for Reno bled onto the people around me. Dr. Krasinski warned me about the shadow that followed my name. He almost didn’t give me a recommendation but—”
I gasped. “Did he give it to you?”
Amir’s mouth quirked into a slight grin. “He did.”
I was so happy for him, I lost my mind, brought our joined hands to my mouth, and bit down on his index finger. When I realized what I’d done, I kissed it better as Amir quietly chuckled.
“I’m really, really proud of you,” I said.
“I could tell.” The way he looked at me reminded me of how Max had looked at my mom. I’d just bitten this man, and he was looking at me like I was his entire world.
My face was on fire, but I let him see it. I was done hiding from him. “Please keep talking.”
“I didn’t have a choice, Zadie. Not just for you, but for Marco and Julien, and fuck, for myself, my future. I got out. It took time and careful planning. Reno wasn’t at all happy with me and made it as hard as possible for me to unravel all my ties. He’s still pissed, but he can’t come down too hard on me with Julien almost dying because of that life.” Amir shuddered, squeezing his eyes closed.
“You got out?”
“I’m finished. That fight? It was the last money I’ll ever earn for Reno. Like I said, he was pissed at me and wanted more than cash for me to sever ties to the business. It couldn’t be easy on me, but I knew it wouldn’t be. I knew it, and I ran straight for it because I wanted it so badly. I threw the fight so Reno could bet against me, allowed Ishkov to beat me to hell and back, all so I could have a clean break. And I’m clean now, Zadie. No ties. That life is history.”
I couldn’t get the image of him pounding his fists into that man out of my head. Nor his bloody knuckles and clothing from the night of the break-in. He might have severed those ties, but what he’d done before…how did I get past that?
“I was at the fight.”
“I saw you. Fucked with my head that you were there. I was gonna come for you after, tell you everything, but you were horrified by me. I never thought I’d see you again. Never thought you’d let me hold you.”
“I didn’t think I would either.”
He gritted his jaw. His chest rose and fell as he swept me with his gaze. “I’ve done things you’ll never be okay with. I wouldn’t want you to be okay with any of it. You wouldn’t be the Zadie I’ve fallen in love with if you were.” He patted his chest and cleared his throat, but every word he said came out choked. “But here I am anyway, asking you to look past it like you once told me you could. If it were one of your flaws, then I would revel in it because it gets me you. You’ve seen the worst of me, and I’m asking for you to love me anyway.”
Fear enveloped me like a fog, surrounding me so thickly, until it was hard to breathe. This was a moment that would change my life. If I said yes, if I took him back with my eyes wide open to exactly who he was, this was it. He was my beginning, but he’d be my end too. I couldn’t see myself ever loving anyone after him if we went any deeper. I would be ruined and made whole again, into the Zadie Night who could only love Amir Vasquez. It might have already been too late. The weeks apart certainly hadn’t lessened my love for him.
At my continued silence, Amir slumped, dropping my hand to cup his head. “Fuck, mama.” He looked at me, stricken, the light dimming behind his eyes. “Really?”
My mouth opened. “I don’t know.”
His exhale was jagged, like splintered air being forced from his lungs. “Fuck.” He got up, pacing in front of the lounger. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”
He strode into the rain, dropping his head back so the drops pummeled his face. I sat there, watching the love of my life awash in agony, and wondered what the hell I was doing. How could I think for even a second I didn’t want Amir to be my ending?
Leaping from my seat, I ran to him. At the last second, he brought his face down, seeing me approach. I collided with his chest, his arms circling me automatically.
“Yes,” I yelled over the rain. “Yes, I’ll love you anyway. If you’ll love me for letting you walk into the rain.”
He barked a laugh, pulling me even more flush with him. “Just now?”
I nodded. “I was scared to say yes.”
“But you did it, mama. You were brave and you came to me.”
He dipped down, covering my mouth with his. I rose on my toes and grasped the collar of his T-shirt to bring him closer. Rivulets of rain ran down our faces, joining our kiss.
A thought occurred to me, and I pulled away, my eyes wide. “I have to tell you something.”
“What?” He tried for my mouth again, but I reared back. His eyes narrowed to slits. “Don’t keep those lips from me. Not after you said yes.”
I covered his mouth with my fingers. “I have to talk to you, baby. I need to tell you something.”
He nipped at my hand. “Like when you call me baby.”
“I know you do. But I have to tell you I met your mom…and I kind of told her off.”
Amir went still for a moment, then he threw his head back and laughed. The sound was so riotous and filled with joy, I smiled hard at him, even as tears joined the rain dripping down my cheeks.
His eyes finally met mine, and they were as bright as the rest of him. Bright, like midnight in the desert, when the sky’s so full of stars, it’s almost unreal. That was Amir. Dark on the surface, but so filled with light, it burst from him when it was least expected.
“I know, mama. I got the full report from Julien.” His grip slid to my ass. “Let me tell you, if I hadn’t already fallen for you, I would have then. That’s when I knew I could get you back. If you didn’t care, if you thought I was nothing more than a violent villain, you wouldn’t have stood up for me.”
“I’ll always stand up for you.”
He slowly shook his head. “Do you have any idea how good that feels?”
“I do, because I know you’ll do the same for me.”
“Hell yes I will. Never doubt that I’m gonna slay every one of your dragons.”
Just like that, I was brought back to our first night together, where he promised the same thing. We barely knew each other then, and I’d been his hostage, but he promised me anyway, and he’d meant it.
That was when my fear joined the rain, rolling off me and dripping to the ground. Why would I be afraid when this man had kept every single one of his promises to me?
“Thank you for the offer, Captor, but I’d rather we slay our dragons together.”
He grinned down at me. “I’m still Captor? After you’ve locked up my heart and soul?”
“Maybe we’ve captured each other.”
“Hell yes we have, mama.”
He hugged me close, running his beautiful hands over my ass, my face, my hair, and kissing me for a long, long time on the space just below my ear. Rising on my toes, I found the same place on him and kissed him there even longer.
“Heart and soul,” he whispered in his rough, lacquered voice.
We didn’t have a Go moment. What we had was so beyond a movie ending, because this was real. We wouldn’t walk off into the sunset. Not us.
No, we were going to walk off, hand in hand, captor and hostage, into the brightness of midnight.
