down the back porch, my eyes darting over the lake and across to Daisy’s bedroom window. She must still be asleep. That sleep tonic she’s been experimenting with obviously works because I hammered on her door like a lunatic last night, desperate to see her. To explain. To tell her I’m sorry. To say anything I can to stop her from leaving things like this between us.
I look back over the lake again. The sun is just rising. It would be a fucking stunning image to capture with my camera. The hues of pink and orange glowing against the water’s still surface. The sky warm, with a promise of a new day.
Fuck, this love shit has turned me into a sap.
I run my hand over my jaw as I stride up and down. Betsy’s laying on the sofa watching me with droopy eyes. She’s tired too. I barely slept last night. I just kept thinking over and over in my head about what I will say to Daisy when I see her. I was up and down like a fucking Yo-Yo all night. And Betsy stayed by my side the entire time.
“What the hell we going to do, eh, girl?” She lets out a soft sigh as she stares at me. “Yeah, I know. You don’t want her to leave either, do you?” I reach down and ruffle her ears.
She lies there, content as I stroke her, until something catches her attention, and her head snaps up. I follow her eyes—now fully alert and shining—to the spot she’s focused on.
That’s when I see her. Standing on the end of the jetty, on the other side of the lake.
Her white cotton dress makes her skin glow. And her blonde hair calls to me like a beacon.
“Daisy,” I whisper, breaking into a run and flying down to the end of the jetty, stopping just in time before I slide off the end into the water.
“Blake!” she calls, rising onto her toes. “Can we talk?”
She’s not even that far away. I can hear her perfectly. I can see her. See her well enough to know that she doesn’t look pissed off. Something about her has changed. She’s less tense, her whole body seems more relaxed. She looks… happier. At least, happier than the last time I saw her, and she’d hurled a bag of Betsy’s shit at me. But although I can see and hear her, she’s still not near enough.
I need to be close to her.
Whatever it is she wants to talk about, I need to look into those clear blue eyes when she says it.
I look to the right. It’ll only take a few minutes to get in my truck and drive around to her side of the lake. But getting in my truck means letting her out of my sight. What if she changes her mind? What if she doesn’t wait?
There’s no way I’m taking that chance.
“Hold on!” I call back. “I’ll come to you.”
I yank my t-shirt up over my head and undo the button of my jeans, pulling them off and throwing them down on the wooden planks. Daisy’s hand flies to her mouth as she watches.
“Don’t move!” I shout.
My feet leave the last wooden board of the jetty behind as I dive into the cool water. It’s a fresh blast to my system, waking me up, invigorating me. I push through it, swimming as far as I can before the need to break the surface and draw in two giant lungs of oxygen claws at my chest.
I suck in the morning air.
The jetty is empty.
Nausea tears through me as my pulse races. I’m not even halfway across the lake. It might as well be the fucking moon.
She’s gone.
“Blake?” a breathy voice says.
I spin my head. Two bright blue eyes meet mine, wet strands of blonde hair plastered to pink cheeks underneath.
“How did…?” I glance back to the jetty and notice the pile of white fabric.
I turn back to face her, both of us treading water and staring at each other. The surface of the water distorts our bodies below. But I can tell Daisy’s naked. It would usually take all my willpower not to glance down and try to make out her beautiful body. But right now, all I can do is stare deep into her eyes.
Stare and wonder if I’m about to lose her.
Forever.
“I—” We both speak at the same time.
Daisy smiles, but it falls from her face almost immediately, and she watches me with big eyes.
“You go first,” I say gently.
She nods, looking up to the sky, then back at me, her bottom lip pulled between her teeth.
“Blake… I…” She blows out a breath and then swims closer. Close enough that I can see the droplets of water from the lake on her eyelashes.
I gulp down the rock that’s taken residence in my throat. Whatever she’s going to say can’t be worse than the other day. Nothing she can say now could be worse than her telling me she’s leaving again, or that her soul isn’t complete.
After a long pause, she speaks. Her voice is soft, and she looks vulnerable as she fixes her focus on me. But her eyes tell a different story. They’re bright, filled with a determination I haven’t seen in them for a long time.
For ten years.
“I’ve been putting all of my energy into fighting, Blake. Fighting you. Fighting myself. When I should have been back home, fighting for what I believe in. Fighting in person. Not running away like a coward.”
Her eyes turn glassy as her voice cracks, and I battle against the energy rushing to my arms, screaming at me to take her into them and hold her. I don’t want to give her any reason to swim away and leave. So, I just watch her. Watch her scrunch up her face and chew her lip as she searches for the right words for whatever it is she’s feeling.
“That’s why I have to leave. To go home and do whatever I can to make this better. It’ll never be right,” she sniffs and glances away as her voice drops to a whisper. “It’ll never be right. But I have to try.”
The sight of her eyes filling with tears is like someone ripping open my chest and pouring salt in.
“It’s okay, I understand. And coming here?… It doesn’t make you a coward. It makes you strong. You got away from a situation where you could have been in danger. Guys like your ex…” I grit my teeth as my jaw ticks. “I’ve met guys like him. He could have killed you in a moment of rage.”
Daisy nods her head. “I know. I think you’re right.”
We float, watching each other. There’s so much to say, yet all we seem to want to do is look at each other. Is she looking at me because she knows it’s the last time? Is she committing my face to memory because she knows that’s all I will be soon? A distant memory. Something to think of now and then, less and less as time passes, until eventually it’s faded away entirely.
Her eyes roam over my face and come back to rest on mine.
“You know, coming back here, it’s been amazing.” She gives me a small smile. “Seeing the house again, the lake, Kayla and Travis… You.”
I force myself to swallow as I listen to her begin her goodbye speech.
“And then Maria gave me a job and became a friend. I’m so blessed. I really am. You’ve all been so amazing.”
“But?” I can’t stop myself from saying the word, leaving the question hanging in the air between us.
Daisy sighs. “But I have to do this, Blake. “
I drop my eyes from hers and look at the tree’s reflection on the surface of the water. Nothing will ever look the same again. Nothing will ever feel the same again. It will all be a faded version.
Without her.
“You’ve given me the courage. You made me realize I am strong enough.” She inches closer in the water, and I raise my eyes back to meet hers. “Spending time with you and Betsy, going up in the forest, seeing the bears.” Her eyes light up. “The thunderstorm! Making all those spa products together. You found a part of me I thought was destroyed. You made me laugh, really laugh, for the first time in months.”
I search her eyes as they shine back at me. The knot in my stomach tightens as the meaning of her words sink in.
“I gave you the strength to leave,” I whisper.
“Yes,” she says softly.
“Jesus.”
I tip my head back into the water and stare up at the sky. I’m the reason she’s able to leave. By helping her, I’ve completely screwed myself. Yet, seeing her like this—freer, more relaxed, more like the woman I know she is deep down—I can’t regret a single thing. If I must lose her, then knowing she will be happier makes it worth it.
Almost.
There’s still so much I need to tell her before she goes. If she’s leaving, then she has to hear it.
“I’m sorry.” The words come out strangled as I raise my head back up and look at her again.
“Why are you apologizing, Blake?”
She swims a little closer, and I realize we’ve been slowly moving toward the jetty on her side of the lake. We’re only meters away from the wooden ladder that reaches into the water at the end.
“Because I made you feel uncomfortable. Because I shouted. Because I didn’t listen to you.”
Because I’m not enough to make you stay.
A small smile lifts the corners of her lips and I swear it’s a sight more incredible than anything I’ve ever seen in the forest, or ever captured on film.
She is simply stunning.
If Daisy was committing my face to memory a few minutes ago, then I’m now doing the same. This is how I want to remember her. Smiling, water in her hair, the morning sun on her face.
My Daisy.
“You never listen to anyone if you don’t want to. You’re stubborn like that.” She arches a brow. “And I’ve never felt more comfortable than when I’m with you. And as for shouting? We were arguing.”
“That’s no excuse. I lose all sense of control around you. I should have never raised my voice at you, Dai—”
Damn.
I wait for the shutters to fly up behind her eyes. But they don’t.
“You said you loved me?” she whispers.
I stare back, my eyes burning into hers.
“I do.”
Her mouth drops open, and she sucks in a breath.
“Even though all I’ve done is push you away since I came back?” Her eyes shine, tears collecting on her lower lids.
“That’s not true.” I inch forward in the water, so I’m close enough to touch her if I were to reach out.
“It is, Blake. You’ve been honest with me. And I’ve not given you the same. I came back here not knowing who I was. I was running away. Ashamed of what I had let happen.”
She lifts her hand from the water and presses her fingers to my lips when I’m about to cut in. The softness of them makes my throat burn and I close my eyes briefly, afraid of what she’ll see in them if I don’t. She’s healing. She’s stronger. I can’t jeopardize that by not having my shit together.
“I blame myself,” she continues. “And I know you’re going to tell me it wasn’t my fault. And my head knows that’s true. But my heart…” Her eyes fill with tears again. “My heart is filled with guilt. He still took a part of me that day and I never got it back.”
“Have mine,” I whisper beneath her fingers.
“What?”
Her brow creases as she looks at me. Her fingers slide away from my lips, and I expect her to take her hand back, but instead she rests it against my chest below the surface of the water.
Hope explodes in my chest as I stare deep into her eyes.
“I said have mine.”
“Your what?” Her eyes search mine, not understanding.
“My soul.”
She gasps and I place my hand over hers on my chest before she can pull it away.
“If you leave and never come back, then you’ll take a part of it with you, anyway. So have it now. Before you go. And let the last time I see you be when you’re complete again.”
“Blake,” she chokes out.
“I mean it. I don’t know what the hell you’ve done to me since you came back here. I’m a fucking mess. But I swear, I love you. And I would give you my last breath if it meant I could see you happy again.”
“I know,” she whispers. “It took seeing a pink foil wrapped candy to realize it.”
“What?” I smile at her, and she beams back.
“All this time I’ve been telling you you’re helping me to forget. And you were. It’s been such a relief not to think about everything that’s happened at home. But what I couldn’t see, or maybe didn’t want to, is that you’ve been helping me remember this entire time. Just like you said. You’ve helped me remember who I am. I’m stronger because of you, Blake.”
My heart is pounding in my chest beneath her palm. Her eyes drop to where our skin meets, and I know she must be able to feel it. Whenever we’re together, there’s this invisible charge, like electricity running between us. How can this be it? How can she have come back after all these years and turned my world upside down, only for her to leave again?
How is that fucking fair?
Life gives you chances. It’s up to you whether you take them. Call it free will. Well, my free will wants to do whatever the hell it can not to lose her.
I open my mouth and force out the words, knowing that her answer will mean everything. Her answer will impact the rest of my life from this day forward.
“You say I’ve given you strength? Have I given you the strength to come back as well?”
Her eyes rise to meet mine and I hold my breath.
This is it.
That moment on a cliff edge where you’re balancing. Straddling that thin line. One side being an exhilarating view that makes you feel alive and full of wonder and hope. And the other, a freefall down to darkness, and nothing else.
I watch as her eyelashes flutter, and she places her free hand over our entwined ones on my chest.
“You have.”
I search her eyes, praying I’ve heard her correctly.
“I have?”
She nods, the next word from her lips coming in one gentle breath. “Yes.”
Our hands stay locked on one another’s over my heart, as I guide us through the water until the wooden ladder is against her back. She lifts her chin, tilting her head back. Holding the ladder with one hand, I place the other underneath her chin, gently grasping it so her eyes stay focused on mine.
“You’re saying you’ll come back?”
She looks at me.
“Yes. I’ll come back. I’m sick of running. I want to have a life where I feel like myself again. I haven’t felt like it in years. Until I saw you again.”
My eyes search hers as warmth floods my body. I release the heavy breath I’ve been holding and drop my forehead to rest against hers.
“Thank you,” I whisper.
Her eyes swim with tears, which I wipe away with my thumb as I hold her face. I tighten my grip on the ladder so our bodies are pressed together.
So she can’t leave.
“Dai—Ah, fuck.” I screw my eyes closed and hiss at my stupidity.
Why can’t I get it right?
She’s telling me she will come back. But if I can’t even listen to her and respect her decision not to be called Daisy, then why would she want to?
Desperation claws at my chest.
“Look, I’ll call you whatever you want. Just let me love you. Because I do. I love you so fucking much! Not seventeen-year-old meat eating you. But twenty-eight-year-old you that drinks flower concoctions and has to sleep with a tidal wave blasting in her ear.”
She giggles before falling silent and reaching her hands up to either side of my face. I open my eyes and crystal blue ones gaze back at me.
“Call me Daisy.”
I shake my head. “But that’s—?”
“It’s what I want.” She fixes her gaze on me and nods as she strokes my jaw with her fingertips. “Mick doesn’t get to change who I am. Only I get to do that.”
She looks up at me from underneath her lashes, and I feel like I might burst with pride at how strong she is. I’ve always known it. I’ve never doubted her. But to see it in her eyes, and hear it in her voice?
It’s fucking incredible.
Our eyes stay locked on each other as I lower my mouth over hers. Her lids flutter closed as the heat of our lips meeting fires up something inside us both. I shut my eyes and groan into her mouth, my tongue finding hers as she runs her hands through my hair and grabs it in her fists.
She pulls back, panting. “Besides, I like it when you say it.”
“Really? Do you throw bags of dog shit at everyone who says something you like?”
Her eyes glitter with regret. “I’m sorry.”
I crash my mouth down over hers again. “No, you’re not,” I murmur between kisses.
“A little bit?”
“Nope.” I kiss her again. “Don’t believe you.”
“Then believe me when I say this.” She pulls back to look at me. “You’re silly and your jokes suck.”
My mouth falls open, but she places her fingers against my lips.
“And I love you, Blake Anderson. I love you so much.”
