I look at her. Really look at her.
“A life. With you. For you. For them.”
Tears blur her eyes. She shakes her head once, whispering, “Knox.”
“I know I messed up. I know I made you doubt everything. But I didn’t run because I didn’t want you, Josie. I ran because I didn’t believe I deserved you. Because I was trying to keep Savannah from getting to you. Because I was scared.”
I swallow hard. My voice cracks. “But when I imagined holding them in my arms, imagined you beside me. I realized I want that fear. I want the sleepless nights. The sticky fingers and the chaos. I want the whole damn thing.”
She’s crying now. Quietly, heartbreakingly.
“I’m still scared,” she says.
“I am, too,” I tell her. “But I’d rather be scared with you than safe without you.”
She covers her mouth with one hand. Then lowers it. And I see it, the hope. The war still raging in her chest. But beneath it, something else.
Trust.
Slowly, she walks over to one of the cribs. Fingers brush the edge. Her breath hitches.
And then she turns.
Takes three steps toward me.
Her arms wrap around my waist like she never wants to let go again.
“I don’t know how to do this,” she whispers into my chest.
I hold her tighter. “We’ll figure it out. If you stay…”
Her cheek is still damp against my chest. Her fingers fist gently in the fabric of my shirt like she’s afraid I’ll vanish if she lets go.
“I—” She gasps. “Yeah, I’ll stay.”
Relief slams into me so hard it nearly brings me to my knees.
Everything inside me uncoils at once, the fear, the guilt, the ache I’ve been carrying since the day she walked away. It floods through me, this dizzying, breathless rush of hope. Like I’ve been drowning for weeks, and suddenly, I can breathe again.
She tilts her face up to mine, and the look in her eyes knocks the breath clean out of my lungs. It’s everything, fear and longing and stubborn, reckless hope. A thousand unspoken things burning behind those lashes.
And fuck, I’m done for.
I cup her face with both hands, my thumbs brushing her cheeks, and lean in so close I can taste her breath, cinnamon and something sharp beneath it, like tears and truth.
“I love you,” I whisper.
And then I kiss her.
Hard.
Deep.
Like I’ve been starved for her. Like the last few weeks were a slow, quiet death, and this is the only thing that’ll bring me back to life.
She gasps against my mouth, her body pressing flush to mine. My hands slide down, anchoring at her waist, then lower. Her fingers rake up into my hair, tugging, demanding more. Always more.
When her tongue brushes mine, I groan into her mouth and spin us until her back meets the nursery wall, the crib just inches away, the soft scent of baby powder and peach paint curling around us.
