“Hey. Everything okay?” I ask quietly.
He lets out a sigh I can feel in my bones, then rubs his eyebrow with his thumb.
“About that list you mentioned a couple of days ago,” he says, hesitantly. “The one you mentioned with ideas for the farm? I’m not really sure where to start.”
“You look like you’re staying busy.” Then it hits me what he’s really asking for. “You need to work on the presentation part.”
He nods, his jaw working.
I glance around the farm, pressing my lips together.
“We can’t do it all by tomorrow, Aiden.”
His head bobs. “I kind of figured. I’ve put this part off. So what if we worry about what we can, and save the rest for later?”
This is when I’d love to borrow some Enchanted Hollow magic. I actually can’t prove that there’s a possibility of a simple wand wave and voilà, it’s all fixed—but it would be nice.
I can’t imagine how tough it will be to reopen the gates tomorrow without his parents.
“I think color is a great place to start. We need lights and ribbons. Where is it all hidden away?”
His eyes focus on something behind me, and I follow his gaze. The big red barn. “It’s all in the loft.”
“I can get it.”
“Chloe, I can climb up there and pull down boxes.”
“I know you can.” I rise up on my toes and press a kiss to his cheek before I realize what I’m doing. “But I can too.”
I’m stuck here, in the middle of another decision. Do I shift just enough to the left so I can kiss him—reallykiss him? Or do I play it off, walk away, and hope he doesn’t mention it again?
Before I can settle on a decision, he turns his head just enough that our faces are barely a breath away from each other. The attraction between us pulls taut, like the string on a bow.
Now that I’ve had a taste of Aiden again, I want to chase the way his kisses make me feel. Like I’m the only person in his world that matters. Like we truly have an entire future sprawling in front of us, and we only have to take the bull by the horns.
But that has nothing to do with what we’re doing here. We need to focus ontomorrow,because time is running out.
He lifts a hand, then settles it on the side of my neck, his fingers lazily curling and uncurling against my skin as he chews on what he wants to say or do. It might be awkward if I didn’t know Aiden. But he’s processing, and the simple rhythm of his fingers is relaxing to me.
“I can’t believe you’re my wife,” he whispers. “I don’t deserve you. Or this. I shouldn’t be grateful that you’re standing here, helping me re-open the farm, when I’m the reason it’s in trouble.”
His first proclamation floors me. The rest is a domino effect that makes me want to cry for him. The pain in his eyes tells me he believes every word, and I wish I could blink it away.
“You’re allowed to feel hope, Aiden.” I lean forward so our foreheads touch, my heart beating a ragged rhythm as a sigh shudders out of him. “You’re allowed to have joy. Happiness. That’s all your parents would’ve ever wanted for you.”
“It feels like I’m betraying them.” The words come out so quietly, sobroken, I almost gasp out loud.
Instead, I give in to the instinct that’s plagued me for the last week. I wrap my arms as tightly as they’ll go around him, and squeeze. It might be a little odd that I’m basically acting as a human weighted blanket, but when Aiden’s arms come around me, I know it was the right thing to do.
His hold isn’t delicate. He holds tight, like I’m his life preserver in a raging sea. I knew this would be tough, but standing here with him makes me want to beg his siblings to do Opening Day without him.
I’m worried it’s too much at once, especially on the heels of last week.
“You’re not,” I say into his neck. “They would be so proud of you, Aiden. You struggled, but you’re surrounded by people who only want to see you succeed. They’d want to see you celebrate, not mourn.”
His hands tighten, gripping my back.
“And mourning is okay, but it deserves balance. Tell me something you want to remember. Or, even better, tell me something you want to honor them with tomorrow.”
