“Hmm?” I twirl her away, and only settle once she’s in my arms again.
“Senior prom…”
I can’t help the groan that escapes. “You let Batman take you.”
Brooke laughs again. “Bruce was not that bad.”
“And his voice wasnotnaturally that deep.”
“But I didn’t dance withhimall night.”
She didn’t. She danced with me, much to Batman’s dismay. And though he was the one to take her home, I picked Brooke up twenty minutes later when her mom and husband number four were fighting so loud she couldn’t fall asleep.
She worries her lip between her teeth, the face she makes when she wants to say something but doesn’t know if she should.“I…” she hesitates as her eyes take in every angle of my face. “I wanted it to be you. I’m sorry I…”
“Hey…” I pause our steps, trapping her hand against my chest. “It’s always been you and me, Babe. And being your friend—the person you’d choose to dance with or come home with over all the other guys you could’ve—that has been the greatest honor of my life.”
She’s still holding back. “Tell me your fear, sweetheart.”
“What if this… us…” She licks her lips and trusts me with another small piece of herself. “What if I’m never ready? What if I’m always afraid?”
“One pitch. One hit. One game, Babe. One day at a time, right?” I promise, “I’m not going anywhere.”
I know she hears me, but rather than acknowledge it, she tangles her free hand in the hair at the nape of my neck and whispers, “You’re almost due for a haircut.”
“We’ll get there, too,” I assure her, and I know it’s true. One day, we’re going to share everything with each other, and I’ll be the one to whisper away her doubts until they’re nothing but a distant memory.
“Tell me an uncertainty?”
“I’m not sure… if you’ll let me kiss you goodnight?”
Brooke purses her lips in a smile. “You’re breaking all the rules, aren’t you?”
“Oh, we’re way past those rules, Babe.” I kiss her cheek and spin her again as the song around us comes to a close. “And I think we’re better for it, don’t you?”
“Yeah, Ruth,” she agrees, a perfect blush blooming across her cheeks. “I do.”
The crowd disperses to their individual Tinkerbells as soon as the song ends, turning off the Christmas lights dangling from their roofs so that the only lights we see are the candles Todd procured for me with the production team and the stars above.Todd gets a few shots of us eating the picnic dinner I scrounged up from our lightly stocked kitchen, then leaves us as silently as he came.
When we finally settle into the makeshift pallet on our roof—made from the spare blankets of all the other contestants who donated them to my cause—Brooke and I stargaze under a perfect summer sky until we can’t keep our eyes open any longer. And for the first time, my wife willingly falls asleep in my arms.
14
BE YOURSELF
WILDER WOODS
BROOKE
Suite Hearts, Day 24
“This was a mistake.” Sweat drips down the side of my face, sliding along the length of my neck until it finally lands in the super-sexy pool of perspiration currently drenching the center of my tank top. Fanning my face, I sift through the supplied ingredients, attempting to make a plan, though my brain is muddled with heat. “We’re in an oven. I don’t think I’ve ever been this hot before.”
Owen snickers, and when I whip my head around, I catch him eyeing the back of my cuffed blue jean shorts. He’s ogling, and he doesn’t look a bit sorry to be caught. Instead, he smirks and raises an eyebrow like he’s ready to continue his perusal as soon as I turn back around.
“I’m glad you think this is so funny,” I say, then throw a towel at his stupid, cute face. “Eyes on the prize, mister.”
The whole camper rocks—like it does every time we move in this miniature hellscape—as Owen unsticks his body from thetiny dining bench and joins me barely two steps away in the kitchen. Where I am melting.
