“Right.” Nash understands.
My head zips in his direction. “I mean, I was here quite a lot when I was married, and obviously, we had a few awkward family holiday dinners here over the years.”
He tries to suppress his grin. “You mean, me avoiding making eye contact and barely saying a word to one another while someone asked if I could pass the green beans?”
My cheeks tighten from his perspective. “Something like that.”
“I’m happy you got to lie in that bed once with me.”
In an abrupt move, I offer my hand, and when our palms join, I lead us straight to the bed where we both plop on top of the mattress and stare at the ceiling from on our backs.
“Whoa, didn’t think you had in you to initiate this here. I mean, how do you want me? On my back or on my knees?” He’s teasing me, and I playfully hit his arm.
“Mr. Funny today,” I remark. “But since Bo is with Harlow, then we don’t need to rush anywhere.”
Nash wiggles on the bed to get comfortable. “So true.”
I sigh. “Your parents texted me that they’re visiting for Thanksgiving. They want to do one last dinner here. For Christmas, they are staying south.”
Nash smacks his lips together before his mouth parts open. “My mom mentioned that tiny fact.”
I turn my head, and my cheek flattens against the blanket. “I’m not sure what to do.”
He jostles to his side with his arms sprawled out along his body and over his head. “Me neither. My dad and I are slightly strained, and my mom, I’m not sure what sets off her emotions these days.”
“They’ll figure it out.” My melancholy tone doesn’t help the dullness of that aspect.
“Honesty is probably the way to go.”
“That we’ve become close because you’ve helped me with Bo and we live together,” I answer.
Nash’s fingers dart out to stroke my cheek. “Except you and I actually started on this very bed.”
My hand covers his, and I rest against our joined hands. “We did. Then we took a few years to let it be more. And now a few years more to be…” I have no clue how to answer.
“I’m not letting you go,” he reminds me in a whisper.
“You’ve mentioned.”
He leans in to brush his lips along mine. “Sometimes we need to untangle feelings for it to be clear.”
It’s as if thunder is rolling in my chest as I’m taking a chance, until sounds from my lips are the clap after lightning. “I love you, Nash, and that may be a problem.”
Nash captures my bottom lip between his until he lets go, the fear not tamed inside of me after I said it. “Summer, I love you. We were idiots for not saying it back then, but maybe the words were waiting for us now, after a long road.”
I bring my head to his, and our noses nuzzle. “I might have buried it for a while when life took me in a different direction, but that isn’t the case anymore.”
He sweeps up my hand to hold the way he does whenthere is a strong reverence that takes over him. He’s always been this way for his whole life. “It’s always been bubbling at the surface for me.”
Another kiss, and I trace my thumb over the lines of his face. “Not everyone will see it this way.”
“But today nobody is looking,” he whispers.
Our feelings are confirming, with no regard in my head for the consequences of what this will bring to our lives. If they are consequences at all.
My arms encircleNash as he balances his focus on stirring the pot and sideways over his shoulder at the hockey game on TV between the Spinners and Dallas.
“Don’t burn the house down.”
