This was the crux of it, of dating people who were members of a club owned by a friend. They would know more about Smith than I did, most likely, and that included history I wasn’t privy to yet.
“Covington,” I said.
Aaron made a noise in the back of his throat. “Which one?”
“Smith.”
“The baby,” Verity cooed.
“He’s twenty-five.”
“And you’re older than him and I’m older than you,” they said. “He’s new though. Are you…sure?”
“New is good for me,” I promised them.
New meant I could go slow. New meant I could ease into things with Smith in a way that felt comfortable for me, for us both. It meant I didn’t need to shove Ev’s memory out the window just yet.
“Then we like it, don’t we?” Aaron coaxed, and Verity gave me a kind smile and a squeeze against my wrist. I realized in that moment how much I missed them. After Ev passed, I had pushed away everyone in my life and they’d let me. Damon was the only one who’d fought his way back in when it was too dark for me to see my hands in front of my face. I owed my life, my shop, my home, all of it to him because I’d been in such a dark place when Ev had died.
As the years inched on and I started to rebuild and return, everyone had been there waiting for me like I’d never left. I realized it wasn’t that they’d walked away from me and my grief, they’d chosen instead to wait it out. Losing love was a hard thing, and at the time, the space was what I’d needed and somehow they all understood that. When I came back to Rapture for the first time, Verity, Landon, Justin… the whole lot of them treated me like I’d never even left.
Waking up from my grief felt a lot like coming back to myself again, a conscious choice I made every day with every decision. From renovating the building to opening the shop to hiring part-time artists and bringing Smith into my bed, every act was a reclaiming, a welcome home.
“We more than like it,” Verity told me. “Truly. But would you be a dear and go refresh my drink?”
They batted their lashes at Aaron, who was helpless to tell them no. I laughed as he took their empty glass and headed back into the club.
“It’s nice, isn’t it?” they murmured, watching Aaron go.
“What is?”
“That for as much as things change, at the heart of it, we’re always the same.”
I swallowed hard, nodding my agreement and desperately hoping it was true.
CHAPTER 21
SMITH
There was no hiding the hickey and no hiding the tattoo so I didn’t even try. I took my shirt off in the parking lot and went into Cunningham’s in my work slacks and white undershirt. I was late, three of my brothers already there when I sank down into the booth to Marshall’s left. He turned to say hello to me, and even from the corner of my eye I could see his stare drop to my neck, to my forearm. He went rigid, sucking in a breath.
“Rip the Band-Aid off, Smith,” Hunter grumbled. “Jesus.”
“What. On. Earth.”
I twisted my face up into a grimace and turned toward my oldest brother, the man I idolized over all others.
“What?” I asked.
“I don’t know where to start,” Marshall said.
“The tattoo?” I prompted.
Across from Marshall, Finn choked on his drink and Hunter slapped him on the back, glaring.
“Let’s start with the hickey.”
“I didn’t think that one needed explaining.”
