When we cuddle after that and I drift to sleep, he pulls me snug against his chest and murmurs sweet things into my ear.
This is fine. Everything is fine.
Chapter 25
Another Field Trip
WES
Idrive Callie’s car back to Portland the next day, with Noah following so he can get me back to Lake Savage.
We talk for the two-hour drive from Boston. Callie asks me about my childhood with Noah and my sisters, and when I talk about Sia and Ivy, she reaches for my hand. She commiserates when I explain my father was an alcoholic and got into shady shit, and that was the reason our family was murdered. Callie tells me how her mother died when she was a senior in high school, and losing a parent relatively young was what originally bonded her and Shane.
Neither of us have had it easy in the past, and neither of us will likely have it easy in the future. I know it’s too much to hope that I can find happiness with Callie. Easy happiness is not for someone like me. There’s always going to be a catch, secrets to hide, a messy past to contend with.
When we get to the parking garage, I walk her to the apartment building’s entrance. I’m hoping she invites me in, and I can send Noah away, but she doesn’t.
Callie’s got her arms crossed and gnaws on her lower lip.She looks tired. A good tired, I hope, but maybe the high of our night together is fading and the worry over her current situation is weighing on her again.
“You want to hang out? Or are you going to try to get some rest?” I reach over and touch her arm.
“Rest.” She leans into my hand. “For some reason, I didn’t sleep much last night.”
We were up for most of the night and only fell asleep for about an hour before Noah was banging on the bedroom door to get us moving.
“You okay with everything, Calliope?” I hold her car keys in my palm, not ready to hand them over yet. “What are you thinking?”
She presses her lips together and looks intently at my face, her gaze sweeping from my eyes to my lips and back up again. I give her time to respond. I’m a patient man.
Callie might not know it yet, but she’s mine. And I’m hers. But even as I think that and know it’s true, I also know it can’t be. The contradiction feels heavy. Callie wants a different life from what I can offer her. There’s no changing who I am or what I’ve done or what I will probably do in the future.
And anyway, I can’t let myself fall for anyone. I can’t be a guard dog for NoahandCallie. It’d be too much. I might lose one of them, or both of them, and I can’t handle the thought of that.
“Last night was a lot,” she says, but she bites her lip and has a soft look on her face.
“Last night was amazing.” I move my hand up to cup her cheek. Her eyes flutter shut, and she reaches up and covers my hand with hers. A tingle runs down my spine, and I’m nervous about how much I like the feel of this. “You’re not freaked out?”
I gotta know how she feels the morning after.
“You mean—” she stops talking as a group of people walk by with coffees in their hands, “—in the alleyway?”
“Yeah. That.”
“No. Not freaked out.” Color creeps into her cheeks, and she pulls away from my hand. “I—I think you’re doing the right thing, in your own way. Not like Shane or my father. You’re not like them.”
“Nope. I’m not.” I don’t love getting lumped in with those assholes. Of course I’m not like Shane or her father. But the fact that it even crossed her mind isn’t a good thing. Just another reminder I’m not what she wants, at least long-term. But for now? Maybe I can be something. I step forward and lift her arms so they’re resting on my shoulders, and I pull her close against me by her waist.
“Wes,” she says my name in a whisper, and tilts that full, sexy mouth up toward me. I lower my mouth to hers and place a long kiss on her lips. I’m not sure I want to hear what she has to say, but I release her mouth eventually.
“Yes, Calliope?”
“I don’t want to live the kind of life I’ve been living.”
“I know. You told me.” Giving voice to it is a dagger to my heart.
“Hmm.” She slides her hands up into my hair, and my eyes half shut at the feel of her fingers on my scalp. Fuck, she feels good. “I don’t know what I can offer you. I’m kind of an empty husk these days.”
That’s not true, but I don’t argue. She’s got so much life in her eyes and passion in her heart. She just doesn’t remember it’s there. I can try to remind her. As long as she’ll let me.
