Page 71 of Jay Bird

“In a couple of weeks, once you’re more settled, we’ll get everyone together. Properly this time. You can meet the whole crew without passing out.”

Willow laughed. “That would be an improvement.”

“Lily can meet the other kids.”

“I’d like that. And so would she.”

They shared a smile, then turned their attention back to their food as the easy conversation around the table continued. For the first time since Willow and Lily had arrived, Jay Bird simply let himself enjoy the moment.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Dinner wound down not long after, and as the last few bites were finished and conversation faded into that comfortable post-meal quiet, Jay Bird automatically took over the cleanup while Willow gathered Lily up for her bath, guiding her down the hall as the evening shifted into the softer rhythm of bedtime.

He listened to Lily’s familiar protests carry down the hallway.

“No shampoo!”

Jay Bird smiled to himself while loading the dishwasher.

Ten minutes later, another dramatic protest about pajamas followed, then a brief stretch of silence that told him everything he needed to know. Bedtime had, once again, won the battle.

Once the kitchen was clean, Jay Bird opened the refrigerator and stared inside. He rarely drank at home, and even when he did with the guys, he never really pushed it. Somewhere along the way, after years of needing to stay in control of everything, getting drunk had stopped appealing to him altogether.

Tonight, though, he grabbed a beer. He walked out the back door and crossed the yard toward the creek. His dock was one of the main reasons he had bought the house.

When things got too loud in his head, this was where he came, leaving behind the television, his phone if he could manage it, and everything else, just for the water and the quiet.

Jay Bird lowered himself into one of the two weathered Adirondack chairs. The creek reflected the fading evening light, small ripples breaking the surface every now and then.

Normally, sitting here would clear his head, the quiet of the water usually doing its job of settling everything inside him. But tonight, no matter how long he stared out at the creek, his thoughts wouldn’t fall into place. They just kept circling, refusing to let him find any peace.

Jay Bird stared at the bottle in his hand as thoughts of Willow and Lily raced around his mind. Could he really do this again? Could he let someone matter that much?

For the past twelve years, the answer had been a simple no because he had already done it once.

He had known what it felt like to plan a future around someone else. To think in terms of we instead of me. To walk through a house and picture what would fill the empty spaces one day. He had known exactly what it felt like to believe he had forever. And he had learned just how quickly forever could disappear.

Twelve years hadn’t changed that lesson. It had just made him better at living around it.

Jay Bird closed his eyes. An image of the past tried to surface, but he shut it before it could fully form.

He opened his eyes and stared hard at the creek. That life was gone, and he’d accepted it. At least, that was what he kept telling himself whenever the memories tried to surface.

So why now? Why Willow, and why Lily of all people? Why did a two-year-old wrapping herself around his leg make something inside him ache in a way he hadn’t allowed himself to feel in years? Why did seeing Willow smile at him make him want things he had stopped believing belonged in his future?

Jay Bird took another drink of beer.

Maybe Bear was right. Maybe he needed to stop trying to figure everything out and just let things happen.

That sounded simple when it came from someone who wasn’t sitting alone on a dock wondering whether opening his heart again would eventually rip it apart a second time.

A soft creak sounded behind him, and he grinned, knowing it was Willow. He had heard her close the door.

He turned and saw her walking down the dock toward him.

And just like that, every thought he had been trying desperately not to have became impossible to avoid.

Willow stepped carefully onto the dock, the baby monitor tucked beneath one arm and a bottle of water in the other.