Page 210 of One Wild Wish

I just had to figure out what to do about her mother’s letter and the news it brought.

I could come clean, explain how I’d ignored a dying woman’s wishes to share Gwen’s father’s name. How I’d needed time to process before facing the only woman I’d ever loved. Feelings that still lingered all these years later. I could tell her I waited and delayed, procrastinating like a prick, and when I finally looked up her father the other day, to make sure he wasn’t a drunk or druggie, or some skeeze who’d hurt her, the intel I discovered had punched me in the gut.

I’d sat in my car afterward, eyes squeezed to the point of pain, wishing I could turn back time.

But her father had died of a heart attack.

Eight days prior.

I’d sat on his name for two months. Because of my procrastination, Gwen would never meet her father. Because of me, she’d never talk to him and find the missing pieces of her puzzle.

The waitress set down my beer, and I grabbed it, thankful to busy my hands.

Owen reached over, knocking his bottle against mine. “Here’s to finding your feet with Gwen and avoiding Ainsley’s wrath.”

“Of which wrath do you speak?”

Ainsley swayed her hips as she approached, more amusement than ire in the sultry pout aimed at Owen. He raised an eyebrow at her. “Doll, don’t pretend like you aren’t terrifying. Jimmy still needs counseling.”

Ainsley sat primly opposite her boyfriend, folding her hands on the table. Rachel followed and slipped into her seat. I exhaled a long, slow breath as Gwen sauntered forward. Her dark jeans and white tank top worshipped her body, her shoulder-length hair loose and messy. Dark makeup lined her green eyes. She was the picture of cool and casual.

She was the only woman I’d ever imagined in my future.

The only one I wanted in my bed now.

Today. This minute.

My calves tightened, my toes contracting, every bone in my body tense and alive. Heat stroked my groin. I gripped my beer, hoping the cold, damp bottle would tame the fire smoking through my veins. I launched her my most charming smile. “Glad you made it back.”

Before she could answer, Ainsley pinned me with her feisty blue eyes. “Ignore the counseling crack. Owen’s just talking about the time I threatened to leave a candiru fish in Jimmy’s toilet bowl. The ones that swim up a urine stream into a guy’s penis and gnaw on its flesh?” She rolled her eyes, as though the comment didn’t send my nuts running for my stomach. “Which is silly, really. It’s nothing like that smallpox virus. You get that sucker, and you don’t have a clue for a week or two, and then bam . Pus-filled blisters are everywhere. In your nose and mouth, covering your entire body. And when they rupture?” She shivered dramatically. “You’d be wishing for a fish gnawing on your junk. So like I said to Jimmy, don’t hurt my friend.”

She punctuated the horrifying threat with a grin.

My face felt as green as Jimmy’s looked. “Your girlfriend is terrifying,” I muttered to Owen.

His eyes turned hazy as he stared at her. “She’s one of a kind.”

I might have to reevaluate what horrors I’d walk through to reach Gwen, but the way she was laughing under her breath, a slight shake to her shoulders, it was worth the nauseating visuals.

Jimmy berated Ainsley for ruining his appetite, but he opened a menu anyway, the four of them debating which appetizers we’d share.

I barely listened, couldn’t tell you what music played, or how full the bar was. All I saw was Gwen, and the amusement draining from her face. She leaned forward. “Were you trying to hurt me before, saying what you did?”

As much as I believed we needed to speak openly about what had happened, not sweep it under the rug like we’d done for nine years, I regretted the comment. “It just came out.”

Her eyes widened. “It just came out?”

I stretched my legs under the table, making contact with her shin. “You’re repeating me again.”

“Because you’re not making sense again. Comments like those don’t just come out .”

No, they didn’t. “I wasn’t trying to hurt you, Gwen. If I did, I’m sorry. But I’m tired of pretending it didn’t happen. It did. It sucked. And I’m ready to move on. Question is, are you?”

She glanced at our friends, who were going out of their way to give us privacy. She slid her attention back at me. “Move on how?”

I could tell her I had every intention of living out my teenage fantasies: Gwen grinding on me, me thrusting into her, slow and deep, my tongue writing songs between her strong thighs. I still had a tour to finish, another album to write, a life in Europe. Gwen’s life was a big unknown.

She didn’t do social media anymore, my creeping of her over the years unearthing zero intel. I had no clue what she did for a living, or if she’d entertain the notion of traveling with me, but my mind was already there.