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His eyes were as soft as his mouth against mine, and I kissed him again, long and slow, pulling back to whisper, “I’ll stay. I will.”
Returning to the kiss, I tried to tell him I meant so much more than simply in that afterglow moment. I was going to stay.
“And I’ll come back, over and over.” For the first time, I could picture it, me out on a dive, a long drive back to Safe Harbor, Holden’s voice in my ear on his latest podcast, Holden the man waiting at home. Home. I couldn’t help it. I had to laugh.
“What?” Holden wrinkled his forehead.
“Been a long damn time since I had a home address.”
“You’ve got more than an address.” He nuzzled my neck. “You’ve got me.”
“I’ve got you,” I agreed happily. “And you’re home.”
“So are you.”
“Me?” I peered down at him through narrowed eyes. “I’m a salty old nomad diver. Isn’t that what you called me?”
“Yeah, but you’re my salty diver. What’s home if not a place you can be yourself?” Holden stroked my face with his thumb. “That’s what you are to me, Cal. Home. A place to relax. With you, I don’t have to be funny. Or the extroverted friend. Hell, I don’t even have to talk. I can have a bad day. Or three. And if I want to talk, I can talk about anything, about the hard stuff, the stuff that sucks, the stuff that doesn’t seem fair.”
“Always. You can always talk to me.”
“Because you get it.” He nodded. “You’ve done battle in the dark. Me whining isn’t going to scare you away.”
“It’s not whining. It’s just life. Sometimes good, sometimes bad.” I cupped his face, willing him to see my truth. “And I want to be here for all of it.”
“Good.” His eyes looked suspiciously damp, so I took a page from his playbook and laughed.
“Guess you better start researching Seattle hotel rooms to visit your brother. See if you can work the visit to your family around my trip to Tahoe.”
“You’ll come?” His pleased expression was worth whatever discomfort the visit might cause me.
Wanting another laugh, I hummed an oldie, one my mom had sung all the time. “…I will follow…”
“No more cheesy TV for you. You’re cut off.”
We laughed and laughed until we were sticky and cold and in extreme need of a shower. And I was still scared, more than a little. Terrified of meeting Holden’s family and the possibility of messing everything up, but at that moment, all I could do was cling to Holden.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Holden
“Everything okay?” my mom called out from Greg and Kathleen’s kitchen. Ever the one in charge, she’d sent the new parents off to nap, Marley to the store, and put Cal and me on baby duty in the living room while she assembled lasagna for dinner for all of us.
“We’ve got this,” I yelled back before she could come check. Casserole assembly was her happy place, and she’d been doing almost as much baby care as Greg and Kathleen. Mom had some murderous TV drama playing softly on her tablet in the kitchen as good smells wafted our way, and I was hoping she’d sneak off for a nap of her own while the lasagna baked.
“Do we have this?” Cal whispered to me as Mom flitted away from the kitchen doorway.
“It’s one teeny baby.” I shifted Charlie from my right to my left shoulder. He had jet-black hair like his mother, dark expressive eyes, part of my dad’s name, and Greg’s unrepentant night owl tendencies. He still looked suspiciously wide awake. And angry. Charlie had enjoyed rocking in my chair with me, wheeling back and forth, but apparently, the novelty had worn off. “He’s been fed, diapered, and should be sleeping.”
“Should being the operative word.” Cal eyed the baby like a grenade. We’d arrived the day before, and he’d handled the onslaught of family and hugs like a champ, but he continued to give the baby a wide berth. Seeming to sense Cal’s distrust, Charlie let out another unhappy squawk, and Cal peered over my shoulder. “Lungs like those, he’ll make a hell of a diver.”
“You planning to stick around long enough to teach him?” I teased, but internally, I cheered. The drive from Safe Harbor had been gorgeous, spring giving way to the early signs of summer. Soon it would be time to think about backyard barbeques and summer trivia-night league. The idea of Cal and me making it through another season and enough years to watch Charlie learn to dive made me ridiculously giddy.
“Someone’s gotta.” Cal’s tone was pragmatic but not without enthusiasm. “Start with some toddler swim classes. Then we show him some easy snorkeling when he’s bigger.” Pausing, Cal narrowed his eyes at me. “Whatcha grinning at?”
“You said we.”
“Hell, you think I’m funding swim classes on my own?” Cal raised both eyebrows at me, and I only grinned wider.
