Late Nights & Love Lines (Single Dad Hotline #2)

28. Here we are

28

HERE WE ARE

ROWAN

I hadn’t meant to run, but here I am, sitting on Sebastian’s bedroom balcony, overlooking a beach party meant to welcome me home, taking pictures for Instagram that no one will ever see instead of being down there.

Home.

My palms sweat, and I wipe them on the hem of my sweater. The salt air is cool tonight, the breeze strong in its assault, a warning of storms to come.

“Row?”

Angling my head toward the balcony door, I smile at Miles. “Hey, bud.”

He holds his arms out wide. “They made us T-shirts.”

Sailport Bay’s lighthouse is plastered to the center of his shirt and the words Welcome Home, Walkers form a circle around it.

“Hey, that’s pretty cool.”

He nods enthusiastically and sits next to me. “They brought cake too.” His big green eyes peer up at me. “I already had two pieces. This one’s for you.” He shoves the cake with ocean-blue frosting into my hands.

“Are you having fun?” I ask, eyeing the cake suspiciously. It’s smashed in a few places—it must have had a hell of a journey up to me. How much of it is all over the floor?

Miles looks from me to the cake and laughs. “Kade was helping me, but then he saw Lucky the cat on the front porch.”

Makes sense.

“Are you having fun?” I ask again, pointing to the party down below, fully aware that I’m the party pooper of the evening.

“Yeah, but…” He pauses and scratches his jaw just below his ear. It’s so similar to his dad that it steals all the air from my lungs. “Well, I didn’t want you to be lonely.”

Geez, this kid.

“I’m not lonely,” I lie. “I needed a few minutes before I came down.”

Both of his little brows raise comically. “You missed dinner, Row.”

“There you are.” Seren pops her head out onto the balcony, sees the two of us, and plops down on my other side.

“Where are your friends?” I ask.

She points to the bonfire, where three girls sit with their heads together, laughing.

Seren smiles down at them and waves.

“Is everything okay?” I ask her.

“Yeah. Marlo was telling me about the teachers at the middle school. They said the music teacher is actually cool.”

“That’s amazing, Ser. Then what the heck are you doing up here?”

She shrugs but bumps my shoulder as though I should already know the answer to that.

“For crying out loud,” Tabby huffs. “You’re impossible to find when you’re hiding.” The balcony off Sebastian’s bedroom isn’t that big, and it’s quickly filling up. I’d only meant to come out here for a minute to peek at the party before joining it.

That was an hour ago.

“I’m not hiding. I’m…preparing myself. Did you need something?” I ask Tabby.

She shrugs and slides to the floor beside us.

A loud pop has everyone glancing to the sky as fireworks light up our features. Every face is pointed upward, but my gaze jumps from person to person.

“If I knew this was the place to be, I’d have gotten a contractor out here to make it bigger,” Sebastian says, joining us on the balcony. He stands behind me, with one hand on Miles and the other on Seren while he rests his chin on my head.

Down below, I find Beck standing at the edge of the ocean, holding Ruby’s hand on his right and Kade’s hand on his left. Both kids jump and splash and jump some more while pointing to the sky.

“Surely there’s a weight limit out here,” Leo grumbles, and doesn’t step outside.

“Oh, they’re so pretty,” Stella says, pushing past Leo and plopping her ass down next to Tabby.

I frown as I place the cake on the small table in front of me.

“What’s going on?” I finally ask.

No one tears their gaze away from the fireworks. And if I didn’t know better, I’d say they’re actively avoiding eye contact.

Tipping my head back dislodges Sebastian’s chin from the top of my head. “What’s going on?” I whisper, somehow believing that he’ll always tell me the truth.

His smile is devastating.

Miles leans into my side, then peers up at me with honesty shining in his eyes. “It’s not a welcome home party without you, Row.”

The porcupine in my throat tosses out a few more quills.

“He’s right.” Sebastian’s voice is soft yet firm in the conviction of those two little words.

“But…” My voice is rough, like fresh sandpaper on a popcorn ceiling. “Tabby, all your friends are down there.”

My hands whip through the air in their manic need to dispel the emotions building within me.

“A lot of them, yes,” she says, without ever tearing her gaze away from the sparklers in the sky shooting rainbow-colored stars through the night. “But they don’t all need me right now.”

“Wh—what do you mean?”

“We gave you space, Row.” Stella shifts on the floor to smile up at me prettily. “But we saw you leaning on the balcony railing, staring at everything as though you wanted to be part of it, but something was holding you back.”

She’s right. I’ve been sitting up here warring with myself for an hour. Why do I have to be so messed up? It’s just a freaking party.

A welcome home party.

“Friendship is about meeting people halfway, Rowan.” Leo still hasn’t stepped onto the balcony, but his words boom through the night as if he’s right beside me. “We’re meeting you halfway.”

“But the party—it’s—everyone’s having a good time down there.” I’m not making any sense. I don’t even know what I mean to say.

“Down there, yes. But one of our lost souls still hasn’t fully entered the orphanage.” Stella grins. “So we brought the orphanage to her.”

“You brought…” My gaze jumps from person to person. Each expression’s filled with more love than the last, and the ache I’ve lived with since I was twelve years old is suddenly close to exploding.

“Yes.” Sebastian’s voice is low and even. “Miles was worried about you, so here we are.”

Miles was worried about me.

“Can I talk to Rowan alone for a minute?” Sebastian asks.

“Go easy on her, Dad.” Seren’s tone is serious, but the happiness on her face is kind. “She’s had a big day.”

As quickly as the balcony filled up, it empties. “I don’t understand,” I finally admit as Sebastian sits next to me.

His hand finds mine in the dark, and he twines our fingers together.

“We want you here, Rowan. But we’re all prepared for you to run, too, and we’re prepared to chase you.”

I attempt to tug my hand free, but he holds tighter.

“It’s what you’re used to,” he continues. “But there are other ways to live. I love you, Peach, but I don’t know how to keep you. The only thing I can do is show you what you have here, regardless of what happens between you and me.”

The damn porcupine has found some friends. My throat is raw from the emotional quills hammering away in it.

What does happen if Seb and I don’t work out?

“Rowan.” He doesn’t snap my name, but his command tells me he understands how quickly my mind can spiral.

Turning my chin toward him, he holds me close enough to smell the hops on his breath from whatever beer he drank downstairs. “Whether you ever love me back or not, this place is your home. These people, us, we’re your family. So, if you run, we’ll keep your heart safe. And when you come home, we’ll be here waiting for you, because this is home, Row. It’s home for you and me, and it’s home for us when you’re ready.”

My phone rings in my hand, once, twice, three times before he sighs and pulls away. Kissing my forehead, he gives me space, and I do the one thing I know won’t cause my pulse to skyrocket so high that I pass out.

I answer the phone. “Single Dad Hotline, I’m your helper, how can I help you?”

“Rowan, I need Lottie’s number.” He’s so loud I have to pull the phone away from my ear.

Thane Wilder has the uncanny ability to ruin a moment.

“Thane—”

“Listen. I know she’s not going to Paris because she has you to take over Europe now, and I don’t even care.”

“What the hell are you talking about? How do you?—”

“Kara’s run away, and I think she’s searching for Lottie because she thinks Lottie is heading to Paris. I need her number.”

“Ran away? Why would she?—”

“For fuck’s sake, Rowan. I need the goddamn number.” In all my time working with Thane, I’ve never once heard him emit an ounce of emotion, but now he sounds as though he’s drowning in it.

My phone is wrenched from my hands. “Don’t fucking talk to her that way.”

I jump to my feet and find a very pissed-off Sebastian scrolling through his own phone while growling into mine. In horror, I watch as he recites Lottie’s personal cell phone number, then tosses my phone onto the bed behind him.

“Paris?” he asks, the word trembling as it crosses his lips.

I wring my hands together in front of me while the lunch I ate earlier swirls in my belly like shards of glass.

“I told you about Lottie’s offer,” I say. My voice shakes worse than a category-five earthquake.

“I remember.” I can’t read his expression, but a fear I’ve never known creeps up my spine.

It’s the fear of losing him, I realize.

“Did you accept the position?” he asks.

I shake my head.

“Did you turn it down?” His tone is a blend of hopefulness and fear that I feel all the way to my bones.

Breaking eye contact, I stare at my wrist while twisting the pretty crystals and shake my head again.

“I see.” Two words that convey the hurt in his tone. He steps forward, holds my biceps in his hands, and places a gentle kiss to my forehead. “I meant what I said. This is your home whether you’re mine or not. Always.”

When he steps back, he doesn’t meet my gaze, and that cuts more than my mother’s indifference. But this time, the pain that I feel is my own damn fault.

“I’m going to get the kids to bed. It’s getting late.”

I try to swallow or nod or something, but my mind has lost control of my body and I can’t even blink.

He leaves me alone on the balcony. The party down below is filled with people who are trying so hard to include me in their lives, yet I’ve never felt more alone in my grief and pain.

“Fight for the life you want, not the life you think you deserve.”

Pappy’s words from my sixteenth birthday come back to haunt me now because I’m beginning to understand that my entire life has been built on fighting for the life I thought I had to have—the one that’s a never-ending uphill battle against old wounds.

What if I’ve been fighting for the wrong thing all this time?

My mind is still in chaotic disarray hours later when my door cracks open and Sebastian slips in.

I hold my breath as he silently closes it behind him before crawling into bed with me. He doesn’t wait for me to say anything, he just wraps his arms around my middle and tugs me across the bed to press my back into his front.

We touch from shoulders to toes while he holds my center in a viselike grip, and finally, finally, I feel as though I can breathe.

“I tried to stay away, to give you time to think tonight,” he whispers into my hair. “But this, right here, with you is where I belong. I decided it’s only fair that if you’re fighting to figure out where you belong that I get a chance to fight for you to stay.”

The remaining tension that had coiled into my body slowly melts away, taking all the noise in my mind with it.

“Todays and tomorrows.” He says it like a prayer, a promise, and an omen.

Together, wrapped as one, I fall asleep, not fighting to get away from my past but fighting for the hope of a future.