Stonehill series collect.., p.69
Stonehill Series Collection, page 69
“It went really well, actually.”
She lifted her brows. “Really?”
“Yes, really.”
“Do you feel like it helped?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know, Annie. I still have a hard time talking about what happened. I think we all do, but we did manage to discuss it a little. I guess I got so caught up in what I was going through that I never really let myself think about what Matt and Paul must have been thinking. I knew they were going through hell, but I never thought about how much.”
She frowned. “I need to have some one-on-one time with Matty. I haven’t done that yet.”
“He’d like that.” He chuckled. “We toasted your stubbornness.”
“My stubbornness?”
“We credit your survival on your inability to relinquish control to anyone else.”
She chuckled. “That very well could be true. And in that line of thinking, because we both know that I’m a beast without caffeine, I also managed to re-teach myself how to make coffee. Would you like some with your cake?”
“I would love some.”
She started to stand, but he tightened his hold on her. “Thank you for being patient with me.”
She sighed. “I think you’ve earned it. You’ve taken an awful lot of crap from me, and not just since the shooting.” She traced his jaw again. “I just want us back. I know that we didn’t have much of an us before, but I really liked what we did have.”
“We had plenty of us before. And I really liked it, too. I miss it, Annie. I don’t mean you the way you were. Because underneath all this, you are still you. I mean the comfort level between us. The banter. The fun. You’ve been taking steps to get back to that, and tonight I feel like I took my first step, too.” He smiled up at her as he ran his hand over her hair. “We’re going to get there. We’re going to find a way to put all this behind us and move forward, and when we do, our life is going to be so beautiful you’re going to want to scream.”
She chuckled but then shook her head. “I have a little different perspective on all this now, you know. I can’t hang on to the past anymore. I can’t be so scared that I don’t live anymore. I know you’ll never hurt me, and that has given me so much freedom, Marcus. You can’t even begin to imagine how much you have given me.”
He smiled and nodded. “I hope so.”
She dipped her head but waited for him to close the distance. He did, and the kiss lingered. It wasn’t passionate or an invitation for more, simply a soft kiss, but it still stirred something inside her, and when she leaned back, she chuckled. “I forgot what I was going to do.”
Marcus grinned.
“Don’t look so cocky,” she whispered. “I have brain damage. I forget a lot of things.”
He laughed as he lifted her from his lap. “Coffee, you shrew. You were making me coffee.”
“Right.” Leaning down, she kissed his head. “I remember now.”
Chapter 18
Stonehill Café wasn’t usually quite so busy. It was good for Jenna that the restaurant was bustling, but Marcus had picked it expecting it to be slower. He put his hand on Annie’s back, trying to gauge her comfort level. She offered him a smile, clearly to reassure him, but she looked uneasy. She still couldn’t wrap her head around all the noises and movements of a crowd.
“Shall we leave?”
She shook her head. “If we are going to take steps to get back the things that make us us, then I need to work on this.”
“We can find someplace quieter.”
“No. This is what you wanted. This is what we’re having. I’ll be fine.”
He hesitated, still uncertain, but when Jenna smiled and gestured for them to have a seat wherever they wanted, he led Annie to a booth that sat away from most of the diners.
“It’s so good to see you, Annie,” Jenna said.
Annie smiled. “You, too.”
“How are you?”
“Doing better every day.”
She slid the menus onto the table, and Annie turned her attention to scanning the options. Marcus didn’t know why. They both knew she’d get the grilled chicken sandwich with no vegetables—they slid off and made the sandwich more difficult for her to hold—and fries—she could eat those with her hands without feeling awkward about it.
When Jenna returned, he ordered the same, just to show Annie a bit of solidarity in their meal. He watched her closely as the noise in the restaurant surrounded them. She was getting better—being around a houseful of O’Connells once a week was turning into great practice for being in larger groups—but she was still clearly uncomfortable with the volume and confusion that too many things happening at once caused.
Reaching across the table, he took her hand, trying to get her to focus on him. He smiled when she met his gaze. “Between lunch and dinner, we used to come here several times a week. I think this is a great place to get back into our habit of dining out.”
She nodded. “I came here for lunch with Paul and Matt last week. Remember?”
“You guys came early to avoid the crowd, though. I think it’s safe to say, this is more like what we should expect when we go to restaurants. How is it?”
She squeezed his hand lightly. “I’m okay, Marcus. Stop worrying about every little thing.”
“I love worrying about every little thing.”
“Yes, I know. To add to that, I wanted to talk about the trip to San Diego. Are you sure about driving?”
“Yeah. And you know, that’s the perfect time to take Mallory her stuff. We’ll take a moving van out, attach my car to the back, and haul it with us then drive back in it.”
“It’s a long way.”
“Are you concerned about the drive?”
“No. I’m not allowed to drive anymore. I’m concerned about you driving. And the weather turning.”
He glanced at a group of teens headed toward a booth close to theirs. He wasn’t exactly going to ask them not to take the free table, but he was hoping they’d move on and sit elsewhere. They were loud coming in, and he expected they’d be just as loud sitting around a table. The added noise was sure to disturb Annie.
His spine stiffened when one of the kids turned and adjusted his cap. The hat—white with a Harley Davidson logo—flashed into Marcus’s mind. The shaggy hair was longer now. But the square jaw was the same. His build was the same.
“Marcus?” Annie tugged at his hands.
The kid smiled at something one of his friends said as his gaze met Marcus’s. It should have only been for a split second, but the way he stopped and his eyes grew wide told Marcus what his gut already knew. That was the bastard who’d shot Annie.
“Don’t move,” Marcus said to Annie as he stood.
“Where are you going?”
Marcus had just taken a step when the kid turned and ran, just like he’d done from the scene of the shooting. This time, however, Marcus was right behind him.
“What the fuck, man?” one of the other teens asked as Marcus pushed through the group.
The kid was almost to the door when Jenna inadvertently stepped in his way. He plowed into her, knocking her down. The tray she was holding crashed to the floor, and glasses broke as sodas mixed and ice cubes scattered with the shards of glass. The kid jumped over her, stumbled, and tried to steady himself, but Marcus was on him a second later, slamming him to the floor. First he’d shot Annie, and then he’d knocked Jen to the ground. There was no way in hell this kid was getting away again.
Marcus grabbed a fistful of his shirt, flipped him over, and slapped the hat off his head.
“I didn’t mean it,” the kid said. “I swear, I didn’t mean it.”
Slamming his back to the ground, Marcus glared at the young man who couldn’t have been older than twenty. “You shot her.”
“It was an accident.”
Marcus wouldn’t ever consider himself a violent man, but the rage inside him took over, and he pulled his fist back and punched the kid when he struggled to get free. “It’s not an accident when you aim a loaded gun at someone’s head.”
Hands pulled at Marcus’s shoulder, but he clung to the kid. He wasn’t letting him go again. He grabbed his shirt and shook him. “Do you have any idea what you’ve put her through? What you’ve done to her family?”
“Sir,” someone said firmly, “I need you to back down.”
Looking over his shoulder, he realized one of the cops who had been sitting at the counter was behind him. Hand on the butt of the gun at his hip as he pulled at Marcus. Annie was standing with Jenna, holding her hand as the other officer who had been waiting for dinner looked Jenna over. The wide-eyed fear on their faces made him ease his hold. He was pulled back, and the officer put himself between Marcus and the kid.
Annie was immediately at Marcus’s side.
Her lips trembled as she looked into his eyes. “He shot me?”
He nodded and pulled her to him. She buried her face in his chest, and he held her tightly as he answered the officer’s demand to know what was going on.
Annie rolled over when Marcus sighed. He’d been making that sorrowful sound about every two minutes if her calculations were correct. Putting her hand on his back, she rubbed gently. “You okay?”
“Am I keeping you awake?”
“Not really. I can’t sleep either.” She scooted closer, spooning him from behind, and slid her arm around his waist and up his chest.
His hand instantly covered hers, and he sighed again. “I’m so sorry.”
“About what?”
“Losing my temper.”
She kissed his back and pressed her cheek against his warm skin. “I told you not to apologize for that anymore. If you hadn’t gone after him, he would have gotten away again.”
“I shouldn’t have hit him like that.”
“Well, since the police wouldn’t let me have a go at him, I’m glad you got your hit in.” She smiled, but he didn’t respond. “Marcus, he deserved it. Look what he’s done to us.”
“But I upset you.”
“No.” She leaned back and pulled at him. “Roll over. Please.”
After a moment, he turned onto his back so she could look down at him in the dimly lit room.
“You didn’t upset me. I was confused at first, but once I realized what was going on, I got it. I get it. He got away with what he’d done to us for too long.”
“I was almost arrested for assault. If you hadn’t called Paul…”
“Hey,” she gently teased. “What good is it having a criminal defense attorney in the family if I don’t get to use him every now and then?”
He sighed and sat up, leaning against the headboard. “I’ve never lost control like that before. I just…I saw that damned hat he was wearing, and that moment came back. I remembered how he had it down on his face, like it was going to disguise him. His eyes. I remembered his eyes. He had that same shocked look, like he couldn’t believe what was happening.”
“He’s ruined the rest of his life.”
Marcus’s face tensed. “He ruined the rest of your life.”
Annie frowned and pushed herself to sit. She pulled her knees under her and kneeled beside him as she stared into his eyes. “I felt that way for a while. For too long. It took a lot of time to realize that you were right when you told me that I needed to be thankful to be alive. I finally am. I finally get what you were saying. My life is different. My life is more difficult. But my life isn’t ruined.” After stroking her hand over his hair, she rested her palms on his cheeks. “My life would be ruined if I lost you. If he’d shot you instead of running, then my life would have been ruined. But we’re both here. We’re both alive.” Tracing his laugh lines with her thumbs, she smiled softly. “He’s going to get what is owed to him. And so are we. Because from this point on, we’re not looking back. We’re just going forward. We’re going to focus on us and the life we said we were going to have.”
“You amaze me,” he whispered. “Every single day I am amazed by you.”
She grinned. “Well, I’m amazing.”
“Yes, you are.”
“You’re pretty great yourself.” Leaning in, she kissed him lightly before resting her forehead against his. She considered only for a moment before kissing him again, this time letting it linger. She waited for the inevitable moment when he shut down, but instead, he put his hands to her hips and lifted her to his lap. She straddled his thighs and wrapped her arms around his neck as she parted her lips and let his tongue in. His fingers pressed into her, pulling her closer. Fire lit inside her at the feel of his body reacting to hers. Grinding into him, her breath caught as he moaned.
Breaking the kiss, Marcus exhaled slowly, warming her face with his breath. “Annie.”
“I’m not going to break,” she whispered. “I promise.”
He brushed his nose against hers, and she kissed him lightly.
“I promise.”
“If you start to feel overwhelmed…”
“Oh, honey. You’re good, but—”
He gently bit her lip, causing her to giggle.
“You’re a smartass,” he said.
“You love that about me.”
He ran his hand over her hair, and the teasing left his gaze. “I love everything about you. I really do.”
She softened her smile as well. “I love you. We’ve made it this far down the path. We’re going to make it to the end. Together. Like we said.”
Pulling her to him, he kissed her, and this time, she knew he wouldn’t stop.
Chapter 19
It wasn’t easy for Annie, but she sat at her kitchen table while her daughter, sisters-in-law, and Jenna took control of Thanksgiving dinner. They bustled about the room, mixing, spilling, and laughing as they went. She used to be in the mix, but now that she was sitting on the outside, she had to admit she kind of enjoyed it. It was nice to be able to watch and actually see the happiness her family felt. Seeing them together like this filled her with her own sense of pride.
This was her family and after so many years of emotional turmoil and hardships, they were finally coming into their own. Matt and Donna were as happy as ever. Paul and Dianna were content with their lives, and she and Marcus were settling in as a couple. Mallory would be leaving for California over the weekend. Once she got to San Diego, she’d find a home and officially be on her own. Everything was growing and changing, but unlike before the shooting, Annie didn’t feel a sense of loss at the changes. Life wasn’t being lived if it wasn’t changing. She understood that now. She embraced it now.
Hands on her shoulders pulled her from her thoughts. She smiled when Marcus bent down to kiss her head. Funny how seven months before, she would have hated how he constantly did that. Now it was one of the most comforting things in her life. He never missed a chance to press his lips to her head, and she’d come to expect, and appreciate, it.
“Okay?”
“Better than okay,” she said.
He kneeled in front of her and took her hands. “You were a million miles away.”
“No, I was focusing on that.” She nodded toward the women.
He glanced over his shoulder. “Making sure they don’t mess up dinner?”
“Soaking in the happiness.”
He lifted his brows. “Oh?”
“Can we take a walk?”
“Do we have time?”
“They won’t eat without us.”
He stood, held his hand out, and pulled her to her feet. “We’ll be back,” he said to the three women cooking. Leading Annie through the living room, he made the same declaration to Paul and Matt.
Paul looked up from the newspaper he was reading. “Where you headed?”
“I need some air,” Annie said.
“Everything okay?”
“Everything’s perfect.” And she meant it. Bundling in her scarf and coat, she struggled with her gloves until Marcus reached for her hands and helped her pull them up. She’d figure it out, she’d learn how to put them on without him, but until then, she’d learned to accept his help.
The cold air bit at her cheeks when they stepped outside. “It’s going to snow.”
“Supposed to start anytime now.”
She drew a deep breath as he took her hand. “It’s still beautiful out.”
“Was it getting to be too much noise?” he asked as they started down the sidewalk.
“No, actually, I was just thinking about how lucky I am. Funny how it took a bullet in the head for me to finally start to get what you’ve been telling me for so long.”
“Everybody needs a wake-up call sometime.”
“I was sitting there feeling so happy, so complete. That’s a good way to put it. My life is finally complete. And I realized there is one thing that will make it better.”
“What?”
“I want to do it.”
He lifted his brows and looked around. “Right here?”
She laughed as she tugged at his hand. Pulling him to a stop, she drew a deep breath and looked into his eyes. “I want us to get married.”
The surprise on his face made her giggle.
“I know this isn’t the most traditional marriage proposal, but when have we ever been traditional?” she asked. “I don’t want the fuss, and not just because I’m not about all that, but honestly”—she touched her head—“I couldn’t handle it. If it’s okay, I thought maybe we could just elope, like said we would. Just a quiet ceremony in San Diego when we visit our girl. Like we joked about.”
He smiled. “You called her our girl.”
“She is our girl. You’re the closest thing to a dad she’s ever had. That she’ll ever have. And we’re a family, right?”
“Damn straight we are.” He put his gloved hands to her face and kissed her. “Don’t move.”
“Hey,” she called as he started back toward the house. “The last time you told me that, you punched a guy.”
“There will be no hitting this time,” he said. “I promise. Just don’t move.”
