Chapter 24

Harley

My conversationwith Tommy stayed with me all morning as I got ready for Wynter and River to visit.

I hadn’t answered his last question because it seemed rhetorical.

And also because I honestly didn’t know the answer.

Could we be more than friends?

The short answer was yes.

Abso-fucking-lutely.

The long answer, however, was much more complicated.

I missed him more than I could put into words, so having him back in my life in any capacity was a yes but I was still in love with him, and being put in the friend zone would ultimately gut me. However, he’d specifically asked if we could be more than friends, which could mean a few different things. At this point in the game, I couldn’t assume anything. I wasn’t ready to ask him if that meant getting back together, getting remarried, becoming a family.

Maybe he was just interested in being fuck buddies.

That was one thing we did incredibly well, even when it was nothing but a hate fuck, like that night at the cemetery.

If that was all he wanted, I didn’t think I could do it, because the physical and emotional would get messy.

It was exciting and terrifying to try and decipher what that statement had meant, and I planned to talk to Allisha about it the first chance we got, but right now I had to focus on my son.

Wynter and River had just parked so I was on my way down to the lobby to meet them. As much as I’d needed this time at Harmony Place, I’d missed my baby like crazy. We’d never been separated for more than a few days, so this had probably been hard on him. It was for me too, but I’d needed it both for myself and for him, so I could be the mother he deserved.

“Mommy!” River broke away from Wynter the moment he saw me, pumping his little legs as fast as they could go until he reached me. I knelt down in time for him to vault himself against me, and I hugged him tightly.

“How’s my baby boy?” I whispered against his hair.

“I miss you,” he whispered back, as if we were sharing some special secret.

“I know, baby, and I miss you too.”

“When are you coming home?” he asked against my chest, his little arms tight around my neck.

“Two more weeks,” I promised. “And when I get home, we can do anything you want.”

“Yay!” He broke away and wiggled happily, his concerns about me coming home no longer an issue.

“Hey, sis.” Wynter was smiling as she approached. “You look…relaxed. And you got some color.”

“I’ve been doing sunrise yoga and walking on the beach and sunning on my balcony. Being here has been therapeutic in more ways than one. I’m really grateful you suggested this place.”

Wynter was looking at something over my shoulder. “Does any of that therapy have to do with a certain drummer we all know and love?”

I turned and smiled when I saw Tommy milling around in the lobby, keeping a respectable distance, probably so he wouldn’t intrude. I motioned for him to join us. “Hey, come meet River.”

He was moving slower than usual since he’d abandoned his cane but was still wearing the brace on his knee.

“River, come say hello to my friend.”

River came bounding over to us and looked up at Tommy with a slight frown. “You’re Uncle Tommy,” he announced proudly.

“That’s right.” Tommy smiled and held out his fist. “Gimme a bump?”

“Yeah!” River immediately bumped his little fist against Tommy’s and then splayed his fingers wide, making an explosion noise.

Tommy laughed and I watched the two of them chat for a few seconds.

The fist bump followed by a fake explosion had been River’s thing with his dad, even though he’d only been two when Carter died, and seeing him do it with Tommy now was poignantly painful. Especially since there was no way Tommy could have known that.

Not for the first or second time, I mentally cursed Carter for abandoning his son, no matter how much pain he’d been in.

“Are we going to the beach, Mommy?” River had already moved on, sliding his hand into mine.

“Sure. The water’s cold, though, so you can only play in the sand.”

“Okay.” He turned to Tommy. “Are you coming with us?”

“If it’s okay with your mom.” Tommy glanced at me, and I nodded.

“I’m going to plant my ass in that chair over there.” Wynter pointed. “And read my book until time for lunch.”

“We’ll circle back and find you,” I told her.

Then Tommy, River, and I headed for the beach.

A tiny piece of my soul crumpled from the agony of pretending that the three of us today were the family I’d always wanted. The family Tommy and I had dreamed of before everything went wrong. Before a medical diagnosis derailed our dreams and one night of passion changed the trajectory of all our lives.

“Mommy, a seashell!” River picked up the tiny shell and held it up like it was made of gold. “Can I keep it?”

“Sure, honey. But just one. If everyone takes all the shells, there won’t be any left to enjoy next time.”

He frowned but nodded, racing ahead of us to kick the sand and spin in circles.

“So much energy,” Tommy murmured, standing next to me as we watched River play.

“He’ll wear himself out and then be ready to settle down to have lunch.”

“He looks just like Carter,” he said after a moment. “Not just the eyes, but the way he smiles too. Even some of his mannerisms.”

“I know.”

“I miss him,” he said, staring out at the water.

“Me too.” I slid my hand into his and he laced his fingers with mine.

“I wish I’d had a chance to say goodbye. To hug him one more time. Something. Anything except that damn phone call telling me he was gone.”

“I knew,” I admitted. “I mean, I didn’t know when or where or how, but he talked about it often. I begged him to get help, but he said he didn’t need help. He just needed peace. He once told me his addiction was like another person living inside his head. It spoke to him, called to him, taunted him, until he couldn’t resist anymore. Only when he was high, did those voices shut up.”

“I fucking hate that for him.”

“Same.”

“Uncle Tommy, look!” River pointed to a seagull that had landed a few feet away from him. “He’s my new friend.”

“Did you name him?” Tommy called back.

River didn’t miss a beat. “His name is Onyx.”

“Do you know what onyx means?” Tommy asked, walking toward him.

River shrugged his little shoulders. “It’s my daddy’s band.”

Oh, geez.

Did I talk about Carter and Onyx Knight too much?

I didn’t know if it was a good thing or a bad thing to keep his father’s memory alive. Would River still have these memories in a few years? Would the pictures and videos I often showed him eventually replace actual memories until he didn’t know what he remembered and what I’d shown him?

“Onyx is another way of saying jet black,” Tommy said patiently.

“It’s a color?”

“Yup. It’s also a precious stone that has black and white stripes.”

“Do you have one?”

“One what? An onyx stone?” Tommy nodded. “I do. I have lots of them. Someday, you can come over to my house and I’ll show you my collection.”

“Yay!” River clapped his hands and then ran after the poor seagull, who would fly a few feet away before landing again, eyeing his tormentor suspiciously.

“Does he remember his dad?” Tommy asked me quietly.

“I don’t know. I talk about him a lot, because I didn’t want him to forget, but he was two. It’s inevitable that he’ll forget, and I don’t know how to stop it.”

“We can keep his memory alive, with pictures, videos, and music. Between the four of us in the band, we have a lot of stories to tell. Some of them are even G-rated.”

I chuckled. “Probably not nearly as many as the R-rated ones.”

“No, but we’ll save those for when he’s older.”

“Carter left him letters,” I said. “One each for his tenth, thirteenth, eighteenth, and twenty-first birthdays. There are a few others for high school graduation, his wedding day, and one he’ll get when he turns thirty and gets access to the full money that’s in trust for him.”

“Why thirteen?” Tommy asked curiously.

“I don’t know. Puberty? The potential discovery of girls? Who knows. Carter planned this so carefully it’s a little scary.”

“Did you read them? The letters for River?”

“No, they’re sealed and in his lawyer’s possession. I plan to read the ones when he’s underage before I give them to him, because he’ll still be a kid and I want to make sure there’s nothing in there that will traumatize him, but I doubt Carter would do something like that. He loved River more than anything.”

“Did you ever consider that you might remarry, maybe have a man willing to step up and become River’s dad?”

I met his gaze as I slowly shook my head. “You were the only man I was ever going to marry.”