I stared at him.

“Though, don’t make it a habit. My brown-eyed girl is a girl, but she’s also a tough chick,” he went on.

That was a tease. He didn’t mean it.

I could cry in his arms every day of my life and he wouldn’t give a shit.

(Though, I’d never do that.)

I kept staring at him, doing it for the first time since it all went down with Dennis Lowe, feeling safe, being safe, totally safe to let it go.

But as I did it, my eyes filled with tears again.

I felt one break free and slide down my cheek.

Merry watched it go.

I started talking.

“I was so stupid.”

Merry looked back at me.

“So stupid,” I repeated. “He didn’t want to meet my mom. He never asked us to his place. I never met any of his friends. His bullshit in bed was fucked up. Even if it was kink, I should have had more self-respect than to let him do that to me. And it wasn’t that I didn’t see it, Merry. It wasn’t that I didn’t put it together. It was all textbook at the very least for him being married but also him bein’ possibly fucked in the head. So it wasn’t that I couldn’t put it together. It was that I refused to see it, because after my dad, after a bunch of shit guys treated me like crap, after Trent, I needed so badly to believe. To believe I could find some happy. So I refused to see. And that’s bad enough just for me. But I exposed Ethan to that. I exposed my baby boy to that kind of crazy just because I wanted us to have a little bit of happy.”

“You weren’t stupid, Cherie.”

“I so was.”

He gave me a squeeze. “In all their years together, how many signs do you think Lowe gave his wife?”

“I know, but—” I tried to cut in.

I failed.

“I never met her,” Merry spoke over me. “But every word said about her was that she was nice, people liked her, and no one said she was dumb. Men like him, it’s part of the sickness, sweetheart, finding the skills to hide he’s sick. He needed something from you and he turned on the charm to get it, by that time having had years to hone his skills at manipulating things to get what he wanted to feed the sick at the same time hide it. He played you, Cher. That’s all he did. The reasons why were worse than the usual player who uses those skills to get you in bed or a con man who does the same to orchestrate his score. But in the end, that’s all it was. And you are far from the first person, woman or man, mother or not, who trusted someone enough to get played.”

I was staring at him again because something about the way he laid that out felt like a knot was being untied inside me. It had been tied together to hold back something important, something crucial, and whatever that was, it finally was let loose.

Or maybe it was that and freaking out on him, attacking him, and dissolving into a sobbing mess in his arms.

Whatever…that knot loosened, that thing inside me untied, it loosened something else.

My mouth.

Thus, I blurted, “I love you.”

“No shit?”

I didn’t stare at that.

I blinked.

Then I asked, “I say, ‘I love you,’ and you say, ‘no shit?’”

“Babe, had my head in my ass, bein’ my own brand of stupid, so I didn’t see it. But when I looked back, I saw it.” His lips quirked. “So yeah. No shit. Seein’ as you been in love with me a long time.”

Oh fuck.

He’d figured that out.

“I have not,” I lied.

“Liar,” he called me on it.

I started to push away.

His arms got tighter.

“Cherie, I love you too.”

He sounded like he was struggling not only against me pulling away but also laughter.

Regardless of the fact that I totally…fucking…loved hearing those words directed at me from Garrett “Merry” Merrick’s beautiful mouth, I was me.

So I stopped pushing and glared at him. “I know. You shared that when you had me pinned against the wall.”

“Honey, you drew blood and nearly got me in the balls…twice. It was either pin you or let you have at it and then go to the emergency room.”

I felt my eyes get big. “I drew blood?”

“Back,” he grunted. “Nails. It’s nothing.”

I stretched to try and see his back. “Let me see.”

“It’s nothing.”

I glared at him again. “Let me see, Merry.”

“Not right now. Later. Now, one thing we gotta get straight—”

“I’ll talk to Doc,” I stated, guessing at what he wanted to get straight. “Ask him if maybe I should talk to someone about PTSD or something so you can fuck me on my stomach, because pre-ax murderer, I liked it like that.”

Merry grinned at me. “Baby, you put up a helluva fight and you were seriously gone, but if you can be glib about therapy for PTSD for the sake of not losin’ a sex position, I think you’re good.”

I hoped so because Feb and Morrie had good insurance, but I had no idea if it covered psychological shit and I had an extra name on my Christmas list now, an important one, and I was already giving up my candy and makeup habits (not all of them but some) in order to save to give it to him good. I didn’t need therapy bills.

“Okay, so if you weren’t gonna get up in my face about seein’ someone to sort my shit out, what do we gotta talk about?” I asked.

“The fact that you clearly think it’s weak to show emotion and to describe ‘weak’ you refer to bein’ a girl. Showing emotion isn’t weak. Showing emotion takes a lot of courage. Trusting someone to give shit to that you can’t hold inside anymore isn’t weak either. I know this because a wise, pretty, brown-eyed woman told me this not two months ago. And if we have girls, I don’t want you teachin’ them that they can’t be girls however they wanna be girls and that anything girl-like is weak. ‘Cause that shit ain’t right.”

I was staring again.

Then I was weeping again.

Finally, I was blurting again.

“If we have girls?”

“You want more kids?”

“Yes,” I whispered.

“Then that can happen, fifty-fifty chance, and if they like butterflies and flowers and have no interest in bein’ tough chicks, gotta know you’re on board with that.”

I was on board.

So on board.

Still whispering (and blurting and weeping), I said, “I love you.”

Merry was whispering too when he replied, “Love you too, Cherie.”

“Can I look at your back now?” I asked softly.

He fell back, doing it twisting.

When he had me back to the bed and him pressed into me, he said, “After I fuck you again.”

My arms around him tightened as my brows went up. “Not concerned about another episode?”

“This time I do you, I’ll be lookin’ in your eyes.”

I liked it like that.

Enough to lift my head and press my lips to his.

He pushed back so my head was to the pillow and opened his mouth.

Our tongues tangled at the same time.

Merry didn’t do me looking in my eyes the whole time.

But it was me who lost eye contact when he made me come.

I would find out later I did draw blood on his back. Two lines, one deeper than the other along his shoulder blade.

I was careful as I washed them in the shower. I gooed them up with Neosporin before we snarfed down donuts.

But the ointment ended up on Merry’s sheets.

What could I say?

We had the whole day.

We were young, healthy.

We loved each other.

And that was worth a repeat.

We loved each other.

I loved Merry and Merry loved me.

Life was good.

For once.

With a hopeful forecast for the future.

Finally.

So it was time to fuck.

* * * * *

Saturday Night

“Babe?”

I was nearly asleep, fucked out and cuddled into my man.

“Mm?”

“Keep an eye, open communication, it happens again, you got shit messin’ with your head, we talk. You need it, we take you to Doc.”

I opened my eyes.

My man took care of me.