Crossing Hathaway (31 page)

Covered in grass and mud, we lay locked together for a while. A lazy smile decorated Ben’s face as he brushed the damp hair away from my brow.

He rolled off, and I nestled into the crook of his arm. In the afterglow, I trembled under each touch of a raindrop on my hot skin, like another tiny orgasm on my sensitive skin.

“I like that fantasy.” Ben nuzzled my face and gave a sleepy smile. “Do you have any others?”

I laughed and circled my fingertips along his chest. “I’m afraid to tell you what they are, because you have the means and are just crazy enough to make them come true.”

His lips found my forehead, planting kisses along my brow. “I’ve prepared another, less naked one for this evening if you’ll allow it.”

I sat up and stared down at him, unease crawling into the background. “You—what?”

He smiled, nodded. “A call from me will have your birth mother there for Sunday dinner as well. Your parents have already given their blessing.”

My head buzzed as I stared over the country town below. “And you’ll really come with me? No negotiating?”

He brought my fingers to his lips. “Simply to make you happy is more than I ever thought myself capable of.”

Tears crested my lashes as I threw myself on top of him like a blubbering fool and kissed everywhere my lips could reach. Laughing, I rose enough to see him without going cross-eyed. “I thought I told you not to make me cry, you jerk.”

“I thought I told you I like it when you do.” He grinned and nibbled my jaw.

I sighed and laughed. “Stubborn ass.”

“Mmm. Just the way you love me.”

Ben and I stood on my parents’ front stoop at ten minutes to six. I fussed with the navy wrap dress Ben had bought for me, swallowing to keep from throwing up.

“I don’t know if I can do this.” I shook my hands to stop their shaking. “This is so stupid. I’m thirty-five years old and I’m afraid my birth mother isn’t going to like me.”

Warm fingers tangled with mine. I followed Ben’s arm up to his face, to his confident smile.

“I’m here,” he said. Not,
it’s going to be okay
, or
I’m sure she’ll love you
. No empty promises or pretty lies. Better and better.

I squeezed his hand and took a breath as his comfort and presence filtered through me. Excitement replaced terror in the pit of my stomach. My lips perked into a grin. “Thank you for this.”

“You’ve given me my life back, and I promise to spend the rest of it making yours spectacular.”

I wrapped my arms around him, burying my face against his throat. “You’re doing a pretty good job so far.”

Jocelyn Adams grew up on a cattle farm in Lakefield and has remained a resident of Southern Ontario her entire life, most recently in Muskoka. She has worked as a computer geek, a stable hand, a secretary, and spent most of her childhood buried up to the waist in an old car or tractor engine with her mechanically inclined dad. But mostly, she's a dreamer with a vivid imagination and a love for fantasy (and a closet romantic—shhh!). When she isn't shooting her compound bow in competition or writing, she hangs out with her husband and young daughter at their little house in the woods.

Her debut novel, The Glass Man, released last fall, several of her short stories have appeared in print anthologies and magazines, and the second novel in her trilogy will release this coming October.