Page 3

That owl hooted again, pulling my gaze off the cold stone for the cemetery’s darkness beyond. The paved road wound through shrubs and what looked like a small chapel in the distance.
A new beginning lay before me like the path that disappeared into the unknown. A new life…
And the family-rich boy beside me seemed just as lost and lonely as I felt deep inside where I smothered all my feelings.
“This and our birthday are the only two days I can’t live in denial he’s gone,” Ashton whispered. “It’s just so much easier pretending he never got sick and died. He was my sunshine, my shoulder to lean on.” The boy released a shuddered sigh and sagged even more like he wanted to sink into the soil and join his twin.
I rarely smiled, so I couldn’t fill up that first part of him he’d lost with his brother. But I sure as hell could offer the second.
“I just moved here, and even though I could never take Archer’s place in your life, I’d like to be your friend,” I suggested quietly. “And I promise you can lean on me whenever you want.”
Ashton turned and threw his arms around me, clinging to me like he had decided I was his tower of strength.
Warmth flooded through my body, and my eyes stung for the first time since I’d buried my puppy. My throat went tight, and I allowed myself to touch him like I’d longed to do. Hugging him close, I leaned my cheek onto the top of his head as he started to cry again.
He smelled like sweat and dirt, the outdoors…and home.
I closed my eyes and filled my senses with all things Ashton Blackwood, calmness I’d been missing since leaving my old town settling into my bones.
I would be Ashton’s rock, be the stability he needed, I decided in that moment as sure as the breath in my lungs.
And he would be my best friend until we too lay beneath soil and moonlight with nothing but a lonely owl keeping our spirits company.
2
Ashton
For once, I woke before Rhett, and I soaked in the pleasure of watching him in a state of slumber, the only place vulnerability owned his mind.
His dark hair stuck up from my running my fingers through it while he’d loved on me the night before. No furrow lined the skin between his thick eyebrows. His lips parted, slack and peaceful in slumber where he rested his cheek on navy satin sheets.
I wondered if he dreamed, and if so, what images filled his mind as the sunrise began to bathe the beach outside our bedroom window.
Once his eyes opened, that brain of his would fire on all cylinders, going through his plans for the day even though Saturday lay before us.
My favorite day.
No work, just hours spent with my lover in the peaceful silence of our oceanfront home.
Smiling, I ghosted my fingertips over his smooth brow and sharp cheekbones, down the bridge of his nose to the perfect bow of his upper lip I wanted to taste.
Rhett Stirling had drawn me in from his first “Hey” when I’d been crying my eyes out by my brother’s grave. Without knowing who the heck he was, I’d thrown myself into his arms since fate had sent him there to help fill the hole Archer’s death had torn open in my soul.
Twenty-three years together, and Rhett was still the one I clung to when my emotions overran and bled for the world to see.
Rhett stirred, his strong arm wrapping around my waist and easing me closer against his hard chest. He hummed under his breath, peeked an eyelid open to reveal orbs as dark as luscious chocolate, and zoned in on my mouth.
Smiling, I closed the distance and pressed my lips against his.
“Zing,” I whispered what I had the first time we’d kissed back in eleventh grade.
“Still?” he murmured, a hint of a smile lifting the corner of his mouth as he slowly blinked the sleep from his eyes.
“Always.” I snuggled against his body and soaked in the warmth and solidity of him. “I love you.”
“Love you too, baby.” He kissed the top of my head, his hand starting its trail up and down my spine.
“So, is coffee, a shower, or fucking first on your agenda for the day?” I asked, since there was no way his brain lay as serene as our limbs.