Page 12 of Almost Beautiful (Beautiful 3)

I closed my eyes and squeezed his arms tighter around me. “It’ll get easier, right?”

“I don’t know, Pidge. I hope so.”

I dried my hands and turned, making my way to the hall. I changed over the laundry, adding more and taking the basket to the bedroom and setting it on the bed.Busy is good.

Travis came in, making the basket bounce when he fell face first onto the bed. He took a few deep breaths and then turned onto his back, crossing his arms behind his head. He stared at the ceiling while I walked around our bed to hang my wedding dress on the curtain rod.

The bare branches of the tree outside quivered in the wind. I’d watched almost every season change that tree from Travis’s bedroom window, and now that window was ours.

“Remind me to take this to the cleaners and have it preserved,” I said, smoothing the skirt.

“Preserved? What the hell does that even mean?” he asked with a grin.

“To keep it from yellowing. To keep it fresh.”

“For what?”

“Forever,” I said, returning to the bed. “Like us.”

Travis held my gaze for a moment, watching me walk back to him with an appreciative smile.

I resumed the tedious but welcomed task of folding our clothes from Vegas and the towels we’d used after we washed off the smoke and soot from the fire. I wished there was a way to make it all go away so easily.

Travis sighed. “I’m not afraid to go to prison, Pidge. I’ve felt, pretty much from the first time I saw you, that ... I dunno. It sounds perfectly normal in my head, but I know if I say it out loud ...”

“Just say it.”

“I’ve never thought I’d get to keep you, but now … What do I do if I never get to see you again? Or get to touch your hair? See the way your eyes look in the sunlight? Feel your wet hair against my arm when I fall asleep at night? The thought of not seeing you every day scares me to death.”

I lined up his socks and folded them into each other. That was Travis and me, one big, knotted bundle.

“You see these socks? They’re a pair. Even when one gets lost, the other has to wait for it to come back, because they’ll always be a match. Even when apart, we’re still awe. It’s just geography. It doesn’t change anything. And it doesn’t matter anyway, because you’re not going anywhere.”

“You can’t fix this, Abby,” he said. “I’m not going to lie. If I was wrong, I deserve to—”

“Stop,” I said, throwing the folded socks at his face.

He caught them just before they hit their mark.

“I’m your wife. Your duty is to be here with me, to protect me, to love me. You promised. We’ve always fought one battle at a time. This is no different.”

He nodded, looking back up at the ceiling. After a few restless minutes, he jerked up, planting his feet on the ground. “I can’t hang around here. It’s making me crazy. Let’s go.”

“Where?” I asked.

“Pinkerton’s.”

“The car dealership? Shouldn’t we save our money?”

Travis smirked. “It’s already paid for. Just pick a color.”

I arched an eyebrow. “Don’t mess with me, Maddox.”

He changed into a long-sleeved T-shirt and a clean pair of jeans, then bent over to slide on and lace up his boots. “We’re going.”

I didn’t budge from my basket of clothes, but Travis strolled over, bumping me with his hip before pulling out one of my shirts and grabbing a hanger. In less than a minute, we had finished and put away the clothes. I stared at the closet with my arms crossed, pretending to be unimpressed with my choices.

“Just a sweater and jeans, baby. You’re beautiful. You don’t even have to try.”