Page 43 of As a Last Resort

I squeezed her hand. “I’m really glad you found him. You always did look good in love.”

“I got lucky.”

“I keep having to remind any cute guy I meet in the city that posting on your Instagram in hopes of becoming an influencer is not actually a job.” She eyed me. “It’s a story.”

“It always is.”

I loved the familiar lull. Being back here with her family, I was afraid I’d no longer fit in. Like this new person wouldn’t have anything in common with me, and there’d be too many awkward pauses and weird looks. But I slid back in, just like I used to. And that scared me too.

There was something beautiful about being known.

“Speaking of cute guys, any chance I can ask you something without you completely freaking out on me?”

“Ah, I’ve been wondering when this would come up.” She looked at me and gave me that kind smile she saved for talks .

“I’m just curious what’s gotten him all hot and bothered tonight.”

“You really don’t know?”

“Please, enlighten me. I can’t seem to figure out what I did wrong. One minute we’re good and wonderful and the next he won’t even look at me.”

She took a deep breath and a healthy swig of wine. “How much has he told you about Vanessa?”

“Nothing really, beyond she left him for his best friend.”

“You knew Austin and her were engaged, right?” I nodded. “Austin is such a planner, and he had it all figured out. They even had their future kids’ names picked out.”

I pulled my knees up and wrapped my arms around my legs. The thought of him and her with children sent me a little off-kilter.

“He was so blindsided by the whole thing. He’s had a hard time trusting anyone since.”

“So he hasn’t dated anyone since that happened?”

“Oh no, he’s dated people. Or, he’s gone on dates with people, I should say. But nothing serious. I think he thought there was absolutely no chance he’d ever need to be back in the dating pool again, so when that all happened, it threw him for a while.”

“But that was three years ago.”

“While I’m sure seeing Vanessa and Tom walk into the bar didn’t help, I also don’t think they’re the reason he’s having a hard time right now.”

“I hounded him yesterday about the whole fishing charter thing and following his dreams. I kind of read him the riot act.”

“Oh, he’s definitely not mad at you for that,” she responded with a little snort. “We’ve all been doing that for years. Sam, you’re the first person he’s been even remotely into. And by remotely into , I mean falling headfirst at about a hundred miles an hour.”

My heart took a tiny leap.

“I think it took him by surprise,” she continued.

“He knows you’re leaving soon without any plans on returning at all.

And I don’t think he knows how to deal with it.

” She looked over at me and her eyes softened.

“Listen, you don’t have to pour your heart out to me, but he’s a really good guy.

And he’s guarded his heart for a really long time.

While I’d love to have you as a sister-in-law someday, I’ve warned him the odds are about one in a trillion that you’d ever stay here.

If he’s lucky. This small-town life isn’t for you.

And leaving it isn’t in the cards for him.

That doesn’t leave much room for there to be anything but heartbreak.

I think he’s just trying to distance himself a little bit to avoid the inevitable. ”

My heart was skipping for joy and gasping for air at the same time. I looked back out onto the water and exhaled, the flutter in my stomach instantly turning sour. Because I could see it. She verbalized exactly what I knew but didn’t want to put words to.

“All my life I’ve spent trying to run from this place.”

“He knows that.”

“There’s no way I’d survive if I came back.”

“He knows that too.” Her eyeline shot above me as I heard footsteps approaching from behind.

“You ladies up for a round of good old-fashioned family Pictionary?” he asked. “Mom says it’s mandatory.”

“I call Samantha!” Lexi shouted as Mary Kay and Bill walked out onto the yard, huge easel in hand, with Rex trailing behind them.

“I think a round of boys versus girls is perfect for tonight.” Mary Kay had a mischievous look on her face and a new bottle of wine.

I saw a glimmer of a real smile on Austin’s face for the first time all night.

“That is a hundred percent a Tyrannosaurus rex .” Austin looked at his drawing on the easel.

Bill and Rex just stared at him, mouths open.

“Or, a raccoon,” I was laughing so hard my lungs were on fire.

“Where do you see a raccoon!?” Austin shouted. “Look at its feet! Raccoons don’t have talons on their feet!”

“Yeah, but their hands look eerily similar to your dinosaur’s hands.” Rex covered his mouth to stop the laugh from bursting out.

Austin scrunched down and put his nose on the easel, squinting at his drawing.

I could barely speak between breathes. “For the record, I don’t think a T. rex has ears.”

“At least not ones shaped like a raccoon’s,” Bill murmured under his breath as everyone cracked up again. Austin threw the marker at him.

After eight rounds, the score was tied. Turns out Rex was a pretty good Sharpie artist, and Bill was used to Austin’s eccentric drawings, which gave them a leg up.

But Lexi and I still made a pretty good team, and with her mother’s drawings looking like professional sketchbook pieces, we were stiff competition.

“Last one, winner takes the title.” Bill tossed Mary Kay the marker. She plucked out a card from the fishbowl, looked over to us and grinned.

He counted down with flare. “And three, two, one, go!”

Tiny grains of sand fell through the small hourglass as Mary Kay drew a stand with a pitcher, and two stick figures smiling with money in their hands. Lexi and I looked at each other and screamed, “A LEMONADE STAND!”

Mary Kay threw the marker up into the air and bowed. She came in for a tipsy winners’ hug with the two of us as we fell back on the couch together in a fit of laughter, chanting “winner winner, chicken dinner.”

“I mean, of all the cards,” Austin mumbled under his breath.

“We’ll get ’em next time, boys,” Rex said, cheering them on in his best high school football coach voice.

Lexi crawled over to give him a kiss. “Always the encourager.”

I leaned back all warm and fuzzy from laughing. I hadn’t felt like a part of a family in a really long time. Hadn’t had bellyaching laughs and inside jokes and a mother figure who looked at me like she knew what I was thinking but wouldn’t out me.

I felt beautifully sad.

“On that note,” Austin stood and faced me with his hand out, “let me take you home. I could stand to walk off some of this humiliation.” My stomach flipped.

“Thank you for coming tonight.” Mary Kay pulled me in for a tight hug. “This was the most fun I’ve had in a long time.” She pulled back and kept me at arm’s length with her hands holding my shoulders. “I hope it’s not seven years before we get to see you again. We’ve missed you.”

My chest sank a bit and it was a little harder to draw in a breath.

I was having such a good time, I forgot I was leaving soon.

With the weight of the looming promotion that had all but been officially decided lifted off my shoulders, I realized I let myself relax a little. Something I rarely did anymore.

Austin and I walked in a comfortable silence for a block or so, until I busted out laughing.

“What?” he asked, looking over at me smiling.

“I was just thinking of your dinosaur raccoon.”

“It was totally a dinosaur.”

“With ears.”

“A dinosaur with ears,” he laughed. “Exactly.”

“They’re amazing. I forgot how that felt.” My voice caught.

“How what felt?”

“Having a family.” I took a deep breath. “People who know you. Like, really know you.” My head was swimming from too much food and wine. I still felt the throbbing of my sore stomach muscles from laughter as we walked.

“I’m sorry.”

When people found out I barely had a family, they usually tried to make me feel better by telling me how awful their family was.

Stories about their annoying older brother teasing them, their sister stealing their clothes, their awkward uncle hitting on their friends at Christmas dinner.

God, what I would give for a burned-turkey-on-Thanksgiving story of my own.

We continued to walk along quiet back roads until we hit his street.

We heard crickets chirping, palm fronds swaying, and the sound of the water in the distance, but we didn’t see a single car drive by.

I had a warm buzz radiating through me. For once I wasn’t obsessing about a call, or a report, or wondering what the next step was.

I wasn’t upset about the lack of people running into me or the background noise of honking and shouting that was all but absent.

I was happy.

“Your family is amazing. And hilarious.”

“And they adore you.”

“That’s your typical Sunday night, then?”

“It’s not typically that animated. It’s usually more of a two-bottle-night adventure, not a six-bottle one.”

We walked up to his house and he stopped a few paces behind me.

“I’m sorry.”

I turned at the sound of his voice.

“About tonight and how I was acting. You haven’t done a single thing to warrant me acting like an emo lovestruck teenager toward you.”

“Lovestruck?” I questioned, raising my brows.

He blushed and shook his head, dismissing the comment. “You go on in and head to bed. I’m going to sit out here for a bit and clear my head.” He nodded toward his front patio swing. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Sam.”

I could have said good night and walked into his house and shut the door behind me.

I could have thought about the fact I was leaving in just under a week and had no intention of coming back. Ever.

I could have thought the right thing to do would be to let him eventually meet someone here, and not make things more complicated.

I could have.

But I didn’t.

I took a deep breath and stepped closer to him, within an inch of his face.

His breath smelled of red wine and chocolate.

He didn’t budge as I crept closer, his hands quarantined to his pockets.

His eyes darkened and searched mine, like he was desperately trying to uncover and catalog every shade of brown in them.

And he waited.

He waited while my insides went on a hundred-foot roller-coaster vertical drop and every word I’ve learned since age two left my brain. His eyes wandered down to my mouth and my lips barely parted, a wordless command my traitorous body was happy to follow.

I took a deep breath.

“For once, I’m not trying to figure out everything ahead of time. I’m not asking questions, not dissecting every possible scenario to guarantee it all will work out in the end and I won’t get hurt.”

“Okay.” Flecks of gold swam around in his heavy eyes and his breath quickened.

“Coming home is really awful for me. And no one ever made this place less scary but you do. You make me think I may actually be able to survive my real life here.”

I inched closer. He tilted his head down, his nose brushing the side of mine.

The heat of his breath filled my mouth, warming my chest, and time seemed to check out for a moment. He was close enough that the worn cotton of his T-shirt teased my hands, and I wanted nothing more than to tug the fabric over his head, and sink my fingers into his skin.

“I’m not a one night kinda guy, Sam.”

I tilted my mouth up to almost reach his, closing the small distance that stood between us. His eyes didn’t leave mine.

“Take your hands out of your pockets.”

His eyes dropped to my mouth. “If I do, I won’t be able to keep them off you.”

My breathing was shallow, and his stopped, waiting for permission.

I leaned my hips into him and whispered into his lips. “That’s kinda what I was hoping for.”

In a split second, his hands gripped me and my back was up against the front door. The warmth of his fingers found their way to my waist, to the tiny sliver of skin that sat in between my shirt and the top of my jeans.

We stared at each other, every almost moment replaying in my head. Then his lips crashed into mine, hot and desperate, as his teeth grazed across my bottom lip. His tongue coaxed my mouth open as he tilted my head gently, his fingers laced through my hair, deepening his reach.

My stomach plummeted, a soft groan coming from the pit of my need into his mouth. His hum matched mine, the sound winding its way into my bloodstream.

“Samantha.” The desperation in his voice sent a line of fire straight down my back to my toes. I sighed into his mouth as he kissed me over and over again, each lick and bite deeper, slower.

I grabbed his waist, pulling him closer, wanting to crawl into his shirt and bury myself into his skin.

This. This was what I wanted. What I needed.

He leaned into me, bracing one hand on the doorjamb as I reached behind me for the knob and flung it open.

“Your door’s unlocked?” I asked through shortened breaths as we fell into his house.

“It’s Rock Island. No one locks their doors.” He bent down and swiped my legs out from under me, wrapping me around him as he carried me to the couch.

I ached for him as I straddled him, wanting to feel his skin on mine in every place that swarmed with him. His smell, his touch, the way his hands claimed my thighs as they gripped him on the couch.

His mouth slid down my neck, heated and ravenous, pulling at my skin with his teeth.

Every inch of my body molded to his, like it was perfectly made to fit into every crevice his body had.

A puzzle piece finally finding its fit. A spark finally finding the trail of lighter fluid it’d been searching for.

I didn’t want slow and steady. I wanted everything.

All of him.

All of this .

He cupped my face and gently paused. “Samantha.”

“That’s the second time you’ve called me that.”

He pinned my gaze, and took a breath, slowing us down. “I want you to be sure.”

I inhaled deeply, searching his face and seeing my primal want and need reflected back right in front of me. “I promise you, I’m sure.” I kissed his top lip. “Austin Marcs.”

A sly smile bloomed across his face as he whispered his words into my mouth. “Say it again.”

“Aust—” and he claimed me before I could finish.