Page 54 of Fierce Love (Tucker Billionaires)

Chapter Forty-Five

Hollyn

U nsure of what to do, I sent Kinsley to Indy’s house with Henry for the night. We can’t stay here, in this house, when Nathaniel probably can’t stand the sight of me. I’ve packed as much of Kinsley’s and my things as I could into the suitcases we had when we arrived.

Tomorrow, I’ll have to pick up some boxes to pack everything else. Assuming Celia lets me leave the island with Kinsley, even though Nate now knows everything, we’ll be gone as soon as I can get our things shipped.

It’s late, so I can only assume Nate’s gone to stay at his apartment. I close my eyes and take some deep breaths. Every time I think about how much I’ve hurt him, I want to burst into fresh sobs. I haven’t had the courage to text him. If he wanted to see me, he would.

I don’t hear the door open and close, but I do hear Nate’s voice reverberating through the house when he calls my name.

“Hols? Where are you?” There’s a hint of panic in his voice, and I hurry to the top of the stairs.

“I’m here,” I say, a rush of relief washing over me that he came back. Maybe it’s only to say goodbye for real, but he’s here.

“Can you come down? We’ve got a lot to talk about.” His voice has gone from slightly panicked to weary.

I descend the stairs one at a time, as though walking to my execution. Internally, I try to brace myself for whatever he might say about my choices, now that he’s had time to process what I did.

When I enter the oversized living room, dining room, and kitchen, Nate is over by the fireplace mantel, a drink already in one hand and a manilla envelope in the other. After today, I’ve seen enough of those long brown envelopes to last a lifetime.

“I see you’ve packed.” He gestures toward my suitcase and other things strewn by the front entrance, waiting for me to get boxes tomorrow.

I meet his gaze, but I’m not sure what to say. His tone feels indecipherable.

“Here,” he says, passing the envelope to me.

I brace myself for a notice to vacate his property, or a termination slip from the show, or anything else that clips the strings that tie us together one by one.

Wordlessly, I slide the document out, and as I scan it, understanding dawns.

“I have full custody of Kinsley?” My voice is hushed, barely above a whisper.

“You do,” he says, and when our gazes meet, the toll that today has taken is obvious. He looks exhausted, probably as emotionally wrung out as I feel. “And I think, if I’ve put the pieces together correctly, that’s the last hold my mother had on you.”

Tears fill my eyes, and I will them not to fall. Technically, she could force me to pay back all the money she spent to finance my college degree, but I have a feeling Nate would just take it out of one bank account to put it back in another, even if I told him not to.

“That was the big one, yeah,” I admit, my voice thick.

Maybe Celia would never have taken full custody of Kinsley, but she could have made our lives extremely difficult if I didn’t play by her rules.

I knew the risks when I made the deals, but I never expected Nate to come so fully back into my life, to make me question every decision I ever made.

“Thank you.” I can barely get the two words out. “You didn’t have to.”

“I did,” he says. “Because when I ask you the next question, I don’t want you bound to anyone but yourself. I need the truth, Hols. I need the complete and utter truth for my sanity. Do you understand?”

Tears have blurred my vision so much that I can hardly see him, and I nod.

“Do you want to be with me?”

“More than anything in the world.” Tears spill onto my cheeks, and my words are garbled coming out of the tightness in my throat. “But I know… I know what I did is probably unforgiveable.”

“What you did? Protecting your aunt and your sister is the most forgivable part of this mess.”

“What?” I whisper, stunned. Maybe I could never bring myself to regret the choice I made—but I’d never expected Nate to forgive me for it, especially after I saw the damage I’d done.

Nate sets his drink on the mantel and closes the small distance between us.

“You were eighteen. Manipulated and backed into a corner. Do I wish you’d been able to see that there were other choices?

Yes. Do I wish you’d talked to me that night?

Yes. But I also can’t even imagine the panic you must have felt when you realized your aunt was in jail and your mother was pregnant.

That’s a one-two punch, and I can see how it would have knocked out eighteen-year-old you. I hate it, and I get it.”

I shake my head, unsure of how to respond.

Deep in my gut, teenage me thought Nate and I were doomed.

He’d go off to college, and he’d find someone smarter or prettier or wealthier than me—his mom’s words, those of his friends, got under my skin deeper than I thought.

All those concerns seem silly now, shameful.

None of that mattered. Our connection is so strong, and it’s so rare to feel this way about another human being that all my past worries seem trivial.

“The only person I’m truly angry with is my mother,” he says.

“She could have helped you, made it all go away like she did, without asking you to sacrifice me. She didn’t have to force you into that choice.

And then she watched me want to cut out my own heart for years.

I just…” He trails off, clearly lost for words.

“My aunt knew too,” I say with a sniff. “You saw the NDA?”

“Yeah,” Nate says with a curt nod. “After Mickie found out, my mom sealed that crack.”

Although my aunt loved Nate once she got to know him, she’d never stopped being wary of what involvement with a Tucker might bring from Mickie and my dad but also from Celia.

Even without the NDA, she might have believed that keeping what really happened a secret was protecting me.

She didn’t always make the right choices, but she tried.

Foolishly, I’d worked very hard to make it seem like leaving Nate behind hadn’t been like being stabbed over and over again in the heart. She knew I’d given him up for her, and I didn’t want her saddled with guilt that I was mostly sure belonged to my mother. Though, it seems I got that wrong too.

“I don’t look at you and see betrayal, Hols. I did for a long time. Too long. But now that all the truths have come to light, it all just makes me unbelievably sad. I trusted my mother, and so did you, and she let us down, tried to run our lives for us. The audacity is… something else.”

“I thought you were going to tell me to leave tonight,” I say, my voice hitching.

“I’ve never wanted you to leave. Not for a second.

This house, my life, my entire world is better when you’re a part of it, and if I’d had a say, you’d never have vanished.

I’d have kept you close forever.” He hesitates for a beat.

“I have kept you close, in here.” He takes my hand and places it over his heart. “You’ve been in here the whole time.”

I rise on my toes, and I kiss him. Part of me can’t even believe that I get to kiss him again. That all the secrets have come out, the deals made in haste behind closed doors have all been brought into the light.

“I loved you then,” Nate murmurs against my lips. “And I love you now, and I know with everything inside me that I’m going to love you forever.”

And then we’re kissing, and the sweet taste of bourbon is on my lips and tongue.

He’s walking me backward toward the bedroom we’ve been sharing on the main floor, and we’re stripping each other.

I’m frantic for the skin-to-skin connection, to know he’s mine, to realize that everything I’ve believed about myself and him and us wasn’t accurate.

We might not be exactly the same people, but the love between us never died—I’m not even sure it truly faded.

“Fuck, I love the feel of your curves under my hands,” he says as he guides my shirt over my head and then tosses it to the floor on our way to the bed.

It’s not the first time he’s said something similar.

Since we’ve been together in this house, the compliments are constant and consistent, as though some part of him might have understood that underneath my confidence was a woman who didn’t feel lovable.

My weight gain has never held me back. The reluctance to sink into our connection has been based on my guilt—not that I made the choice but that my decisions hurt him—that hasn’t allowed me to give myself to him completely, to move beyond our past to create something new.

With all the secrets and lies revealed, I have to learn to forgive myself.

Nate’s right—Celia could have taken a less hurtful path.

I never expected her to go easy on me when I arrived at her doorstep, but she could have put Nate’s feelings first. It wasn’t her back against the wall or the lives of her loved ones hanging in the balance, but her cutthroat tactics hurt more than just me.

“Hols,” Nate says as he kisses a line up my leg and inner thigh after urging me, naked, onto the bed. “Be here with me.”

“I am,” I say. “I’m right here with you.”

He runs a finger along my core, letting out a groan of appreciation. “I love everything about you—have I told you that? But this pussy is exquisite.”

My body tenses with eagerness, and at the first swipe of his tongue, I clutch the sheets, already anticipating how good he’ll make me feel.

There’s nothing Nate won’t do to make sure I’m completely satisfied, and it’s been thrilling to be in a relationship with so much care and trust and love between us.

I haven’t felt this sexually free since we were together the first time.

In no time, he’s got me panting and pleading, desperate for release and equally desperate to hold out for more pleasure, more time this close to him.

“Tell me what you want,” he murmurs against my thigh as he dips a single finger in.

My breath catches, and I wiggle against him. “More,” I say.

“Tell me.”