Page 108 of Fierce-Matt

Matt reached his hand across the seats for hers, threaded their fingers together and held on.

“Would it scare you to know I love you?” he asked.

A road trip was the last place she thought this would come out. “If I was scared you’ve got me trapped on the highway,” she said, laughing.

“That’s not funny.”

“It is a little. But no, I’m not scared because I feel the same way.” She released his fingers. “Now both hands on the wheel.”

“I’m not letting you change the subject,” he said. “You do that too much.”

“I’m not changing it,” she argued. “I do love you. I’m not sure how we went from where we were to where we are now, but I’m thrilled it happened.”

“Me too,” he said. “I meant it though. I always saw us here.”

“I didn’t. When I was younger, I thought you were hot in the way a teenage girl lusts after her best friend’s older brother. Butthoughts of this?” Her hand was moving back and forth between them. “It didn’t cross my mind because I didn’t know it existed.”

“I did,” he said. “I saw it with my parents. Your parents look happy together.”

“They are,” she said. “But it wasn’t a household like you’ve got. My father wasn’t someone to express his love freely. He worked a lot and in his mind a good father and husband was a provider. My mother was to be the soft sensitive one between them.”

“So the parts of your father that I see now, taking your mother to lunch, or planting her flowers, he wasn’t like that?”

“Not that I saw. Maybe it was behind closed doors. There wasn’t a lot of open affection there. I’m not saying they didn’t love each other. They did and they do. But their kids didn’t witness it. Not like your parents always had. I see that difference. You’re very free about hugging, kissing, touching me in front of them. I wouldn’t have been like that in front of my parents before.”

“You are now though,” he said. “Or was that fake in front of my parents?”

“Nothing in front of your parents is fake. I’m more open in your household than I’ve been anywhere else. And trust me, I’ve had a lot of reasons to be withdrawn, but there is something about your parents that allows me to be unhinged. Untethered with my emotions and feelings.”

Grace had always been so nice to her when she’d been in the house.

The first one to give Matt hell for overstepping and pulling him away.

The one who would take them to get their nails done and sit with them and talk about boys and crushes.

The mother who gave just enough space to let the girls feel as if they had freedom when deep down they really didn’t.

That was a balance that couldn’t be achieved in her household.

Maybe if it had been, things would have been different.

But as she’d said, the past was where that needed to live and she preferred to move into the future.

With Matt.

30

NOT GOING ANYWHERE

“Here we are,” Matt said, sliding the key card into the slot of their hotel room on the top floor.

The two of them walked into the room on the Isle of Palms.

“Not really Charleston,” she said. “But even better. That view!”

She was running toward the glass doors that overlooked the Atlantic Ocean.

“We are only thirty minutes from Charleston,” he said. “We can check the city out tomorrow.”