Page 26 of Shattered Promise (Avalon Falls #4)

MASON

I carry the guitar case.

Take it straight from her hands like I don’t trust myself not to touch her instead.

It’s solid and scuffed and heavier than it looks, but I don’t care. I need something to hold. Something to keep me from doing the thing I keep thinking about—cupping the back of her neck, tilting her face to mine, and kissing the hell out of her right here in the middle of this festival.

We leave the music tent in a hush that doesn’t match the noise outside. Abby falls into step beside me, her arm brushing mine every few feet.

Theo’s in the stroller, happy and fed, babbling at the breeze. I’ve got one hand on the handlebar and the other gripping the handle of that guitar case tighter than I need to.

She played a few bars of music, and then she smiled, like she didn’t even know what she was giving away. Like she didn’t realize she’d just unraveled every thread I’ve spent years trying to knot back together.

I don’t know what’s happening to me.

No—that’s a lie. I do.

It’s the motherfucking Abby Carter effect.

Every time she looks at me, I feel young and reckless and right on the edge of every dumb decision I ever made around her. Every time she laughs, my brain short-circuits and goes straight to hands and mouths and the taste of her name in my mouth.

We drift back into the main park, the gold of late afternoon slanting low and hot through the trees.

The festival’s crowd has thickened, festival-goers clustering in loose packs around the beer garden and a folk band tuning up on the main stage.

Parents corral sugar-high kids, and a handful of couples are tangled together on picnic blankets in the grass.

Abby beelines for the open lawn, skirting around blankets and people sprawled out.

She picks a patch of grass near the edge of the shade, halfway between the main stage and a line of food tents, and gestures with her chin. “Let’s park there.”

She grabs Theo and rifles in the diaper bag, pulling out a muslin blanket, and spreading it one-handed on the grass. Her movements are efficient, practiced, but there’s something loose in her shoulders now, a slackening I haven’t seen in her in a long time.

I set the guitar case down with care, then drop onto the grass beside her.

She sits cross-legged, dress fanned out, arms bracing behind her as she tips her face up to the sun.

For a second, all I can do is watch the light paint her hair gold and the curve of her neck and the shape of her smile, soft and secret.

I feel it again, that urge—so overwhelming, I have to channel it somewhere safe, or I’ll do something irreversible.

I take Theo from the stroller and set him on the blanket where he crawls over my legs, and dives for the grass, giving me the perfect distraction from the heat gathering behind my neck.

I let him climb me, his tiny hands scrabbling for purchase on my jeans, and Abby grins as he flops onto my thigh and immediately tries to eat a handful of grass.

“Hey, buddy, we can’t eat grass,” she says, plucking the grass from his grip and flashing him a silly face.

He makes a sound—a delighted, gurgly offense—and tries again, relentless.

Abby’s laugh is low, a little wild, her eyes bright with the kind of happiness that can’t be faked.

I feel it echo in my chest. I’d let this kid try to eat the entire lawn if it meant keeping that sound alive for another minute.

She leans in to wipe the drool off Theo’s chin, and her hair swings forward, sunlight catching on the flower crown that’s somehow still perched on her head. I have to look away before I reach out and tuck it behind her ear. Instead, I focus on Theo, who’s now chewing on his fist.

Then the band on the stage starts up, the first notes of a mandolin cutting through the park and sending a ripple across the crowd.

Theo’s head snaps up. He freezes, eyes wide, then lets out a startled giggle and starts bouncing where he sits.

He wobbles on his diapered butt, flapping both arms like he’s trying to take flight.

The music picks up, a bright, rollicking tempo, and Theo rocks back and forth, an uncoordinated but totally committed dance.

Abby cracks up, her laugh going high and loud this time. She claps along, encouraging him, and Theo doubles down, looking at her like he’s making sure she’s watching.

“He’s got your rhythm,” she says, flashing me a wink.

I pitch my voice low, feeling the corner of my mouth curve upward. “Are you trying to talk shit, Trouble?”

“ Me ?” She presses her hand against her chest like she’s offended, but it’s all an act.

Her grin gives her away immediately. “I’d never.

I’m simply pointing out that I remember the time you and Beau thought you’d be the next backup dancers and taped yourselves learning some dance routine.

You even roped in Graham, if I remember correctly. ”

I bark out a laugh—loud and sharp, so sudden I startle Theo. He gets over it quickly, giggling, then tipping sideways into Abby’s lap, rolling like a drunken seal.

The memory hits me so hard I have to brace myself with one hand on the grass.

I can see it—the three of us in the Carter’s unfinished basement, carpet squares peeling from the concrete, a laptop propped on a milk crate, and some viral hip-hop tutorial playing over and over while we tried to coordinate our arms and legs into something resembling choreography.

“Holy shit,” I groan, covering my face with my free hand.

"That was supposed to be destroyed," I say, dragging my hand over my face. "The footage, I mean. Beau swore he'd delete it years ago."

Abby wipes tears of laughter from the corners of her eyes, her shoulders shaking. "Beau? Not only did he not delete it—he showed it at my graduation party. To everyone ."

I groan again, but it's a hollow protest. The memory isn't even embarrassing now, not really—just another thread in the long, tangled rope of our lives together. I feel the knot of it in my chest, the way it tugs me back to all the versions of ourselves we’ve been to each other over the years.

“Shit. I can’t believe he kept that.” I shake my head, and the words come out softer than I mean.

Theo’s crawling again, this time toward the edge of the blanket, where the grass gives way to clover. He pauses, fascinated by a stray dandelion fluff seed drifting past his face.

Abby sits up and scoops him into her lap, tucking her knees around him like a fortress, and for a split second, I see a whole future unspool—a hundred lazy Saturdays, this exact patch of grass, a dozen small and perfect moments strung together until a whole life unfolds.

She catches me staring, her smile slipping a little as worry creases her brows. “You okay?”

I shake my head a little bit, but the image of a life stays burned into my brain. “Fuckin’ perfect,” I murmur.

Theo pushes up to his knees, wobbly and determined.

He gets a grip on Abby’s dress and uses it to haul himself upright, his little toes digging into the blanket.

For a second, he just stands there in awe of himself, swaying like a baby giraffe, and then he grabs for Abby’s hands, clutching them in his fists.

She laughs and lets him pull her closer. He bounces in place, knees bent and unsteady, then starts this weird, jerky dance—half squat, half stamp, all joy. And he’s not letting go of her hands

“Someone wants to dance,” she says, grinning at me.

She’s got Theo by the wrists, tiny arms out like he’s steering her. She scoops him up and settles him on her hip, holding his one hand like they’re going to perform a ballroom dance. She sways and dips him, and he cackles so loud, the people five feet away look over with matching grins.

His face is pure delight, cheeks red and mouth wide enough to swallow the world. He’s not the only one—it’s like every time she laughs, something inside me shakes loose and starts again.

I let myself have this. Just for a minute, just this one small pocket in time. The three of us on the grass, music curling in the air, Abby dancing with my son.

We’re still there when the second set starts, the folk band’s rhythm slowing, the crowd mellowing as the sun softens behind the tree line.

Theo’s falling asleep, his head heavy on Abby’s collarbone.

Her arms have gone slack around him, and she rocks him without even noticing, matching the slow sway of the lullaby curling out from the stage.

I lean back on my elbows, watching the way the last light paints her face in honey and shadow. She’s humming, low and tuneless, maybe not even aware she’s doing it.

She looks at me over his head with an arched brow. “Think we should get this little pumpkin home? I’m pretty sure he’s asleep.”

“Yeah,” I say with a sigh.

“It’s just, I don’t want his bedtime routine to get messed up, not when you’re already fighting nap strikes and sleep regression.”

“Yeah.” I nod a few times. She’s not wrong, I don’t want to throw his routine off. But I’m enjoying myself more than I thought I would today.

Still, I push to my feet and start to gather our stuff up. I balance the guitar case in the stroller seat and fold the blanket, and Abby tucks Theo’s toy frog into the cupholder of the stroller. She shifts Theo in her arms, boosting him a little higher.

“I’ll take him if he’s getting too heavy.”

“I’m fine,” she says, and her voice is softer now. Different.

I reach for him anyway, just in case she changes her mind. But she doesn't hand him over. Not yet.

For a heartbeat, we’re close—her face inches from mine, eyes flicking up, unguarded. I could kiss her right now.

And fuck me, do I want to.

“You do that thing,” she says suddenly, her voice barely more than a whisper.

“What thing?”

“That . . . squint. When you’re thinking too hard. Like you’re trying to talk yourself out of something before you’ve even let yourself want it.”

I freeze. My jaw ticks.