Page 86 of What He Always Knew

“Can you come over?”

“Not yet,” I answered. “I’m at the groundbreaking of Jeremiah’s house. But… I’ll come later. Tonight.”

“Okay,” he said, and I felt the questions hanging in the silence between us. He wanted to know my decision. He wanted to know everything I was thinking. But, I wasn’t ready to voice the thoughts I had.

The truth was, I didn’t trust them — not yet. There was something inside me holding back, keeping my words as prisoners along with my heart.

“I should go.”

“Wait,” he said. “Can you do something for me first?”

My eyes caught on Cameron across the yard, though his were locked on the woman he was talking to. She was flanked by a cameraman, her hand wrapped around a microphone as she spoke with Cameron, and I watched them as I answered Reese.

“Anything.”

“Close your eyes,” he said. “And I mean it, really close them.”

I chuckled, doing as he said. “They’re closed.”

“Okay. Now, I want you to come away with me, just for one moment. I want you to lie under the sheets of that fort we built together. Remember the candles, the wine? Remember the warmth when you curled into me, when my arm was around you?”

I smiled, feeling the sunshine through my windshield as the same warmth I remembered in Reese’s arms. “I remember.”

“Remember how it felt the first time we kissed,” he whispered. “The first time wereallykissed, when we had each other after years and years of wanting. Do you remember how it felt to have my hands on you, to touch me, to have me as your own?”

It was easy to remember — so much so that I knew I’d never forget it, not as long as I lived. When he touched me for the first time, he washed me clean like an avalanche, leaving behind the same woman, yet one who was forever altered. I could still feel that charge of energy, that burst of heat, that overwhelming sensation of beingright.

“I do,” I answered.

“Do you remember the song?” he asked, and on cue, that soft melody that played in my dreams filtered through the speaker of my phone. I smiled, leaning my head back against the head rest, remembering him playing shirtless at his piano like it was happening right now.

“I remember it all,” I told him, voice soft as I listened to the song playing. “Every second.”

“That happiness you felt with me, Charlie,” Reese said, his hands still working the keys. “It was real. It may not have been at the time you expected it, the time you felt was right. It may have even felt wrong. But the love I have for you is the kind that cannot be tamed, the kind that cannot be told what rules to follow or what lines to stay within. The love you have for me is the same.”

I kept my eyes closed, smiling though tears pricked behind my lids. I felt his every word like a muscle under my own skin — they were strong, undeniable and true.

“I know what I’m asking isn’t easy,” he said. “Asking you to love me when you’ve promised to love another, it isn’t fair. But Charlie, it is right. You and me? We areright. We may have missed an earlier opportunity, we may have led lives away from each other, but just like you said the night you came to me…”

“I’m the river,” I finished for him.

“And I, the ocean. It all comes back to us in the end, Charlie. It always has, and it always will.”

I choked on something between a laugh and a sob, finally letting my eyes flutter open.

“You don’t need to say anything right now, okay? I’ll wait here for you. I will wait as long as you ask me to.”

I shook my head, that ache pinging to life in my chest. “I love you, Reese.”

“I know,” he said softly. “And I love you, Charlie. I always will.”

I didn’t say another word, just listened to the last of his song, the notes of it sounding through my soul. When the last one played, I closed my eyes again, imagining Reese at his piano. And as I ended the call, letting my phone fall in my lap, I pictured myself sitting there on top of it, too.

The sound of my car door opening made me jump, and my eyes shot open again, finding Cameron standing above me. His eyes fell to the phone in my lap before they found mine, and he forced a smile, holding his hand down for mine.

“We’re about to get started,” he said. “Jeremiah and his family are over talking to the news outlets now, but I thought you might want to see them before the speech.”

“Yes.” I wiped my cheeks, though they were dry, before grabbing my purse out of the passenger seat and taking Cameron’s hand. “Yes, I want to see them.”