Bliss Brothers (Complete Series), page 36
And it’s too late.
Holiday’s gone.
If you think I didn’t walk to her house this morning at the asscrack of dawn to make one last attempt at…I don’t know, a compromise? A conversation? Anything? You’re out of your mind. Of course I did. I sprinted down the sand in the half-light of dawn and found an empty house waiting for me.
Thinking of her is not helping me pack this carry-on with the right clothes to get me through the next two weeks. It’s not the amount that matters so much as the combination. I never have to worry about this. I drive. I drive, and that means I don’t have to play these torturous mind games while my heart stabs me with every beat.
“Is he ready yet?” Charlie’s voice on the deck is the last thing I need to hear.
“Can you two find anything else to do?” I shout at them.
“If I don’t stay, you won’t go to the airport,” Beau shouts back. “And then you’ll get fired.”
“I don’t think it would be that bad to get fired at this point.”
“How can you be a Bliss brother and not work at the resort?” Charlie asks. He sounds out of breath, like he’s been running. The man has been running too much lately, if you ask me. The financial stuff must be a bigger deal than I thought, or else he’s disproportionately stressed out about it. Either one could be true.
“Ask Asher,” I fire back. “Does he even work here?”
No answer. Typical.
“Five minutes,” Beau calls. If you can’t see him, he sounds exactly like Charlie. This makes sense, because they’re identical twins. It’s weird that they don’t switch identities more often.
Or maybe they do, and I can’t tell the difference.
This is not what I need to be thinking about in this moment. I put one of the shirts back in the carry-on. It goes with all the pants, and if I need to, I can buy t-shirts when I’m on the ground in Washington and mail them back to myself. I guess. Or I could just keep them there and start a whole new life under a false identity, which seems like less of a hassle than getting on the plane in the first place.
“Driver,” shouts Beau.
“Shut the hell up,” I call over my shoulder. “I’m almost done.”
“No—”
“Beau, if you can’t stop talking for five seconds, I’m never going to get—”
“He’s right, Drive,” says Charlie. “You should come out here.”
The hairs on the back of my neck rise like a supernatural energy has passed through my living room, which it has not. It must be something in the tenor of their voices.
“If I come out there and you guys are screwing around, it will be the last thing you ever—”
The cry is so faint I think it’s a figment of my imagination.
“Drive, come out.” I don’t know which twin says it, but this time I drop the shirts onto the open carry-on and go out the front door. Both Beau and Charlie are looking in the same direction, their heads at an uncannily similar angle.
“What is—oh.”
Holiday is running up the gentle slope to our houses, her purse in one hand and a pair of high heels in the other. She looks so different that my first instinct is to blink, hard, to get my eyes to work. She’s dressed in a gray skirt and blazer, looking every bit the accountant, and her hair flies back over her shoulders.
“Looks like she belongs with you, Charles,” says Beau, and Charlie slaps him on the arm.
“Driver,” she yells.
She’s crying.
I move toward her without another thought, taking the stairs two at a time and sprinting down the narrow walk to the pavement. Holiday lifts her head and sees me and a sob tears from her throat. I can’t get to her fast enough, and once I do, I can’t see enough.
“Are you all right?” I check her head for wounds. She’s crying so hard that she must be hurt. There’s no blood on her head, so I scan down over her shoulders to her wrists. “Hey. Talk to me. Are you all right?”
“I fucked up,” she screeches, her voice echoing off all the other houses on our street. “I made a mistake, Driver. It was a mistake to go to New York and be without you for even a second.”
“It’s all right.” I kneel down and check her legs. Her feet are dirty. “Did you step on something?”
“God, no, I didn’t step on anything.” She grabs a fistful of my t-shirt and pulls me up to standing. “I got to the city and it was terrible. I threw up in a garbage bin, and I couldn’t get away from it. And I realized—” She hiccups, the tears running down her face. “I’m in love with you, okay?” Her voice rises, almost to a scream. “I love you. And it’s stupid because we don’t know each other that well. I mean, we’ve had sex an absurd amount of times, but I don’t know where you went to high school.”
“I went to high school in Ruby Bay.”
“Ruby Bay! Fine!” She throws her hands up. “I want to know you. I want to spend every day knowing you. And I want our baby to know you. And I don’t care what I have to give up. I’ll give up a hundred jobs.”
I smooth her hair away from her face. “You gave up your job?”
“Why would I keep a publishing job if it meant being away from you?” She wipes furiously at her eyes, but more tears come. “You scare the shit out of me, Driver. I would always be outside my comfort zone with you. But I don’t care, because no comfort zone is worth being away from you. Do you get it? I love you. I love you.”
I laugh because I’m so happy, and because this is so insane, and because this incident is sure to go down in Bliss Resort history. “I love you too, and I don’t know why. You like to stay inside way too much, and you don’t seem to get that being inside a car is still…being inside. We can stay inside all the damn time if you want, as long as we can take some trips.”
“Oh, hell, no.” She brandishes a finger at me. “You’re not giving up your travel. I’m the one who got to make the grand sacrifice, and you will not take it away from me. Do you hear me?”
“Everybody hears you. You’re shouting so loud.”
“It’s because I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
“I can’t hear you,” she shouts.
“I love you, too.”
And with my idiot brothers cheering from my front porch and adding to the spectacle, I pick her up in my arms and kiss her like she’s a miracle returned to me.
That’s exactly what she is.
20
Holiday
Two weeks later
“SOME STRANGER’S house at the Bliss Resort has never looked so good,” I tell Driver as he steers the car toward his house in the club.
He snorts. “Some stranger’s house. That’s your house now. You’d better get used to it.”
“We’ll see. I might want to keep traveling.”
Driver keeps a straight face for longer than I thought he could, then bursts out laughing. He reaches for my hand and gives it a squeeze. “I don’t see that happening. But as a housewarming surprise…”
My heart leaps. “You didn’t get a different house, did you? I agreed to come live with you under the condition that it’s this house.”
“I didn’t get a different house. I did have a chat with Roman the other night while you were at the gym.”
“Oh, yeah?” Exercising, in a shocking turn of events, felt good. I didn’t have a single episode of morning sickness the whole time we were in Washington. Though it could have been the constant proximity to Driver—hard to say. “About what?”
“About rearranging my work schedule.”
“Driver Bliss. You did not.”
Driver laughs, his face warmed by the evening sun. “I didn’t ask him for another job. I’m still going to be traveling, but we’ve…condensed the schedule.”
I wait.
“Five days a month.”
It warms my entire chest like a shot of tequila. Not that I’ve had a shot of tequila in recent weeks, or even recent years, but I remember what it felt like—and actually, this is better.
I raise his hand to my lips and kiss his knuckles. “I love that you’d do that for me, but you can’t do that for me.”
“I can, and I have.”
“That’s not enough for you.”
“You know what, Holiday Taylor?” He makes the turn into his driveway, throws the car in park, and turns the key in the ignition. Then he holds my hands with both of his. “You’ve taught me a lot.”
“I know. You’re way better at sex now.”
He jerks backward. “Excuse me, but you hunted me down on the beach a month later because of my prowess.”
“I hunted you down because I was pregnant.”
“Because of my prowess.” Driver clears his throat. “You’ve taught me that I can find ways to be in control over my own life even if I’m not spending every day behind the wheel. I learned that because you did the same thing by shutting yourself in a house like Rapuznel.”
I sniff. “It wasn’t like Rapunzel. I didn’t have a cool tower or anything.”
He looks into my eyes. “I decided this. Roman and I figured it out. And what it means for us is that we’re meeting in the middle.” He laughs. “I still can’t believe they gave you that job as a remote worker.”
“They must have been impressed with my gumption.”
Driver laughs. “Where do you get these words?”
“Books and movies. Where else? I spent all summer in a sprawling summer cottage with no responsibilities and a private library.”
“You never showed me the library.” Driver narrows his eyes. “How can I be sure it was there?”
“I never showed you the library because it doesn’t have a bed in it.”
“I do not need a bed to show you the time of your life.” He leans in, blue eyes shining, and kisses me.
It’s as good as the first time, every time. Driver’s lips are firm and gentle and as the kiss lengthens it gets hotter, his tongue demanding entrance to my lips. I’m hot and bothered in a matter of heartbeats, squirming in my seat.
“Hey, lovebirds.” The rap at my window is enough to wake the dead. “Driver, get your tongue out of her throat. We’re all waiting.”
Driver raises a hand slowly into the frame of the window, his middle finger raised. “We’ll continue this shortly,” he tells me.
“We’d better.” I turn to face a grinning Beau, who waves at me like a contestant in a beauty pageant.
We get out of the car and go up toward the porch, where Roman and Charlie are waiting.
“There’s another housewarming surprise,” Driver murmurs into my ear. My heart races, then gallops. “You’re going to love it.”
At the door, Beau clears his throat, then opens it for us and lets us step through.
I. Am. Speechless.
My mouth hangs open like a flytrap, but I couldn’t close it to save my life. Every inch of this place—every inch that I can see—has been completely repainted. It was dark before, as if Beau had left the decorations from the previous owner, but now? Now?
Now it’s as bright as my uncle’s cottage. It wasn’t exactly a small house before, but now it looks open and massive and clean.
“I—”
“Shh,” Beau says. “Come upstairs before you thank us.”
He leads the way up to the second floor, which is large enough for Driver’s bedroom—our bedroom—and two additional bedrooms. Beau stops at the first door on the right and swings it open.
“A nursery!” I cry, because apparently I lose the power to do anything other than basic descriptions when I’m this overwhelmed by love. “A baby nursery! You guys.” I turn around to face them. All four of them. Driver, who gave them permission to change everything while we were gone. Roman, who probably micromanaged the whole enterprise. Charlie, standing quietly in the back, who organized the budgeting. And Beau, who undoubtedly hung around bothering the construction crew and supplying them with free drinks. “This is amazing. What can I do? Can I buy you a pizza? Let me buy you a pizza. I’m not going to make it, but where can I order it from? Do you have—Driver, what’s the best pizza place?” I pull my phone out of my pocket and drop it on the ground, then realize I never followed through on my intended hug. I get them all in my arms as much as I can, squeezing tight. “Thank you. I’m going to get you a lot of pizza. Thank you so much.”
“I think she likes it,” Beau says in a strangled voice. I release his neck, then kiss each of them on the cheek. Except for Driver. I bite his lip. It’s been a long car ride back to the Bliss Resort, and I want him. As soon as his brothers are out of the way…look out.
I snatch my phone off the floor and go back downstairs. There’s so much to see, and already it feels exactly right. It feels like I belong here. And most importantly, it feels like I could go anywhere, for any amount of time, and still find home in these rooms.
That’s what it’s about. Not hiding from the world, and not subjecting myself to living arrangements I don’t like for the sake of…
For no sake at all, really. There was never a sake when it came to living in the city.
“Are your other brothers coming?” I call back up the stairs to Driver. “Huck, and Asher?”
“Asher’s never coming,” one of the twins calls down to me. I can’t tell which one, and then they’re all thundering down the steps to the main floor. “Maybe you should ride his ass about that, Roman.”
“Maybe I will,” says Roman, and Driver laughs.
“I’ll believe that when I see it.”
I look up the number for the pizza place and dial, making my way back through the living room, taking a detour through the den, and ending in the kitchen. It’s bathed in the kind of evening light that used to make me sad. I was sad because I’d spent another day not being the person I wanted to be.
Those days are over.
I order three pizzas just to express my gratitude and look out the kitchen window. Driver’s brothers mowed the lawn and put in a little playset while we were gone. The miniature swing fills me with anticipation and nervousness and…hope.
So much hope.
Arms wrap around me from behind and I lean into Driver’s chest. “Do you like it?” he says into my hair.
“I love it.” I lean down and kiss the backs of his hands. “But I love you more.”
“You scared?”
I know he’s not asking about the house.
“Oh, I’m terrified.” He laughs, his chest shaking against my back. “It’s going to be a wild ride. Worth it in the end, though.”
“Worth it without end.” Driver kisses me one more time, smiling at his own clever play on words.
He’s got that right.
Epilogue
Charlie
THE PIZZA ARRIVES with Jenny and Claire, who clearly accosted the delivery man at the end of the sidewalk. They ring the doorbell too many times and pile in through the front door of Driver’s house.
“We helped him so much,” Jenny says, balancing the three pizza boxes on her hands. “This is hot.”
I take the boxes from her and bend down to kiss her cheek, then Claire’s.
“So serious, Charlie,” says Claire. “Aren’t you impressed with us? We tipped double, too. He’s going to love coming here.”
“I hate to break it to you, but all the drivers from that pizza place love coming here. The Bliss family has a reputation for tipping well.”
Claire flicks my chest. “Don’t steal my thunder.”
Beau sticks his head into the entryway. “Is that the pizza? Thank god.”
“I love you so much,” Claire tells him, and he laughs.
“Driver!” shouts Jenny. “Show us the new house!” Somehow, they all push past me and I’m left standing in the entryway with the pizza boxes.
More for me.
I go down the hall and cross through the living room, where everybody is gathered, exclaiming over the new paint job. I’m not even going to mention that it’s more than a paint job. Most of the drywall in Driver’s house had to come out. And still, thanks to yours truly, the project got done on time and only slightly over budget.
I lay the pizza boxes on the kitchen counter, opening each one. I’m not sure if anyone notices that I’m the one who does this kind of behind-the-scenes stuff, but it might be better that way. It’s hard to concentrate with people around.
“Thanks for doing this.” I turn my head in time to see Holiday rising on tiptoe to reach into one of the open-front covers for plates. “The pizza took forever to get here, didn’t it?”
“Forever. Ruby Bay needs another pizza place.”
“I bet you could start one.” She stretches her arms above her head.
“Here—I’ll get them.” I lift the plates down from the shelf and when I set them down next to the pizzas, I feel her eyes on me. “Is…everything all right?’
“Is everything all right with you?” Holiday watches me. She has eyes in a shade of gray I’ve never seen on a person before. “You’re really quiet and serious.”
“Everybody here plays a part.”
“Do you wish you were playing a different one?”
My breath catches. Most of the time, no. I’m invested in my work, and I want to keep the family legacy alive for at least another five generations. But when I see the rest of them gathered together like that, all paired up…
“Not always.” It’s as much of the truth as I’m willing to give her.
“Charlie. You’re holding out on us,” Beau calls from the living room. “Bring it on out.”
“Come get it yourself, you lazyass,” I shout back, giving Holiday another smile. “Sometimes you need the right person to play a different part. I haven’t found one yet.”
She pats me on the arm, nodding like she can possibly understand.
I don’t tell her that I don’t think I’ll ever find that person.
Or that I’m slightly terrified I might have already found her…and let her go.
Who tells someone their secret fears at a party? Not me.
