Heh. It made me smile despite the hint of dread I felt at him leaving sooner than later. “I just gave him shit. Don’t get all butthurt.”

“What did he say?”

I crossed one leg over the other and grinned at the ceiling like I had probably never grinned before. “Well, it was more of what I told him. He showed up almost fifteen minutes late, if you didn’t see that. And I don’t know if you know, but I hate tardiness. I hate being late and having my time wasted.” Especially when we were supposed to be having a serious conversation, but I didn’t need to bring that up. “And after that….”

Was I going to tell him that I said I loved him? When he hadn’t said those words to me? When I didn’t even know what we were going to do in the near future with him leaving?

But those words clung onto my tongue, staked through my heart.

He cared about me. He got jealous. He was trying.

And according to Grandpa, he loved me.

So I had to try too if this—he—was what I wanted. And it was. There was no question there.

“He tried to bring up a bunch of old shit, and I had to remind him that he hadn’t been my friend in a long time.” I paused, knowing this was a leap and taking it. “I told him that I didn’t feel the same way about him.”

Jonah literally fucking grunted, and I could hear him breathing loudly over the line. It must have been at least a minute before he spoke up again. “What else did you tell him?”

You snooze you lose, right? And I hated losing.

So I went for it. Fuck it. “Well, I told him I was in love with your dumb ass.”

I heard him exhale.

And I definitely heard him when he said in a clear, clear voice, “Did you tell him that I love you back?” There was a pause. “Or that his time had passed, and that I wasn’t going to make the same mistake again?”

I pressed my lips together as my eyes started to sting out of nowhere. “No. I didn’t tell him that.”

His voice was a husky grumble. “You should have. Because it’s the truth. Because I love you and Mo so much, I’m going to make up the last seventeen months to you both, Len.” He paused. “If you’ll let me.”

Chapter 20

Subject: COME ON

Lenny DeMaio:

Wed 3/22/2019 1:29 p.m.

to Jonah Collins

Can you please fucking call me back?

Text me back?

Send me a fucking letter if you’re too much of a chicken to communicate with me: one on one?

You need to know something.

I’m not trying to get you to like me again, but I have to tell you something important

If I would have been the kind of girl to keep a diary, I was sure every entry for the next three weeks of my life would have been something along the lines of TODAY IS THE BEST DAY OF MY LIFE.

And it wouldn’t have been an exaggeration.

I couldn’t remember ever being so… happy. Not in a way that I was smiling or laughing all the time, that wasn’t me, but happy in the way that it was on the inside. Almost like wearing a life jacket even though I knew how to swim. I felt just… better than usual, and I had always been pretty good.

I was still tired and didn’t want to kill people at the gym any less, but it was different.

Jonah’s mom and sister had flown back to New Zealand right on the date that he’d told me, leaving me with a big hug from Natia and a pat on the back from his mom. She, of course, didn’t leave without a long, long look that might have made me uncomfortable if I wasn’t used to getting ugly looks from people and a question of, “You’ll bring Mo to visit?” that didn’t really feel like she was asking me but telling me.

I promised that I would.

Then I’d surprised the shit out of myself by inviting her to come visit whenever she wanted.

Every ten years or so.

I was just kidding.

Kind of.

No sooner had Jonah dropped them off at the airport, then he came knocking on the back door with his luggage duffel and a new rolling suitcase. Peter had let him in while I was busy flying Mo around the house. When I heard his voice in the kitchen, I kicked the door open and carried her in, belly down, her head up, fingers and toes wiggling in the diaper and shirt she was in.

“Don’t be afraid; it’s just the flying incredible Mo,” I told them as I zoomed her around the island and flew her straight toward them.

Peter laughed as I stopped her in midflight and asked her to give him a kiss—she did, and he gave her one back—and then said “Pssshew” and fake threw her at Jonah, who had his hands open and wide at chest level, taking her with an ease that made me smile. He grinned at me before brushing his lips across my own briefly. He lifted her up over his head, elbows nearly locking, her body inches from the ceiling as she shrieked, “Da!” with absolute fucking joy.

“She loves me,” the big man gasped, grinning as he lowered her back down to earth and planted a kiss on each cheek.

Ugh. They were too cute. It was sickening.

And amazing.

I couldn’t stop smiling as Jonah lifted her back up high toward the ceiling, lowered her back down to his chest level, and then asked me, “May I continue the tour of the house?”

“Yup.”

Off they went, with Jonah using his butt to push the door open and them disappearing through the house, with Mo laughing and giggling, back in airplane mode.

An arm came over my shoulder, and I felt Peter’s kiss on the side of my head. I leaned against him before turning to him and raising my eyebrows, a smile stretching across my mouth.

He wasn’t smiling, but I could tell he was happy. “Did you tell him?”

I knew what he was asking. “Yes.”

He nodded, and I felt the deep, deep breath he took.

So I dug my knuckle into his rib and said, “Speaking of, when are you going to make an honest man out of my grandpa?”

Peter laughed like he always did when I asked him that every six months.

But we both knew the truth. If it ever happened, it wouldn’t be until they both retired and had nothing to do with MMA anymore. But despite keeping it a secret for so long, I understood the reason behind the sacrifices that they’d made to make what they had work. Especially for so long.

And I guess, if they could make it work for so many years…. Well, if you tried hard enough, you could make anything work for that long.

You just had to have some heart. And patience. And a whole lot of will.

Luckily, I had all three.

Later that same night, on the night that started the best three weeks of my life, we were all hanging around the living room. Grandpa Gus and Peter were sitting on their love seat, Grandpa half reading a novel and Peter with his eyes glued to a television program about police officers in the Pacific Northwest. I was sitting on the couch with Mo tucked into my arm, over my chest since she’d just finished her bottle. I had Where the Wild Things Are opened on my lap as I read to her while she tried fighting falling asleep. Jonah was in the middle of the couch, his thigh pressed against mine, with one hand resting on my thigh, holding her foot in his palm.