She lifted her hands up and wrapped them around her throat as she continued to stare at the ceiling. It was like she was trying to hold that scream in. But there was no going back. We both heard it.

“What almost happened today . . . I can’t ever be the reason that little boy loses you. I can’t be the selfish, thoughtless person my father spent my entire life trying to convince me I was.”

I blinked, a little bit stunned at her quiet revelation, and bent over so I could pick my shirt up off the floor.

“You could never be thoughtless or selfish, Sayer. You don’t have an ounce of that inside of you.” I shoved my hands through my hair and stopped to tug on it hard enough to bring tears to my eyes. “You want to be the emotionless robot you had to be to survive your father and your mother’s death, that is a choice you are consciously making when you know there are other options. That is what you are choosing when instead you could choose me, could choose us. I know it’s a risk but it’s a risk we would take together.” I sighed at her as I yanked on my shirt, not even bothering to try and find my T-shirt. “I love you and you know it. What you choose to do with it is also your choice.”

I saw her hands tighten reflexively where she was still holding her neck and I wondered if all those emotions she kept bottled up and trapped inside were rising up to choke her.

I took the step that was needed to have my knees touching hers and hunched over so that I could put my hands on either side of her head. I stared down at her as she continued to cry and gazed up at me with those liquid, thawing eyes. Parts of the iceberg were shearing off and the jagged edges were slicing her to bits.

I touched my lips to her forehead and whispered against her skin, “I choose you, Sayer. Lover, lawyer, and all the shit you are in between that, I choose it. I choose us. When you’re ready to accept that, you come find me.” I pushed up off of her and gave her a twisted grin that had no joy or humor in it. “I’ll see you in court.”

The gauntlet was thrown down, my last hand had been played. Now all I could do was love her and leave her.

I LIKED BERYL’S boyfriend. Wes was an easygoing guy and he didn’t seem put off by my sour mood or the fact I had a five-year-old Velcro’d to my side. I was surprised how shy Hyde was when the whole family got together for brunch on Sunday. It could have been the way my mother burst into tears the second she saw him and that she couldn’t stop rubbing the top of his head or bending down to hug him. Or maybe it was that after we all ate, my mom and sister presented him with an army of toys that were more than enough to make up for every Christmas and birthday we had missed with him. There was no way my condo wasn’t going to be considered kid-friendly after I hauled everything home for him.

I kept asking the little boy if everything w1as all right and he would nod at me and not say anything. Finally, after everyone was stuffed with dessert, Joss dragged him away to go watch some Disney movie with her in the living room while Wes and I tackled the dishes in the kitchen. Beryl was torn between keeping an eye on the kids and making sure I didn’t do anything to embarrass her now that she had officially brought her man home to meet the family. Around the fifth time she stuck her head in the kitchen to ask if we needed help, I made sure she caught me relaying the most embarrassing story I could think of from when she was in high school. It involved her sneaking out in the middle of winter to hook up with a neighbor, getting locked out of the house by accident, and almost getting frostbite because she was too scared to ring the doorbell to let Mom know where she was at. I told him my sister had always taken risks when it came to men and rarely did they work out. She glared at me as Wes laughed, but there was weight to my words under the humor and my meaning was clear.

Don’t be a risk she regrets taking.

Wes handed me a stack of plates to dry and leaned on the counter so he could face me. “I’ve never worked as hard in my life as I have to get her to give me a shot. She’s beautiful, but it was more than that from the very start. I knew she was special and she made me feel special by being around her. That isn’t something you give up lightly.”

No, it wasn’t. It had only been a few days and I felt the weight and loss of walking away from Sayer with every breath I took and in every movement I made. She was settled in my bones, tied so irrevocably to my foundation that the absence of her made me feel like I was going to collapse in on myself. I was also back to being in one hell of a shit mood because of the untouchable blonde.

“And Joss.” He shook his head on a laugh and his eyes lit up as he talked about my niece. “That kid is something else. The life in her is amazing and you never know what is going to come out of her mouth.”

I snorted and put the plates down so I could adopt a similar pose to his.

“Usually something that shouldn’t be coming out. She’s trouble, and as she gets older it’s only going to get worse. Beryl is going to have to be on her toes.”

“Well, hopefully she won’t be the only one. I plan on sticking around, Zeb. I’m in this for the long haul. I want them to be my girls.”

I considered him thoughtfully and silently for a long time. I could tell my lack of response made him nervous because he shifted on his feet a little bit. I was a good six inches taller than him, probably outweighed him by a solid eighty pounds, and I knew that he knew about my past. But he never wavered or looked away. He just told me softly, “I’m not asking you to give them up, but I do want you to share them with me.”

I dipped my chin down in a jerky nod. “As long as you treat them right and they want you around, I’m happy to share. Make my sister happy and try and keep my niece out of trouble, that’s all I ask for.”

He chuckled. “Neither of those things is an easy task, but I’m going to give it my best shot from here until eternity.”

The guy really loved my girls, and I would be lying if I said it didn’t sting just a little bit at how easy it seemed to be for them. I knew that wasn’t the case; Beryl had been burned and turned just as badly as Sayer had been, but my sister wanted more, so she let the past go. Sayer seemed to be holding on to it in a death grip. If I could just get her to let go I could have everything I wanted: the girl, my kid, the dream house, and a life with all of those things tied together.

After the dishes were done we went and watched the rest of the movie with everyone. Hyde was curled up into my mother’s side, and I don’t think he had any clue that the simple gesture was making her cry. It was so small and yet so huge that he was here with all of us. He was ours and he fit right in.