Yours Forever (Reign 3)

“Open it,” Jack coaxed.

With a deep breath, I took the red one. “That’s from me,” Cal said and bounced a little. Which was adorable, since he was large, tattooed, and everything about him could be intimidating if he wasn’t so wonderfully caring.

I ripped at the paper and opened the box. I pulled out a blue Golden Fire T-shirt. Only it wasn’t Cal’s, it wasn’t oversized. It was my size.

“The guys said you’re one of us and you needed your own shirt,” he said with a shrug. But, when I looked and saw a small piece of paper on the bottom of the box, I reached in and realized it was a recipe card.

“Bea’s cranberry sauce?” I asked.

Cal nodded. “She refuses to pass it down to anyone. It’s just for family. She gave it to me after I met you.”

Tears stung my eyes. This was too much. It was simple, yet said something more than I could dare to hope. Something I’d once hoped for. Family. A sense of belonging. And Cal was the man who was so good at giving me that.

“Thank you,” I whispered. I stopped myself from hugging and kissing him, which was one of the hardest things I’d ever done.

He nodded. “You’re welcome.”

I looked at Jack, his was the white present. I opened the box and unrolled something in tissue paper. I pulled out a small tree branch. No, wait, it wasn’t a tree branch. But it looked like it. It was a creamy color and felt fragile and rough to the touch. But the intricate pattern it was in made me think it was some kind of decorative piece.

“Thank you,” I said, smiling.

Jack just grinned. “You don’t know what it is, do you?”

“Of course I do,” I said, and looked the branch thing in my hand again.

“Truth,” he reminded me.

I pursed my lips and said, “No, I’m sorry. I’m not sure what it is.”

“Good. That means that you’ve never seen it before.”

I looked at the piece again. Nope, couldn’t say that I have.

“It’s lightning,” Jack said in a calm tone.

My eyes shot wide and I looked at him, then at the mystery item in my hand. He had told me once that I was his light within the storm. Everything from that moment had changed because I knew then that we were unique. Our relationship was unique. And he’d made me feel special. Like he needed me.

“How…how is that possible?” I whispered. Leave it to Jack to find a way to give me lightning.

“It’s sand that was hit by lightning. Forever frozen from the place it marked.”

The tears I’d been fighting back lined my eyes. I couldn’t fight the need to reach out. To either of them. So, I did just that.

I wrapped my arm around the back of Jack’s neck and pulled him in for a kiss.

When his lips met mine, I kissed him hard and deep and swiftly, backing away before I could start, because I’d get lost.

I turned to Cal and pulled him in by the T-shirt and he crashed his lips on mine. Stealing one hot, brief kiss.

“Thank you,” I whispered against him. Then pulled back to look at Jack. “Thank you both so much.”

Getting pegged between a hot black stare and smoldering blue gaze, I didn’t know what to do. I knew what I wanted to do. What I wanted to say. But I couldn’t. I loved them. And it was tearing apart everything.

I gathered my treasures and stood.

“This was more than I ever expected,” I said. And I meant that beyond the gifts. Jack and Cal were beyond anything I ever thought my life would obtain. And I would lose them.

With a final look at them, I walked to my room and shut the door. A loud exhale left my chest, because it took everything I had not to throw open the door and go running, begging for them to love me.