She had.
The day that I’d woken up in the bed next to her, the first word out of my mouth had been Dillan’s name. Not because I thought it was Dillan next to me, but because I’d systematically just fucked up everything I might have had with Dillan. And I’d known it instantaneously.
“Can you ask around quietly?” she asked. “I really don’t want this to affect her. The moment Kerrie knows we’re looking into him, he’s going to lash out. He’s a vindictive little shit.”
“No hard feelings?” I asked. “You’re not going to be upset on his behalf?”
“The day that he took my sister’s virginity, he ceased to matter as a person to me,” she said.
I had a feeling that I wasn’t going to like the explanation that came out of Delanie’s mouth.
Thirty minutes later, I knew that I didn’t.
I was fuming mad when I finally found my girl.
That anger took a diving leap the moment that I saw her with my boy. My boy who was most definitely no longer asleep.
Dillan was hosing off, not the dogs like I’d thought I was about to walk out to witness, but my son.
Asa would laugh, dart away and try to sneak up on her from a different angle, but Dillan would catch him before he could get too close. Quickly, she’d turn the water in his direction again, causing him to shriek.
I could do nothing but smile at that.
“I couldn’t have asked for a better person for you,” Delanie said softly. “Just don’t hurt her, Booth. I know you won’t mean to… but she’s everything to all of us. Without her, we’d be lost.”
Without her, I’d be lost, too.
Even her constant anger over the last couple of years had given me what I needed—her, in any form she would give me.
“I’m not going to hurt her,” I told her bluntly. “I think I’ve done that enough, don’t you?”
And, just when I was about to say more, the water was turned on me.
I froze when my body was doused with cold water, and then I heard Asa’s manic laughter as he ran from behind me.
When I opened my eyes, it was to find Dillan staring at me in horror.
“I didn’t know you were there,” she said, eyes cute and apologetic.
I looked over at Delanie, who was just as wet as I was.
Then I took two steps forward.
Dillan shrieked just as I got to her.
She tried to run away, but her mistake had been not letting go of the hose.
The moment that I caught up to her, I wrapped my arms around her waist, then ducked behind her as she tried to spray me all over again with the hose.
She laughed and shrieked, twisting to get out of my arms, but I wouldn’t be letting her go.
Not now, and not ever.
Asa hit me around the legs then, taking me down to the ground in his exuberance.
I kept Dillan in my arms as I went, laughing as I fell with her.
The jolt of pain to my chest was worth it as Dillan straight up laughed in my face.
She and Asa then spent the next five minutes trying to subdue me, but I wasn’t having it.
“Yield!” Asa cried out loudly.
Dillan burst out laughing, her mouth pressing against my neck as Asa tightened his scrawny arms around my head and squeezed as tight as he could.
“Never,” I said as I started tickling Asa now instead of my girl.
He shrieked and dove at me, but just as I was about to pull him away from me to gain better access, Dillan was there.
We did this back and forth game for a while, not stopping—despite the pain in my chest—for a while.
“Not that this isn’t interesting,” Bourne said with amusement over all of our antics. “But we have a family dinner in about forty-five minutes. And I’m supposed to be picking y’all up. And you’re all soaked, covered in grass and dirt, and very not ready to go.”
I reluctantly stopped my tickling of both Asa and Dillan and turned to look at my brother.
He was standing there, arms crossed across his chest, tapping his foot.
I glanced at Asa out of the corner of my eye and watched him move toward the hose.
Dillan sat up, momentarily causing my brother to look toward her.
When she held out her hand, he reached forward to help her up. Only to get a face full of water, too.
Bourne took the hose straight to the face for all of two seconds before he was running after Asa.
Bourne caught him in a matter of steps, tossed him over his shoulder, and pointed at us.
“Y’all need to get dressed.” He stopped in front of Delanie. “You need to get this thing handled.”
Delanie took the very wet, very dirty, very laughing boy of ours and grinned at Bourne.