Craving Cecilia (The Aces' Sons 6)

“You wanna stay here?” he asked quietly, pulling me snug against him.

“In Eugene?” I reached out to lay my hand lightly on Olive’s chest. “Or in the clubhouse? Because I’d seriously like to get out of here.”

“In Eugene,” he clarified.

I thought about it before answering. I’d made a life in San Diego. I had friends there—not close ones, but friends all the same. I liked my neighbors and my condo. I knew the grocery store near my place like the back of my hand. Plus, there were a hundred beaches to go to. Restaurants with authentic food from all over the world. Sunshine all year round.

“Yeah,” I said finally, thinking about the way my mom bounced Olive as she walked her around, showing her off. “Yeah, I’d like to stay.”

“Okay, baby,” he said simply.

“What about you?” I asked nervously. “You have a life down there, too. You own a house and your job is there.”

“I go where you go, remember?” he said, kissing my neck again. “We’ll figure it out.”

“Seriously?” I tried to turn my head toward him, but he blocked it with his chin, keeping me in place.

“I can live anywhere,” he said with a small shrug. “I’ll sell the house and we can figure it out from there.”

“What about your job?”

Mark was quiet for a while, long enough for my fingers to unconsciously start rubbing along the chapped skin of my lower lip.

“I can work from anywhere,” he said finally, reaching up to grab my hand and slide his fingers between mine. “But I don’t know. Not sure I wanna be gone for months at a time.”

“You’re gone for months at a time?” I asked, my stomach sinking. I’d just gotten him back, and that sounded like torture.

“Yeah,” he whispered. “And I’m thinkin’ that wouldn’t work for either of us.”

A quiet knock on the bedroom door interrupted our conversation, and Mark slid off the bed to answer it.

“What’s up?” he asked, keeping his voice down.

“I apologize for the interruption,” Wilson replied, his voice equally quiet. “I have a flight in a couple hours, and I’d like to speak to you before I leave.”

“Alright,” Mark said. “Let me get dressed.”

The door closed again, and I rolled to my back to watch as Mark pulled on his clothes.

“He sounds—” I searched for the right word.

“Off,” Mark supplied. “Yeah, I know.” He came to me and kissed me, the soft peck turning naturally into a deep, satisfying tangle of lips and tongues. “I’ll be back in a bit. Try to get some more sleep.”

He left and I sighed, staring at the ceiling. There was no way in hell I’d be able to fall back asleep.

Ten minutes later, there was another knock on the door, and I knew who it was just by the sound of the knuckles hitting the wood. How many times had I heard that exact cadence? More times than I could count. I pulled on my clothes and took a deep breath as I opened the door.

“You were shot?” my mom said, staring at me in confusion, her face tear streaked. “Why the fuck wouldn’t you tell me? I’m your mother.”

“Come in,” I said quietly, glancing at Olive as I moved back into the room.

My mom followed me inside with my dad right behind her. As soon as he’d closed the door, I sat on the edge of the bed, my hands clenched together in my lap.

“Things were really bad,” I said, lifting my hand to stop my mom as she started to interrupt. “Things were really bad,” I said again. “And I didn’t want to make things worse for you.”

“Bumblebee,” my dad said, his voice full of censure. “It doesn’t matter how tough shit is, you can always tell us anythin’.”

“How did I miss it?” my mom said, still completely bewildered. “How did I not know?”

“I made sure you didn’t,” I replied. I swallowed hard. “It felt—” I searched for the right words. “inconsequential, compared to everything else.”

“That’s bullshit,” my mom said. “Jesus, CeeCee. How bad was it?”

“It was just a scratch,” I replied, reaching up to run my hand over the scar through my t-shirt. “I put a couple Band-Aids on it and it was fine.”

My dad ran his hands down his face, pressing his fingers into his eye sockets in frustration or disappointment—maybe both. “We fucked up,” he said, his voice strained.

“I didn’t want you to know,” I reminded him. “And I was old enough to hide it. I felt guilty that it was even there—it would’ve been a hundred times worse if someone had noticed I was hurt and made a big deal about it.”

“Why in God’s name would you feel guilty?” my mom said in confusion.

“Because I thought I’d saved Lily,” I said, the words burning my throat. “I didn’t realize I had Rose until we were behind the tree, and by then I couldn’t move. I couldn’t get to her.”