I grasp his arms, try to stay upright. But then he lowers the strap of my dress and frees my breasts from my bra and his mouth is there and I go insane with want, with need, and my hands are on his belt, on his zipper, and I’m releasing him while he pushes my panties to the side, and the front door opens, and I squeal, and Luke says, “Fuck!” and Leo says, “Fuck,” and Lachlan, eyes covered by Leo’s hand, says, “Are they sexing?”

“Two minutes,” I breathe out.

Lucas scoffs. “Twenty-eight minutes.”

Without a word, Leo takes Lachlan, and they leave, close the door after them.

I laugh. “Twenty-eight minutes?”

“What?”

“So specific. Do you time yourself?”

“Shut up. And why is the front door unlocked? I told you to make sure—”

“You were out last when you went for your run!” I cut in.

“Was not.”

“Was to!”

“Was not!”

“Was to!”

He rolls his eyes. “We’re like an old married couple.”

I smile.

“What?”

He knows what. “Nothing.”

He stands higher, covers me up and adjusts my dress. I do the same for him. His pants—he doesn’t wear dresses. He kisses me once. “Have a good day with Leo and Vivian.”

“Have a good day at work.” I hand him his lunch, and he kisses me again. “I’ll miss you,” I tell him, and I really will. I’ve gotten so used to him being around.

He heads for the door, and I start on cleaning the kitchen.

“Hey, Lane,” he says, hand on the doorknob.

“Yeah?”

“I’ll need a few years.”

“For what?”

“For the whole married-couple thing.”

My heart lodges in my throat, stops me from breathing.

“Wait for me, okay?”

I nod, unable to speak.

He smiles. “I love you, Lois Lane.”

I get home a half hour before Luke does, and when he enters our apartment covered in construction dust and dirt, I frown. “How was your day?”

“It was okay,” he tells me. “I’m going to jump in the shower real quick.”

He returns to the living room five minutes later, shirtless and in running shorts.

“You going for a run?”

He shakes his head, flops onto the floor between the couch and the coffee table, rolls his neck from side to side.

I sit behind him, massage his shoulders, and he moans in appreciation. “Tough day?” I ask, kissing his cheek.

“I don’t think I realized how hard our dads work until today.”

“Did you hate it?”

“As weird as it sounds, I really enjoyed it. I mean, I’d worked for him before, but it was different today. I was in the mix, you know? It’s good, hard, honest work. And when you think about it, we’re building a house for a family, and they’re going to live and make memories in there. It’ll mean so much to them. It’s… rewarding.”

“So… you like working?”

He grasps one of my hands, stops me from working on his shoulders, and turns to me. “I actually wanted to talk to you about that.”

“About what?”

“Well…” He moves to sit on the couch next to me and shifts my legs until they’re on top of his. He massages my knee, says, “This project is going to be done in a couple of weeks. After that, they’re building a new house from the bottom up, and I think I really want to be part of that. See it through to the end. Dad said he could use the extra hands, and I could work around your rehab and our therapy, and it’s not like we couldn’t use the money.”

“I’ll get a job.”

“Babe.” He laughs once, waits until I’m looking at him. “You’re not listening to me.”

“I am. But this isn’t 1950, Luke. I’m not just here to make you lunch and send you off to work to provide for me.”

He sighs, his gaze distant. “I don’t see the problem with that, Lane. That’s how things were with my mom and dad, and it worked for them. The point is I want to work. And I want to take care of you. I don’t want you getting a job until you’re fully healed, and even then you don’t have to. You can go to community college, build up some credits, or not… I mean, you can do whatever you want. You can sit around and knit all day. I don’t care. I just want you to do whatever is going to make you happy.”

“And this job,” I ask, loving him more with every second, “this job is going to make you happy?”

“I think so.”

“What about UNC?”

“UNC is months away; we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.”

Chapter Forty-One

LOIS

We did cross that bridge. Lucas deferred for another semester. He was in the middle of building a house, and he wanted to see it to the end, so he did. I got my old job back, working at the movie theater, day shifts only. It was pretty quiet during the day, so I spent most of the time flipping through course catalogs trying to find something that interested me. It’s been six months, and I still don’t know what to do with my life.

My injuries have fully healed, but like the docs said, I still have a slight limp. That’s never going to change. Neither will my undying love for the boy sitting opposite me at the kitchen table, watching me, his eyes worried.

“Why didn’t Vivian give it to me?” I ask, looking down at the envelope addressed to Lois Sanders from an inmate at North Carolina Department of Correction.

Lucas says, “She wanted me to decide whether or not to give it to you.”

I look down at the letter, back at him. Tell me what to do, Lucas.

“Do you want a minute?”

“No!” I say quickly.

“Okay,” he says, just as fast. Then he sighs. “You want to go down to the lake? Dad just got a couple of jet skis.”

“Jet skis?”

“One of his clients is moving overseas, sold them to Dad real cheap.” He starts bouncing in his seat. “They’re all down there playing.”

“And you want to play?”

He nods, his smile wide, the letter now forgotten. “So bad.”

“Okay, let’s go play.”

“Good,” he says, standing up. “I got you something.” He takes my hand and leads me to the bedroom, where he points to a bag sitting in the middle of the bed.

I rush to see what’s inside, and when I do, my heart drops. “Luke.” I lift the bikini. “What is this?”

“It’s what you’re wearing today.”

I shake my head. “I can’t wear this.”

“Why?”

“I’ll scare everyone with my scars.”

He shrugs. “Don’t wear it for everyone, babe. Wear it for me.” And I know it’s not about the bikini, or the scars, or the fact that people will see them. It’s about my confidence, about how he wants me to see myself the way he does. The way you look at me, Lucas…