Saturday
I chickened out.
I chickened the fuck out—again—multiple times now. Nathan was right. I was only hurting her in the process. I saw it on her face last night as she stepped away from me, as she declined my invitation to come in and talk, as the tears welled up in her perfect eyes and coated her freckled face. Forty-five had fallen. I’d actually managed to count all of them.
I wasn’t going to chicken out today. I couldn’t. I was going to lay every single card I had on the table, explain everything as well as I could. I was going to fix this.
I had to fix this.
The moment I woke up, as I shifted between the sheets searching for my phone, I decided that tonight had to be the night. If I forced myself into a position where I had to tell her, where it would be the only thing I could do, then I couldn’t run away from it. I’d have to face it head-on, good or bad. I still wasn’t entirely sure which was which.
I called my mom first and sorted out babysitting. She would take Jamey for the night, and though I couldn’t explain exactly why, she seemed to handle it better than I thought she would considering she’d just had him for five nights in a row. Jamey wouldn’t be pleased, but I needed him to be alone with Sophie this evening.
I called the caterers next. I booked a private chef for seven o’clock onward, instructing him to board my yacht before we arrived. It was too large to fit along the side of my house, so I paid the fees to keep it docked although I hadn’t set foot on it in two years. The S.S. Becks would need a new name, but in the meantime, it would have to do.
I called the cleaners. Begged them at short notice to clean up the boat, change the sheets on the bed, and ensure the vessel was spotless after two years of avoiding it like the plague. I’d have done it myself if I had the time, but I didn’t. I needed the day to prepare.
Nathan did like to say I was dramatic.
————
The traffic entering central Boston was absolute hell on earth. My satnav claimed there was a crash ahead and all four lanes of US-1 were stopped, inching forward at a snail’s pace.
I pulled my phone from my pocket, double-checking around me that there weren’t any police officers stuck in traffic next to me, and fired off a text to Sophie.
I need to see you tonight. I’ll explain everything. Come over at seven. Wear something nice.
My hand shook as I hit the send button. I wasn’t even sure if she’d respond. I’d told myself multiple times this morning that if she didn’t want to talk to me, if she ignored my calls and messages, I’d go to her house and beg her to come with me if that’s what it took. I wasn’t going to let this fall apart again. I wasn’t going to chicken out again.
My phone buzzed as I moved a centimeter forward in traffic.
Can we have crab legs again?
I chuckled, the back of my head falling against the headrest. That message was ten times better than what I was expecting. She easily could have told me to go fuck myself and even that would have felt like a relief.
Abso-fucking-lutely.
Okay. Will Jamey be there?
Nope. Just us.
————
My jaw nearly hit the floor like one of the animated characters in Jamey’s cartoons when Sophie stepped through my door. I understood now why she wanted to know if Jamey was coming.
The tight, black dress she wore hugged every nook and cranny of her body. The neckline plunged almost down to her navel, thin straps held it up on her shoulders, and the back showed off so much of her skin that I thought I might actually not make it through the evening. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to think about literally anything else other than what lay beneath the fabric.
“Don’t stare at me like that,” she grumbled, turning toward the nearest reflective surface as she pushed her stud earrings through the holes in her lobes. “You’ve seen me naked. Surely this must be nothing for you.”
“That dress might just be on par with you, bare, underneath me.”
She mumbled something under her breath, the little strands of hair hanging from her high bun rustling as she turned toward me. “Well, I figured soon enough I won’t really be able to wear something like this for a while, so I might as well tonight.”
“I’m not complaining.”
“I know you’re not.”
“But for the record.” I said, taking a step toward her. I brushed a wavy strand of hair from her face, my fingers gently swiping against her skin. It felt far too electric for my own good. “I’ll still find you just as enticing when you’re in your second and third trimesters. You can absolutely still wear things like this.”
Her cheeks warmed beneath my touch, blush spreading out across her face. “I don’t know if I should take that as a compliment or just a guy being pervy.”
I chuckled as I dragged my fingers down along her jaw, lifting her chin so she’d meet my gaze. “Well, you’ll have plenty of time to decide in the car. We need to get going, though. We’re already late.”
“Late for what?”
“You’ll see.”
————
Sophie didn’t say one word to me the entire car ride.
Normally, her silence didn’t bother me. I knew her too well by now to take anything bad from it. But for the thirty-minute drive out to the docks, I’d found myself white-knuckling the steering wheel, thoughts racing from bad to worse to catastrophic. I was nervous about getting back on the yacht after so long, I’d been spending my time on my smaller boat instead. I was worried that Sophie might get angry at me, might not feel the same way I did, or would just full-on have a heart attack from my openness.
A quick glance at Sophie’s left hand as I pulled into the parking lot confirmed she hadn’t worn the ring tonight. I almost wished she had, but she had no reason to and I had to remind myself of that. I didn’t tell her she’d be impressing anyone, I didn’t tell her there’d be anyone to fool.
I only hoped that when we inevitably left the yacht, there’d be one on her finger.
The rain slowed a little as I shifted into park, and her head lifted from the passenger window of my Mercedes. “Are we here?” She asked, a little yawn drawing her mouth open.
“Yeah.” I leaned back between the seats, searching around on the floor for the umbrella I normally kept down there, but came up instead with an empty bag of crisps and Jamey’s tiny raincloud umbrella. “Fucks sake,” I breathed, groaning as I laid it out in my lap. “This isn’t going to plan.”
“It’s okay,” she said softly. “How far is it?”
“About a two-minute walk. But I don’t want you to get wet.”
“Jamey’s umbrella should be fine.” Her lips twitched upward as she looked at me, her eyes far too soft. “Don’t worry about it. Have you got anything to cover yourself with?”
I shook my head no, pushing the door open with my foot. “Nope. I don’t mind a little rain.” The droplets began their ruination of my decently styled hair as I rounded the car, the pebbled parking lot crunching beneath my feet. My trembling hand shook as I reached for her door handle, slipping against the slick outer shell of my car, and I leaned over the empty space the door left behind to shield her from the rain. “Come on, angel.”
She blinked up at me, Jamey’s umbrella clutched in her hand, as she untangled the velcro close on it. “What’s happening?” She chuckled as her heeled feet touched the rocks.
“We’re having dinner on my yacht.” I held out my hand, taking a step back as she unfurled the umbrella before grasping onto my arm for leverage.
“Are you taking me on a date, Hudson Brady?” She joked, elbowing me in the side as she found her footing.
“That’s exactly what I’m doing.”
“Wait, seriously?” Her eyes met mine, wide and full of a mixture of surprise and some hidden emotion.
“Seriously.”
Placing my damp hand on the small of her back, I lead her across the gravel to the docks. She watched her feet the entire way, and I had to tell myself over and over that it wasn’t because she didn’t want this, it was just because her thin heels could get stuck in the gaps between the floating cement and wood. It’ll go well. It’ll go well. It’ll go well.
“This is us.” The S.S. Becks stood tall before us, the painted name on the side screaming at me in too-large letters. From the exterior, you’d never know that I hadn’t stepped foot on it myself in two years, let alone anyone else. It was the only thing that still filled me with anxiety, the thought of boarding. It made my throat close, my damp hands damper, that sinking feeling weighing me down and burying me beneath the water below us.
“You okay?”
I blinked the rain from my eyes as I looked down at her. So fucking sexy in that dress, so fucking ridiculous with that raincloud PAW Patrol umbrella. “I’m fine.”
“You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” she said.
I chuckled lightly as I ushered her forward onto the ramp. “I did. You should’ve seen it. Big, see-through, scary. I think it had fangs.”
“Fangs? I think you might be confusing ghosts with vampires,” she laughed, folding her umbrella in as she stepped into the covered, lit area of the yacht. “Hudson?”
“Yeah?”
“Are you gonna… you know… get onboard?”
I stood at the edge where the ramp met solid, polished hardwood. The rain still fell over me, soaking me down to my bones, and that sinking feeling amplified tenfold. “Yeah,” I breathed, staring down at the threshold. It’s a step. One step, and it’s over. You’ll have done it.
A hand appeared in my field of vision, little raindrops hitting the skin and sliding down until they fell to the joining spot below. Painted nails, freckles. “Come on. You’ve got it.”
My throat closed as I took her offer, grasping her wet hand in mine. She pulled me toward her with one quick burst, forcing me over the threshold and into the warm light of the cabin of the ship. I stumbled forward into her, her back hitting the black marble wall. I caged her in unintentionally, my breathing rapid, my heart pounding. I couldn’t open my eyes, could only feel the water sliding off of me, dripping onto the floor and likely her face. I was onboard.
“Hey, hey,” she cooed, her hand reaching up to cup my cheek. She wiped the water from my face, my eyes. “You’re okay. Slow down your breathing.”
Fuck, I loved her.
I did as she said, breathing in through my nose and out through my mouth to slow myself down. Finally, I forced my eyes to open, meeting her wide and worried gaze as she looked up at me. “Sorry,” I mumbled.
“Ah, there you two are! I was beginning to worry.”
I leaned back, putting that little bit of distance between us again and immediately regretting it. “Hey, Thomas,” I said, forcing the most polite grin to my face as possible as I turned toward the chef. “Sorry we’re late. The rain made it a little hard to see out there.”
“No problem, sir. Your dinner should be ready soon. Would you like me to fetch you a towel?”
“Nah, it’s fine. I’ll get one. Thank you.”
Thomas nodded before heading back off to the kitchen, leaving us in heavy silence. I glanced around the ship, taking in as much as I could see from the entryway. The cleaning crew had, I assumed, done a fantastic job. I didn’t know the state it had been left in, didn’t know how bad it had gotten over the years since, but it looked brand new again.
“Did you bring any other clothes? I can go grab them from the car,” Sophie offered, her hand resting gently against my arm. “You’re soaked straight through.”
“I think I’ve still got some in the bedroom. I’ll have a look.”
————
The snort of a laugh Sophie let out as I walked into the dining room told me she could see just how ill-fitting the clothes I’d found were. They were two years old, and in those two years, I’d packed on a fair bit of extra muscle. I just had to pray that the buttons on my shirt didn’t fly off into my food.
“Don’t laugh at me,” I smirked, plopping into my chair before her with one hand on the closures of my buttons. “It was all that was left in the closet.”
“I’m not laughing,” she insisted, one hand coming up to cover the growing grin on her face. “I actually kind of like it. Shows off everything.”
“You have already seen me naked. Surely this must be nothing for you,” I said, repeating her own words back to her.
Blush spread across her freckled face. “Shut it, Hudson.”
Chef Thomas rounded the corner of the room with two bowls stacked on his arm and a small cutting board of bread. He set the bowls in front of us, clam chowder filled to the rim of the small containers. “Your appetizers.”
Sophie snatched a piece of bread before he’d even set the cutting board down. “So what is it that you so desperately had to drag me all the way out here for? In the pouring rain, on a yacht, with a private chef. It must be good,” she chuckled, dipping her bread into the chowder as the chef retreated back to the kitchen. “Or really bad, I guess.”
My grasp on the spoon in my hand went slippery. “Maybe we should wait until after dinner to chat?”
“That bad, huh?” I watched as she stuffed a mouthful of bread between her lips.
“It could go either way.” Dipping my spoon into the milky-white soup, I suddenly felt far too nauseous to eat. “And if it goes badly, then this date is going to be extremely awkward for both of us.”
Sophie wiped the corner of her mouth with her thumb, her eyes studying me. “I don’t think it’ll go badly. If I didn’t want to be on a date with you, Hudson, I wouldn’t have agreed to come.”
She had a point. She had to at least have some idea of where this was going, though maybe not how far.
“Can I guess?” Sophie asked, tearing another piece of bread as she watched me. I didn’t know what to say, and she took my silence as a yes. “Okay, so, this is going to be even more awkward if I’m wrong. But I think you’re finally going to admit that you have feelings for me. I think you’re going to lay it all out there, the good and the bad, and tell me you want to give us a real shot.”
I blinked at her, feeling far too much like an open book. The spoon in my hand dropped into the bowl, little droplets of clam chowder arcing up and landing on the wooden table. “That is… uh…” I cleared my throat as I grabbed for my napkin, hastily wiping away the specks of soup and fighting the urge to run away.
“Shit, am I wrong?” She asked around a mouthful of food, wide eyes getting wider, blushed cheeks getting redder. “Shit.”
“No, you’re not wrong.” The words left me before I could even process them. “That’s exactly what I’m doing, Sophia.”
“Oh,” she mumbled, hurriedly swallowing her mouthful of soupy bread. “Oh.”
I took a deep breath, forcing my racing heart to calm down, grasping onto the napkin so hard I was worried the fabric would tear. Do it now. Do it now. “I was going to wait until after dinner, but I might as well just do it now since you’ve already guessed.” Another deep breath, in through my nose and out through my mouth.
“Take your time,” she said. I nodded.
“You know parts of my story. Little glimpses here and there that I gave up, or that you shoved your way into. You know my ex-wife, Becks, left me and Jamey two years ago, and you know that I’ve been closed off ever since. I didn’t see a future where I could find someone that made me feel again. But somehow, Sophia, you did. I don’t know how. I don’t know what witchcraft you hide under those adorable freckles, but you’ve weaseled your way in and fucking unfrosted my heart.”
Sophie blinked at me, the bread in her hand crumbling into her soup.
“I think I might have known from the moment you ran across your yard barefoot and told your parents we were engaged,” I chuckled, the words flowing a little smoother now, a little less frightening. “Or maybe when I caught you watching me from your window. From that moment I knew you’d be trouble at the very least.”
Sophie’s face grew redder, her hand covering her half-open mouth. “I’m definitely trouble,” she breathed, the smallest laugh crawling from her lips.
“You are such fucking trouble,” I chuckled, reaching across the table until my hand rested atop hers. “When you showed up in my office that first time, I wasn’t sure if I was the luckiest or unluckiest man in the world. But I knew there was a pull between us, some invisible string tugging me toward you. I felt it pull when I saw you with Jamey that afternoon on the first day you watched him. I felt it pull when you asked me about Becks. I felt it pull that night that I took you for the first time, felt it in the way I couldn’t keep my hands off you, felt it in the way you breathed.”
“Hudson…”
“I felt it pull harder when we fought. When I told you that sleeping with you was a mistake… that still fucking haunts me. I hated myself for that. I felt it pull when you hadn’t spoken to me for days afterward, harder and harder each night, telling me to just go fix it. It pulled me so hard when I found out you were pregnant that I was honestly scared it might snap.”
I took another deep breath, my mouth going dry, and tried to quench it with my glass of wine. It only made it worse.
“But throughout all of that, I was terrified. I still am. What happened with Becks, it wasn’t like I saw it coming. We weren’t fighting constantly, we were happy, we had a child. She was a great mom, not the best, but she was good.” My hand spasmed from clenching the napkin so hard, dropping it from my grip. “The day before she left, the three of us went out sailing on this fucking boat and we had what I thought was the best day ever. Jamey fell asleep on the drive home. We were out late because we had a hard time docking, the water was a bit choppy. I carried Jamey up to bed that night and the look she gave me… I don’t know if I should have suspected something was wrong right then and there, but it was different. Loving, but different.”
Sophie’s hand squeezed mine, and as I watched her, her eyes darted to the corner of the room. She held up one hand and shook her head before looking back to me, and when I turned, I saw Chef Thomas backing out of the room with plates full of food. “Is that why you didn’t want to get on the boat?”
I nodded. “Yeah. When I woke up the next morning, she was gone. I haven’t been on board since.”
“Oh, Hudson…”
I sucked in air, needing to feel the sharpness of my lungs filling. I’m okay, Jamey’s okay, Sophie’s okay. “I didn’t trust anyone after that for a while. I vowed to myself that I’d never let anyone get that close to me or Jamey again. But then you came along, and all of that went out the window. Or, rather, I’ve been fighting myself over it ever since. But this is different. This is so much more than what I’ve ever felt before, and we’ve only known each other, what, two months? If that?”
“Two years if we’re going based on what we’ve told our parents,” she joked, her hand squeezing mine again.
“Yeah,” I chuckled. “It feels like two years, to be honest. It feels like longer. It feels like I might have known you my whole life, like I was just waiting for you to appear. I’ve fucking fallen in love with you, Sophia. I’ve torn down my walls for you. I’ve let you in, let Jamey get attached. I’ve gone against everything I told myself I wouldn’t do for you. I’m only sorry that I’ve handled it all so poorly.”
I watched as her throat bobbed, her eyes going glassy, tears beginning to form. She laughed lightly at herself as she wiped them away with the back of her finger, preserving as much mascara as she could. “I’ve fallen in love with you too,” she sniffled.
I breathed out a sigh of relief, my grin far too wide to even try to hide it. “Good,” I said, standing from the table and shoving my hand into the pocket of my slacks. I wrapped my fingers tightly around the little wooden box. “That makes what I’m about to do a lot less terrifying.”
