“Oh, my god!” Lexi shouted. She pulled the covers up and tossed a pillow at Bo’s fleeing body. His laughter rang through the room as he opened the door to allow both him and the dog out.
He turned back one last time. “I am younger than him, you know. And way prettier.”
“You’re going to be way deader if you don’t stop looking at my girl!” Aidan shouted the warning, but there was a lightness to it. He was playing with his brother, and from the look on his face, Lucas could tell it made Aidan happy.
“Everyone got a glimpse of my cootchie today,” Lexi grumbled.
“Naw.” Aidan pulled her back down and snuggled against her. “Just me and Lucas, and your mom, and Karen, and Sam and Dwight and Bo. That’s all. Jack was taking care of the kids. So not everyone. Oh, and yesterday it was everyone at The Club.”
Lexi slapped at him playfully. “I am going to be fully dressed from now on.”
Lucas wasn’t going to allow that to happen. He tossed his sweaty body right in the middle of the bed, covering both Lexi and Aidan.
“Lucas, you smell so bad!” Lexi tried to get away, but he and Aidan held her down.
“He smells like a working man, angel. Get used to it.” Aidan seemed to be on the same wavelength as Lucas.
“Besides, we have a few hours before we meet your mom and stepdads.” Lucas leaned in for a kiss. “We can all take a shower.”
“After,” Aidan said, his hand pulling Lexi’s shirt off.
“After,” Lucas agreed.
Lexi walked across the fair grounds, the neon lights playing through the night. Blues and pinks and greens twinkled all around her. The smell of funnel cakes frying tickled her nose. Lucas and Aidan had wandered off to grab hot dogs. Olivia shouted her joy about everything. She loved the games and the food and the rides.
Lexi followed her family, feeling strangely out of place. She was intensely aware of everything moving around her. The world was flowing and changing, but she felt stuck in place. She’d spent the entire afternoon in Aidan’s arms. While she was there, she hadn’t thought about it. She’d just let herself be. But now she was back to reality.
He’d left her. He’d walked out on her, blaming her for things that weren’t her fault. Aidan had been gone long enough that he’d changed in almost unfathomable ways. And when he came back, he’d done it under false pretenses. How was she supposed to forgive that?
And how would she ever tell him what had happened to her while he’d been off figuring himself out?
“Alexis?” Her mother slowed down to walk beside her. “Are you all right?”
She nodded and made her best attempt at a bright smile. “I’m great.”
“I want to ride the Ferris wheel!” Olivia motored by, making a beeline for the rides.
“I want to ride the bumper cars!” Sam yelled, winking at his wife as he ran after their daughter. Jack was more leisurely, walking with Josh on his hip. Lexi looked away from the sight of her baby brother.
Her mother’s mouth was tight as she crossed her arms over her chest. “Are you going to be able to forgive Jack?”
Lexi sighed. That wasn’t the biggest question of the day, but she knew how much her mother was worried about it. “I can forgive him, Mom. I don’t want to cause trouble between the two of you.”
“He did that all by himself,” Abby said. “He’s not perfect, you know. His instinct is to protect.”
“By tricking me into getting involved with a man who ripped my heart out?”
Abby stopped, and she stared at the ground for a moment. “I’ve been thinking a lot about this, baby. You’ve been lost since Aidan left. My first instinct was to get really mad at Jack for bringing him back into your life. You’ve been with Lucas. But I’ve been fooling myself. I think I’ve seen what I wanted to see. I told myself that you and Lucas were happy.”
“We are happy.”
“Oh, baby, you’re not functional.” Her mother’s hazel eyes held a sheen of tears that threatened to rip Lexi’s heart out. “You and Lucas don’t work without someone like Aidan. I know the rest of the world doesn’t get how this works, but some people have two soul mates. Could Jack and I have been happy without Sam? Maybe, but we wouldn’t have been complete. Sam and I would have been lost without Jack. I only know that I was lucky enough to find both of them. You and Lucas have been fumbling. I know you weren’t making love, and that’s so important. You are now, and I think Aidan had something to do with it.”
An uncomfortable feeling took a hold of Lexi’s gut. “We would have gotten there.”
“I know what Jack did was manipulative, but he did it because he loves you. He did it because he was scared. He spent almost a year really getting to know Aidan. Jack brought Aidan into his business. His herd is now affiliated with Barnes-Fleetwood.”
Lexi felt her mouth fall open. “He did what?”
“He’s made Aidan a partner in Barnes-Fleetwood. Junior, but a partner. Jack believes in him. I know that man. I know his heart. He would never have done that if he thought Aidan wasn’t the best thing in the world for you and Lucas. I was mad at first, but I saw you today. You were more alive than you’ve been in years. God, Lexi, I want my daughter back. I spent the afternoon realizing I would have done much worse than Jack to get you back.”
Lexi looked back and thought of all the ways her mom and her stepdads had tried to engage her in the last couple of years. Jack and Sam had moved her from Austin to Dallas. They were wealthy enough to have simply paid for the move, but they had shown up and carried out her furniture and boxes and loaded them into her rented truck. They had driven her and hauled it all out again. Jack had offered job advice. Her mother had tried to get her to come out to the ranch on weekends, and when she wouldn’t, had shown up on her doorstep claiming she needed to shop. They had tried in a thousand different ways, and then Jack had brought the sledgehammer down because he wasn’t a man to give up.
And she’d felt more in the last two days than she had in years.
It wasn’t that she didn’t love Lucas. God, she loved him so much, and he loved her. But they needed Aidan. Aidan pushed them.
Lexi could forgive Jack, but she still wasn’t sure how to handle Aidan.
“I think you need to give this time, baby girl,” her mother said.
“I have a lot of that now. Aidan quit my job for me.”
Her mother smiled. The light joy on her face made her seem years younger. “He’s a Dom all right. Such pushy men, but there’s nothing like a good one. Ask yourself something. Did you love that job?”
“No, but it was mine. What am I supposed to do now?” She knew she was being stubborn. She’d been thinking about quitting the job anyway. She had money in the bank. She could always find another crap job.
“What do you want to do, Lexi? Because it occurs to me that Aidan is offering you a chance. Between Aidan and Lucas, you don’t have to work if you don’t want to. I know that sounds unliberated of me, but given the fact that your stepfathers are multi-millionaires, it’s not like you’ll be on the streets if something happens to Aidan or Lucas. You’re in a unique position, one a lot of women would kill to be in. You can follow your dream. You don’t have to work eight hours a day and then try to get some words on a page. Don’t you see? By making you quit a job you didn’t even like, Aidan is trying to give you what you need.”
“Shouldn’t that be my choice?” Again, she knew she was stupidly stubborn, but damn it, she wasn’t ready to concede yet.
“It is,” her mom said with a sad sigh. “It’s always your choice. Once the Dawson brothers figure out what’s going on with the attempt on your life, you can go back to Dallas and take up your old life. Lucas will follow you. Lucas will do whatever you decide. Jack can get you your old job back, or you can find a new one. You don’t have to see Aidan again.”