Don't Forget Me Tomorrow (Time River, #2)

by A.L. Jackson

Nothing had ever felt quite like kissing Dakota Cooper.

With the history around us, I was thankful we’d gotten to this place. Where we could be easy together.

“Haven’t you learned yet that you don’t need to ride in like the cavalry, Ryder?” “I already rode in, Cookie, so you might as well let me.” I’d started calling her that years ago. Now there was no way I could stop.

“Guess I like you on your knees for me.” A snort left my nose. I’d been for years, and she didn’t have a clue.

I was so fucking proud of what I’d built. Of the beauty I created with my hands. But it was the underbelly of it that made me sick. The chains that held me hostage.

Because I meant what I’d said. I was about finished with this bullshit. And it was on me to figure out how to get myself free.

But one thing was for sure. I couldn’t keep pining after him my whole life. It was time to let go.

She cleared our plates, stacking them high in one hand, before she pulled the bill from her pocket. She set it facedown in front of me before she grazed a gentle brush of those fingers across my shoulder. Sparks lit. A faint glimmer. A glow of what could never be.

I shouldn’t be surprised. Shouldn’t take it as something it was not. But it never failed to stab me in the guts. Love is on the house.

Ryder, Cody. It had always been Ryder.

Because Cody might have always supported me, but it was Ryder who’d given me the courage to chase my dreams.

“Not taking that chance, Dakota. Not with you, and not with your son.

“I’m not sure, Dakota, but if you are? I promise I will take care of you. Protect you.” “Why?” “Because protecting you is what I was created to do.”

“I’m not incapable of carrying in a few bags, Ryder.” He smirked one of those smirks that danced through my insides. “Clearly. But why would you go and do that when I’m here to do it? Use me up, Dakota.” He had the audacity to wink.

My throat nearly closed off as I looked at where its fractured hands were forever stuck at five o’ four. A moment in time that had marked him. Scarred him. Destroyed him.

“You think any of those women could ever be more important than you?”

Long ago, I’d accepted my body. No longer saw it as an imperfection or a blight. Had come to love it. But the one person in this world I’d ever wished I looked different for was Ryder. He had a type, and I definitely wasn’t it.

“Don’t be an idiot, Ryder. Ezra has this handled, and the last thing I need is you getting involved in something that doesn’t even concern you.” He slowly approached, closing the distance until there was no space left between us. “Doesn’t concern me? Believe me, Cookie…” His words scraped, low and gruff. Edged with a razor. “It absolutely concerns me.”

“I can’t take that risk with you, Dakota, and not with Kayden, either. Please. Stay with me.” “We each have our own lives, Ryder.” I forced it out around the tumult. His teeth ground. “You are my life, Dakota.”

But love was like that a whole lot of the time, wasn’t it? Painful. Unfulfilled. Unrequited. That or you were terrified you were going to lose it once you had it.

“You don’t have to go back to your house soon, Dakota. My place is yours for as long as you want it.” Forever if need be. Hell, I’d be a lucky bastard if I could have that. But I wasn’t lucky, was I?

“Do you think I’d take the time to spoil anyone else but you, Dakota?” It was out before I could stop it, no way to reel the confession back before it’d hit the air.

“You deserve everything. Had once thought I’d be the one to give it to you.” What?

“Did he touch you?” Her head barely shook, the word a breath. “No.” “Did you want him to?” “No,” she whispered again, the word a short gasp. “Why not?” My nose brushed her jaw when I asked it. The air that had been crackling flamed. She met my gaze, and she lifted that chin. In it was both surrender and defiance. “Because the only person I want to touch me is you.”

“So gorgeous, Dakota.” His voice was hushed, dragging through the dense air. “Earth shatteringly beautiful. You make the world stop spinning every time I look at you.”

“What I’m thinking right now is I have a goddess kneeling in front of me.” “I’ve always been here, Ryder. On my knees for you.” “No, Cookie. It’s always been me. A beggar at your feet.”

But I hadn’t known how to stop myself when she’d come through the door looking like that last night. A fucking goddess dressed in pink.

Not when I had been so twisted up thinking about her out with that douchebag, losing my goddamned mind as I’d imagined every way Brad might be taking what was supposed to have been mine.

In her expression was something I’d never dared allow myself to recognize before. Like she was imagining what it might be like if this was our truth.

how gorgeous you are,” I murmured as I wound my hand into her hair. “How beautiful you are. The way you steal my breath every time you walk into the room.”

“Do you have any idea, Dakota? What you do to me?”

“You were the one person I wanted to be something different for.” It fucking gutted me.

“Look at you,” I said again, voice so low. “Do you see what I see? Because what I see is this fuckin’ stunning woman who’s got me so hard I can hardly think straight. So twisted up, I might black out. A woman who walks into the room and every head turns, drawn to her beauty.”

“Told you last night that you’re the one who’s had me on my knees, Dakota. A beggar at your feet. Do you get it now?” “Yes.” “Good.”

His hand tightened on my hip, fingers dipping in, like he was terrified of letting go. His nose burrowed into my hair at the back of my head, and his rumbled words glided through me like a dream. “Love you.”

“Look at you, Dakota. Do you have any idea what I see when I’m looking at you? A goddess in the morning. The light breaking inside me.”

The roaring in my heart and in my ears shouted louder. The chant of my soul. I love you. I love you.

The man I’d loved since I was nineteen. Probably longer than that if I was being honest with myself. But he was right—I deserved better than what he was offering me.

When he spoke, I nearly broke. “Do you think I don’t love you, Dakota?”

“I love you, Dakota. I’m gone for you. Since I was twenty-two fucking years old, I’ve been gone for you. Since you became the one thing in this world that could soothe the ache inside me. Since you became the reason to look beyond my circumstances. Since you reminded me of the good things this world might have to offer.”

“You saved me, Dakota. Saved me when I was lost. When I’d given up. And I keep trying to push you away because I know I don’t deserve you. But I can’t do that any longer. I can’t fucking deny that you are the one thing in this life that I’ve been living for. You are the light breaking the darkness inside me. And I’m begging you, please don’t walk away.”

My heart pounded out between us. Pleading for her to see. To get it. To understand when I hadn’t given her a reason to, not when there was all this bullshit I had to keep hidden in the shadows. But the shame I felt over the corruption hadn’t come close to the kind I’d felt when she’d walked out on me this morning. The shame I’d felt when I couldn’t speak it. When I’d rejected the gift that Dakota had offered. When I’d refused our truth. I wouldn’t refuse it any longer.

“Cookie,” I murmured. “Tell me I’m not too late. Tell me you still love me, too.”

“Do you think I could ever stop loving you?” The second she said it, I snapped, and I was across the room.

Nothing had ever felt quite like kissing Dakota Cooper.

“I love you, Ryder, I love you,” she mumbled at our connection. The sound of it reverberated through me, slipping down my throat and spreading through my cells. It seeped all the way down to my spirit because this woman would always possess my soul.

“I love you, Dakota. So fucking much.”

“Nothing could ever feel as good as being loved by you, Dakota Cooper.” “That’s good, Ryder, because I promise you, I’m going to be doing it my whole life.”

“It’s the one thing I can’t give you, Dakota.” Hurt stabbed into my chest. “You don’t trust me?” He only hesitated for a beat before the words began to flood, quiet and hard and riddled with a torment that I didn’t understand.

“No. Because it’s dangerous, and I can’t involve you in it. It’s why I’m going to have to go on pretending like you’re not mine when we’re in public because I can’t risk someone knowing who you are to me or what you mean to me. Just for a little while, until I find a way to get out from under this.”