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“Things can always get worse, Johnny,” I whispered.
“No, no, we’re not doing that.” Johnny stared hard at me, calling me right out on it. “You don’t get to shut me out, Shannon. You don’t get to do that to me again, because I won’t go this time. Do you hear me? I’m here, I’m in, I care, and I’m not going the fuck away.”
“I care so fucking much I can hardly breathe.”
“I made it worse for you,” he choked out. “You made it bearable,” I whispered.
“Hi, Johnny,” she whispered, tumbling off the door step as she clung to me. “You came back.” “Hi, Shannon.” My crutches fell to the ground as I wrapped my arms around her body, holding her in place. “I promised I would,” I replied, keeping my eyes narrowed and locked on her brother.
“I’ve spent days waiting for this,” he quickly hurried on, his words coming fast, his accent thickening as he spoke. “To get time with you. To just be with you, and now I have you here?” His hand snaked out and entwined with mine. “Where I know you’re safe? All I want to do is just…” Shaking his head, he pulled me closer. “Keep you right here with me and never give you back.”
“Your eyes,” he said, tone gruff. “I need them on me.”
“I’m going to buy you dinner, Shannon.” Closing the space between us, he lowered himself down on the couch and turned to face me. “Sometimes we’ll eat here and sometimes we’ll go out, but it’s going to be a regular occurrence, so don’t overthink it, okay?”
His eyes blazed. “And I’d give you full marks.” “Me?” “Always you,” he whispered, eyes flicking to my mouth. “I love this.”
“How are you feeling…about me?” Her eyes widened. “About you?” “Yeah.” I swallowed. “About me.” Shannon was silent for so long that I was afraid she wasn’t going to answer me, but then she started to speak. “Sometimes I feel like I’m stranded,” she confessed in a small voice, dropping her gaze to where I was holding her legs. “Like I’m stuck in the same place and I’m drowning.” Clasping her hands together, she continued to speak, to gut me with her truth. “It’s like I’m watching the water rising, and it’s coming higher and higher. I can see it closing in on me, taking me under.” Shivering, she
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“That’s how you make me feel,” she whispered, blue eyes burning their way right down to my soul. “Better. Alive. Free. Safe. Important. I feel like I can breathe for the first time in days, and that’s only because you’re here—because I’m with you.”
Kissing her was different because there were feelings involved. Big, huge, terrifying fucking feelings that I knew she felt, too. It was different because it mattered—because we mattered to each other.
“It felt…unfair.” “Unfair?” I gave a small nod and tightened my hold on him. “Because I thought it was over and I wasn’t ready for it to be.” “It?” “My life.” He sucked in a sharp breath. “It’s not over, Shannon.”
“I don’t just like you. I fucking—” Shaking his head, Johnny rubbed his jaw before looking back at me. “Shannon, I love you.” I stopped breathing. “You love me?” He nodded slowly, blue eyes locked on mine. “Like, a crazy fucking amount.” “Really?” “Really,” he confirmed.
“I love you,” he went right ahead and rocked my world by saying again. “Present tense—as in I mean it now. And maybe I shouldn’t be saying that, maybe I’m fucking everything up by telling you that when you’re in the middle of your family stuff, but it’s the truth.” He shrugged helplessly. “I’m in love with you. I think I’ve been that way for a while now—a long fucking while, if we’re being totally honest.” Exhaling shakily, he added, “And that scares the shit out of me worse than the thought of not making the U20s. You scare me more than anyone I’ve ever come up against on a pitch.”
“What do you need from me, Shannon?” he croaked out, voice thick and husky. “I’ll give you anything you need, baby.” Shaking his head, he groaned like he was in pain. “I just…I want to make you happy.” “You,” I whispered. “All of you.” “I’m already yours,” he groaned, before covering my lips with his.
“Shannon Lynch?” I called out, ignoring the rest of her fucked-up family. “I love you back.” Sniffling, she lifted her chin from Joey’s chest and looked at me all red-eyed and blotchy. “S-still?” “Still.” I nodded in confirmation. “Like, a crazy fucking amount.”
“Can you not climb back inside that shell of yours every time we’re not together for a few days?” I swallowed eyes locked on his. “My shell?” “Your shell,” he confirmed. “Don’t do that to me, Shannon—don’t block me out. Don’t give me you last weekend and then take it away again. I’m the same me from that night in my house. I’m the same me from every other time we’ve been together. So don’t put a wall up between us, not when you’ve already let me climb over it.”
“I’m not in your corner, Shannon,” Johnny replied in a gruff tone. “I’m standing right beside you.”
“I told you when we slept together, we would sleep together,” he said gruffly. “And I know I made a balls of the first part.” With a vulnerable look in his eyes, Johnny shrugged and gestured to my tiny bed. “But do you think you can fit me in for the second part?”
“I just need to hold you.”
“You’re my everything.”
