Heathen & Honeysuckle (Pacific Shores, #1)

by Sarah A. Bailey

“You remind me of honeysuckle. Nectar sweet as honey, like the sound of your voice. But the berries are deceiving—poisonous if consumed.” He shrugs playfully. “Beautiful and deadly.”

“That boy is a heathen. If you’re smart, you’d stay far away from him.”

I’ve always loved the beauty of the boardwalk at night, but I quickly realize it holds no comparison to the golden girl standing in front of me now.

She may be the most effortlessly beautiful girl I’ve ever encountered. I feel my breathing get heavy, and my legs dissolve into jelly again, but Darby just continues to smile at me without a care in the world.

“This is what I live by: I only break rules that affect me and only me. I don’t ever do anything to hurt someone else. I don’t run traffic lights or steal from people. I don’t hurt or lie or cheat. I go swimming at night because the city ordinance in place is to protect me from drowning in the dark. I’m a good-ass swimmer, so I’m not too worried about that. Plus, if I drown, the only person I’m really hurting is myself, and⁠—” “And all the people who love you,” I say. He smiles at me. “That’s where you’re wrong, Honeysuckle. Nobody loves me. I can only hurt myself.”

with Darby, it feels like she scares them away. She’s daylight to their darkness. They disappear when she’s around, and I don’t find them creeping back in until I’m alone in the black of my bedroom, hoping sleep will take me before they do.

“I want to bring you with me because you scare my ghosts away, Darby.”

I squeeze her hand four times. I’ll. Keep. You. Safe. We jump together, free-falling into the abyss.

We stare at each other for so long I think the sun fades across the sky, the moon rises, and the sun follows it again. Flowers bloom and die in the moment we take to soak the other in.

Darby’s hand flexes against my forearm, as if I’m the only thing anchoring her to this world, and it suddenly feels a whole hell of a lot like something inside me is being set free for the first time in a while.

I feel the warmth of his breath as he speaks against the side of my head. He smells like the ocean breeze I haven’t experienced in years, and he feels like taking a deep breath after being underwater for far too long.

“I came because you needed me, because I promised you that I’d be there for you if you asked. I came because you deserve better than this.” He pauses until I finally meet his eyes. “I’m here to be whatever you need from me. You want to go home? I’ll take you home, Darby. I’ve got a car. I’ll find a plane. A submarine. I don’t fucking care. Just say the word.”

Don’t ever hide your smiles from me, Honeysuckle. I need to see every single one, especially the ones I put there.”

It feels like one of those moments where you suddenly realize you’d been longing for something your entire life, but you weren’t sure what it was until it was standing in front of you. It’s like how I imagine it feels when an artist picks up a paintbrush for the first time, or a writer gets their first story down on paper. It’s like you know you existed before you found it—that thing, but you don’t know how you lived before it. You suddenly can’t imagine yourself being whole without it.

He has a tendency to do that, the heathen—completely eclipse my life until nothing of it remains except for him.

“That was really cheesy.” “Yeah, well, you make me a melted puddle of emotion, Honeysuckle. It’s your fault.”

The song says something about belonging to another person for eternity until the sun no longer shines and the rivers run dry. I’ve never much related to love songs, but as his thumb runs across my skin again, I can’t help but feel like the music speaks to me directly.

I want to soak him in, soak in this moment, grab hold of it, and never let it end. The way his body aligns with mine, and I feel him everywhere. The way he tastes like something that was always meant to be. The way his hands feel against my skin and his lips feel against my mouth. The way his sounds of need echo through my body, bouncing off the walls of my chest and ringing through my soul.

“Stop looking at me like that,” he whispers. “Like what?” “Like I own all the pieces of your soul. Like you’ve been incomplete all this time without them.”

After ten years of drought, my soul is experiencing its first rainfall,

“I promised I’d always keep you safe. I’ll always be there for you. I came out here to keep that promise, and I’ve also realized I never fell out of love with you, either.”

She’s the source of warmth for my incandescent soul.

“You’re the one who chases my ghosts away now,” she whispers. I lean into her, laughing against her lips. “You’re still the sunlight shining through the cracks of my shattered soul.”

“You’re my ‘it for me’ person. You were my first love. Then, the one who got away. Now, you’re my ‘it was always you.’ And it doesn’t matter what happened in between, because you’re gonna be my forever person too.” He cups my face, bringing his mouth to mine. “You’re my once-in-a-lifetime kind of love, Darby.”

“I’ll write you a love letter every day for the rest of my life if you just come home, Honeysuckle. Stay with me.”

“I bought a house for you to line with books and flowers and to fill with babies and laughter and happiness. To give you the home you’ve always deserved and never got to have.”

I’ll take out the trash, and you can close the lid on the toilet seat when I inevitably leave it up. I won’t even be mad at you when you yell at me about it. You’ll water the plants because they’ll die if I touch them, and I’ll mow the lawn. You’ll decorate the house, and I’ll hang things on the wall.” I brace my arms on either side of the counter behind her, pressing our bodies together. Her eyes are wide, chest heaving, as she looks at me. I let myself melt into her warmth. “We’ll figure it out each day. We’ll keep growing together. We’ll change, we’ll fight, and we’ll have hard days, and that will all be okay.” I drop my head, running my nose along hers. “You know why, honeysuckle?” She shudders at the feel of my lips against her jaw. I drag them up until they feather against her mouth. “Because nothing is so bad when I’m with you, Heathen.”

“An angel and her demon.” She sighs against my lips. “A heathen and his honeysuckle,” I respond. Within the waves, beneath the palms, and under the gold of the setting sun, I kiss her. Two lost souls find their way home.

“There have been times where I’ve struggled with faith and fate, where I’ve had a lot of questions I never thought I’d get the answers to. Where I’ve felt like a soulless ghost, lost and wandering.” He takes my trembling hand in his steady one. “But meeting you made me believe in things I never thought were real. Knowing you answered every question I’ve ever had about the world. Finding you again brought me back to life.”

“You’re my once-in-a-lifetime love, Darby, and I don’t want to live another moment without the entire world, all the universe and the heavens above it, knowing that we’re meant to be.” He lifts the black velvet box, revealing a golden ring, now studded with diamonds that catch the sunlight. “Will you marry me?”