In a Rush (Friendship, Rhode Island #2)

by Kate Canterbary

“You can.” “What?” I turned the water glass, letting the condensation slick my palms. “What do you mean?” “Stop looking. Marry me.”

“I think marrying my best friend—the girl from back home, the one the media called my high school sweetheart in all of the Heisman packages because there are so damn many photos of us together after my games, the one who waited all this time for me to find my way back to her—will do the fucking trick.”

“It’s our history that makes it believable. I wouldn’t be able to do this with anyone else.” “I guess it’s nice to know I’m not at the bottom of your list or something depressing like that.” He met my eyes. “You’re the list, Em. You’re it.”

“I’ll be damned.” “What?” I snarled. He smiled at me then, wide and toothy and definitely smug. “Ryan Ralston has a heart,” he said. “I haven’t seen it until now because you left it with her.”

“The only way to live is with a drink in both hands.”

“How do you know her again?” Stella asked. I watched Emme help the karate-kicker tuck a disaster of papers in his desk. When she was finished, she gave me a nod. I felt my lips turning up into a smile. The obvious answer was from back home, from high school, from ninth-grade biology, from listening to music in her car during lunch all of senior year so I didn’t have to talk to anyone. But I heard myself say, “She’s my favorite thing in the world.”

“Am I allowed to touch you?” “Of course,” she said. “Like you’re my wife?”

So, when I found myself staring into the eyes of the only woman I’d ever loved, I knew it wouldn’t feel like work at all.

“I’m going to spend a little over sixty million on these teams when the ink is dry,” he said, the words low and husky. “That’s less than what I earn in a year before postseason bonuses, before endorsements.” He released my hair and let his fingers trail down my bare arm to circle my wrist. “Buy all the books you want, wife.”

“You look like the first day of spring after the coldest, most brutal winter,” he said. “No one is going to be able to take their eyes off you.”

texted Bowen an hour ago to order everything on the dessert menu and have it ready to pick up,” Ryan said. “I never forget my promises to you.”

“I don’t want to hurt them,” she said. When it ends. She didn’t say that but it was obvious. “We won’t,” I said. We stared at each other. I knew she was thinking we would hurt my family when we split up. But I was thinking we could spare everyone and just keep this ruse going for the next fifty, sixty years.

I wanted to pry my ribs open and show her my heart because I’d swear to god it only beat like this for her.

“You’re so warm,” she groaned. “Then come sit with me while the meds kick in,” I said. She considered this for several long seconds before giving me a resigned shrug. “Only if you tell me if it’s uncomfortable for you.” I was more likely to chew my arm off, but I said, “Yeah.”

We shared a meal upstairs in the family room and then she worked on her plans for school while I watched a few hockey games. I needed to pack for my trip to Minnesota tomorrow and I owed Jakobi a call—my grandmother too—but nothing in the world could get me off this couch. No fewer than six hundred times did I stop myself from asking Can we do this forever? Goddamn, that was all I wanted. Just like this and for as long as possible.

ache from the inside out. “Are you going to make me beg for you?” I asked as I tipped her head back and traced my thumb over those plump lips. “I will. I’ll get on my knees. I’ll worship you.”

“It’s hard,” she said softly. “Always having to be strong. It’s exhausting.” “Yeah. I know all about that.” I dropped a line of light kisses across her cheek. “But I’ll block the hits for you now. It’s your turn to take it easy. You can rest.”

She flicked her free hand at me and her eyes widened when her gaze fell on the hard shaft jutting out toward her. As if I could help it. She was wet, for fuck’s sake.

I had to choke back an irritable growl at this fake-marriage thing. I’d sooner survive her reaching in and ripping my beating heart from my chest than I would hearing those words ever again.

She wrapped her arms around me and tucked her head under my chin. We fit together like puzzle pieces, and even if we did this for the next thousand years, I didn’t think I’d ever find something so right.