I can’t believe I’m allowing myself to let him fend for his own in there. But I know how this all works. If he’s under arrest, he can invoke his right to counsel. It doesn’t look like he’s done that, though.

As I sit in the waiting area, I peer out the window. Night has fallen, but the sky is bright and grey. It looks like it’s about to start snowing at any moment.

Headlights cut through the parking lot as a car pulls in slowly. I quickly recognize it’s Dad in his police car.

He comes through the front door of the station and lingers by the door.

“Is he here?” Dad asks.

“Yeah,” I say. “I told him about the warrant. He agreed to come in.”

“And Colin is here?” he asks, coming toward me.

“Questioning him now.”

Dad starts toward the back of the station and I sigh, sinking lower into my chair and pulling my hoodie up around me tighter. All of the waiting and the uncertainty is making me feel desperate.

The door to the back opens, and Colin steps into the waiting room.

“Can I talk to you for a minute?” he says.

I get up and start toward him, and he holds the door open for me as I walk past him.

“I just have a few questions about where you’ve been the past few days,” he clarifies.

My stomach flips over. Travis must have named me as his alibi.

He has nothing to hide. I have nothing to hide.

I want to bring everything out into the light.

I want to tear down the walls and tell the truth and make them all see that Travis isn’t what they think. He isn’t who they think.

I follow Colin into the back. I don’t see Travis or Dad. They’re probably in one of the interrogation rooms. Colin sits down behind his desk and motions for me to take a seat facing him.

“A man matching Travis’ description robbed about three thousand dollars from a liquor store in Derby. Can you please walk me through your whereabouts this weekend, Daisy?”

His lips curl up into an expression I can’t read. I don’t know if he’s messing with me, trying to make me nervous, or if he’s just so confident that I can’t supply an alibi for Travis.

It doesn’t matter what he thinks. I tell him exactly where I’ve been this weekend. I tell him exactly where Travis has been.

I’m tired of the lies. I’m tired of Travis having a dark shadow over his head, following him wherever he goes.

But I can’t go back. I can’t clear his name. He made his decision a year ago.

All I can do now is go forward.

* * *

I hear the gravel crunching under his tires as I wake up. The sound is reassuring. It’s the sound his car used to make in the unpaved parking lot of the bowling alley when we went there every Friday night back in high school. The sound is familiar.

It’s not just the gravel, though. It’s the frost from the first snowflakes of the season gently falling down around us, covering the fallen leaves. But I can still see the bright orange and red on the trees. They’re still fighting the snow.

“Hey,” Travis says as he shifts into park. He sighs deeply, running his hands along the steering wheel. My fingers reach over to his forearm, and my fingertips run along his skin. You can get a tan from being outside in the fall and winter. Sometimes the sun reflects brightly off the pure white snow. That’s not what’s happened to him, though. He hasn’t had that chance yet. But he will.

He isn’t going back to prison. Colin and Dad were satisfied with his alibi, and even though I saw the disappointment in Dad’s eyes when I told him I was with Travis at the quarry, I didn’t regret anything.

I’ll never regret telling the truth.

“We’re home,” I say, smiling up at Travis. His body seems weary, but when he looks at me, his eyes seem excited and fresh. The deep pools of blue are the same as they used to be, too. His body may have changed over the past year, but he’s still the same. He still looks at me with the same longing.

That desire’s grown up quite a bit, though. But it’s still the same, deep down.

We’re both still the same.

“I don’t know if I’m dropping you off at your place or bringing you back to mine,” he says, scrubbing the side of his face with an open palm. His smile flickers in the darkness of the car. We’re parked between our two houses, but I know where I want to go.

He leans over, taking my face in one of his hands, running his thumb along my lip, under my chin. He tips my chin up and kisses me gently on the mouth, his soft, sexy lips lingering there before he captures me. I hear a whimper escape my lips as he curls his hand around my neck and pinches me gently with his fingers.

“You know where I belong,” I say as he pulls away from me.

“Yeah,” he says, looking deeply into my eyes. “I do.”

We make our way over to his house, the car doors slamming behind us and punctuating the silent night. All of the lights in his house are off; it seems so empty. I haven’t been here since the funeral. I’ll never forget it. Travis didn’t let it show, but I knew how empty he felt. I’m only now beginning to learn how guilty he felt, too.

Travis is proud and strong, and he doesn’t want help from anyone. He’s brave but confused, and he’s perfectly imperfect.

We don’t complete each other. Neither of us will ever be perfect or whole. But our flaws compliment each other’s, and we can give strength to each other.

“I remember this,” I say as we enter the sunroom. “Your mom loved her plants.”

Glancing around, I realize they’re all wilted and they’ve outgrown their vessels. They haven’t been taken care of.

“We’ll bring them back to life,” I say, slipping a dying leaf between my fingers. It’s still on one of the long ivy vines that snakes up the side of the house. We can bring it back to life.

Travis lets me into the house without saying anything. He starts toward the stairs, but he stops and turns around to me.

“I don’t know if I’ll ever be redeemable,” he says. “But I know what I want. I just want to live next door to you forever.”

I sigh and step toward him. He looks so sexy, even though he’s tired and has been through so much today. I just want to run my fingers through his tousled hair and feel his hands roam my body.

“I don’t want to live next door forever,” I say softly into the darkness between us. “Next door isn’t close enough. I want...I want to live with you, Travis. Maybe not today or tomorrow, but when we’re ready.”

As soon as I say my words, my heart clenches up inside my chest. I want him now. I want him tomorrow and forever.

And I wish I still had the ring he gave me.

Travis steps toward me and pulls me in close, wrapping his arms around my waist.

“Whenever you’re ready,” he says. Then he takes my hand and leads me upstairs to his room.

It’s been long - too long since I’ve been here. I step into the room, the bare wood floor squeaking under my feet. The room still smells like him, the way it smelled back in high school. I step over to his window and pull back the thick, heavy curtain.

“It’s so weird seeing my house from here,” I say. “It’s weird to see my room from here.”

My head is still reeling from everything that’s happened, and the strangest thing is seeing my house from his. I feel like everything’s been turned upside down.

Except him...he’s like a rock solid foundation in all of this.

I never stopped loving him. Even through all of the confusion, and doubting myself...I never stopped loving him.

I feel Travis come up behind me and envelope me with his arms. He kisses the top of my head, and my body warms from the inside. I lean down and kiss his forearm, the hard flesh beneath my lips softening slightly.

His arms cross in front of me, and his hands come down my sides, to my waist, turning me around slowly. He leans down and captures my lips with his, and gently sucks on my bottom lip. I feel my eyebrows knit together in the center as a wave of heat flows through my belly and then lower, spearing me between the legs.

He keeps me close as his teeth nibble on my lip and one of his hands snakes up my back, to my neck. This move always made my knees weak, like jelly. He holds me up, but I feel like I could collapse from the pure eroticism of his body. From the pure pleasure he’s giving me.

His fingers dig gently into the back of my neck as he forces my mouth open with his and guides me over to his bed. He lays me back gently, my back arched, and his hands behind me, guiding me down softly.

“I love you, Daisy. I alway did.” His lips tear away from mine for a moment, and I drink his words in.

“I know,” I breathe. He crawls on top of me, nudging my legs open with one of his knees. He puts his hand between my legs, cupping my pussy, heat radiating between us. He comes up onto his knees and pulls his shirt off from the bottom with both hands, revealing abs and corded muscle, and flashing his gorgeous, bittersweet smile. Both of his hands come down on either side of my stomach, caging me as he kisses my belly.

A soft moan escapes from between my parted lips, and I bite down to stop myself. But it’s just out of habit. I don’t need to be quiet, and I don’t want to be. My heart clenches knowing that we’re the only ones in the house, and that it’ll stay that way.

“It’s okay,” he says. “I want you to fill my room with those sweet moans.”

He works the button on my shorts and pulls the zipper down slowly, brushing against me with his fingers. My breath hitches far back in my throat as his lips come back to my flesh, to my lower belly, as he slowly slides off my shorts and panties in one pull.

“You’re fucking perfect,” he grows, pushing my legs up. He holds me open with two fingers, and makes a circle against my clit with the tips of his hard tongue.

“Fuck,” I exhale, my body on fire. It feels so good to be with him. My body tenses up as he sucks my clit into his mouth and starts rolling against it with his soft, broad tongue.

My legs quiver as I tense up, feeling the tip of his finger against my opening.

“Cum for me,” he growls, pushing two fingers up and inside me. “Please. I just want you to feel good.”

He curls his fingers up, coaxing me toward the edge. I get there so fast, and I spill over, my back arching as I moan his name, running my fingers through his hair.

“That feels so good,” I sigh. He smiles up at me and kneels between my legs again. My body tenses in anticipation because I know he isn’t finished. He pushes his jeans and boxers down, pulling out his cock and stroking it. Seeing him like this makes me crazy with hot desire. It’s in my belly, inside my mind.

“You make me feel good,” he responds. “Even if I never touched you again, you’d be the most beautiful thing in my life. The thing that I want the most.”

He pushes himself down onto me gently, and I wrap my legs up around his waist. He drags his hand down the side of my body, roaming along my curves, making my back arch off the bed.

His arm scoops around to my back and he holds me close, aligning himself with my pussy. I’m so wet, and so wanting, and he enters me hard and fast, bringing my body to his.

His lips part and take mine, and he kisses me frantically. His name is painted on my lips, and as his body moves against me, he fills me up, his cock pressing against the innermost depths of my body. I feel so tight with him inside me, and I can’t help moaning and mewling into his mouth.

Travis pulls his mouth away from me, a wicked and gorgeous smile on his lips as his body moves above me, slamming into me over and over. His arms make a cage around my body, keeping me safe and needy and begging.

His fingers slip up to my neck and he curls a lock of hair up around his fingers, tugging gently. This was always the move I thought of when I fantasized about him when he was gone. It was a reminder of how well he knew me, how he could read me and give me what I wanted. He always put me first. He always put himself last.

“I missed you, Travis” I ask, putting my hands on his shoulders. He looks down at me with needy reverence.

His eyes scan up and down my body and he shakes his head, giving my hair another little tug.

“You’re everything I want, right here. This is all I want.”

I swallow thickly and bite down on my bottom to stop the tears from coming.

He’s everything I want, too.

He kisses me again, pressing our bodies together. His cock feels thick and full inside me, and I feel myself start to cum again, reacting to the heat between us. He slams into me, pressing his lips onto mine, and our kisses become less frantic. They become slow and sweet.

Travis lays down beside me, curling his arm over me, lacing his fingers through mine.

I’m ready for him. I’m ready for all of it.

I have to risk my father being cross at me. I have to risk Travis going away again. I have to risk getting my heart broken again.

I have to risk it all for him. Because the alternative would be worse. No being with him...not feeling that excitement, the rush he gives me, the adrenaline I feel soaring through my body when he looks at me with those eyes and kisses me with those lips. When he holds me and whispers and makes love to me.

I can’t risk not having that anymore.