Chapter Six
The police had come and gone for two days, taking statements and collecting evidence. Everyone agreed it was likely that Stan would be sent back to prison with a much longer sentence this time.
At last Diesel and Pippa were alone. Or as alone as a single mother with a two year old could be. Ben was napping and they had a chance to really talk now. They’d been talking for the better part of an hour.
“Are you sure you want to be a part of our lives? I mean you hardly know us,” her voice was serious but uncertain.
“I know that I’ve dreamed about you many nights when I was deployed over the last two years.” He reached out a hand for hers, grasped it and pulled her nearer. “Dreamt of you and of finding you. Dreamt of making love to you again. Of touching your skin, kissing your lips. Of sliding my arms around your waist just like this.” His arms slid around her waist. “Of tasting you again and again.” He kissed her lips softly and then released her to finish what he had waited so long to say. “Of making love to you all night and waking up with you still in my bed, in my arms. For two years I’ve thought of finding you. Now you’re here,” his arms pulled her closer until their hips met and he felt the softness of her fuller more rounded belly as he looked down into her eyes, “And I don’t want to let you go.”
Her eyes searched his, looking for what lay deep within, below the surfaces. “Is it only sex?” she asked, “I desire you too, but is it only sex?”
“If it were, any woman would do. No, it is not only sex. I want you.” His eyes searched hers now, seeking his answers. “And I’m hoping you want me too.”
“I do,” she breathed the words out. “I want to know you. More and more to know you. But I’m afraid.”
“What are you afraid of?”
“That you will change. And then you will hurt me.”
“Because of him.”
“Yes.”
“Do you know how to conquer a fear?”
She shook her head no, unable to speak. Her eyes wide, she watched him.
“You conquer a fear by working through it. By facing the fear and moving through it. The way out of fear is through. It’s how you get to the other side.”
She nodded, listening.
“We can take this slow. We should take this slow. It would be best for you and for Ben too.”
“Yes,” relief showed on her face.
“I’m not going to push you to chose me. I want you to choose me for me and to choose you for you, neither of us owning the other. Ben has been fatherless for two years already, and I will be in his life now, no matter what you decide, but neither of you know me that well yet. This will take time.”
“Ben is the easy one I think. Children just love right away, like puppies. It’s so innocent and pure. First loves are like that too. We go into them wide eyed and thinking no one will hurt us, no one will leave us. And then they do.” Pippa stared off away from him.
“Pippa,” he said softly. “I would injure myself before I would ever hurt you or Ben. I’m not the kind of man who hurts women or children. I’m a protecting kind of man, the kind who saves them.”
“Yes, you are,” she smiled a soft smile. “You certainly saved me. And Ben too.”
“How about we start with this. I want to protect you and Ben, for the rest of my life. To make sure no harm comes to you. But I want more.”
“More?” she whispered the word.
“Yes. More. I want to be the protector of your heart.”
She breathed in sharp and held her breath.
“Will you allow me to do that for you? To guard and protect your heart?”
This was beyond anything she had ever dreamed of. It hardly seemed real. She placed her hand on his warm, strong forearm. Feeling his strength in body and the strength of his love and this gift he was giving her now. “Yes,” she breathed out. “Yes.”
****
Though they would marry nine months later, with a daughter on the way, both, from the day Diesel became the protector of Pippa’s heart, would consider the day of that first vow to be their first wedding day, when Diesel became Pippa’s Protector, the guardian and keeper of her heart.
THE END