Chapter Twenty-One
LATER THAT NIGHT Pete, Jenna, Sky, and Joey sat on a blanket on the beach. The bay lapped at the shore, bringing a gentle breeze across the hibachi with each lick of the waves. Stars peppered the sky like glimmers of hope, and Pete couldn’t remember a time when he’d felt so settled.
“I still can’t get over everything that happened today.” Sky wore a hoodie over her tank top, and as she drew her knees up to her chest, her skirt billowed around her bare feet. She rested her head on her knees and sighed.
“I’m sorry, Sky. I should have told you sooner, but—”
“Don’t, Pete. Even if you should have, you never would have. You’d protect me until I was a hundred years old if I didn’t speak up. I appreciate you taking care of me. I really do.” Sky smiled at Jenna and petted Joey. “But now you can focus on Jenna.”
Jenna and Sky had bonded over a pint of ice cream while Pete called each of his brothers and gave them the good news. By the time he was done with the phone calls, Jenna and Sky were laughing like best friends—and the ice cream container was empty.
“He always focuses on me.” Jenna leaned over and kissed Pete; then she turned back to Sky. “But if you think he’ll stop taking care of you, I think you’re sorely mistaken. One thing I’ve learned about Pete is that his love knows no confines, and once it finds you, it never lets go.”
“Yeah, I guess it could be worse,” Sky teased.
“Hey. I’m sitting right here.” Pete reached behind Jenna and playfully pushed his sister’s shoulder. “I’ll protect both of you as much as I please, so shut up and pass me that pack.”
Sky handed him a black backpack. He loaded up two sticks with marshmallows and handed one to Sky. Joey sniffed at the sweets.
“Hey, what about mine?” Jenna wrinkled her brow.
“That’s what I’m here for, remember?” Pete began cooking Jenna’s marshmallow. So little time had passed since their first date, and it felt like a lifetime. “Sixty-seven seconds on each side, five inches from the fire, twenty seconds with the tip of the marshmallow aimed directly at the flames. I’ve got this, my little marshmallow princess.” He smiled at Jenna.
“Wow, that’s quite a process.” Sky ate her marshmallow without cooking it. She licked her fingers. “Best thing ever. Besides ice cream, that is.” She rose to her feet. “I’m going to go inside and settle in for the night. I guess I’ll see you two in the morning?”
You two. It was a given, and one that Pete was ready to solidify. “Take Joey with you. I don’t want you to be alone.”
“Really?” she said sarcastically. “Are you going to do this all the time?”
“What do you think?” He nodded at Joey.
“Fine. Come on, Joey.” Sky patted her leg, and Joey trotted along beside her.
“See you in the morning, sis.” Pete blindly fished around in the backpack, watching Sky and Joey walk inside the house. He knew he was overprotective, but he also knew he wasn’t about to change, and he was okay with that. Annoying his sister was a small price to pay for peace of mind.
“Here you are, princess.” He handed Jenna her marshmallow. “There are very few times in a woman’s life when she can don a tiara.” He gently placed a plastic tiara on Jenna’s head and moved a few strands of her hair over the band. “When you’re royalty, of course, but we might be waiting a while for that one. When you’re five years old and it’s your birthday, if you’re lucky, and when you are the marshmallow princess and your prince presents you with golden-brown marshmallows. Not golden, not brown, but golden brown.”
Jenna touched the tiara and smiled. “You got me a tiara?”
“I would have bought you diamonds if they sold them in the novelty section of Stop & Shop. Every marshmallow princess deserves a tiara.”
“That’s almost as romantic as the rock you gave me on our first date.” She pulled him down beside her.
Pete waited for her to finish eating the marshmallow, and then he put her finger in his mouth and sucked the sticky sweetness from it.
“Mm. I like where this is headed.” Jenna leaned forward and kissed him again, a passionate kiss that tasted of sugar and love.
Pete lowered her to her back and lay beside her, drawing one thigh over her legs. He caressed her cheek with his thumb.
“Today marks the first night in two years that I won’t have to worry about my cell phone going off in the middle of the night and having to race out to check on my father.” He paused, letting the weight of that settle into his own mind. When he’d taken his father to the rehab center, Neil had given him a condescending look and followed it up with one of the tightest hugs they’d ever shared. That look cut Pete to his core, and the hug shored him up again. “And it marks the first night of the rest of our lives. Jenna, I don’t want to just consider moving in together. I want your face to be the first thing I see in the morning, and I want you safe in my arms when you fall asleep at night. It took us a long time to come together. Let’s not wait any longer.”
“I have to give notice at my work and let my landlord know I’m moving out, and get all my stuff. I can’t just leave the school hanging.”
He knew this, of course. He’d never expect Jenna to be irresponsible. He touched his forehead to hers. “I don’t mean to rush you, but what are you waiting for?”
Jenna laughed and pushed him onto his back and climbed him like a mountain. “I was waiting for you to do more than ask me if I’d consider it. I thought that might take another five years.”
Pete wrapped an arm around her waist, and in one swift move he rolled her onto her back and pinned her to the blanket beneath him.
“Jenna Ward, will you move in with me? Now? This second?”
She laughed. “No.”
He dropped his head to her shoulder. “You’re killing me here.”
“If you think I’m getting up from beneath you to move stuff into your house, you’re totally wrong.”
He lifted his head and saw the tease in her eyes.
“Yes, I’ll move in with you, but I’m not missing one second of making out in the moonlight with my hunky hero. So moving will have to wait.”
“Baby, we might never get you moved in.” He sealed his lips over hers and disappeared into his luscious Jenna.