"You should have stayed home with your family." She told him, eyes still closed as she tilted her head to the side.
It had only been three days since she'd seen him, but she had missed him more than she cared to admit, even though she knew she shouldn't... She had so many other things to worry about and her affair really should have been the very last thing on her mind, but it wasn't.
Lindsey let his lips travel from the top of her head, down the curve of her neck as he continued to rub her shoulder lightly.
She used her free hand to reach back, fingers getting lost in his curls as the tears began to roll down her cheeks. "Did you hear me?" Stevie whispered, already feeling like total putty in his hands, per usual.
She didn't know how they could still make one another totally weak in the knees, not after everything they'd been through together, but there they were... driving each other crazy in more ways than one.
He nodded softly, pressing his lips to that dimple on her shoulder one last time before he replied. "I heard you, yeah." Lindsey assured, hand moving down her arm before he patted it. "But I think I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be right now." He added with a simple shrug of his shoulder as he nearly whispered that in her ear.
He had missed her too, but mentioning it in the moment didn't seem right...
Biting down on her bottom lip, her heart sank as she ran the tips of her fingers along the back of his neck. "Lindsey...." She half whined, tears still outlining the curve of her face.
She had been an emotional wreck since she'd gotten the news, but something about Lindsey's presence just made it all feel a little more real than before.
He swallowed hard, a deep sigh escaping him as he slowly traveled around the sofa to take a seat on the couch right next to her. "I know." He wrapped his arm around her shoulders, almost surprised when her head met his chest and she snuggled right into the safety of his side.
She let out a deep, almost content breath, creasing a brow and chewing on the inside of her cheek out of build up nerves. "Go home to that baby, please." Stevie mumbled, even though her words were almost totally muffled as she buried her face in his shirt. "You shouldn't have to be here, dealing with this kind of-"
"Stop it." He cut off her anxious rambling in a gentle tone of voice as his hand met the back of her head, letting his fingers instantly get tangled in her blonde locks. "I wanna be with you..." Lindsey wasn't always a soft man, but he knew when it was needed and in that moment, she needed it. "With you, and with Nash, and with Laurel, and with your mom..." he added, trying to make her feel a little better, even if it seemed impossible to do so.
They had been though a lot together... and apart, but mainly together, yet this felt completely different. Nothing serious like that had ever happened, not to their kids. Of course, there were a few minor things throughout the years... Like the time Lindsey and his girlfriend had Laurel for the weekend and she fell off the trampoline. She ended up breaking her arm in two spots and Stevie never, ever let him live it down. Or that one time that Nash had gone racing with some of his friends down Sunset shortly after he turned seventeen and got into a small accident, but he was bandaged up and sent home that same day.
It was all typical stuff, so Stevie really didn't know how to react to things happening to her children of that severity and the situation that they were in had to have been the absolute worst case scenario.
She wanted to just fast forward to a point where everything was moderately okay again.
"Gosh," She reached up slowly, letting the palm of her hand land on his cheek to rub the pad of her thumb back and forth under the curve of his eye.
She wanted it to be that simple all the time, she really did, but it had never been a walk in the park... If they could get along like that every day, she would have married him years earlier.
"Just take Laurel away from all of this for awhile." Stevie knew that she, herself, would be just fine, but her daughter was a different story. "Take her out to lunch or the beach, or shopping, or anything." She was feeling like she was at a loss and even though she wouldn't dare say it aloud, she was very grateful that he decided to show up... Mick hadn't even made it to town yet.
He stared down at her for a long moment, heart skipping a beat when those brown eyes met his.
She was the strongest woman in the world- she always had been. She was selfless, always putting both of her kids before herself and even though it never worked out the way he had hoped, Lindsey found it impossible not to fall a little more in love with her in moments like that...
"You're incredible." Lindsey whispered, gaze scanning over the circumstance of her beautiful face for a long moment. "You know that, right?" He used his free hand to wipe away same of her tears as a soft, reassuring smile tugged at the corners of his mouth.
She wrinkled her forehead, still looking so deep into those blue eyes, she almost felt like she'd gotten lost in the storm... They had the ability to draw her in like no other. "Shh," her head fell on his chest once more, not in the mood to listen to him say things like that. "Just hold me for awhile."
~~~
With a deep sigh, Laurel stayed standing right in the center of the living room as she stared blankly at the couple on the couch.
They were all curled up together, a throw blanket resting on her mother's and her dad's arms wrapped around her tight. They were both fast asleep, even though they were half sitting up and half slouched down.... They'd take turns complaining about their backs hurting in about two hours, max.
"Laurel..." Barbara's voice was gentle, not wanting to wake them but also not wanting her to dwell on that too much as she leaned into the doorframe.
Looking up at her grandma, the young blonde creased a brow as her brown eyes grew dim. "Why...?" She whispered, shaking her head lightly as she started to travel back through the room in slow motion, almost. "Why'd he have to show right now?" She wondered, rolling her eyes and tossing her hands out to her sides the moment she stepped into the kitchen.
Barbara let out a sigh, setting her cup of coffee down on the counter as she nodded her head to sympathize... It wasn't easy. "Just let him comfort her." She held up a hand, trying to calm her down before she even got that worked up.
Laurel let out a light scoff, tears already lingering in her eyes. "This is not the time for them and their usual bullshit."
