His & Mine | Sequel to Make It Known | DISCONTINUED

Chapter Forty-Two: Young

Chapter Forty-Two: Young

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Melanie:

When I leave Ophelia's room after our chat, click the door shut behind me, for some reason there are tears stinging my eyes.

Oh, get a grip, you. Menopause is such a bitch.

I blink the wetness away and dab at the corners of my eyes with the tip of a ring finger.

Swallowing back the dryness, I walk into our bedroom and push the door closed just as Gavin exits the en suite bathroom. He looks comfortable, ready for bed, clad in just a dark blue t-shirt and white-and-blue pinstriped boxers.

I offer him a small smile of greeting, trying for normalcy, and his brow instantly furrows.

He strides over to me with a couple long steps, takes my face in his warm hands. "Hey, baby," he murmurs, arched over me, studying me. The tenderness of his touch and the soft concern on his handsomely-aged face somehow makes my throat raw, makes my lips quiver, gives my chin licence to begin wobbling.

"Gavin," I breathe hoarsely. "She's... all grown up..." An irrational, unwelcome string tears starts streaming down my face and he wipes away at them with his thumbs, draws me into his arms and lets me bury my head in his shoulder. "She doesn't... need me anymore..." One of his big, achingly-familiar hands comes up to stroke the back of my head, his fingers threading into my hair as he kisses the top of my forehead gently, soothingly.

"Oh, Mel," he grumbles, cocooning me tightly against his solid chest. "You know that's not true, baby. She's always gonna need you. Even when she doesn't realize it."

I laugh quietly at myself, at my hysterics, pull away from him a little. "I went to see... how she was doing, if she needed anything, any advice, but..." I give him a wry, watery smile and whisper, "She seemed to have it all figured out."

He chuckles, arcs a dry eyebrow. "And obviously that would be because she has her mother's genes." His forehead wrinkles softly at the thought. Oh, my baby. It isn't easy for him either, I know.

I reach up so I can sift my fingers through his salt-and-pepper hair. A few years ago, he was mortified to find those first few strands of grey, but now he's used to it, and I can't help but think the still looks so very sexy. My husband has aged better than Brad Pitt and that man is hotter in his fifties than ever.

"I'm surprised it hasn't all fallen out from the way you like to tug at it," he muses lowly.

His blue eyes glimmer warmly down at me and it cuts through some of the ambivalence weighing heavily on my heart. "Don't jinx it."

Those worn, solid hands find my waist, tug me towards him. He rests his forehead onto mine so the tips of our noses connect and then after a few moments of us breathing the same air he mumbles gruffly, "Just remember that I, at least, will always need you."

Something twists and curls and squeezes in my chest. How does this man still have the ability to make my heart stutter as fast and off-beat as he did a couple decades ago?

I sink forward into his embrace and he holds me for a bit before taking my hand so we can go to bed.

We settle back against the headboard with his arms around me and my head in his shoulder as my thoughts begin to carry me away again. "She's so young, Gavin. Do you remember being that young?"