“Anything you want.”
He pulled her in close, and she sighed as she breathed in his familiar scent. Smiled when her sex went wet all over again. But she didn’t need sex right now. His arms around her, their bodies pressed close, knowing he loved her, was enough.
“Don’t fuck it up, Mick,” she murmured, smiling to herself.
“You are one sassy little wench, girl.”
“You love that about me.”
“Yeah, I do. Doesn’t mean I don’t owe you one hell of a spanking later, though. With a small club.”
She closed her eyes, burrowed in closer. “You would never spank me with a club.”
“I’m beginning to consider it.”
He bent and kissed the top of her head, pushed her hair back and kissed her cheek, her lips. He pulled back and she looked up to see him shaking his head.
“What?” she asked.
“Who would have believed this? After all this time.”
“Marie Dawn did. Jamie sort of did or he wouldn’t have helped me.”
“Remind me to take that club to his ass, too.”
She giggled. “Like that’ll ever happen.”
His face grew sober. “This happened. I feel like it’s a miracle, Allie.”
So did she. No matter how much she’d wanted to believe they could be together again, she’d always harbored doubts. A screaming fear she couldn’t quite put voice to—it was too painful to really consider. But here they were. Together. Happy.
“You’re right. It is a small miracle. It’s what I wanted for so long. Thank God I was stubborn enough to get it.”
“Thank you,” he whispered as his arms tightened around her.
* * *
THEY SPENT THE next several weeks, in between Mick’s work gigs, visiting all their favorite old haunts, like the Court of Two Sisters, where they feasted on peppery shrimp wrapped in bacon and cold beer over long conversations about politics, their families, their high school days. Art and movies and kink. Friends and books and travel. They stopped at Café Du Monde sometimes twice in a day to drink the chicory-laced coffee and eat the sweet, scalding-hot beignets, or sometimes just to see how much powdered sugar was on the sidewalk surrounding the canopied patio before wandering across the street to hang out in Jackson Square, making out on the benches like they had when they were teenagers.
They discovered new common interests, things they’d never done together before. They both loved the old architecture of the city, and they visited the famous homes that were part of the official Historic New Orleans Collection. They both particularly loved the Perrilliat House, with its spiral wooden staircase.
They had dinner with Neal and Marie Dawn, and Allie realized how much she’d missed seeing Mick with his family, the two men joking with each other in the rough way brothers often did. And it felt right somehow, everyone being together as couples. Of course, she’d told her best friend that she and Mick were together, but neither Marie Dawn or Neal questioned them too closely. Everyone had simply accepted their being together, almost as if it were expected. Perhaps it was.
They had a late brunch with her mother and her aunts and uncles after they’d all returned from church one Sunday. Mick was immediately taken into the family as if it hadn’t been thirteen years since he’d last been in her mother’s house, eaten her coq au vin, the wonderful French peasant stew recipe that had been passed down from Allie’s long-gone grand-mère, her father’s mother. They sat around the table and drank wine and talked and argued for hours, a ritual that had always been part of her family, from both her mother’s Italian side and her father’s French side—something Allie realized she missed, too, and she vowed to spend more time with them.
In June Mick invited her to his parents’ house for their annual Father’s Day barbeque. They’d been back together for almost six weeks, and she still hadn’t seen any of Mick’s family aside from Neal. She was trying to decide what to wear when her cell phone rang.
“Marie Dawn—just the person I needed to talk to.”
“What’s up, chérie? Everything okay with you and Mick?”
“Everything’s great.”
“Is he there? Or are you at his place?”
“No, I’m at my house, alone. Why?”
“Just making sure that wasn’t girlcode because he was standing right next to you.”
“Things really are great. Better than great. It’s been amazing with us.”
“Then what did you need to talk to me about?” Marie Dawn asked.
“I need my best friend for more than relationship advice, you know.”
“Like what?”
“Like fashion advice.”
“You’re the one who traveled the world and came home with that sense of simple European sophistication, mon amie.”
“I did not,” Allie protested, digging through her dresser drawer while holding her cell phone between her ear and shoulder. “I came back with oven burns and an overwhelming urge to kiss everyone’s cheeks.”
Marie Dawn sighed. “All you do is add one of those tissue-thin scarves to a wifebeater and jeans, and you look like a million dollars. It’s so damn . . . French.”
Allie laughed. “Okay, the scarf trick is French. But what I really need to know is what to wear to this barbeque.”
“It’s a barbeque. Wear your jeans and that scarf.”
“But it’s Father’s Day and I haven’t seen his family for years, other than you guys. Shouldn’t I wear a dress or something?”
“Sure, a sundress, if you want. This is New Orleans, in case you’ve forgotten. It’s going to be almost ninety and humid out there. My only advice would be to put your hair up.”
Allie bit her lip, holding up a dusky pink cotton tank trimmed in lace. “Hmm . . . okay, I’ll do that.”
“So . . .” Marie Dawn started. “How are things with you two . . . you know . . . at the club?”
“We haven’t been going. We’ve just kind of wanted to spend time reconnecting. We both feel the same way about it—like the club would almost be a distraction right now. We just want it to be about the two of us.”
“That sounds really good. I’m happy for you, chérie.”
Allie straightened up, smiling. “So am I.”
“So you’ve put the kinky stuff on hold, then?”
She laughed. “You are so nosy! But no, we haven’t put the kink on hold. We’re just doing our thing at home. Technically. There was that one time in his truck . . . and maybe one time on a bench at Washington Square Park.”
“Allie! You had sex at a park? Where there are kids?”
“It was right after sunset, and the park had emptied out because it started to rain. And we didn’t have sex. He was just sort of . . . holding my hands behind my back and kissing me really hard and pulling my hair and . . . you really don’t want to know any more than that.”
“Oh, but I do. Brother-in-law or not.” She paused for a moment. “You know, I’ve been thinking lately that Neal and I could spice things up a bit. I may need to come to you with some questions.”
“Anytime. Except for at this Father’s Day thing.”
“Oh my God—can you imagine their mother overhearing a conversation like that?”
“Please. She’d die of shock.”
Marie Dawn giggled.
“Promise me you’ll behave,” Allie demanded. “You’ve been part of the Reid family longer than I have.”
“Longer than . . . ? Allie, are you guys planning on getting engaged or something?” Allie heard her take in a breath. “Did you get engaged and not tell me? Are you two going to announce it today?”
“What? No. Of course not.”
“Why ‘of course not’? You just said—”
“It was a slip of the tongue. We’re not there yet, Marie Dawn. We haven’t even been back together for two months yet. We haven’t talked about anything that far in the future. If we had, you know you’d be the first person I called.”
But they sort of had—they’d both used the word forever. Still, now that Marie Dawn had asked, Allie couldn’t help but wonder if either of them truly had a grasp on what forever meant.