Jess excused herself at that point when someone called her name. “I’ll be back in a minute. Hold that conversation.”
“Not keen on getting off your ass and joining the Army, Rachael?” he teased as they watched Jess disappear into the crowd.
“And break a nail?”
He raised a brow sardonically. “That’s your priority?”
“No,” she’d said softly, her eyes on Fin. “My friends and family are.” Rachael turned and ran her eyes over him in his military uniform. “What’s your priority, Ryan?”
His eyes had immediately fallen to Fin, his stomach in knots at the thought of her leaving for Antarctica the next morning.
“Someone better get the barbecue started before I chew a hole in the couch,” Jess shouted over the conversation.
He was thankful they hadn’t gone anywhere. In the next few weeks, he was going to need Fin to be their priority when he left.
Ryan stood up, setting Fin on her feet. “I’ll do it.”
“No, it’s okay, Ryan. I organised the party.”
He pushed her towards the seat he just vacated. “No. Sit down, spend some time with your friends.”
As the guys vacated the room with him, he heard Laura say, “Well that got them out of the room, Jess. You can show us your tattoo now, Fin.”
Kyle spun around and Ryan reached behind him, grabbing a fistful of his shirt. “You go outside and start the barbecue,” he ordered, shoving him towards the direction of the back deck while he headed into the kitchen.
The four girls were laughing loud at something when he peered at them over the fridge door. “What am I cooking, baby?”
She looked up at him. “There should be some chicken and veggie kebabs in there on a platter and some steak I marinated this morning.”
He inspected the contents of the fridge, not seeing anything that resembled what she just said.
“It’s probably hidden behind all the beer,” she called out.
Crouching down, he shuffled a few bottles around. “Got it!” His hands full, he joined the guys on the back deck as Kyle lit the barbecue. Setting everything down on the nearby table, he took the beer that Monty held out. Twisting the cap off, he joined the circle as they saluted him with their bottles and wished him a happy birthday.
Ryan nodded as he stared at the ground. He didn’t want them to see his eyes burning because his best friend wasn’t there. It felt wrong getting older without Jake aging alongside him. Jake would never grow old, he would never have another birthday, he would simply stay twenty-seven forever. It made his stomach churn. Would the ache ever get easier to live with?
“Jesus,” Kyle breathed.
His head snapped up and followed Kyle’s line of sight to the group of girls inside. Fin’s dress was hiked up, her panties pushed down the side of her hip slightly as the girls crowded around for a closer look at the tattoo.
“Fuck me,” he heard Monty breathe beside him.
Ryan rapped on the glass French doors with his bottle of beer, and they all looked up.
Kyle cleared his throat. “Well. That’s one hell of a birthday present, Kendall,” he said, the girls laughing while Fin snapped her clothes back into place.
Ryan raised a brow. “And that’s as close as you’ll ever get to it, yeah?”
“Stand down, Kendall,” he replied with a grin. “I love you both like family.”
“Shut up, a**hole, and check if the grill is hot enough yet.”
Kyle returned to the barbecue. With his beer in one hand, he used the other to scrape the stainless steel spatula over the hotplate.
“Have you told Fin yet?” Monty asked.
His chest tightened. “Not yet.”
Kyle looked over his shoulder at him, grief flashing briefly across his face. “You better do it soon. The next four weeks are gonna fly.”
Ryan looked through the doors again at Fin. He hadn’t seen her this happy since … he couldn’t remember. “Soon,” he muttered.
“I need to ice this cake, girls,” he heard her call out as she stood. He frowned when she paused, her eyes going vacant for a moment.
“Fin?” Rachael called out.
She turned to look at Rachael, a distant smile on her face as she said something and waved her hand in casual dismissal.
Had she eaten anything at all today? Was not eating her way of controlling her grief? Maybe he needed to ask someone.
“Back in a minute,” he said and walked inside to where she was now standing in the kitchen, bowl in hand.
“Have you got some sort of inbuilt frosting beacon?” she teased.
His brows drew together. “You okay?”
Fin paused, the spatula hovering over the cake. “Of course.” She looked at him, her eyes wide. “Why?”
Ryan took a deep breath. “No reason.”
She dipped her finger into the frosting and held it out to him, her eyes closing when he leaned forward and licked it off.
He swallowed the sticky, sweet sugar, getting hard as he imagined licking it off her entire body. “Can we send everyone home yet?”
Fin laughed, the sound husky on her lips, and he grabbed her hips, yanking her towards him. “Soon.”
“Good,” he breathed against her mouth before he kissed her long and slow.
Chapter Fifteen
Fin turned the key in the ignition and Ryan’s car came to life with a deep, throaty growl. Pleasure shot through her body, fizzing her blood with excitement at the sound. Putting her hands on the steering wheel, she looked at Ryan, grinning as he opened the passenger door.
Ducking his head, he met her eyes. “I can’t believe I’m letting you do this.”
“It’s only a fifteen minute drive to Mum and Dad’s place,” Fin pointed out.
There was no way he was getting out of letting her drive this car. For a brief moment of joy, she was going to ignore the gas guzzling pollution and feel the brute force of Ryan’s car move beneath her touch. She rolled down the window, knowing the feel of the wind blowing carelessly through her hair would only heighten the experience. Fin returned her hands to their tight grip on the steering wheel and a light sweat of anticipation broke over her palms.
“You’re sure about me driving your car, right?” She didn’t know why she asked that. It didn’t matter because she was driving this car whether he was sure or not.
Ryan shook his head as he slid inside the car. “No. I’m not sure at all. I’m only letting you drive it on one condition.”
Her fingers tapped impatiently as she watched him shut his door. “This is the first time I’ve heard anything about a condition being attached. What is it?”
He grinned at her. “I’m not saying what it is. You just have to agree to it, and when I do eventually tell you, you’re not allowed to say no.”
“Alright,” she replied, knowing she’d agree to almost anything in that moment just to drive his car.
Ryan put his seatbelt on, her first attempt at an apple pie wobbling on his lap as he clicked it into place. Finished, he looked at her. “Remember when you first learned how to drive?”
Laughter bubbled out of her at the memory. Fin’s dad had sat in the passenger seat. His voice had taken on that scarily patient tone—the one where you just knew he was holding it together by the skin of his teeth. She would’ve preferred the shouting because the alternative made her more nervous. What made it worse was that Jake and Ryan were sitting in the back seat, Jake having insisted on getting front row tickets to her misery. Ryan had sat there, his lips suppressing a smile. Jake wasn’t so polite—he was already laughing before she even backed the car out of the driveway. How was she to know that the balance of the clutch and the acceleration pedal was an exact science? Dad and Jake, and even Ryan for that matter, made it look so effortless.
After Fin stalled her way across town, she made sure to do a lap around the car park at the beach where Jake and Ryan’s friends hung out. It had been a beautiful day—there were no clouds lining the sky and the heat of the sun burned hot and bright, making the beach a busy place that particular morning. She’d giggled as the car bunny hopped wildly around the entire length with Jake hunched over in the back, hiding as he begged Dad to make her stop.
“I’m not sure you’ve improved,” Ryan told her.
Fin arched her brow at the seriousness of his tone. “You’re not nervous are you?” she teased as he ran his fingers through his silky hair.
Ryan turned to look at her. The heated pink of the sunset reflected brightly in his dark eyes, and her breath caught at their beauty. “It’s not your driving I’m nervous about, baby.”
He was worried about seeing her parents, but he didn’t need to be. They didn’t deal with their own heartache by taking it out on others—not like his father. He was solely to blame for the tension making Ryan’s shoulders tight. “Ryan … I don’t know your dad, but I do know it’s possible to hate someone you’ve never met.”
“Don’t, Fin.” He reached out and grabbed her hand. Rather than the usual warmth, his touch was cold and damp. “Don’t hate. I don’t want that inside you.”
“It’s too late for that,” she told him.
The anger had taken hold of her the moment she saw the bruises marking his body when he was young. How could someone hurt the very person they were supposed to protect?
“It’s all in the past, Fin.”
“It’s not. It doesn’t matter what you’ve seen and done in your life, Ryan, because everywhere you’ve gone, your past has followed you. You haven’t let it go because it’s still here, wedged between us. You’re still trying to escape it, and I hate that after everything you’re still letting it hurt you.”
Ryan squeezed her hand in his. “Remember the night not long after you turned sixteen and your father said you couldn’t date?”
Fin nodded, remembering the feeling of calm that settled over her when her dad laid down the law. She’d only wanted Ryan and it had been the perfect excuse to use every time a boy asked her out.
“I was so relieved. I didn’t want anyone to have you. Even before then I thought of you as mine. It was that night, when I followed you outside, that I realised you knew about my father. I didn’t want you to know. I didn’t want you to see me that way—as someone weak and helpless, someone to be pitied.”
“Ryan.” She frowned. “I would never think—”
“Who was it that told you? Was it Jake or was it Mike and Julie?”
Her mouth fell open. “Mum and Dad knew?” Fury rose swiftly inside her, warring with the confusion. “Why didn’t they do anything?” she cried out.
“Don’t be angry with them. They tried, believe me, they really did, but …” he trailed off, his brows drawn.
“But what?”
Ryan sighed deeply. “We argued. It ended with me telling them I’d run away if they said anything. I was young and desperate, and they were scared of what would happen to me if I ended up on the streets. At least this way they could make sure I was okay—that they were there if I needed them.”