Inked Ever After by Elle Aycart Page B

lifeline. Losing him must have been like losing
Jonah all over again.
    They were silent for a long while.
    “I love you, princess,” he said against her hair.
    “It feels wrong,” she whispered.
    He stilled. “Loving me feels wrong?”
    “No, James. Loving you feels totally right. I mean being
happy. Being happy feels wrong.”
    Then it dawned on him; the wedding was the first really
joyful thing that had happened to the Cooper family after that horrible
accident that had truncated all their lives, and she felt guilty now—guilty for
being happy. And afraid to let him know all those contradictory emotions were
warring inside her. Afraid he would think less of her. As if anyone who knew
what she’d gone through could ever think that.
    “Being sad feels wrong too,” she continued, her face still
hidden in his neck. “Like I’m letting you down by being sad. So you see, I
can’t win.”
    Tenderness swelled unbearably in his chest. No wonder,
besides repeating she loved him, she hadn’t been able to coherently express her
feelings. How could she when she was conflicted about feeling them? Convinced
that she was letting those that she loved down. The dead ones by being happy,
the live ones by being sad.
    “Look at me,” he said, bringing his fingers to her chin. She
obeyed, her eyes red and swollen. A deep shame shadowed them. “Princess, you
could never let me down, much less by being sad. Ever. You have the right to be
sad, and to be happy too. Pissed, gleeful, mad, excited, furious. You have a
right to all of those. Feelings are feelings: they aren’t right or wrong; they
just are. You can’t smother them out of guilt. And I didn’t get to meet your
dad or Jonah, but I know they loved you very much. There’s not a doubt in my
mind they’d want you to be happy.”
    She buried her face in his neck again. “I know, but this is
so fucking unfair, James.”
    “Life is unfair, princess. Bad things happen to good people.
Lady Luck is a motherfucking bitch. But we keep our chins up. We don’t give up.
We don’t surrender. And we come back swinging.”
    He felt her smile on his throat. “We come back swinging?”
    “Yep. And flipping the bird if need be.”
    She lifted her gaze to him. “At Lady Luck?”
    “At whatever tries keeping us on our knees, princess.”
    * * * *
    “The sushi was the bomb,” Tate said as they walked hand in
hand to the cabin.
    The Mendiolas’ Mexican food had been exceptional, but their
sushi was even better. Lots of deep frying, lots of spices. Killer rolls.
Fusion at its best.
    “Yes, it was,” James assented. “No wonder the place was
packed.”
    After crying all over him and talking her heart out in the
truck, she’d fallen asleep. By the time James had woken her up, they were
parked in front of Kamikaze.
    “On your feet, princess. Let’s go.” She felt so depleted she
hadn’t really wanted to go in, but James had insisted. “This is good. Trust me.
You’ll see.”
    And he’d been right, like always. The second they entered,
the Mendiolas had descended upon them. Carlos’s siblings, his parents, his
grandma. Fussing over them as if she and James were part of their family.
    “It isn’t anything like I remembered.”
    “I bet it isn’t,” James said, chuckling. “That place looked
like Hooters meets Hard Rock Café meets sushi bar.”
    True. Mendiola’s had been a quiet family restaurant.
Kamikaze was anything but.
    “One thing hasn’t changed though,” Tate said as they reached
the cabin and sat on the porch. “Their food is still frigging hot. My mouth is
on fire. Almost numbed. I should have gone for the dessert. Maybe it would have
helped.” Although she somehow doubted it. All the beers they’d pushed at her
hadn’t. Wasabi explosion night hadn’t been a figurative name.
    “If you want some dessert, we have the wedding-cake bites
they packed for us in the bakery,” James said, gesturing toward the cooler he’d
left on the ground. When the owner