Suddenly, his eyes didn’t see Carnal. His mind had a vision of his wife cooking, eating and being with their family that day in her clingy wraparound dress, high-heeled boots and the diamonds he gave her last Christmas in her ears and at her neck.

Ty gave Lexie diamonds for her birthday, Christmas and their anniversary, every year. He worked overtime to do it. And he never f**ked around. She didn’t get earrings or a necklace or a bracelet. She got a set. Sometimes a couple of pieces, sometimes three.

For their fifth wedding anniversary that year, though, Bessie and Roland came up from Miami to watch the girls for a long weekend while Ty took his wife back to Vegas where they stayed in the same hotel but in a better room and he topped her wedding rings with a wide band set all around with diamonds. It cost a f**king whack and the stack of rings nearly covered her finger to her knuckle.

She took them off to clean them every day and she took them off to give her massages.

Other than that, they were never off. Not when she was showering, cooking, bathing the girls.

Never.

“When is this?” he asked Sam, eyes on Carnal.

“Two weeks.”

Two weeks. They hadn’t had a real vacation since April when they went to Ella’s for week over Easter.

He bent his neck and looked at his feet, muttering, “I’ll talk to Lex.”

He heard Sam’s chuckle then, “All right then, see you in two weeks.”

Then he had nothing but dead air.

He flipped his phone shut and shoved it in his back pocket knowing Sam was right. Hawaii, a private jet, money in the bank and diamonds, his woman would not be hard to convince especially since this was his first game since the one he sat two days after he met her.

He’d stuck to his vow.

Until now.

He moved through the house, seeing the shadowed pieces on the walls.

Lex was a regular at the frame shop in Chantelle, such a regular, they sent Christmas cards. Glitter pen art done by Lell framed like it was executed by a master. Unusual multi-frames holding family snapshots. Two small shadowboxes displaying their daughter’s tiny hospital bracelets, two others that held the first lock of their hair cut by Dominic, Lell’s tied in a little, pale yellow ribbon, Vivie’s with a pale pink one. Down the main hall, a double line of black-framed, cream-matted, black-ink, tiny but slowly getting bigger handprints, five of Lell’s, one Lexie did two days after Lella came home from the hospital and one for each birthday; three of Vivie’s little hand.

There’d be another row there soon or she might branch out to the opposite wall and he liked that, he liked a décor based in comfort and family but he loved the home his wife made for them.

He checked the outer doors one last time to make sure they were locked, engaged the alarm then he went to the stairs.

But he stopped dead at the foot when he saw the shadowed figure sitting halfway up.

Ella.

He felt her eyes in the dark and gave her his.

She was silent.

He was too.

Then she whispered, “Love you, Ty.”

It was the first time she’d said it even after years of her acting it and Jesus, God, it felt f**king good.

“Same,” he rumbled, his voice rough.

He saw the shadow of her head nod then she got up and he watched her walk up the stairs and turn right.

He sucked in breath. Then he followed her.

As he did every night, he looked in on Lella and Vivie who shared a room at Lexie’s demand. She wanted them to grow up close, like Bessie and Honey did. She wanted them to have girlie nighttime chats. She wanted them to have togetherness.

She got what she wanted. Ty didn’t argue. There was no reason, her motives were sound.

Both his girls were out. Not a surprise. They’d had a full day.

Then, quietly, because Ella, Bess and Roland and Honey and Zander were staying with them, he went to his wife.

He barely got the doors closed before she looked at him from her place sitting cross-legged on the bed and said, “The answer is yes.”

He stopped and stared at her.

Then he guessed, “Sam called you before he called me.”

She threw her arms in the air and, in a muted shout, cried, “Hawaii!”

Jesus. His wife was a goof.

He walked to the end of the bed, trying and failing not to let the scar marring her left, dark, arched eyebrow penetrate. He could ignore it in the day. It was the night when the rest of the world faded and it was him and Lex in their room, their bed, when he couldn’t. It was a constant reminder of that day where he lived for agonizing hours with the possibility that he could lose her, he would never have Lell or Vivie, when he couldn’t ignore it.

It wasn’t identical to his, slightly off to the outer edge whereas Ty’s was in the middle. He didn’t mind matching Team Walker t-shirts (something, now, both his daughters had, his wife and his daughters wore them often, he wore his solely at the gym).

He did mind semi-matching scars.

This had got so deep under his skin, he’d eventually talked about it with Tate, considering Laurie bore her own scar after being stuck by a serial killer and Tate had to see that shit every day. Tate had words of wisdom, they helped but not enough.

So, in the end, he had to suck it up and remind himself she was in their room, their bed, their daughters down the hall and now his, hope to God, son in her belly. She’d endured a nightmare and killed a man so she could end up breathing and save him from the lonely, lost life Tuku had led.

And he absolutely could live with that.

But he wished like f**k one of the many times he swept his thumb along that scar, when he was done, he’d make a miracle and it would go away.

So far this had not happened but he didn’t stop trying.

He made it to the end of the bed and put his hands to his hips. She pushed forward and crawled on all fours to him. His c**k started getting hard watching her and kept doing it when she made it to him, got up on her knees and slid her hands up his chest as she pressed close to him.

“Nic already gave me the time off,” she told him.

“I’m thinkin’ you chattin’ with Sam behind my back is somethin’ I should be pissed about.”

Her head tipped to the side and her lips twitched. “Why?”

“Uh… Lex, you and Sam are playin’ me,” he informed her.

“Right, so you can beat the pants off stodgy old farts that Sam heard saying the n-word,” she returned. “It’s worth it.”

And there it was. It was gone. Any wound he left after tearing her apart five years ago hadn’t just healed over. It was gone. He knew it because she didn’t blink before playing him. No uncertainty. She knew he’d do nothing, not one thing, to harm what they had.