With Hearts to Hear| ✔

|26|

Rachel didn't give herself time to second guess her decision to bring Killian to her mother's house. It was the closest place that they could take refuge from the rain, and also where she would have had to go to pick up her daughter anyway.

Her fingers shook as she lined the key up with the lock. Killian's solid weight behind her was both steadying and yet utterly surreal; she wondered if he could hear her heart pounding or her shaky breath.

Killian could hear her unease; she was practically shaking with jitters.

"Are you always this nervous to pick Diana up?" He joked, wanting to cut the tension. Then not wanting her to think that he was making fun of how nervous she was, he rubbed the side of his neck with a sheepish look. "Rae, I can wait in the car or something?"

"No," She didn't hesitate, but her fingers fumbled with the key once again. She took a deep steadying breath, her resolve coming back to her when she looked over her shoulder at him with a small smile. "No. I want you to meet my mother, and your daughter."

He stood there large and imposing, and yet the way he craned his neck down, his hand rubbing the side of his neck; it was almost as if he was trying to make himself smaller. It made her feel a little better that she wasn't the only one who was nervous.

"I don't want you to feel like we have to do this." He shrugged, somewhat unsure. He had never really been one to relent; he had made compromises, but he had never backed down from something that he had really wanted— especially something important to him.

Rachel wondered if she had caused this wound in him, or if he was just being like that around her because of what had happened. There was something about the air between them that almost felt like they had started all over again; it wasn't exactly awkward, but there was something bubbling between them like the feeling of being on their first date all over again.

"We don't, but you're here right now." Rachel reached for his hand, his smooth palm wrapped around hers and those familiar sparks made her lightheaded with the relief of the familiarity. "You've missed her first year, I don't want you to miss a second more."

His other hand reached up to touch her cold cheek, pulling aware the dark wet strand of hair that had stuck itself to her cheek. He had every intention, eyes drawn into hers, to kiss her then— to get lost in nothing but the feel of her lips, the cold rain, and dark of night.

His lips like a ship finding their north star against hers, he leaned in. She sucked in a breath, a shiver going down her spine, whether a growing chill or sheer anticipation Rachel didn't care. She wanted to feel his lips against hers; something in her crying out for him, her veins singing after having been silent for two years.

He pulled away with a swiftness that left her cold when the front door flew open. Her mother stood in the lit doorway, warm light bathing the two of them on the doorstep. For a split-second Rachel felt like a teenager, caught in the middle of something she wasn't supposed to be doing.

She expected her to say something about the very large, very handsome, very Diana-looking man beside her. Instead, she tutted, waving frantically for them to step into the house, her tone harsh but entirely motherly in a way Rachel had always known her mother to be. "Why you just standing outside in the rain? Look at you, you're looking like a drenched mouse."

"I think it's 'a drowned rat.'" Rachel scrunched her brows in thought, not at all minding the drizzles of rain that floated down onto her.

Killian held back a small chuckle, he couldn't help but think that she looked adorable. She had grown to be different in the time that she had spent away, more womanly, more mature in some way; even so she had not lost her playfulness nor her rebellion. Perhaps now, he figured, she no longer uses them to push against the tide, but rather to push forwards.