The air sucked out of his lungs and he stared at her, wanting to believe her so much he could feel his knees weakening, his resolve slipping. But he couldn’t believe her. “Do you think that’s the answer? Do you think that changes anything?”

  “I...hope so.”

  He shook his head. “It doesn’t.”

  “Haven’t you ever made a mistake?” she asked.

  He nodded. “Yeah, a few weeks ago I made the biggest mistake of my life.”

  She winced. “You don’t mean that. I know you’re not hurtful for the sake of it. I know I made a mistake and I’ll own it. But we were in this thing together and I know what I felt... I know how you made me feel. And you can deny it, you can stand there and say you don’t love me back, but I don’t believe it. I think you do love me,” she said, her back straightening, looking more beautiful and passionate than he’d ever seen her. “I think you love me and it’s scaring you to death. And I think being mad at me for not telling you about my grandmother is just the excuse you need, so you can bail.” She inhaled, hands on hips, her gaze pinning him. “Because you’re not ready to love someone. You’re not ready to give that part of yourself to me or anyone else, because loving someone means you might lose them. Loving someone is risky. And you haven’t risked yourself for a long time.”

  His back straightened. She was pulling him apart, piece by piece. “You don’t know anything about it, or me.”

  “But I do,” she said defiantly. “I know you live in your safe little world of one-night stands every second weekend. I know that you love your daughters more than life itself. I know that losing Lara almost broke you in two. I know that you think the accident that injured your brother was your fault. I know that you haven’t called your father back because if you do, you might forgive him, and if you forgive him, he might hurt you all over again.”

  “Marnie,” he warned, “stop.”

  “No,” she said. “I won’t. Because sometimes people hurt you, even if they don’t mean it. And being hurt doesn’t end you, it doesn’t destroy you... I know that for a fact. I was betrayed by a habitual cheater because I didn’t think I deserved any more than that. Yeah, it might feel like it at the time, it might feel like you’re going to break into two...but that’s not real. It’s how we bounce back that counts. How we get up and move on. Like you should do from Lara, from your father.” She stopped, taking a breath, giving him a chance to regroup for a second. “You know, Joss, loving someone else doesn’t mean you love Lara less. And seeing your father and forgiving him doesn’t mean you become like him in any way. It just means you’re not hanging on to that anger and rage. It means that you’re giving the rest of the world a chance. Giving yourself a chance to be happy. All I know,” she said and pressed a hand to her heart, “is that I love you and I want to be with you.”

  Her words cut at him rawly, deeply. He didn’t want her or anyone else speculating about his reasons for not contacting Billie-Jack. He didn’t want anyone wondering why he hadn’t had a serious relationship since Lara died. He didn’t want Marnie getting inside his head and seeing that he was terrified of not measuring up. And he didn’t want her saying she loved him.

  But she was right. About Billie-Jack. About Lara. And knowing she had his number made him feel more vulnerable and exposed than he ever had in his life. And he knew what he had to say.

  “I don’t want you to love me,” he said flatly.

  “Too late.”

  But he was out the door before he could see the hurt in her eyes.

  * * *

  After four weeks of working at the school, Marnie was in her groove. Her life in general was in a groove, she thought, as she collected the quizzes her students had left on their desks. She had spent a lovely few days with her grandmother and their relationship was getting stronger every day. She had also made amends with Abby and discovered they had a lot in common. Plus, she’d found a good friend in Ellie. She’d even received a text from Joss after that ill-fated evening at the Triple C, saying he’d reconsidered his position and she could spend time with his daughters if that was what they wanted. Nothing about their relationship.

  Nothing about forgiving her or loving her.

  And really, she was tired of thinking about it, tired of wondering how it all went so spectacularly pear-shaped in such a short time. So, she concentrated on the good things. On Patience. On having another cousin. On the family she now had.

  “I wish you’d marry my dad.”

  It was Clare who said it. Right after class when all the other students had left and Marnie was collecting the quizzes. She looked at her and smiled. “Sometimes things just don’t work out.”

  “I don’t understand adults sometimes. You act like you have all the answers, but then you act all stupid about it. Dad said I had to stop saying stuff about it.”

  “He’s probably right,” Marnie said gently.

  “He’s just being stubborn.”

  “Maybe,” she offered. “But I’m sure he thinks he’s doing what’s best.”

  “Marrying you would be what’s best,” Clare said and huffed. “So, would you marry him if he asked you?”

  Marnie raised a brow. “He’s not going to ask me, so we shouldn’t speculate, okay?”

  “But if he did,” Clare asked again, with extra drama, “would you?”

  Marnie couldn’t lie. “Yes, I would.”

  Clare grinned a little. “Then you’d be my mom, right?”

  She nodded and shuddered out a breath. “Shouldn’t you be waiting outside for your dad to pick you up?”

  “Aunt Ellie is picking me up in five minutes,” she replied. “Daddy’s gone away for a couple of days.”

  “He has?” she asked, her interest piqued. “Where to?”

  Clare shrugged. “He didn’t tell us.”

  Marnie’s insides sank. It was a Friday and he’d gone away? Maybe he was seeing someone. Having a vacation. A hot and steamy weekend. Oh, God...she wanted to fall in a heap. And then she wanted to smack herself for being so ridiculous and predictable. She’d offered him her love and he’d rejected her. She didn’t need to hear those words again in a hurry.

  “You should get going,” Marnie said and was startled when Clare rushed forward and gave her a hug.

  “I wish you were my mom.”

  Marnie’s heart rolled over. “Oh, honey. I know you do. I wish I could tell you that everything will work out.”

  Clare swallowed hard. “I think my dad loves you.”

  Marnie hugged her again. As much as she’d tried to convince herself he didn’t care, she couldn’t. He wouldn’t have pushed her away so harshly if he wasn’t invested in her and in them. He just couldn’t let himself love her for reasons of his own.

  Marnie watched as Clare left, and realized the little girl had taken a piece of her heart with her. When she got home she showered, changed, ate a noodle cup over the sink and watched TV for a while. She was just turning into bed at ten when her cell pinged. It was Joss.

  Did you tell my daughter we were getting married?

  Marnie laughed out loud and replied quickly.

  Of course not. She asked me if I WOULD marry you. I said I would. If you asked.

  A message came back a few seconds later.

  That’s kind of the same thing.

  She responded swiftly, smiling a little, which was a nice change from crying all the time.

  No, it’s not. I said I would. I didn’t say you had asked.

  Her cell pinged again.

  Well, I haven’t asked. So, can you stop filling her head with the idea?

  She typed out a response and hit Send.

  I’m not promising anything. Where are you, by the way?

  It didn’t take long to get a reply.

  What?

  Clare said you were out of town. Romantic getaway?

  He responded with a grumpy emoji.

  Not likely. Personal errand. Good night.

  She toyed with her reply and then settled on the truth.

  If you want your daughter to stop matchmaking, then maybe you should fall out of love with me.

  The grumpy emoji returned. Along with I’m not in love with you.

  She replied within seconds.

  Sure you are. You’re just too chicken to admit it.

  He didn’t respond. She didn’t expect him to. And she hurt so much she could barely breathe.

  * * *

  Joss wasn’t sure what to expect when he met Billie-Jack for the first time in two decades. Of course, he knew the old man was sick. Knew from Grant and Mitch that the illness and treatment had taken its toll. But the small, thin man in front of him wasn’t who he remembered. There was a hollowness in his expression and a vacancy in his gaze that conflicted with his memories of the man who had been an abusive drunk, who’d belted him countless times with a strap, who’d rarely said a kind word in those last few years.

  What amazed him, though, was in that moment, he felt nothing.

  Not anger, not resentment, just indifference.

  He had to admit, the old man appeared to have turned his life around. His lady friend, Mindy, was polite and offered him coffee and there was no sign of alcohol or any other kind of excess in the small house.

  “Is this your first time in Arkansas?” she asked.

  He nodded and turned his attention to his father. “So, why have you been calling me? What do you want?”

  Billie-Jack pushed forward in his seat. “You know what.”

  “Forgiveness?” he queried.

  Billie-Jack shrugged. “I’m not after a miracle. I just wanted to see you, to tell you I was sorry for everything that happened.”

  “For what?” Joss shot back. “For checking out after Mom died? For getting drunk five days out of seven? For almost killing Hank? For bailing because you didn’t have the guts to face what you’d done?”

  It was a long list of accusations, each one of them true, each one laced with the hurt he’d felt back then, as a fourteen-year-old boy who’d needed guidance and comfort after losing his mother—and instead got belted with a strap. And then the indifference he’d always clung to, the indifference that had somehow kept him from feeling anything, slowly morphed into something else, something he knew he’d suppressed all his adult life—anger.

  “You had one job, Dad,” he said, staying in his seat, even though he was itching to get up. “To look after your kids when they needed you. That’s all you had to do. You didn’t have to be father of the year, you didn’t have to drown your sorrows in a bottle—you just had to step up and look after your kids.”

  Billie-Jack nodded slowly. “Like you did,” he said and linked his bony hands together. “After your wife died.”

  His throat burned. “Yes, exactly.”

  His father nodded again. “There’s a difference, though. You’re strong, like your mom. I wasn’t. I was weak and scared. I didn’t want to live after your mother died. I didn’t want to face life without her. I shut down because I didn’t wanna feel anything—because feeling things hurt too much.”

  Joss stilled, and as his anger slowly dissipated, it was replaced by something else—acknowledgment. Self-ackowledgment. Because, in a way, hadn’t he done exactly the same thing after Lara had died? He’d shut himself down emotionally, channeling all his energy into raising the girls and work, hiding behind meaningless one-night stands for years and refusing to admit what he was really afraid of—loving someone and then losing them. Like he’d lost his mom. And Lara. And, in a way, Billie-Jack. It was easier—and safer—to shut down, to pretend he had enough to do with being a father and running his business, and that he wasn’t so wretchedly lonely most days that he ached inside.

  Until Marnie had entered his life.

  With her blue eyes and soft voice, she’d turned his emotional switch back on. She made him think, yearn, feel...for the first time in forever. But the fact she was in town for only six months had waved like a red flag and, in a way, was the perfect excuse for him to hold back. Learning she hadn’t come clean about her identity and her real reason for coming to Cedar River was all he needed to cement that excuse. In the end, it was an easy out.

  And one of the hardest things he’d ever done.

  All I know is that I love you and I want to be with you.

  Her words came back and hit him with stunning clarity, and in that moment he knew exactly what he wanted. And who. It didn’t matter that they had known one another only a short time. It didn’t matter that she’d felt the need to keep her identity a secret. All he knew, deep in his heart, was that he was in love with her. He had the rest of his life to live, and if he was lucky, he’d live that life with Marnie at his side.

  Joss got to his feet and looked at his father. “For a long time I blamed myself for the accident,” he said and saw the startled look on Billie-Jack’s face.

  “You did?” his father asked. “Why? It wasn’t your fault.”

  “It’s hard to feel logical at fourteen. I thought that maybe if you and I hadn’t got into it that day, you might not have taken off in the truck, drunk. I thought you might have slept it off and the accident might never have happened. But it did happen. You were drunk. You drove with your kids in the back seat. You didn’t care about anyone or anything other than yourself. You have to live with that. You have to learn how to forgive yourself.” He took a long breath, finding strength from the air in his lungs. “But I don’t need to forgive you. Frankly, I don’t need anything from you. What I need isn’t in this room. It’s back home with my kids and my family, and the woman I love.”

  He stood and looked at Mindy, then back at his father. “Take care of yourself, Billie-Jack. And I hope you both have a happy life. Goodbye.”

  With that, he walked out and closed the door.

  * * *

  Marnie had spent several days in varying emotional states. Happy because she was reconnected with her grandmother and had quickly grown to love the older woman. And heartbroken because she hadn’t heard from Joss and suspected that their fledgling relationship was over before it really had a chance to begin. The truth was, she missed him. She missed their talks and their laughter, and she missed his touch so much.

  She went to Abby and Jake’s on Saturday morning, along with Patience and Ellie, and had a lovely time learning how to make choux pastry. Abby was such a talented chef, and a great teacher, and by midday there were trays of sweets laid out on the kitchen countertop. By one, Mitch and Tess had arrived, and Hank turned up shortly after. Even Grant and Winona, who’d been in newlywed bliss for the past few months, according to Ellie, made an appearance. Everyone was excited about the baby they were expecting, and Tess was already insisting they have the baby shower at the ranch.

  Everyone was there. Except for Joss and the girls.

  “I’m not sure what’s wrong with Joss lately,” Jake said, shrugging.

  They were on the front deck, enjoying the cool, clear weather, drinking coffee and eating cake after a barbecue lunch, and Marnie knew she was the center of everyone’s speculation. Natural, she supposed, that they would all be curious about the state of her relationship with their brother. And really, she felt so at ease with them all, she couldn’t do anything other than smile and shrug.

  “Beats me,” she said and knew everyone could hear. “I just happen to love the guy.”

  She got a few sympathetic looks and then felt embarrassed to the tips of her hair.

  “Isn’t that Joss’s truck?” Ellie asked and pointed to a vehicle driving toward the house.

  “Yep,” Hank said and chuckled. “Sure is.”

  He was back from wherever he had been. Personal errand, he’d called it. She wanted to strangle him for making her wonder if he’d been with another woman. The girls got out first and came racing toward the house. She wondered if any of the family thought it odd that they made a beeline for her first. She didn’t have too much time to speculate, though, because within seconds of hugging each girl, his brothers were all laughing loudly.

  Because there he was, getting out of his truck, dressed in a chicken costume. A giant, feathery, yellow chicken costume with only his face peering out from a round gap at the front. He strode to the bottom step on big red chicken feet and stopped, looking up at her. Only her. And ignoring everyone else.

  “What are you doing?” she asked, too stunned to laugh.

  He flapped the wings. “Proving to you that you were right... I am chicken.”

  Her heart soared. “You are?”

  He shrugged. “Turns out you were right about a lot of things. So, I figured, if I’m gonna do this, then I do it in front of everyone, and then I’ll have no excuses and nothing to hide behind.”

  Marnie’s eyes filled with moisture and as she looked at him, dressed in the ridiculous costume, she’d never loved anyone more, ever, in her entire life. “Okay...do it. I’m listening.”

  He took a deep breath, glanced at the family she knew he adored and then met her gaze head-on. “I never imagined I would love anyone ever again. I never imagined I’d be lucky enough to find someone that makes me laugh. I never imagined I would find someone who would be so kind and generous with my children. I never imagined I would find someone who saw me for who I am, who knew why I was scared to make a commitment. Or would know why I didn’t want to talk to my father after so many years. Which I did, by the way,” he added and shrugged again. “Which is where I’ve been for the last couple of days. We didn’t make amends. But he listened.”

  “And the guilt?” she asked, knowing she was the only person who knew what was in his heart.

  “Gone.”

  “How does it feel?”

  He nodded. “Good. Anyway, back to me being—what did you call me the other night—too chicken. Well, yeah, I have been. But the thing is, I never imagined that I would screw up so badly,” he said and shrugged, “and that you would forgive me because, for some reason, you seem to be in love with me.”