I spun and pressed my fingers to my mouth.
Rhys was leaning against a tree that must’ve concealed him from me. He wasn’t wearing a cap of any sort and his rich brown hair was neatly combed to the side. His blue eyes glowed lighter under the evening sun, and his jeans weren’t one of the worn pairs he usually worked in. At his feet was a suitcase.
“Rhys?”
He slipped the Grand Ole Opry ticket out of his back pocket. He held it in the air pinched between his middle and index finger. “It was hard as hell to keep you or your family from seeing me. But there was no fucking way I was going to miss your big debut.” He stuffed the ticket back into his pocket. “After your show, when I wasn’t the one waiting offstage to give you the biggest hug and kiss, I admitted that I hadn’t moved on. I finally told Kirstin to go live her dreams because it wasn’t fair to her to be married to me. Even then, I still had no clue that moving on from you was impossible.”
He crossed to me and gently took the guitar case out of my hand. Then he tipped my chin up, his touch light but firm. My gaze turned watery. What was he going to say? What wasn’t he going to say?
I couldn’t get my hopes up again.
“I love you, June. I always have. I won’t ever forgive myself for breaking your heart. I can’t forget the amount of time we lost, but I sure as fuck have realized that I don’t want to waste one second more.”
“What are you saying?” I whispered.
“I’m saying that I talked to Wren about my mom and what she knew.” He clenched his jaw. “Turned out it was a whole damn lot, and she’d been waiting for me to be ready to hear it.” He stroked his hand down to my shoulder. “I also talked to Kirstin. I told her that the girls wanted her around. That she didn’t have to be like Wren to be the mom they needed. I said she needed to try harder and that I didn’t give a fuck about her travel schedule. I’d need her help with the girls while you’re on tour.” His smile was tentative, with a thread of trepidation. “We won’t be able to be on the road with you the whole time, but if you’ll give me a chance, I’ll sure as hell make this work between us.”
Nothing was making sense. The fear was too strong inside me. “You said you were going to come with me once before and you lied.”
“I lied to us both and I’m so damn sorry. I truly thought it’d be the best for you. But when I picked you up in the rain, it was the universe’s way of telling me I’d been a dumbass. I don’t know how I got lucky enough to get a second chance, but I’m not ready to throw it away yet.” He towered over me. “Can you trust me one more time? Can you let me prove that I’ll never, ever let you down?”
Could I? He’d resisted a reconnection for two months. He’d broken my heart, but he also had the key to putting it back together and he’d never used it. “I don’t know...”
“Can you think about it while I drive?”
While he drove? My gaze landed on the suitcase. “You’re coming with me?”
“Am I, June?” He feathered a thumb over the pulse point in my throat.
My breathing quickened. This was happening so fast. I had to be dreaming. “What about the girls?”
“They’ll stay with Wren. I’ll have to come back fairly often for long stretches of time when they’re in school, but on vacations, they can fly out with me. Otherwise, I can juggle the schedule with Kirstin.”
“What did she—” I shook my head. His ex was none of my business.
“She said it was about time I quit living in a shell. She’d also like to take the girls with her too, and try to bond with them a little more, but she was afraid to ask. She was afraid I’d lock them away.” His smile was sad. “I needed a lot of real talk from a lot of women who really care about me.”
“You’re important to more than just me.”
“Kirstin said she’ll even get her own place. It’s been hard for her to return to Bourbon Canyon and feel like a stranger.”
Everything about that sounded amazing. Except I couldn’t buy the too-good-to-be-true quality of it. “Your ranch?” He didn’t have employees. The whole thing depended on him.
“I can’t be gone for long at a time, but I was told once I could call in a favor for helping work cattle with Bailey Beef.”
“My brothers know about this?”
“I only talked to Tate, but he said whatever I needed,whenever I needed it.” He continued the steady strokes of his thumb along the base of my neck.
As much as I wanted to sink into him, the young girl inside me remembered waking up alone. Only weeks ago, I’d woken up without him and thought he’d left for good. “I don’t know if I can trust you’ll stay with me.”
“I know, June.” His whisper was ragged and he pressed a kiss to my forehead. “I fucked up over and over again. You paid for it. I want to spend my life making you happy. You want to tour for the next twenty years? We’ll do it. You want to retire immediately? I don’t care. I’m just going to be there for you, no matter what.”
“Rhys.” I blinked up at him and tears rolled down my cheeks. I was one more adrenaline pump away from shaking. “I’m scared.”
“Me too. I want to run, to hide in my small farmhouse and let you go so I’m not a detriment to your career, but I keep telling myself that I’ve done that. Just because I was out of the picture didn’t mean it was smooth sailing for you. After talking to Wren... it makes sense. You were right about my mom and I should’ve seen it years ago, as soon as I became a dad. But then I would’ve had to admit that I’d let the most important person in my life get away because of a selfish woman who never really cared about me. She was siphoning money from Dad, and after he married Wren, my mom was even more controlling when it came to me.”
“Oh, Rhys. I’m so sorry.”
