“I’m leaving.”
“No, wait—just—let me check.”
“Zoe.”
“I’ll look for everyone.” She backs away toward the swinging door behind the bar. “Since it’s midday and they’re not technically open yet, maybe they’re doing brewery things. Maybe there’s a, uh, yeast crisis? I don’t know.”
“Zoe.”
“Love you!” she chirps, then disappears into the back, the door swinging shut behind her.
I stand in the middle of the empty brewery with my keys still clutched in my fist, tempted to just walk back out, my heart beating too hard. Not a single part of me trusts this.
For one blissful second, nothing happens.
But then I hear footsteps. Not from the direction Zoe went, but from my left, down a short hallway markedEmployees Only.
My suspicions are immediately confirmed.
Grayson steps into the open and stops a few feet away, and every thought I have goes clean out of my head. His eyes are still tired, and there’s a tension around his mouth that makes my chest ache, but he’s shaved, dressed nicely, standing straight with color in his face and determination in the line of his shoulders.
I take the smallest step back.
“I know you have an interview,” he says slowly.
My fingers tighten around my keys. “Gray?—”
“I’m not here to stop you from going.”
That shuts me up.
He takes a breath, his eyes fixed on mine. “I’m here because I should have gone after you the other day.”
My mind goes quiet for once.
“I should have gone after you the moment I calmed down after the wedding. I should have gone after you when you left the cafe. I should have shown up at Zoe’s door two nights ago and kept apologizing until my voice gave out.”
My throat tightens.
“But I… I froze,” he says. “And I told myself I was respecting what you asked for, but the truth is, I was scared of making it worse. I was scared of pushing too hard. I was scared of doing the wrong thing, so I locked up and did nothing. And I know doing nothing was the wrong thing.”
My eyes burn, and my hand loosens around my keys just a little.
“I’m so sorry, Carly,” he says. “Again. And I’m going to keep saying it, not because I think the words fix anything, but because you deserve to hear it as many times as it takes for you to know I understand what I broke and I never want to do that again, even if you don’t want to be with me.”
A choked little noise escapes me, and I swallow, trying to calm it. I don’t know if he’s here because he chose to be or because the rest of them made him, and my brain can’t stop turning that question over, hoping more than I should.
“I have fought for everything I’ve ever wanted,” he continues. “Every contract. Every win. Every minute with my daughter. Every stable piece of the life I built for her. I fought for my company, my reputation, my future.”
He swallows, his Adam’s apple moving.
“I don’t know exactly how to fight for you. But I’m trying,” he rasps, taking a step toward me. I don’t move. “I love you, Carly. I do, and I swear to god, I will keep trying until you won’t let me anymore.”
I choke a little at the words laid out so easily. They’re not implied or hidden or buried under soft sex or a gentle touch or a look across his dinner table.He said it. Out loud.
“I love you,” he says again, and this time his voice breaks around it. “I love you so much it scares the hell out of me, but I’m done letting fear make decisions for me.”
My vision fully blurs, his shape turning into a smudge, and I blink hard to clear it.
