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His gut twisted into a painful knot. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. He sensed her working hard to rebuild the wall between them, but he refused to give up. They’d come too far to let their future slip away. She loved him. He knew it. She just had to admit it.
He got to his feet. “If it’s your father, you don’t have to worry. He gave us his blessing before he left.”
“My father…he knows you were going to propose?”
“Yes. He encouraged me.”
Her fingers reached out to Cord’s face. They traced down over his jaw, and he waited, wondering what she was about to do. His heart hammered. His muscles tensed. He forced himself not to pull her to him. This had to be at her pace. He couldn’t rush her.
“You’re so sweet.” She shook her head again and backed up. “But I can’t accept this. Not like this. It won’t work.”
“It can if you’ll just believe in us as much as I do.”
She swiped at her cheeks. “I’ve got to go.”
Her words slugged him in the gut, knocking the wind from him. He’d put himself out there, put his feelings on the line, and she’d rejected his proposal—she’d rejected him.
His chest ached as though his heart had been ripped from it and lay bleeding on the floor. The searing pain of loss surpassed anything he’d ever endured.
“Don’t let me stop you.” He strode out the door.
Unable to believe it was truly ending this way, he paused at the door and turned back. Lexi closed her suitcase and lowered it to the floor. The finality of her with her bag in hand drove home the reality of the situation.
He’d lost the thing he loved most—Lexi.
???
Alexis passed through the airport’s security checkpoint. She had a plan, a way to make things work for her and Cord, but as things stood, she couldn’t accept his proposal. He’d sacrificed too much to make it work between them. And some day he’d realize this, and he would grow to resent her. She wouldn’t be able to bear losing him.
Before that happened, she needed to fix this for him, for herself—for them. The first thing she had to do was catch up to her father. As soon as she’d arrived at the airport, she’d called his cell phone, but it went to voice mail. Then she’d had him paged. She’d waited, but he didn’t respond. Her heart pitter-pattered as her gaze scanned the multitude of people. He had to be here somewhere. But where?
Her mind was still busy ironing out the details of her plan. She was certain withdrawing her trust fund was the right decision. This was most certainly an emergency, but she needed to do one more thing.
> She braced herself for the argument of her life once she located her father.
“Alexis?”
She turned, and her gaze landed on her father. In the end, he’d been the one to find her. He strode up to her. Before she could say a word, he enveloped her in his arms, and the tension melted away. This was her father. The man who’d always been there when she needed him.
He released her and stepped back. “Before you say anything. I want you to know that I didn’t fly here to undercut you. In fact, Cord had those papers signed before I got to the ranch.”
“He told me.”
Her father’s brows rose. “So he caught up with you, yet you’re here. What happened?”
She bit down on her bottom lip to keep control of her emotions. This was her chance to make everything right—or as right as they could ever be. She had to hold it together until she got it all out.
“He proposed.”
“You’re here, so I’m guessing you turned him down. Why, Alexis? I know you care about him. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have stalled on this project and defended him countless times. That’s why I came here, to make sure the man who stole away my little girl is good enough.”
The air trapped in her lungs. Had she heard him correctly? It took her a moment to breathe again. “You came all this way for me?”
Her father nodded. “Cord’s a good guy. He’ll do right by you. So if you turned him down because you don’t love him, that I can accept. But if you turned him down because people you’ve loved in the past have let you down, then you aren’t being fair to yourself or him.”
Alexis shook her head. “It’s not that. I love him, but I have to make things right between us, or else we won’t have a chance for a happy future.”
The crowd of people thickened, making it harder to talk. Her father grabbed her hand and led her off to the side where black-cushioned seats lined the wall.
