Page 55 of Mountain Dreams

Was she considering it? NO! Cody thought, his heart rate spiking.

“It won’t,” Wyatt said, but without the proper conviction.

“We were together a long time, and I think you miss my presence more than you miss me. I think we stayed together out of habit more than anything else. We fell out of love a long time ago.”

This was news to Cody. He’d thought their problems were more recent, but now he understood that it went deeper than that.

“Some love is meant to last forever, but not ours,” she solemnly concluded.

Wyatt stared at her for a long, uncomfortable moment. “So, it’s really over?”

“Yes,” she said, her voice unwavering.

Cody felt his muscles relax as some of the tension drained out of him, but he maintained a neutral expression, mostly for Wyatt’s sake. No use hitting a man when he was already down.

“What about the rest of your things?” Wyatt asked.

“I’ll help her with that,” Cody said, feeling like it was safe to speak now. As usual, he might have jumped the gun a bit.

“Where are you moving to?” Wyatt asked, looking from Maddie to Cody.

This was the first Cody had seen her flinch since she’d come home. “I don’t have a permanent place yet, but I’ve been looking.”

“Are you staying with your folks in the meantime?”

She shook her head.

“One of your sisters?”

“She’s staying here,” Cody blurted out.

Wyatt slowly turned to face him, anger oozing out his pores and a vein throbbing in his neck.

“With you?” he said.

His voice had returned to its usual deep timbre, but Cody wasn’t intimidated. “She needed someplace to stay, and I have plenty of room.”

“I’m living in the basement,” Maddie interjected, as if that would smooth things over.

Wyatt narrowed his eyes at Cody as a thin sheath of sweat broke out on his brow. “Since when?”

“Since she left your house,” Cody said, briefly wondering if this would come to blows.

“You didn’t waste any time, did you, buddy?”

“Wyatt, stop,” Maddie said.

She started to come closer, but Cody shook his head at her. If he and Wyatt were to come to blows, he didn’t want her caught in the crossfire. Wyatt was heavier than him, but he was faster, so at least there was that.

“How long you been planning this, huh? Since that day you stopped by my office?”

“You did this, Wyatt. Don’t try to pin the blame on me.”

“Just leave, Wyatt,” Maddie said, her voice shaky.

“Not until I find out what’s really going on here,” Wyatt said.

“I told you. She needed a place to stay, and I gave her one. End of story.”