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Dinner was ready. She pulled down plates from the cupboard and got out forks. She set the table and checked her hair in the reflective glass on the microwave, watched the clock tick to the top of the hour, and turned toward the door as someone knocked on it.
“Come in,” she called. She moved toward the door as Kyle opened it, and she squealed when he stepped inside, all of his sexy cowboy goodness coming with him.
He laughed and swooped her into his arms. The moment he set her back on her feet, he lowered his head to kiss her. Maddy tensed, ready after being separated from him for the past seven days. “I sure did miss you, Miss Maddy,” he murmured.
“I missed you too,” she said back.
“We’re okay?” he asked.
She looked up then, catching a hint of unrest in his gaze. “Yes,” she said. “Why wouldn’t we be okay?”
“I don’t know. I know you’ve been nervous about me signing this contract. That’s all.”
She wrapped her hands around the back of his neck. “I thinkyouwere the nervous one.”
He chuckled. “Maybe I was.”
“Why’s that?”
“Honestly?”
She nodded, because what was the point of having a relationship with him if they couldn’t be honest with each other?
“I think what we have is important, and I don’t want this to ruin it.” He swallowed, and Maddy found that so adorable. He certainly knew how to say the right things too.
“You said you wouldn’t have to be gone a lot right now,” she said. Her fingers slid down to the buttons along his collar. “Has that changed?”
“No.”
“So you’ll be here this summer.”
“Yes. For the most part, yes.”
She looked up at him. “We were going to see if we could build something strong enough to withstand the distance from here to Dripping Springs. If it can do that, it can weather a record deal.”
“I want to keep building it.”
“Me too,” she said. Her fingers curled into fists around his collar. “Now, kiss me cowboy, because dinner’s cooling, and I know the stage is going to steal you from me in only an hour.”
He grinned at her and then lowered his head to meet her mouth with his. He kissed her slowly, almost like he had to get re-acclimated to her lips, the taste of her tongue. By the time he pulled away, Maddy’s head swam and she’d forgotten where she stood. She only knew Kyle, and how he smelled, what the shape of his mouth felt like, and what he tasted like.
“You grilled?” he asked, and Maddy opened her eyes.
“Yes.” She came back to her senses. “Ribeye and loaded baked potatoes.” She went into the kitchen, her heels clicking against the tile when she touched it. She must’ve looked a sight standing in the gravel in these bright blue shoes, checking on her steaks. “I know you don’t like veggies much, so I included them on the potatoes.” She indicated the steamed broccoli. “You can have a little or a lot.”
He grinned at her, his fun-loving personality shining through. “Thank you, Mads.” He slung his arm around her waist. “I’m glad to be here with you.”
“Yeah, because your family probably has a thousand questions.”
“Glares,” he said. “I think you meant to say my family has a thousand glares, all of them poisoned and sharp, and all of them directed at me.”
She frowned up at him. “They’re not happy for you?’
“They are,” he said cautiously. “But remember, Mads, we’ve all been through this before, and it didn’t end well last time.”
Her hearing aid starting to chime, and that meant the battery had gotten low enough to alert her. She reached up and touched it to turn it off. The world went a little quieter, and her voice felt out of balance as she said, “You know more now.”
“Yeah,” he said.
