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She apparently doesn’t find me funny and barrels toward me.
“I was totally safe,” I assure her.
Tillie rolls her eyes, and it’s one of the things I adore most about her. “Why are you cutting down trees?” she huffs in exasperation.
“Why? Because you want to build a studio, and you need a driveway.”
“But you need your space and privacy,” she counters.
“Do I?”
Tillie blinks up at me. “You’re the one who sued me to keep the trees. It was important to you.”
“I’m thinkingwasis the key word. Clearly, I’m not still feeling that if I’m out here cutting them down. And besides, no way in hell I’m letting you sell your property.”
Her brows furrow.
I grab her hand and turn her toward the line of trees that separates our homes. “I’ve been thinking, and hear me out—we cut down all these trees, not just the ones needed for a driveway. We combine our two properties together—”
Her head whips to look up at me. “Wait! What?”
I sweep a hand out in front of us. “Imagine it… we can live in my cabin, since it’s larger. And we can convert your house into astudio. It will be far easier than to build from scratch, and your house already has great light, which I’m assuming artists need. And people could then use your existing driveway. We’ll put in a path from the back deck of our cabin over there so you can walk to the studio each day. It will be perfect.”
“We?” she whispers, wearing a deep frown.
“Yes, we. I’ll help you when I can.”
“You want me to move into your cabin?” she asks, voice still low and soft.
Disbelieving.
“Yes,” I exclaim happily—almost giddily—as I pull her into my arms. She tips her head back, confusion etched on every angle of her face, so I kiss her to try to alleviate some of it.
“But… you’re moving back to Pittsburgh.”
“Well, we need to talk about that.” I dip my head and kiss her again, ever so slowly. I feel her body start to relax, then melt against me. Moving my lips to her ear, I say, “I’m not ready to give you up when I go back.”
Tillie’s entire body jerks, and she again looks up at me. I band my arms around her lower back so she can’t escape.
“What do you mean?”
“It means that I never thought in a million years I’d find someone like you. Hell, I wasn’t even looking, and when I moved here, I wanted to be left alone with my misery. But then you came along, and well… you turned my world upside down.”
“In a good way?” she inquires hesitantly.
“In the best ways,” I assure her. “You’ve changed my life, Tillie, and you alone gave me the strength to consider giving my old life a chance. The only problem is, my old life doesn’t include you.”
“No, it doesn’t,” she murmurs, her gaze drifting from mine.
“But I want it to.”
Her eyes slide back, mouth slightly parted. I want to kiss her again, but I refrain. “It’s going to be hard to figure out. I’m hoping you can come stay in Pittsburgh with me some, but I understand you have a life here too. Especially after you open the studio. But I’ll come here when I can. I have the summer, a full bye week, and Christmas I’ll spend here with you. And once in a blue moon, we have three- to four-day stretches with no games, so you can time visits then. I’ll have practice, of course, but lots of time to spend with you. You could come to some away games. We can make it work. I know we can. I’ll get a bigger place in Pittsburgh, and we’ll set up an art studio for you in one of the rooms. I’ll make sure it has good lighting and… whoa… fuck… Tillie… are you crying?”
Yes, tears are brimming in her eyes, and when she blinks, they stream down her cheeks and wet her golden eyelashes.
I brush them away with my thumbs and dip my head to kiss her softly. “Is my idea so repugnant? Is that why you’re crying?”
She shakes her head and laughs. “No… it’s just… I thought yesterday when you told me you were going back to Pittsburgh that it was the definite end for us.”
