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“Focus on the road, Billy. No, you didn’t, at least not on purpose. But you…well, I guess you benefited from my total Billy Cooper immersion.”
He was quiet for a long time, making her wonder if she’d gone too far, given him too much of her truth. This was a level of self-understanding she’d taken a long time—with some books and counseling sessions—to work out for herself. She hadn’t talked to him about any of it because…well, why would she? They were through.
So why was she bringing it up now?
When he finally spoke, she knew why. Because the Billy of here and now was open to it. They never could have had this conversation before.
“Yeah, you’re right,” he said. “I did benefit. I ate it up. And I think I know why. I never had anyone care about me or think I was important like that. You were the only one. I soaked it in like a starving puppy. I should have realized it wasn’t going both ways. I’m sorry, Jenna.”
His apology left her breathless. She put her hand to her chest, and realized that even though she’d sounded cool and collected, her heart was hammering. Speaking out, telling her truth…she wasn’t used to it.
“I wish I’d known it was a red flag.” His voice was filled with regret. “I would have…been different. Do you ever wish you could have a do-over on certain things?”
A do-over. Her heart ached at the thought. But life didn’t really work that way. If it did, she could think of all kinds of things…
“No do-overs in baseball,” she said lightly, through the ache in her heart. “But if there were, I might skip the awards dinner right before a snowstorm.”
“Copy that.”
She looked at her phone again. “Shoot, I missed a text from Galen.” She scanned through it. “He says service is very spotty. He tried to call but it didn’t work. Only texts are going through.” She thumbed to the previous text. “He got to the house but it’s empty! No one’s there.”
“What?” The shock nearly made him drive off the side of the road. She waited until he got the Tundra straightened out.
“No one was home.” She read from Galen’s text. “The house is warm enough. Wood stove is out, but someone did make a fire in it. I estimate it’s been out for about two hours. The damper is closed.” She looked up from the phone. “Maybe Annika was trying to make sure the house didn’t freeze up while they were gone?”
“But why would they leave? Where did they go? It makes no sense.”
She kept scanning. “No footprints in the snow, so they must have left while it was still storming. Maybe in the night.”
He jammed his foot on the accelerator and the truck leaped forward.
“Billy!”
“What?”
“It won’t help anyone if we slide off the road.”
“I’m not going to do that. I’m going to drive like a bat out of hell until I get to Lake Bittersweet and find Zack and Bean.”
“And Annika,” she reminded him.
“Yeah, Annika. So she can tell me why she didn’t contact us.”
She grabbed his forearm, tense with corded muscles. “I’m sure she would have if she could. Slow down, Billy!”
“Honey. You know me. I’m a trained athlete with world-class reaction time, pinpoint throwing accuracy and absolute focus on the baseball diamond. Do you think I’m going to let us crash?”
A bolt of lust hit her right in the solar plexus. When Billy was intense and hardcore protective like that, he made every part of her—body, heart and soul— long for him.
Had she really been thinking that she could pretend last night didn’t matter? Delusional. Because her body didn’t forget a thing.
“No,” she said softly. “I think you’ll get us there safely. I might have a heart attack on the way, but…”
“You will not. Because you trust me.”
He was right. She really did trust him. Not because of his “world-class reaction time”—which would be arrogant if it wasn’t true—but because he was Billy.
They didn’t speak for the rest of the drive so that he could put that famous focus to work. Jenna had to squeeze her eyes shut now and then, and by the time they reached the outskirts of Lake Bittersweet, her hands were cramped from white-knuckling it.
