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Her hand covers mine. “I’m so sorry. I gave you that whole spiel about keeping things professional, and here I am, vomiting my private life all over you.”
It’s only natural for me to flip my hand over and link her fingers with mine. “Anytime. I’ve been through it, and I’ve been through the therapy. And the rehab.”
She doesn’t pull away, her eyes searching mine. “Rehab?”
“I tried to escape for a while after Kevin died. I’ve been sober for ten years.”
“You were so young.” Her eyes are compassionate when she leans into me, her shoulder pressing into mine.
“We both were.”
Her warm gaze, the press of her body, and the floral scent of her skin all hit me like a physical blow shooting straight to my gut, spreading heat through me that can’t be attributed to the fire burning in front of us.
The world tilts beneath me.
The moment before the fall.
And then I open my mouth and say, “I have to go.”
ChapterThirteen
Mindy
“I don’t know if I like this phrasing.” Luke tilts his notebook in my direction.
The moment before I fall
I skim over the line, taking in some of the other lyrics. Words have been erased and rewritten so many times, the paper is thinning.
The wind whispers in my ear
Heart beating fast, adrenaline rush
Feel the weight of the world, it's too much
“What about a stronger word for fall? Something like, plummet, maybe?”
His eyes brighten. “I like that. Let me try it.” He sets the notebook on the coffee table in front of us, leaning over to scribble more notes.
Then he picks up his guitar and strums a few chords, humming along, trying to harmonize the sound of the lyrics with the beat and the pitch.
The past few days have been a frenzy of work, development on Luke’s old songs, and hashing out this new one. The idea struck him the other night, the same night I fought with Taylor at dinner and we made s’mores and held hands and I almost threw myself at him and then he took off running.
Well, more or less. I understand what it’s like when the muse hits. He helped me put out the fire and dropped me off at the main house before racing to the cabin for his notebook and guitar.
That was the first time I’d ever spoken about what happened with Taylor, and even though I left out a lot of details, he knows more about the rift between us than anyone, even Finley. I can’t figure it out—what made me tell Luke, what made me want to open up, like the words were just sitting in a cage, waiting for him to come along and unlock them.
Maybe it’s because of practically living with each other over these past couple of weeks, the shared vulnerability, the closeness that comes from working together so intimately—but I’ve done this before with other artists.
With Luke, it’s different. It’s easy, but there’s an undercurrent of something else. Something more.
Luke shifts on the couch next to me, angling his knees in my direction. “I want it to be like, the fear of the fall but also feeling safe at the same time.” He taps the pencil on his bottom lip. “Feeling secure and unafraid in the face of jumping into the unknown—that sort of contrast. Does that make sense?”
“It does.”
He keeps strumming on his guitar, humming a little and playing with the pitch.
When he first shared what he was working on, this song about falling in love, I couldn’t help but wonder—since it came to him when we were holding hands—is it about me?
