Page 136 of Play For Me

“Cecelia,” I say again, a little louder. She blinks awake, her gaze latching right on my face. For a split second, she smiles, likeshe’s happy to see me. Like maybe, in her sleep, she forgot about the last few weeks. But then it must come back to her, because her expression closes off. I have to rub at my chest, the ache is so strong.

“Where are we?” she asks, blinking out into the darkness. Her eyes widen. “The ranch?”

“Yeah.” I rub the back of my neck. Maybe I should have told her where I was taking her, instead of just driving her seventy miles away while she slept. But the fact that she came with me without asking where has to be a good sign, right?

“There’s some food inside,” I tell her, unbuckling my seat belt. “Then I thought we could have a fire.”

She studies me in the dim car interior for a moment. “Okay,” she finally says, her voice soft.

It’s weird to be in the ranch house without Red. Even the dogs are boarding in one of the barns, so the hands can keep an eye on them. It’s quiet in the kitchen while I work, warming up our plates of pasta.

“That smells good,” she tells me, sitting at the table where I deposited her with instructions to finish an electrolyte drink.

I shoot her a look. “I know you’d rather have pizza, but this is a good mix of carbs and protein for your post-game recovery.”

She laughs softly, the sound going straight to my chest.

We talk about the game while we eat. There’s some tension in the air, but it’s better than I thought it would be. Mostly she seems tired, and my chest aches with the desire to hold her while she sleeps.

Instead, I bring our dishes to the sink then take her hand again. “Remember when we were here before, I told you how amazing the sky is at night?”

She nods, studying my face.

“I thought we could have a fire. Look at the stars. Sound good?”

“Sounds good,” she agrees.

I use the flashlight on my phone to lead her out to the fire pit. It’s a bit of a far walk in the dark, out past the bunk house where the ranch hands stay, but the distance from the main light sources only makes the stars more incredible.

I get to work setting up the logs. “You’ve done this before,” Cecelia says.

“About a thousand times,” I agree. “You said you had bonfires at the farm in Tennessee?”

“Yeah, but the boys always fight over who gets to start the fire, so I never bothered to learn.”

“Come here, then,” I tell her. “I’ll show you.”

I explain how to arrange the logs and how to get the kindling going so the bigger twigs will catch. When the logs start to burn, she looks up at me, face lit by the fire, and smiles. “I did pretty good for my first time.”

“You’re so beautiful,” I tell her without thinking, because how could I say anything else when she’s sitting there smiling in the firelight under a million stars?

She looks away, like she’s not sure what to do with the compliment, and I clear my throat. “Let’s sit. The benches are pretty comfortable.”

I let her choose her seat first, and give her a little space, sitting a few feet down, even though every instinct in me is yelling that I should take her into my arms.

Not yet,I tell myself.Not until she knows everything.

We sit in silence for a bit, Cecelia watching the fire, me watching Cecelia. Eventually she tilts her head back to look up at the sky, and when she sees the stars, she gasps. “This is unbelievable,” she says. “It’s like being in a planetarium or something.”

I know exactly what she means. The sky feels huge out here, like it’s surrounding us on all sides and not just overhead. It’s ayoung moon, so the stars are about as bright as they get, not a single cloud in the sky to distract from the sight.

“See that smudge?” I ask, pointing up. “That’s the Milky Way.”

“Insane,” she breathes out. “We get bright stars in Tennessee, but the sky feels so much closer out here.”

“It’s one of my favorite things about the ranch,” I tell her.

Now or never, Sol,I think to myself.