Page 45 of True Ruin

Hmm, he didn’t hate it.

“Don’t look so pleased, Hotshot. But wow, I was way off, huh?” She was smiling again, throwing her arms around him, nearly climbing into his lap.

Dallas would never understand women, but he hoped to spend the rest of his life trying to understandher.

“I love you,” he murmured into the crown of her head, glad she couldn’t see the sting of tears in his eyes. She was the only person he’d said those words to except his mom, and he was rusty. His family would be next, soon. “What is theGreat Expectationsquote? I love you against reason, against everything, anything. I don’t want someone else. I will nevernotwant you, Gabi Wilder. I’ll admit, we didn’t meet at precisely the right time, for either of us. We just need to get through this stretch, my promotion, your coffee shop. Not forever, I promise. We’ll figure it out.”

“I always know where I am with you.Safe.” She pressed the word into the curve of his neck, and he remembered how the men who should have mattered most—Theo and her father—hadn’t shown up for her. He wasn’t going to be that guy.

“You’re here.” He placed her hand over his heart. “And I’m terrified as fuck about it.”

“Well, I love you that much and more, and I’m not.”

He tipped her chin with his knuckle. Her eyes glistened. His probably looked just as soupy. “You’ve got more courage.”

Threading her fingers through his hair, finally long enough to catch, she brushed her lips over his. “I’m just one hundred percent certain. No more ‘my story, my byline.’ Sam and I are in it now, too.”

“That sounds like something Justin would say,” he growled against her mouth.

She walked her fingers up his thigh, and his body answered just as she intended. She had to feel him, hard against her hip. “So,” she whispered. “Phone sex. Have you ever?”

“No.” His breath caught as she slowly circled every button of his fly.

But he would like to.

“Do you think, when you’re gone?—”

“Yes,” he said, and lowered her to the porch before she could finish.

FOURTEEN

To Wish Impossible Things–The Cure

Christmas and NewYear’s were good. Busy. She realized the magic didn’t last, and Sam was already nine, so the clock was ticking on Santa and all that. Theo made more of an effort this year, taking some of the pressure off her, possibly because he was dating someone Gabi actually liked—Tammi, who owned Hair Extraordinaire, Promise’s only salon. She was friendly, showy, outgoing. Pretty much perfect for Theo.

Gabi and Theo had never really looked like a couple, except in high school, where football and cheerleading went hand-in-hand, and they had nothing to worry about except the next history test, the keg party on Friday night.

Gabi smiled softly. Turned out, the guys with books tucked into their back pockets—the shy, sexy ones—were the keepers.

Dallas left for Cairo a week late. He’d dodged calls from his editor for as long as he could, and she’d been the one to help him pack, driven him to the airport in Greenville, a bit like she was sending him off to college. She hadn’t cried until she got back toher car after leaving him at the gate, then it was huge, heaving sobs while hugging her steering wheel.

He was still limping and tended to startle at loud noises, and maybe he always would. He had nightmares. She wasn’t sure conflict reporting was where he needed to be anymore—and she suspected in some deep part of himself he felt the same.

But he had to figure that out. It was his life, and she wanted him to be happy. She wanted Dallas to beDallas—not who anyone else thought he should be.

She was just the girlfriend waiting at home. The girlfriend who owned her own business in his cousin’s refurbished mill, where Wilder Grounds had opened in February and quickly become more than a café. On Saturday mornings, local potters, quilters, and woodworkers set up tables along the old brick walls. Twice a month, a musician played beside the freight doors while she served lattes and warm apple cake. She’d even considered applying for a beer-and-wine license and hosting the occasional happy hour or light Sunday brunch.

She might be waiting, but she wasn’t standing still.

She’d done that for a man once. Never again. The right guy didn’t expect you to put your life on hold, she’d learned.

Being apart hadn’t meant silence. There were calls with Sam filling Dallas in on the latestBlue’s Cluesepisode and the antics of their new dog, Scooby, and Dallas telling Sam about Cairo—a place her son could now locate on his globe. There were long emails sent at strange hours, two battered packages stuffed with postcards, gifts, and pages torn from his notebooks, and one frantic, apologetic call from him after no one had heard from him in nearly six days. Then there were the calls after Sam was asleep, when Dallas’s voice dropped, and he told her to spread her legs, slip her hand beneath her panties, and move exactly the way he wanted her to. He could keep her trembling with nothing but his voice, listening to every broken breath until she camewith his name trapped between her teeth. It wasn’t remotely the same as having him inside her.

But some nights, it was the only thing that got them through.

Tonight, getting through it meant sitting on the lowered steps of the Wilder Grounds truck with a beer between her knees, while she waved to people as Promise’s Spring Jubilee wound down around her. Andy Morrel was taking down the colored bulbs hanging over the craft booths, and a talented bluegrass guitarist she’d booked for Wilder Grounds next month was packing up near the courthouse steps. It was almost deserted, and she was only putting off going home to a Dallas-less bed. She’d kept the truck for street fairs, ballgames, and the occasional town event. The café had outgrown it, but she hadn’t been able to let it go.

Sam was with Theo and Tammi tonight. He’d raced over an hour ago, flushed and grinning, to show her the plastic trophy he’d won at one of the game booths.