Maybe she should go back to the motel and sleep on it. But if she stepped away from this bridge, she knew she wouldn’t return.
So she stayed. Deliberated. Reread Tommy’s email. Listened to Mason’s new voicemail messages. Then she watched her video through a fresh sheen of tears.
On the screen, she looked like a raving lunatic. A sad, pitiful victim crying out for help. That wasn’t her. It was just a moment, one she’d needed to give herself. If she was brave enough, she could put the video and all thoughts of suicide behind her.
She deleted the recording. Then she sat in the silence and allowed herself to grieve.
Hours passed. She remained on the bridge until the first rays of dawn broke over the horizon.
She hadn’t slept. Hadn’t jumped. But she was no longer crying.
After spending the evening imagining what her life would look like without Mason, she had a plan. It wasn’t dreamy or exciting, but it was obtainable. She could get by with a broken heart, and maybe someday, she might find a way to be happy as a single woman.
The sunrise stretched pink and lavender fingers across the rippling surface of the river below. In the light, a fall at this height felt a lot more daunting.
Her moment to jump had come and gone.
Woodenly, she gathered her things into her bag and checked her phone.
Another email had been sent to Tommysgirl ten minutes ago. She opened the message.
Me again.
I fought with my mom last night. Turns out, I was right about her cancer.
The doctors give her six months to live.
I really need you.
Are you there?
“Yeah.” She stepped away from the ledge and trudged to her car on bare feet. “I’m here, Tommy.”
Eldorado, Texas
Present Day
“I’ll only be gone a month, Evan.” Rylee breezed past him, her mind running in a million different directions. “The lights are on timers, so don’t mess with the switches.”
“At least tell me where you’re going.” Evan caught her arm, stopping her at the front door. “You owe me that much.”
“Bullshit.” Anger flared as she whirled on him. “I had one rule.”
“I never agreed—”
“No expectations. No commitments. No possessive behavior.”
“That’s three.”
“All synonymous with no clinging.”
“I’m not…” He followed her narrowed gaze to his grip on her arm. “Jesus.” His fingers sprung open, releasing her. “Don’t break my balls because I give a shit.”
“Stop.”
“Stop what? Caring about you?”
“Yes.” She grabbed her backpack and slung it over her shoulder on her way out the door. “My bills are paid through next month. You’re listed as my emergency contact, but nothing is going to happen. It’s just a sabbatical. My first vacation ever.”
“Rylee.” He stepped in front of her, blocking her exit off the porch.
“Evan.” Impatience clipped her voice.
His bright blue eyes searched her face as his hand crept along her jaw, soft yet demanding. “Let me in.”
She’d let him in her bed, and that was enough.
More than enough.
In the ten years since her divorce, she made it a point only to have sex with strangers. She didn’t do relationships. Never slept with the same man twice. She didn’t let people in.
Then Evan moved into the house next door.
For the first few years, she turned down his persistent sexual advances. Didn’t matter how goddamn good-looking he was. A one-night stand with a guy who lived twenty feet away was a terrible idea.
But Evan was confident and aggressive and gorgeous in all the ways that spoke to her. So it happened—late one evening, after too many beers and a long bout of loneliness.
Drunken stupidity had been her excuse the first time. But the sex was good. So she let it continue. With one rule.
No clingy attachment.
Except they were together a lot. His place. Her place. Several nights a week. Until she woke one morning and realized he was the only man who had been in her bed in over a year.
She’d broken her own damned rule.
Not only did she have sex with her next-door neighbor, but she’d also become monogamous with him. That was dangerously close to a relationship.
“I need to go.” She tried to step around him.
“You have no obligations for the next month.” He stayed with her, sliding a hand into the back pocket of her jeans, his fingers squeezing her butt as he tucked their hips together. “Give me a few minutes.”
She pulled in a calming breath, which inadvertently drew his sexy, masculine scent into her lungs. He smelled amazing, but she was immune. Damaged. Closed off to anything beyond a casual hookup.
Ten years hadn’t dulled the thorns inside her. If anything, time had made her harder, icier, more set in her ways. She wasn’t looking to change. Detachment suited her career and safeguarded the life she’d built for herself.
But it didn’t negate the fact that Evan was her friend. Her only friend. He didn’t deserve to be stonewalled.
She lowered the backpack to the porch and rested her hands on his biceps. Thick, corded muscle stretched the sleeves of his shirt, every inch honed through manual labor in his construction job.
At age forty-three, he was two years her senior, divorced, and living paycheck to paycheck just like her. His modest two-bedroom house was well-kept like hers. He drank cheap, domestic beer like her. His life was humble, unsophisticated, and honest. Like hers.
But unlike her, he had no reservations about putting himself out there—his generosity, his vulnerabilities, and his overprotective heart.
Evan was a catch, and every unattached woman in their small Texan town wanted him. He needed to stop wasting his time with her.
“All right.” She straightened her spine, wishing she were anywhere but here. “I’m listening.”
“You should see the look on your face. It’s as if a conversation with me makes you physically ill. It’s not like I’m asking you to marry me.”
Blood drained from her cheeks, and she suddenly felt lightheaded and shaky.
“Fuck, Rylee.” He cupped her neck, eyes blazing and mouth twisting with malevolence. “I’m going to kill that son of a bitch.”
She never told him about Mason, never even mentioned she was divorced. But over the years, Evan had put it together. Every time she shut him out, he blamed a man she tried to forget.
“Are you going to slay all my demons?” she asked.
“If you let me.”
“Because I’m not strong enough to fight them myself?”
“Don’t put words in my mouth. You’ve been fighting for years, proving to the world that you’re an impenetrable badass. I get it. You don’t need me or anyone else. But dammit, if you let me in, you won’t have to fight alone.”
With a sigh, she rested her cheek on his chest. “You’re a good man.”
“The best you’ll find this side of the Rio Grande. You should be chasing me, not the other way around.”
The only thing she chased was her career, but she wouldn’t insult him by voicing what he already knew.