But just as I started reaching for him, he broke the kiss, his eyes boring into mine when he asked, “You gonna be here?”
I made some sort of delirious, confirming sound, and was rewarded with a flash of his dimples and blinding smile before he was gone.
I was there when he came back from taking care of the animals. And as we spent the entire day moving from the bed to the kitchen to the shower, I was sure I never wanted it to end.
“I’m already here,” Sawyer said, voice pouring through my truck’s speakers. “Got here first thing this morning.”
I nodded as I took a turn. “I had some things to do in town, but I gotta get out in the orchard for at least a few hours. We just started thinning the trees today. I can’t sit back and let the crews do that without me.”
A grunt of understanding sounded.
“I’ll be there this evening. Yeah?”
“Sounds good, man. Rae and Em will be here later too,” he said, his tone shifting as soon as Rae’s name left him.
She’d returned nearly a week ago, and they’d spent an entire day laying out her fears and working through his shit the way they should’ve from the beginning. The guy had been pure joy ever since.
A smirk tugged at my mouth. “Getting bossed around by two pregnant women sounds like my kinda party.”
His laugh was loud and free and had one rumbling in my chest. “Especially those two,” he agreed, all affectionate teasing. “Indecisive as hell.”
“Gonna make sure they know you said that.”
“Pretty sure I’ve told them about a dozen times since we started this.”
I didn’t doubt it.
As Cayson had assumed, Emberly was a force that was impossible to stop. She’d wanted their new ranch all fixed up, and for them to be moved in, by the time Cayson got home.
The place needed serious work inside and out, but she’d been determined. Put her and Rae together? Jesus Christ. There was no way it wasn’t getting done.
And for all our teasing and complaining, I knew Sawyer and I were just grateful. Saw, because he lived to help people and Rae was back. And me, because it kept me going. Kept my mind off the fact that Madison had been gone for a week, and things were just as unsure between us as they had been that morning. Her messages were only ever responses, and they were short. Direct. Never offering anything in return.
The one call she’d answered had nearly sent me to my knees because she’d talked to me like I was a stranger.
And that glow?
Fuck, even through the phone, I could tell it was gone.
Everything had been there. That future I’d waited for and known I was meant to have. It was in my fucking grasp . . . and I’d lost it in a second.
The change in her that morning—the cold that settled between us and the mixture of pain and betrayal that had emanated from her—it was a constant twisting in my gut. A jagged rock in my throat. A crushing weight on my chest, making it hard to breathe.
I made the turn onto my long, gravel drive to drop off the paperwork I’d just had finalized for Cayson’s buy-in. Listening as Sawyer listed off what he’d already done to the property, and what he planned to get done before that night, when my phone chimed.
I grabbed it out of the cup holder and felt my heart take off when I saw Madison’s name. Only to falter and fall at the possibilities of what the message would say since it was the first time she was reaching out to me.
But then I glanced up. The phone slipping from my fingers back into the cup holder, and my head slanting when I saw the unfamiliar cars parked in front of my house.
“Gotta go,” I mumbled, cutting off Sawyer. “Sorry, man. See you tonight.”
I knew without a doubt, whoever was there wasn’t there for malicious reasons . . . like breaking in and stealing shit.
This was Amber.
Besides, Izzy was there. If anyone broke in, they’d regret it as soon as they stumbled onto her. But there was something about the cars that had my stomach filling with lead and slowly sinking as I hurried out of my truck and up the porch.
As soon as I set foot inside, I nearly went back out when the collective gasps of excitement met me.
I froze in the entryway, staring down women I’d known most of my life.
Two I’d gone to school with, one was a little older than me.
All were looking at me with the hungry and competitive expressions I’d come to recognize and avoid in town.
“Can I help you?” I managed to ask, the words slow and holding a hint of warning.
The one closest to me giggled in an annoyingly sweet way as she smoothed her hands over her shirt. “Hunter Dixon . . . always such a riot.” She gave a shy smile that I was pretty damn sure she’d practiced. “We’re here for the interviews, silly.”
My mind was so busy barreling down the avoid-Amber-women-at-all-costs track that it took a few seconds for her words to register.
When they did, my blood ran cold.
“Out,” I demanded, not waiting to see if they left as I stormed toward the kitchen and then the office.
The closer I got, the harsher my breaths came.
The more my stomach twisted with denial and fear and this agony that had been eating me up.
The harder it became to continue because I could hear Isabel talking with someone else.
I shoved open the partially-closed door, the same demand ripping from my chest as I did. “Out.” I didn’t even look to see who I was snapping at. I couldn’t.
All I could see was Isabel.
Her shock faded to irritation that was so clearly trying to cover her pain. “I’m sorry, I’ll be in touch,” she muttered as whoever she’d been interviewing slipped from the room with a sultry, “Hunter.”
“What the fuck are you doing?” I ground out when the interviewee’s steps had long since faded. “Interviews, Izzy?”
She lifted a hand before letting it fall onto a small stack of papers in her lap.
An application.
“What the fuck?”
Izzy swallowed, her throat shifting with the action before she looked away in an attempt to hide her building tears.
Whispers dragged my attention away from the woman in front of me. My blood pounded when I saw two shocked faces dart out of view of the hallway.
“What part of out did y’all not understand?” I barked as I stalked toward them. “Get out of my goddamn house. There’re no interviews. There’s no position available.” By then, I’d reached where all four of them were scrambling for the door. “If I find you on my property again, we’re gonna have a fucking problem.”
I locked the door behind them and dragged my hands through my hair, knocking my baseball cap to the floor as I did.
I’d never spoken to a female that way, and I had no doubt I would feel like hell for it . . . later.
But at that moment, I couldn’t think straight. The weight that was already on my chest from Madison was pressing down harder and harder. I couldn’t breathe despite how roughly I was trying to drag in air.
I wasn’t sure if I was in more pain than I could bear, or if I couldn’t feel anything at all anymore because I was losing Madison—I could sense it with every day that passed. And I was about to lose my best friend on top of it.
Jesus fucking Christ . . . I was crying.