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“How do I look?” I stare at her for a few beats. What a woman. What an incredible fucking woman. She deserves the goddamn world. And I’m going to be the one to give it to her. “Like mine,” I say with a firm nod.
I know I’ll pay for what I’m about to do, and I should have come clean a long time ago. But if it means Bailey comes out ahead … then so fucking be it. Haven’t left a man behind on a mission so far in this life, and I have no plans to start now.
“Beau,” she hisses through her teeth and tugs at my shirt. “Don’t do this. It’s not your place.” I tilt my head and gaze down at her, memorizing the little freckle beside her upper lip just in case I never get close enough to see it again. “Yeah, it actually is.”
“You three, get the fuck out of my bar! Or I’ll have the cops come remove you from my property this time.” Bailey gasps, but I don’t stop there. “And anyone else who plans to treat my fiancée and my staff with anything less than the utmost respect, you can get out too.”
I turn to the woman I love to see if I can gauge what kind of damage my secret has caused. All it takes is one beat spent in her eyes for me to see the damage might be more than I can repair.
Under new ownership was the town gossip, but I never cared much. I had a job that paid reasonably well. I kept my head down and worked. Management never changed, and the company signed my checks. The story was that there was a silent investor. Someone hands-off.
“Since when?” “A few years now.” A few years. God. The ache in my chest has me gasping for breath. It could take me to my knees if I let it.
“Done with all you assholes and all your shit! I am done being treated like garbage. I am done rising above it all with a polite fucking smile. I am done trying to be classy about it. I am done with being related to you when I hate you. Go. Away.”
“And everyone else!” I turn and face the other patrons in The Railspur. “Stop looking at me like I’m infectious. Stop watching me like this is entertainment. Stop treating me like you’re superior. You’re all cruel and shitty and bigoted and have made living here my entire life absolutely miserable.”
thought the bar was mine. I thought that was the one place people appreciated me and my hard work. I thought I earned that place in the world.
“I don’t want your apology! I want an explanation. Have you spent all these nights sitting at my bar because you’re protecting your investment or because you wanted to be with me?” “Bailey, how can you even ask me that? I’ve been totally hands-off with that place for years. It’s always been about you.” My chest. It hurts. “Explain.”
“One night when I was home and heading in there to meet Jasper for a drink, I overheard the owner and the manager talking outside.” I prop a shoulder against the doorframe and cross my arms. A silent instruction for him to keep going. “They were talking about how the place was getting run-down. There wasn’t enough money to fix it up. Fred, the guy who owned it, told Jake that firing you might bring more people down.”
“I … I don’t even know how to make sense of this. Why buy it at all?” The smile that touches his lips is sad. “I watched you that night. I saw how hard you worked. How nervous you were. And I … ” He scrubs his hands down over his face. “I don’t know, Bailey. I guess I’ve always been impulsive where you’re concerned. Because I walked into the back and made Fred an offer on the place that he couldn’t refuse. It just didn’t feel right. Knowing what he was going to do to you.”
“And that job? That job has always felt like proof I did something for myself, despite where I come from. Proof that I don’t need anyone’s pity. That I’m strong enough to rise above it all. That if I had the chance to show people how hard I work, they’d reward me. And you just tugged the one thing I thought I’d done with my life right out from under me. I’m utterly dependent on you, and that terrifies me. And it’s even worse because first you made me fall in l—you know what?”
“I need some time to get my bearings so I don’t say anything I’ll regret.”
“Sugar, I am so sorry.” I smile sadly and draw away from him. “I know,” is all I say as I lock myself into my lonely little trailer. And then I head back to the bed, where I lie awake all night long, analyzing my life from every angle and wondering how the hell I got here. And how the hell I’m going to fix us so I don’t spend the rest of my life feeling like Beau Eaton’s pet project.
“No, sugar. When it comes to you, I’m downright hopeless.”
“No, listen. You need out of this town. For a while there, I thought you didn’t. For a while, I thought I could make it better here for you. But the truth is, you made my life better, so much fucking better, and I worry I made yours worse.”
“Yeah. Exactly. So what’s your plan for this? You gonna keep working a job you hate in a town you clearly feel uncomfortable in because of your misplaced sense of duty while she leaves and lives her life? You’ve got a choice to make, and I’m not sure you realize it. You going with her or not? You keep saying that leaving is what’s best for her, but what about what’s best for you?”
“I have a plan,” I mumble. Because I do. I have for quite some time. I just haven’t told anyone. Haven’t given anyone the honest truth about my plans in years, and the only person I’m going to change that with is Bailey. Truthfully, I don’t want any input. I trust my judgment where she’s concerned. I haven’t felt such a single-minded purpose since before my accident.
“Told you I love you, Bailey. And I meant it.” He gives me a wink and hits the truck roof twice, like I’m a fucking cab driver or something. “Make sure whatever house you pick has room for us to host family dinners. You know the Eaton clan will visit more than we want them to.” Us. We.
Because that’s not nearly enough space to host the Eatons. And I want that. I want Beau, and I want that life, and I—god, I wish he was here with me.
“You’re not used to anyone showing up for you, Bailey. This is what that looks like. I told you I love you. I’ve never loved a woman before. Wasn’t sure I ever would. But now I do. And you and me? We’re a team. You don’t quit on your teammates. You don’t leave a man behind. So now you’re stuck with me. I’m just being patient. Waiting for you to come back.”
“It’s like I’ve been searching for something, something to tie me to this new reality. I wasn’t looking for love; I was looking for a purpose. I just didn’t expect my purpose to be you.” I say the only thing I can say in the wake of his words, in the wake of everything he’s done for me. “I love you, Beau.”
“I told you once that I don’t think anyone has loved me before. But … ” I nibble at my lip. “But I don’t think I’ve ever really loved anyone either.”
“You’re twenty-two. You start university in six weeks. Of course you’re going to change. Nobody stays the same at your age, and in my case, thank fucking god, cause you’d have hated twenty-two-year-old me.”
“You fill me with purpose. Lifting you up gives me a reason. Seeing you smile makes me feel whole. And I’m never going to apologize for that. We’re symbiotic, you and me. Without you, this version of me doesn’t exist. Without the next version of you, the next version of me doesn’t exist either. We’re going to grow together.”
“You asked me who I wanted to be once, and it’s this. Me. Right here. Right now. With you.” All she can manage is a nod and a sniffle. “Okay. I have no poetic response to that. Other than yes, please, sir.”
“So … this isn’t just Bailey’s house. It’s mine too. I’m moving here and starting a new job with the fire department.” I glance over at Cade. “Sorry, man, this is my two weeks’ notice.” He just grunts. “That’s fine. You’re the worst employee I’ve ever had.”
“But you and your fiancée buy a house—a damn nice house—in the city, where she’s going to be spending the next, what? Seven years, at least? And you’re announcing this to us like it isn’t the most obvious thing in the world? Y’all are a bunch of attention seekers. Or dumb. I’m not sure. Either way, just wild.” He shakes his head.
“This is … this doesn’t feel like alone together. This just feels like together-together.” With one hand, I grip her chin, watching her eyes dance between mine. I kiss her hard. My better half. My other half. “That’s us, sugar. Together-together.”
“Maybe down by the river,” I whisper, confessing what I’ve envisioned for some time now. “Behind your house. Like, where it all began kind of thing.” I shrug, feeling suddenly shy.
