“Question for a question?” she asked, reminding him of a time long ago when she’d sat in his beat-up truck and said the same thing.
“You first.” He shifted to lean back against a stack of pillows and lifted his arm, hoping she’d settle in to his side.
She didn’t disappoint. Once she’d snuggled in, she traced one of the twisted roots over his hip bone. “There are more roots here than when you left. So many more.”
He’d been waiting for this, had wondered how long it’d take her to ask about it. He pressed his lips to the crown of her head. “That’s not a question.”
She pinched his side and tilted her head back to meet his gaze. “Tell me about it?”
Reaching up, he brushed the hair back from her face, stroked his fingertip down the slope of her nose, around the outline of her lips. “That first year…” He swallowed, averted his gaze, and guided her head to rest on his chest again. Thinking it’d be easier if she wasn’t staring at him with those beseeching eyes. “On your nineteenth birthday, I was in a bad place. I fuckin’missedyou. Every day, but especially that day. I passed a tattoo parlor on my way home, and I didn’t even think—just pulled in. Hoped like hell they had an opening. I got the first root added that night. The others happened every year on your birthday.”
She was quiet for a moment, then she whispered, “Why?”
Would it be too much to tell her it was the only thing he’d had of her when he’d been gone? That he’d craved that connection, even when he’d been the one to sever it? Probably.
“Uh, uh. My turn, sweetness.”
She huffed, pinching his side again. “Well, come on, then.”
There was really no question what he wanted to ask. The same thing he’d been desperate to know since he’d found out she’d moved back to Havenbrook after college. “Why’re you back here, Willowtree? Why didn’t you go to Nashville and do what we planned? Are you as happy here as you would’ve been there?”
“You think if you shove three questions together real fast it’ll only count as one?”
“Umm…I was sorta hopin’ it’d work like that, yeah.”
“Cheater.” She didn’t put any heat into the insult, though. “I’m here because it’s my home, and leavin’—much as I yearned for it then—felt…wrong. And, yes, I’m happy. For the most part. I have good days and bad days, same as anyone, I suppose. But I really do love what I do—or I do when I’m not doin’ the work of three people. Revitalizing the square…” She shook her head against his chest, her deep breath brushing across his skin. “Seeing it come to life because of what I did? It’s like a living, breathing canvas.”
He waited for her to answer why she’d hadn’t gone to Nashville like they’d planned, but when she didn’t, he nudged her. “And?”
“And…it’s your turn for a question.” She turned on her side and propped herself up on her elbow, using her other hand to trace the numbers over his heart. “Coordinates?”
He swallowed, watching her as she stared at his skin. True, he’d only added to her tree on her birthday, but every other tattoo he had on him was a tribute to her in some way. The map and coordinates reminding him where his home was. The compass because she was his true north. “Yeah.”
“Of what?” She looked up at him then, her lip caught between her teeth.
Reaching out, he tugged her lip free, brushed his thumb across it. “This. Here.”
“Here?” She furrowed her brow. “Thetree house?”
“The one and only.”
Her mouth dropped open, her eyes full of something he couldn’t quite name. “Finn—”
“My turn. Tell me about Nashville.”
She looked like she wanted to argue, wanted to press, but then she shrugged, dropping her gaze. “Nothing to tell. You left. I withdrew my admission and went to MSU instead.”
“Because?”
“Because…what I thought I wanted wasn’t the same without you there too.”
Damn, this hurt. Getting all this out in the open was good for them, but he couldn’t deny the way his stomach clenched over all the time they’d lost. All because of the decisions he’d made—decisions he hadn’t been given much choice over, but his all the same.
“I’m sorry, Willowtree.” He cupped her neck, needing to feel her any way he could. “Even though it won’t give us back the time we lost, I want you to know I’m sorry. And not a day went by when I didn’t think about you. About coming back to you.”
She stared at him for a moment then opened her mouth, no doubt to ask why the hell he didn’t. Before she could do so, he pulled her toward him. Pressed his lips to hers and waited for her to melt into him. Hoping with everything he had that her doing so meant maybe, just maybe, forgiveness would come eventually.
After round two where Finn had taken Willow nice and slow, trying to show her in every kiss, every roll of his hips how much he still loved her, he walked her to her house, their fingers linked between them. It’d been a long damn time since he’d done something as simple as holding hands—in fact, the last time had probably been with Willow.
