“That’s ridiculous. You should get home. Enjoy—enjoy the parade. The festivities. Sleeping. Whatever you need.”
I sigh. I don’t meanhere, literally, and I think she knows it. “I’ll betheretoo.”
Her chin wobbles. “You shouldn’t. Not if—not if you find a better ... there.”
“Been looking for twenty years and haven’t yet.”
“Flint—”
“Go get June. Bring her home. Do what you need to do for you. But whatever that is, Maisey, you don’t have to do it alone.”
She doesn’t believe me.
Or she’s afraid.
I know today sucks. I know it does. But she’s not alone, and I need her to know that.
Mostly because I need her to come back.
I can’t be there waiting if she doesn’t come back.
Her phone dings, and she steps up onto the curb. “It’s Junie. I have to—thank you. Again. For the ride. And—you deserve so much better, Flint. You really, really do.”
She shuts my truck door and turns to dash inside the airport.
I wait in the parking lot until I know her plane has departed, and then I start the long drive home.
Alone.
Chapter 34
Maisey
I move Junie’s flight home and book myself on the same flight before I land in Tampa. Everything gets crazy as soon as I’m on the ground. There’s airport security. Sheriff’s-office paperwork. Dean and his parents and the woman who’s apparently on her way to being Junie’s stepmother.
And there’s Junie.
Hunched in on herself, looking like she would’ve rather a whale swallowed her whole last night.
“I told you not to come,” Dean says to me.
He’s thinner than he used to be. Either that, or I’ve gotten so used to Flint’s bulk that anything looks small now. “I’m not here for you.”
I step around him and kneel in front of Junie, taking her face in my hands until she looks at me. “I have missed you so much. And I am so glad you’re okay.”
There’s absolutely no point in yelling at her for running away. She’s beating herself up enough over it, and I’d imagine Dean’s laid into her already a time or two.
Let him be the bad guy.
“You stink,” Junie whispers.
“I haven’t showered in four days, and I rode on an airplane,” I whisper back.
“This ismytime with my daughter,” Dean says. “Go. Away.”
I sigh. “Sorry, Junie, but I’m not sitting this one out,” I tell her.
And then I rise.
