Since Marla had mentioned her name, he couldn’t get Rowan out of his head. Not that he needed anyone to put her in his head—she was always there, lurking in the corners of his mind.
But now…the possibility of hearing her voice was almost too much. He missed the way she used to call himdarlin’. Maybe more than anything he missed having that connection with another person. He had his team, but he didn’t have anyone who knew him inside and out.
They knew Luke Stone, chart-topping country singer. They didn’t know Luke Stone, skinny kid with braces all the way up through tenth grade when he’d finally grown into his height and lost the headgear.
And now the idea of seeing Rowan, of hearing her voice, wouldn’t get out of his mind. It nagged at him like a melody for a song that wouldn’t leave him alone until he’d written it down.
He still wasn’t sure how things had ended so bad with Rowan. They’d agreed to the plan—they’d pretend he was single for the first year and then slowly introduce her back into his new life. He hadn’t liked it any more than she had, but Bobby John and Brett had assured him that was best for his career. Singers in steady relationships didn’t appeal as much to women.
Marla had blown that whole argument out of the water and Luke wondered what she would have advised if she’d been his publicist from the very beginning.
Jerking the door to his bus open, he jumped up the steps and snatched his phone from the charger. Pulling up the email app, he found Marla’s message. The number was hyperlinked and he selected it.
The warning window popped up, asking if he wanted to call that number. Did he? What was he going to say? “Sorry I was an ass and listened to even bigger asses instead of doing what I knew was right?”
That was as good a place as any to start. If she didn’t immediately hang up on him as soon as she heard his voice. But like his mama said, the answer’s always no if you don’t ask the question.
He pressedyesand lifted the phone to his ear.
“Who’s this?” a man asked.
“Uh…this is Luke. I’m looking for Rowan.”
“Sorry, man, she gave you the wrong number.”
“No. This is—How long have you had this number?”
“Over three years.” The guy was getting impatient.
“Okay. Thanks.” He ended the call then slumped onto the bench and tapped his phone against his knee. Now what?
He had no way of finding out if she was on social media. He didn’t even know what sites he was on other than Facebook because it was all handled by the PR team. He’d tried to keep his profile locked down and only have his page public, but it had gotten to the point where it was too much with everything else going on.
He opened his email again and responded to Marla’s. Rowan was going to be at the Denver show. He just needed to know where she would be sitting.
