“Don’t do this,” I tell him, my own eyes getting teary as my stomach swoops. I can pretend he never said that. If I can shove those words down so deep inside of me that they won’t continue to bounce around in my brain like they currently are, we don’t have to quit doing this.
He can continue to be sort of mine, and I can continue to be kind of his, and we can keep making the best of my time in Cedar Creek until I get the money and ability to leave.
“I’m leaving,” I tell him for the hundredth time.
“I know you are, baby,” he whispers, voice breaking.
Despite my best efforts not to even blink, the tears well over, slipping down my cheeks only to be thwarted by his thumbs. He brushes them away like there’s not more ready to take their place.
I can’t do this. I can’t watch Maddox’s face while I’m breaking his heart. I don’t want him watching mine while I break my own, either. My good hand wraps around his wrist, ready to pull him away from me, but he takes a deep breath and continues.
“I’m giving you the bar, and you can keep it if you want to—take up the administrative side of things until you’re ready to start working behind it again,” he says and then pauses, eyes tracing my face. “Or you can sell it, and use the money you get to leave.”
My lips part, but I don’t say a thing. I can’t think of any other moment in my life that I’ve been genuinely speechless, and honestly, I sort of thought it was just a saying, that there’d never be a time words didn’t come.
Maddox’s tears finally well over too and he grants himselfthe favor he wouldn’t grant me, pulling away from me and turning his back to wipe them.
My throat aches and I bite my bottom lip to try to keep it from wobbling, but that just makes my chin do it instead.
“You don’t gotta have an answer tonight,” he tells me, looking out his kitchen window like it’s not pitch black out there. “Think on it if you need to and then get back to me. I’ve got Bailey running the admin stuff for me temporarily, but when the guests start coming in June, she’ll have to focus on that, so…”
A month. We have one more month together at best. I swallow past the lump in my throat.
“Y-you’re just going to give it to me and let me sell it? You don’t want to sell it for yourself?” I finally ask. Maybe a part of me wants him to do just that, wants to take away this sudden ticket out of Cedar Creek he’s dropped in my lap. Leaving had been something abstract I’d been working towards for years now and I assumed I’d have months left here since I had to start all over with saving money.
Maddox’s hands curl around the edge of the counter, knuckles going white for a flash before he’s turning back around and leaning against it—the same as just a few minutes ago, but the tension is a thousand times heavier.
“I don’t want to sell it for myself, no.” His voice is quiet. I think he had to force himself to say those words. “I want to take care of you, Austin. If taking care of you means getting you out of this town, then that’s what I want to do.”
His eyes leave mine as the words settle. He pulls away from the counter, knocking his knuckles against the top of it and it occurs to me I don’t think I’ve ever seen Maddox fidget. I don’t know how he’s managing to keep it together because I’m sure as hell not. Maybe that’s why he had to look away.
I turn my back to wipe my face, giving him some privacy as well.
“Listen, I… Uh, I’m gonna sleep out here on the couch tonight. Give you some space with your thoughts, alright?”
I nod my head enough for him to be able to see the movement from behind me, chin wobbling as I squeeze my eyes shut to cut off my tears. Wiping my face is redundant when they’re flowing so much. He comes up behind me, cups my neck through my hair and kisses the back of my head. He’s still, breathing me in. For a second, I think he’s going to say more, maybe even take back the option to sell the bar, but then he’s pulling away.
I don’t see him again for three and a half months.
FIFTY-ONE
AUSTIN
“Of all the gin joints,”he says after opening his front door and leaning against the frame in that annoyingly attractive way men like to do.
I narrow my eyes at him, crossing my arms and hiding my wince. Technically, I’m not supposed to be out of my sling yet, but technically I don’t think I should be trying to sell Chase Cartwright my bar either.
“You don’t drink gin, and I’d bet Quitter’s that you don’t even know what that’s from.”
“The thing about betting is you’ve gotta have the ability to pay up if you’re wrong,” he drawls.
“Funny, that,” I say, flashing him the papers that were on the breakfast bar this morning when I woke up. Maddox had signed the bar over to me on the dotted line, and all it took was a flourish of the pen he left behind to do my part. I’d loaded my shit in my truck while he was working, and with any luck, by the time he got home tonight, I’d be long gone. I guess it depends on how long Chase intends to diddle-fart around though.
Chase squints and then opens the door wider to let me pass by into his trailer. It’s cleaner than I’d expected it to be, not that Iwas one to throw stones when it came to the cleanliness of anyone’s home.
“Mind telling me what this little visit’s about before the town starts gossiping? Not sure who’d be angrier—my girl or her brother.”
“Well, last I heard, you don’t have a girl and I’m not sure why Colt would give a fuck about Cedar Creek drama.”
