‘Listen to me, okay? I love that woman – she’s a sister to me, more. But believe me when I say that she needs to sort this out herself. You can tell her until the end of time that she’s not this awful, undeserving person she seems to think she is, but she needs to see it for herself.’ She stopped, her voice growing thin for a moment, Cole frowning in concern. ‘I think . . . no, Iknow, she feels more for you than she’s saying and that with some time apart she might just realize it.’
Drawing a breath, I braced myself against the truck with one hand.
‘I love her, Lottie,’ I rasped, bowing my head to the floor, hating the pain in Cole’s face on my behalf. ‘I can’t let her walk away.’
‘And we love you, Jesse,’ she countered, her voice hardening. ‘This is the moment where we need to protect you, okay? If Hestia is going to fucking self-destruct, or see the truth, she needs to do it alone. I know you love her, but that’s exactly why you’ve got to let her get on that plane.’ She drew in a sharp breath, as if steadying herself. ‘Believe me, it’s just as hard for me to say as it is for you to hear.’
Cole finally took the phone back and off speaker phone, turning as he spoke to Lottie in low tones for a moment before hanging up.
Still leaning on the truck, I let her words sink in, hearing the sense in them. Hating it. Hating it as much as I loved Hestia.
‘Jesse.’
I turned to see Cole, resignation on his face and truck keys in hand, holding them out to me, waiting.
‘Just take the damn truck. I know Lottie’s making sense, but if that was her going to the airport, I’d fucking hate the guts of anyone trying to stop me. I don’t want that between us. So just call me if you need me, okay?’
Swallowing hard, I nodded, took the keys and jumped in.
Grateful that the whole town – and most of their cars – were inside the rodeo, I quickly wove my way out and onto the highway, pushing Cole’s truck hard.
But, in the quiet of the cab, Lottie’s words replayed on a loop. The longer I drove, the more they made sense, the feeling deep in my gut confirming that Hestia wasn’t going to let me in until she could stop hating on herself.
I could love and protect her as much as I wanted from the outside, but she was the only one who could really let me inside. And right now, she wasn’t ready.
As I thought it over and over, the truck slowed. I eased my foot on the gas as the airport came into view, imagining bursting in there and following her through, trying to persuade her to stay in a damn airport lounge . . .
It wouldn’t work. Lottie was right.
Barely coasting now, I forced myself to keep it together, rolling slowly into a space at the far end of the lot overlooking the runway.
That’s where, not more than an hour later, head in my hands and heart fucking numb, I watched her plane take off.
CHAPTER18
HESTIA
It wasn’t until I reached Denver on the smaller plane that I had officially cried myself out. Every time I thought it was under control, something would echo through my mind – Lottie’s cool stare as she told me I just wasn’t choosing this, that I was lying to myself. Or the raw, unfiltered pain in Jesse’s face as he realized I wasn’t choosing him either, that I was about to walk away from us with no knowing when or if I could return.
Even knowing that he loved me, needed me.
Gritting my teeth to it as I settled into my seat for the much longer leg back to London, headphones on, I’d almost made it when one of Jesse’s favourite tracks began playing.
After weeks of country music slowly trickling through my playlists, my music app was now suggesting more – and this one, ‘Something in the Orange’, was one Jesse had played many times in his truck.
It hit me like a brick to the chest as a sudden onslaught of vivid detail washed over me. All of the times leading up to now when I’d felt the love he’d just declared, in his touch, the way he kissed me like it was something heneeded. I realized I knew it, recognized the feeling so easily, because it was everything I needed too.
And for the sake of Cal, someone I knew now had never even come close to meaning anything like Jesse to me – for a business I’d run away from in the first place, unable to bear the thought of working alongside his chaos – I’d just thrown away the one person that I’d ever really, truly fallen in love with.
Curling myself into the window, I covered myself with the blanket and sobbed in silence, only stopping as exhaustion took over long after we’d taken off. An uneasy, dream-laced sleep followed as I crossed the ocean that now lay between us.
Arriving back in London among the grey skies, the soft patter of rain on the train windows as we sped from west to east, I felt numb. Everything felt small and enclosed, from the heavy clouds overhead to the narrow roads and tiny cars – not a Ford pick-up truck in sight. The sheer volume of people crowded onto the tube was suddenly claustrophobic, their glances at my clothes – my cowboy boots, Wranglers edged with rodeo dust, and cowboy hat on my lap – making me feel as though I’d landed from another planet.
Sighing, I buried myself in opening some of the messages that’d come through since I’d landed. There were four from Lottie. My heart fluttered at the thought of her at home right now, maybe even prepping coffee or having breakfast with Jesse.
I miss you already.
I’m sorry if I was harsh before. I just thought, somehow, you might just stay for good. I know it’s stupid but I thought my Hallmark movie life might just extend to you too.
