“Mae.”
“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” she asks.
I purse my lips as if I’m seriously reconsidering. “I’m full of excellent ideas. You should know this by now.”
She rolls her eyes, but I see the smile all over her face.
“Okay, I’ll come if the girls don’t want to do anything else,” she says.
“Hopefully they don’t,” I mumble into her neck.
“Don’t you need to get back to the ranch?” she asks.
“Want me gone already? Sorry, I’m going to be a lot harder to get rid of, stubborn.”
Mae snuggles deeper into my side, throwing her leg over mine. “No, I don’t, and I have to admit this was a pleasant surprise. But I also recognize that we have things in life we need to do.”
“It’s the worst,” I mumble looking down at her gazing up at me with her cheek on my chest. I want to say the words sitting on my tongue. But there is a little part of me that’s scared of her answer. It’s not necessarily the rejection of the thing. It’s the reality that she might not want me the same way, and I read it all wrong.
I said I’d marry her in the middle of a storm, and she smiled. I sense a lot of deep-seated fears in her, and as a man, I want to fix them or carry them however she needs. Unfortunately, I can’t do any of that for her. But I can bethe encouragement, the patience she needs while she gets there because I want her — forever.
Chapter 38
Mae
“Okay,myvoteisdrinks at the bar, and then we can shop. We have to pregame before we spend money so it won’t hurt so bad,” June says as we drive to Whipping Rivers, the next town over.
“Is this town bigger than Paxton?” I ask her.
Grace snorts. “Yeah, it’s like triple the size. They have better shopping, and more than two bars.” She tugs her hat down over her head and adjusts her sunglasses.
“Is that so no one recognizes you?” I ask her.
Her jaw ticks, and she looks out the window. “When I’m home, I’m home,” she says.
“I wonder if that one bar we went to a while ago is still doing the bottomless mimosas,” June says.
“June, it’s two in the afternoon,” I say.
Grace snorts.
“It’s five o’clock somewhere!” June sings.
I shake my head with a smile and look out the window. My mind replays earlier today and the day before on a loop.
“Are you doing okay over there?” Grace asks.
“Fine.”
She hums. “That doesn’t sound fine to me.”
I shrug. “I didn’t think I’d ever be here. I guess I’m still processing.”
“My cousin?” June asks.
“Yes, your cousin.”
She meets my eyes in the rearview mirror. Not wanting to talk about myself, I direct attention back to her.
