The trust makes me feel even worse about the lying.
After dinner, Wade and Tucker start clearing plates while Sierra and Marley make coffee. Colt and Harper disappear onto the porch, and I can hear them laughing about something. Emma begs Boone to tell her a story about one of the horses, and Nicole settles in to listen too.
It's so family-oriented. So completely foreign to someone who spent the last two years alone in a series of increasingly depressing apartments.
"Want some air?" Rhett asks quietly, and I nod gratefully.
We slip out the back door onto a smaller porch that overlooks the darkening fields. The temperature has dropped significantly, and I wrap my arms around myself. The sky is enormous here, stars already beginning to appear in the twilight.
"I'm sorry," Rhett says immediately. "I know that was hard. They ask a lot of questions."
"They're nice," I say, because they are. "Really nice. Which somehow makes the lying worse."
He leans against the porch railing, his profile sharp against the fading light. "I know. I feel like shit about it too. But I didn't know what else to do. Telling them the truth right away..."
"Would make us both look insane," I finish. "I get it. I do. It just feels wrong."
"Everything about this feels wrong," he admits. "But also... maybe right? I don't know. Is that crazy?"
I look at him. He's objectively handsome, with strong features and kind eyes. But more than that, he seems genuine. Uncertain and scared and clearly out of his depth, but genuine. He's not trying to be someone he's not. He's just trying to figure this out, same as me.
"I don't think it's crazy," I say. "Or if it is, we're both crazy together."
He turns to face me fully, and in the dim porch light I can see the vulnerability across his face. "Are you okay? Really? Because if this is too much, if you want to leave—"
"I have nowhere to go," I interrupt, then immediately regret the honesty. "I mean—"
"I know what you mean." His voice is gentle. "And I'm not trying to trap you here because you have no options. I'm just...I'm trying to offer you a real choice. A real chance at something different."
"I know you are." I swallow hard against the lump in my throat. "And I'm grateful. I just don't know if I'm strong enough to keep up this lie for however long it takes."
"We don't have to decide everything tonight," Rhett says. "We just have to get through tonight. Then tomorrow. One day at a time."
One day at a time. It's what my father used to say when things got hard. *Just focus on today, Claire-bear. Tomorrow will take care of itself.*
"Okay," I agree. "One day at a time."
The back door opens, and Mason sticks his head out. "Coffee's ready if you want some. Fair warning: Colt made it, so it's basically paint thinner."
"Hey!" Colt's voice comes from inside. "My coffee is fine!"
"Your coffee could strip rust," Harper calls back.
Rhett looks at me, a question in his eyes. I nod. We can go back inside. We can sit with his family and drink terrible coffee and pretend everything is normal.
Because maybe if we pretend long enough, it'll become true.
We head back in, and Nicole immediately pats the couch cushion next to her. "Sit with us. Colt's about to tell the story about the time he got his head stuck in a fence, and it's comedy gold."
"I was eight," Colt protests. "And I maintain that fence was poorly designed."
"You tried to squeeze through a gap designed for chickens," Boone says dryly.
"In my defense, I really wanted to see what was on the other side."
I settle onto the couch between Nicole and Rhett, accepting a mug of coffee that does indeed smell like it could fuel a rocket ship. The room is warm and loud with friendly bickering, and despite everything—the lies, the fear, the uncertainty—I feel something I haven't felt in years.
Safe.
