But I’d be lying if the idea of being spontaneous didn’t sound appealing.
“You won’t regret this,” Collie tells me, smiling wide and bright. “Time to stay wild. Wyoming, here we come.”
Will I, though? Will I regret this? That seems to be my life’s biggest question.
7
EASTON
Ridge
Gonna need you to claim proof of life, brother. First, you call off the wedding on your wedding day. Then, you hightail it out of Nashville without a word. Wtf??
You know I couldn’t do it. It wasn’t right. Don’t worry. I feel like shit enough for the both of us.
Ridge
I’m just fucking with you, East. You have everyone worried.
Just cover for me for a while. Syd knows where I’m going. We talked. I can’t handle anything more than that right now.
Ridge
I got you. Take care of yourself. Hope you find what you’re lookin’ for.
Yeah.Me too, Ridge. Me too.
I should have expected my best friend to be the first person I’d actually respond to. He’s like a brother to me. We work together day in and day out. He’s the one dude I know has my back.
If only he knew what I just got myself into. Why I invited a stranger I’ve never met on what was supposed to be my honeymoon is beyond me.
My honeymoon. It’s wild how fast life can shift.
One minute, I was engaged to be married to Sydney. My childhood best friend and my dead brother’s girl. And the next, I’m hightailing it through the vineyard, only to tell her I can’t marry her.
I wanted to fucking flee the state and not talk to anyone, but I owed it to her.
Owed it to him.
Now, here I am. In a side-by-side with the random woman I met at the airport, heading to the place we’ll staytogetherfor the next two weeks.
Collie Meadows.
She’s a lost girl with a striking amount of charisma and beauty. A woman who, years ago, I would have only dreamt of being alone with. Still might if it weren’t for my personal turmoil.
I know I have a handful of people to answer to when I get back to Salt Hollow. So many plans have now been tarnished at my hands. While I would typically be doing everything I can to mend those fences, I don’t feel the slightest bit of guilt toward any of them.
It’s to my brother that my guilt lies. Even though I know he’d beat the living shit out of me for feeling this way. Just like I know if I could just get myself to read the letter he left for me in his last days, I’m sure I’d find him either threatening my life if I ever touch Sydney or threatening my life if Ileave her high and dry. Either way, I know I’m fucked. But I can’t do it. The neatly sealed paper is tightly folded in my wallet, waiting for the day I grow a pair and face his truth.
But I still need time to process the dumpster fire that is my life. Process the fact that I chose to go against my promise to him and put myself first for once. I’d like to think Ben would respect that, but I can also imagine him kicking my ass next to the big guy upstairs.
Hating me for not being a man of my word.
But what happens when our word becomes an anchor to our death? Life is too fucking short. Too short to be married to someone I never loved, all for someone who isn’t here. Hell, I’ve spent the past two years we were together practically celibate, all because every inch of her felt likehis.
Not to mention, it was the farthest thing from what I want.
What would it have been like to be married to a woman I never intended to touch intimately again?
