“Are you under house arrest?” He steals a look at my dining room table. “Looks like your brain might explode if you look at another carefully laid out school plan.”
“It won’t.”
Micah pushes out his lips in thought, then says, “So, what you’re saying is that you’re not packing?”
I lift my chin and straighten my spine with a, “Yes. I’mnotpacking.”
He shrugs dismissive and casually. “Alright, sweetheart. If that’s the way you wanna do it.”
I bow my head, grateful that, for once, we don’t have to keep going back and forth about it. That I finally won an argumentfrom this country boy who took my heart and stomped on it a few times without an explanation at first. Then, when he did, I felt like a complete moron for not putting two and two together.
It’s been weeks since the Sweetheart Ball, and I broke any romantic relationship off with Thaddeus as soon as we left.
He didn’t come over to my house—he was never invited to stay anyway—and I haven’t gone out with anyone.
I can’t.
No matter how hard I try, Micah is there in my mind. The way we hit it off. How I was willing to date him under the rules we weren’t supposed to break.
“Fine,” Micah says. “But don’t say I didn’t warn you, sweetheart.”
I’m in the air and thrown over his shoulder before I can even register that he moved. My brain doesn’t pick up the three steps he took out of my house, but it does when he softly closes my door.
I begin kicking my feet. “Micah, put me downnow.”
“No, thanks.”
I’m being manhandled down my driveway within the next few seconds to be carefully placed in the front seat of his truck like the most precious thing he just acquired.
Then the door is slammed in my face.
He is kidnapping me.
25
MICAH
The BNB iscountry as hell, but I’m grateful that it doesn’t have classic roosters as the decor or a fetish with cows.
It’s a two-bedroom house, tucked at the edge of town, and far enough away that Sienna couldn’t walk home.
I kidnapped her.
And I have zero remorse for the fact, the thought, or the way I did it.
I know I hurt her, but I need some time to remind her how we were together without doors being in our way or court orders being shoved in my face by my lawyer or Laura’s.
I’m finally done with all that.
Laura is back home with herboyfriend,Paul, and I can go back to getting my damn life on track. Because she didn’t winanycustody over my son. The judge didn’t buy her pity party and condemned it as bad decision-making that she won’t be making right.
Now, my full focus is on Sienna and how I can get her to forgive me.
I’m now the new coach of Magnolia Elementary’s football team—the River Otters.
We’re changing that shit.
I’m going to be helping out a little with the baseball team, which I want to do, but it’s just a small step closer to Sienna.
