There’s nothing to celebrate. Now that Trish knows the truth, she won’t want me there. But she’ll feel obligated to keep the boss or scared that I’ll fire her. I never wanted a pity job. I wanted something of my own.
It’s all I’ll ever want.
I drive toward Nashville with no destination in mind. By the time I realize where I’m headed, I’m nearly there. I don’t know why I drove here. It’s like Sterling is a planet and I’m caught in his orbit. I can’t move away from him. I can’t find my own path. Maybe I don’t want to. Maybe I should stop fighting it.
I pull into the parking garage at Twelve and South to consider my options. I can check into the Eaton, which would be reasonable. I can call Poppy. Another rational option. I can drive around and pretend that I know where I’m going. Less rational, but still more reasonable than running to him after this morning. I turn off the car anyway.
Don’t let a day be coal, I hear mom saying. Turn it into a diamond.
Maybe that doesn’t just apply to days. Maybe it applies to people, too.
Everything in my body tells me this is the right place to be. I don’t want to trust Sterling. I don’t want to need him. But I can’t deny that he’s the only person who’s ever truly understood me. Maybe that doesn’t make us friends. Maybe some people wouldn’t call that love. It’s the only kind I’ve ever known, and right now, I need someone who sees me.
I’m nearly to the parking garage’s elevator when I remember the card in my purse. I know it’s from him, just like I knew this moment was inevitable when he showed up in the rain at my daddy’s funeral. The crash. The collision. The inescapable force that draws us together time and time again.
In the cement parking garage, the overhead lights flicker as I slip out the card.
Four simple words scrawled in familiar handwriting.
Four simple words that answer my questions. Four simple words that don’t belong to another soul. They’re ours and always have been. Sterling doesn’t need to say I love you. That’s not what mattered to us then. It’s not what matters now. Reading the card makes it easy to press the call button on the elevator. I watch every floor light up, my certainty build with each.
Zeus is at the door before I manage to knock. I can hear him whining with excitement. Sterling’s voice follows from inside, commanding him to calm down. He opens the door before I reach it. For just one moment our eyes meet, and it’s the closest I’ve ever felt to coming home.
“I knew the flowers would…” The words die from his lips when he stops to really look at me. I know he sees the tear stains on my cheeks and my red nose. I know he sees what’s under that, too. Pain and defeat and exhaustion. He’s at my side then, leading me to the couch. I sit. He stands. “What happened, Lucky?”
The story falls out of me in pieces. I don’t cry. I just speak absently, staring beyond him while trying to see a future that might never be in reach. When I finally get to the part where Malcolm tells me to get out, Sterling takes a seat next to me on the couch. Zeus lays his massive head on my knees. I’m not sure which one looks more concerned.
“You can stay here,” he says without hesitation.
“I’m not sure that’s a good idea.” I know that because I want to stay, and I don’t have the best instincts of late.
“I meant what I said earlier today. I know it came out shitty,” he adds when I startle. “I’m not taking this farther then you ask me to. What I mean is that I don’t expect anything if you stay.”
Maybe I’m an idiot, because I believe him. There’s a million reasons not to trust him. It’s stupid considering I don’t know where he’s been all these years and who he really is anymore.
And none of that matters.
Because he’s Sterling and I’m Adair and some things—even when they don’t make sense—are meant to be.
“I’m sorry,” I say in a quiet voice.
His eyebrow arches. “For what?”
“Do you want the whole list?” I ask. “It could take a while.”
He hesitates. A tempest rages in his blue eyes, pulling him in every direction. Pushing him toward me and wrenching him away. I wish I could be his calm—the safe place he seeks instead of the storm. His Adam’s apple slides drawing attention to the stubble peppering his jawline. I’ve been so busy thinking about the boy I used to know that I didn’t see the man in front of me. Now that I do, I see what I didn’t before: I see what drives him.
And it breaks my heart.
“I shouldn’t have come here. I don’t know why I came here,” I say, the words tripping on my tongue, caught in the confusion that clouds me.
“That’s what we do,” he murmurs. He’s so close that I swear I feel him on my skin even though we aren’t touching. “We run back to each other.”
We did once. We broke each other then. We rebuilt ourselves, but why? So we can destroy each other again?
I push and he pulls and we break— and maybe that’s why we’ll never fix us.
Or maybe it’s because last time, he didn’t run back. I didn’t rebuild. We’ve lived shattered lives and told ourselves it made us stronger.
“Why did you leave?” I search his face for the answer I’ve needed for years.
Sterling brushes a thumb over my lower lip. His touch is a lightning strike and there’s nowhere for me to hide. Fire ignites on contact, traveling through me
