How do you walk away from a man like Maddox?From the way he looks at you like he’s already chosen you, even when he’s scared.From the quiet certainty of how right it felt when it was good between us.
You don’t, not without one last try.
The thought settles into my chest with a steadiness that surprises me.This isn’t desperation, and it isn’t hope running ahead of sense—it’s clarity.I didn’t come this far, emotionally or literally, to turn my back on the one thing that has felt true in longer than I can remember.If there’s a chance we can work through this, I owe it to both of us to find out.
I wipe my cheeks with the back of my hand and breathe slowly until my pulse evens out.Gripping the wheel, I signal and ease the car back onto the road toward Winslow Grove.
I’m choosing him.
I’m about a mile out when headlights bloom in my rearview mirror.A truck rides my speed, closer than I’d like, and my shoulders tense as I clock the shape of it.Dark.Familiar lines.
My pulse skids sideways, and I check the mirror again, heart loud in my ears.The grille is wide and squared off, the kind you don’t forget once you’ve stood beside it in a gravel drive, once you’ve watched its owner lean against the door with his arms crossed.
The truck honks once, sharp and insistent.
My breath catches somewhere in my throat.The driver lifts one hand from the wheel, slow and deliberate.
Maddox.
His name lands heavy and warm, right in the center of my chest, and my foot eases off the gas.The car slows onto the shoulder ahead, and I pull over without letting myself think too hard about what comes next.
When I cut the engine, the quiet presses in around me.Through the windshield, I can see the faint outline of Winslow Grove in the distance, the town sitting just there, patient and waiting, like it knew I’d be back.
He gets out of his truck, and I wind my window down.The cold moves through immediately, biting at my cheeks and slipping under my collar as the sound of his boots on gravel grows louder and steadier with every step.
I stay still with my palms flat on my thighs and my breath shallow.Every instinct I have tells me to brace, to rebuild the wall fast before he gets close enough to matter again.I don’t.I’ve already broken open today, and there’s no putting me back the way I was, so I let him come.
He appears beside my window with his shoulders hunched against the cold and his jaw set, and he looks exhausted but determined.Like a man who made a decision and chased it down before it could get away, or maybe that’s what I want to see.
He braces one hand on the roof of the car and dips his head toward the open window.The familiar pull of him is almost enough to undo the last of my composure.
“You weren’t supposed to leave like that.”There’s no accusation in his tone, no anger—just the truth, laid bare between us in the cold.
Something loosens in my chest.“I wasn’t supposed to stay either.”
His gaze drops to my mouth and then lifts to meet my eyes.“I couldn’t let you go without trying.Not again.”
Not again.
His admission has me pushing the car door open and stepping onto the gravel.
“You came after me.”It’s a silly thing to say.Obvious, but I need to hear him confirm it out loud.
He nods once.“Yeah.”
“Say what you need to say, Maddox.”
“Before anything else, I need you to hear me when I say I’mhere.”He doesn’t look away, doesn’t shift or hedge, and it isn’t until I give him a small nod—until I let him see I’m receiving it—that he continues.“I read it.”
“What?”
“The article you said you were submitting.”
The following silence is fragile enough I’m almost afraid to breathe through it.
His gaze bores into me.“You didn’t think I’d believe you.That you’d ever get me to understand how the story needed to be told.”Something honest and tired moves through his voice.
“I just—I couldn’t make you hear me.Not in that moment.”The words leave me hollowed out, scraped clean of everything but the uselessness of having tried.