Her mouth opened. He sighed, came up to the counter. “I should have told you I was leaving long before the fight. I was afraid that ... I don’t know, that you’d get mad.”
“I would have. Idid.” Her mouth made a grim line.
“And you had a good reason. But ... the fact is, I ... I loved you, Harley. So much and I feared that if I told you then ... well, you had the power to make me stay.”
She met his gaze. “And you couldn’t stay.”
“I wanted to cast my own shadow. Not follow in my dad’s. And I wasn’t ready for that. But I never...” He shook his head. “I wish he knew I wasn’t rejecting my legacy. Or whatever.”
“No, that’s the word.”
She flipped the sandwiches, then came over to him. “Go over to the house. Say goodbye.”
His mouth opened. Closed. “No.”
“Yes. Are you kidding me? Of course you should go over there.”
Then she lifted herself up, put her arms around him, and kissed him. Not urgent. Not desperate.
As if she might be his partner, the girl who knew him, the woman who believed in him. It swept him up, and he put his arms around her and kissed her back. Not desperate but needing her.
Oh, needing her. Yes, he had a new heart, and this one had no fear of belonging to Harley Tatum.
He lifted his head when she gasped and pushed him away.
“What?”
But she’d fled to the stove and pulled the pan off the heat. “Aw. I burned the cheezers.”
“I like burned toast.”
She shook her head. “I don’t. Listen, really, go over to the house. I’ll keep the soup warm. When you get back, I’ll make more sandwiches.” She leaned a hip against the sink. “Then we’ll watch the stars. But ... you’d better behave yourself.”
“That’s a promise I can’t make there, HT.”
She grinned at him. “I hope not.”
He sighed.
She cocked her head. “What?”
“I don’t know. Just ... memories.” And unfinished conversation.
“They might surprise you,” she said softly.
His mouth tightened.
“Go. I’ll be watching.”
He frowned, then.Oh.“The light.”
“The light,” she said. “One last time.”
He laughed, despite the bittersweet taste of her words. “Lock the door behind me. I won’t be long.”
His feet remembered the way through the forest to his childhood home.
The house seemed less grand than he remembered. Two stories, with a front porch and gabled windows that overlooked the lake. The stone chimney jutted from the roof, now cold, although the front porch was cleared of snow, thanks to the local rental company. It groaned as he stepped on it, the light by the door bearing rust, a little crooked. He fixed it, then pushed the code for the lockbox by the door, retrieved the key, and went inside.