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A small, quiet moment passed as we both seemed to register those words being said, honoring them by giving the moment time to breathe. Then, as if to punctuate it, he leaned forward, and I met him more than halfway with a soft but firm kiss.

“As I was saying,” he said, seeming to need a moment to recover and remember where he was, “we can make this thing work. We can find a way. But I don’t want that to be you quitting your job and starting something because you think that’s the only way, or because it’s what I want.”

“It isn’t,” I said. “Look, while I was sitting in that cell, I don’t know how to explain it, but, when I was sitting there, it was like a lightbulb went off in my head. A dozen lightbulbs in fact. All the lightbulbs.”

“Very bright,” he joked.

“Yes,” I said. “It was.”

“Pickle?”

“Yes,” I said, taking another pickle and chomping on it.

“Go on.”

“Right. So all these lightbulbs went off, and I realized I’d been doing the safe thing all my life. I’d been a good girl, doing good girl things forever. The only times I didn’t were with you. And you know what? Those were the only times I ever felt good. The only times I ever felt alive.

I realized that I spent so much time trying not to be my father, trying not to make mistakes and doing the safe things, that I hadn’t really lived. I’d thrown myself into work and kept my nose to the ground and not enjoyed anything life had to offer if it wasn’t a five-minute break and then getting right back to it. So I decided that I was done with that. I wanted to enjoy life like you do. I wanted tolivelife like you do.”

“Maybe not entirely like I do. I think I might need a dose of your nose to the ground-ness, honestly. I’m kind of tired of going to jail and being beaten half to death.”

“Well, yes, there is a balance,” I said. “But the thing is, I want to find that balance. I don’t want to live the life of a goody-two-shoes anymore. I want to enjoy what life has to offer. I want to take a ride on the Jesse James train and see where it takes me.”

He grinned. “As much as I like the wording of you taking that ride, I just want to make sure you know it isn’t always a smooth one. Things can get a little crazy.”

“You mean like you almost getting killed and me punching Trish Anderson in the nose so I could spend a few hours in jail?”

“Well… yeah. Actually, yeah, that’s about it.”

I smiled. “I think I’ve already bought my ticket and boarded, Jesse.”

“Fair enough,” he said. “Youreallyhit her?”

“I did.”

“How didthatfeel?”

“It feltincredible,” I laughed. “Honestly, I’ve never hit anyone before. Besides slapping Tamara one time, and I felt horrible about that. We were just kids, and she kicked me in the shin and I turned around and smacked her. She cried so hard, and I felt like the worst sister ever.”

“Lord, me and my brothers have had way worse tiffs than that. One time, Logan folded Collin into a pretzel so bad that it broke his wrist, and Collin got him back a year later by knocking him out cold when Logan said something Collin didn’t like about Mom.”

“Wait, how old were they?”

“Collin was thirty,” he laughed. “Cowboys can get rough, Charlotte.”

“I see that,” she laughed.

“So no more April Garafalo?”

I shook my head.

“No, I’m afraid she has retired,” I said. “She was a good egg, but I don’t need her around anymore. She was the representation of everything I was running away from. She was me, but not me. Me trying to be this person I never really wanted to be in the first place. But now, now I can just be Charlotte. Charlotte Garafalo. Jesse’s girlfriend.”

“I like the sound of that,” he said.

“Me too.”

“You know something?”