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He crinkles his brow at me in question.

“You said this is your second favorite place in the world.”

He grins at me and holds me tighter. “Right here with you in my arms, that’s my favorite place in the world, baby.”

I wish time would pause. That I could stay right here, in this barn, wrapped in him and this golden light and the scent of music and memory and everything that feels too big to name.

He turns me gently, his arms sliding around my waist.

“I know we don’t have much time,” he says, brushing my hair back behind my ear. “But I want to share this with you.”

“You already are,” I whisper, cupping his jaw, my thumb sweeping across the stubble there. “Every second I get with you… I feel it.”

He kisses me—soft and slow and full of things neither of us are ready to say. My hands curl into his shirt, holding him there, not ready to let him go.

Not yet.

Not ever.

Eddie pulls away from our kiss and brushes a thumb across my lower lip, lingering for a second like he wants to memorize the feel of me. Then he steps toward the wall where one of his acoustic guitars rests on a stand, lifting it with practiced ease and settling onto the stool in the middle of the room like he’s done it a thousand times.

But this time—this time—he’s only playing for me.

The studio feels even quieter now. Like the air is holding its breath.

He strums once—low, warm, resonant. The sound seems to hum in my chest, wrapping around my ribs. Then he looks up at me through those long lashes, mouth twitching into the faintest smile.

“This one’s kind of new,” he says. “Rough around the edges.”

“Like you,” I tease softly.

He gives me a look, but he’s smiling.

And then he starts to play.

The first song is slow, aching. A sweet country ballad laced with yearning and something softer underneath—loss maybe, or hope. His voice is low and gravelly, rich as molasses, and it pulls me under.

I sink to the rug near the base of the stool, cross-legged, watching him with my chin in my hand. He doesn’t perform it like he would on stage. This is something else—intimate, stripped down, every lyric landing like a whisper only I’m meant to hear.

The chorus slides over me like warm rain: “I’d chase you down a backroad / with your name burned in my mouth / give up every song I’ve ever sung / if you’d just turn around.”

I forget to breathe.

When he finishes, the silence rings louder than the music. I don’t say anything, just sit there blinking like I’ve just woken from a dream. Eddie looks at me for a moment, something unreadable in his eyes, then clears his throat and shifts.

“Okay,” he says, suddenly bashful, “now one with a little more dirt under its boots.”

He launches into something brighter—still country, but playful, faster. The chords bounce with rhythm, and I can’t help but grin as he sings about whiskey-drenched kisses and losing bets on love, throwing a wink in my direction as he strums.

“She rolled into town in a t-shirt and thunder / had me down in two flat, head full of wonder…”

It’s charming and cocky and unmistakably him.

And still, it’s so damn good.

By the time he strums the final chord, my cheeks hurt from smiling. I push myself up from the rug, my heart thudding in a way that feels a lot like falling.

I meet his gaze across the room, both of us wrapped in the stillness that follows music when it’s left something behind.