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She smiled. “Kind of, but…”

“But what?”

He sounded so worried that she had to be honest with him. “It’s okay, I didn’t mean anything bad by it. What I didn’t know if I should say is that you going too fast and coming on strong isn’t scaring me off. What I’m worried about is getting too caught up in it. You already know how I feel about you, Tanner. That’s not the issue.”

“I get it. Ashton comes first. We can slow things down. Take our time. But you need to know that I’d like to meet him as soon as you think the time’s right.”

“Thanks.”

He chuckled. “No, thankyou. Thanks for giving me another chance.”

“I wish you’d stop saying that. If you think about it, you didn’t do a damn thing wrong.I did. I should have told you sooner. And really, my dad was the one who brought things to a head. If he hadn’t shown up the way he did, I would have told you.”

Her heart sank. She was so caught up in this that she’d somehow forgotten – even before her dad had shown up, she’d gone to the ranch to say goodbye to him because she had to come home.

“Mind if I ask you something?” he asked.

“Sure.”

“Would you really have told me about Ashton? I went up to Remington Ranch after you left. They said you’d checked out in the morning. Were you planning on going home anyway?”

She blew out a sigh. “Yes, I was. My mom needed to go to Hawaii, and I needed to get back here for Ashton.”

He was quiet for a long few moments.

“And yes, I’m not going to hide anything else from you – I’ve learned my lesson about that – when I came to see you, I was coming to say goodbye.”

“I figured as much. Listen, Everly, don’t let me talk you into something that you don’t want. Just because I…”

“But that’s the thing – Idowant to see where things can go between us. It’s just that I’m a practical soul at heart, and I have Ashton to think about. I didn’t think it was going to be easy to say goodbye to you, I just thought that it was for the best all around.”

“Do you still think that?”

“No. It might seem like the sensible thing to do but I don’t want to.”

“Okay then. I don’t want you to say goodbye. I want to see what we can do to move this thing forward. I… Fuck it! At the risk of making you think that I’m a crazy man, I’m going to tell you. I’m already falling for you, Everly. In some ways, we barely know each other – as we’ve already proven. But I feel like I know who you are in your heart, and who you are is right for me. I get that you’ll need to figure out if I’m right for you, and if I can be right for Ashton.”

She sniffed and swiped her thumbs under her eyes to catch the tears that were falling.

“Shit! Are you crying? I didn’t make you cry, did I?”

She chuckled. “It’s okay, they’re not sad tears. I just… What you said? It means the world.”

“I don’t know which bit you mean, but I didn’t say any of it for effect. It’s all true.”

“It’s alright. I know.”

“Good. So, what’s he like?”

She laughed. “Ashton? That was an abrupt change of subject.”

“Yeah. I figure we’ve waded through enough deep stuff for tonight. I want to know all about the little guy. What’s he like?”

“He’s a wonderful little person. I mean, I’m biased, of course, but he really is. He’s not a rough and tumble kind of boy. He’s on the quieter side – although, he has his moments. He likes to read. He’s kind of small for his age and he looks a bit skinny – although I have no idea why. I’ve never known a kid who can put away as much food as he does.”

She held her breath when Tanner laughed. If he made a joke about her precious son, this might all be over before it started. Ashton had been bullied by bigger kids in the past who called him things like weak, and puny. She bristled, prepared to defend him against whatever Tanner might say.

“And I was worried that we wouldn’t have anything in common. I used to get called the runt at school. I was lucky that I had Ford and Wade around. I was the shortest, skinniest kid in my class when I was small. And that’s not a good thing when you go to school with big, brawny farm kids.”