Page 100 of The Lilac River

"No," Nash said, cutting me off gently. "That’s not true. We should have. We just should’ve done it with a little more... reverence."

His voice dipped into something broken and tender. "You deserved more than a table and regret."

"But it’s been ten years," I said, my heart hammering. "We’re not who we were."

"Exactly," he said with certainty. "We’re better. Stronger. Smarter. You’ve lived. I’ve raised a daughter.

And through it all, Lily, I’ve never stopped wondering what it would’ve been like to still have you."

He reached for my hand, both of his encompassing mine, and I forgot how to breathe. The warmth of his skin anchored me. His thumb slid along my wrist, slow and steady, and a hundred old memories flooded me. Him rubbing nettle stings from my skin when we were sixteen and went hiking one weekend. Holding ice to my ears after cheap earrings made my lobes swell. All the tiny ways he used to take care of me without asking, without expecting anything back.

He was doing it again now. Taking care of me. Like breathing.

"What I mean," he said quietly, "is that I want to see what we can be. Now. Not what we were. What we are."

I swallowed hard, my heart threatening to beat straight out of my chest. "What if it doesn’t work?"

"Then we deal," he said without hesitation. "But I’d rather fail trying with you than spend the rest of my life wondering."

He shifted onto his knees in front of me, his hands sliding up to cradle my face. His touch was reverent, trembling with the kind of tenderness that could break a person open.

"I want to try, Lily," he whispered, forehead almost resting against mine. "Please tell me you want to try too."

Tears stung my eyes. "I was pretty bad at the marriage thing," I whispered. "What if I’m just bad at love?"

His jaw clenched, his eyes fierce and unwavering. "You’re not. You just gave your heart to the wrong man." His thumb brushed along my cheekbone. "But I’m not him, Lily. And you...you've always been the one."

God. He was breaking me with his tenderness, piece by piece, until there was nothing left but the truth.

"Yes," I whispered. "I want to try."

The look on his face was like I’d handed him a whole galaxy. He leaned in, just about to kiss me, to seal it all, but I stopped him with a hand pressed to his chest.

"If we do this," I said shakily, "we can’t let your dad know."

Confusion clouded his face. "My dad? Why?"

I hesitated, heart pounding painfully against my ribs. "We may need a drink for this," I said quietly.

And as I walked to the kitchen, the warmth of Nash’s touch still buzzing along my skin, I wondered if telling him the truth would break us before we ever really began. Returning with the hard liquor we needed, I closed my eyes, not able to look at himwhile I said the words, and the memory felt like a punch to the gut.

Ten years ago

I was tiptoeing through the mud, sneakers squelching on the wet grass as I slipped out the side door of the Miller ranch house. The sun hadn’t even lifted over the lavender fields yet, the world muted to misty purples and hushed blues. Fog rolled like breath over the hills, softening the edges of the barn and fencing, cloaking the world in a gentle hush that felt deceptively safe.

I wasn’t supposed to stay the night. Mom was on a night duty at the hospital, and Nash didn’t want me to be alone. The neighbors were nosy, though, so I stayed at the ranch. With him.

He’d kissed me, whispered that he loved me, told me to have fun at Grandma’s. He’d said he couldn’t wait to see me Sunday. Like it was just a normal weekend. Like we had all the time in the world.

Having left him sleeping, I wasn’t sneaking because I had something to hide. But the heavy tread of boots behind me told me someone didn’t believe that.

“Running off so early, Lily?”

The voice stopped me cold. It wasn’t loud. It didn’t have to be.

I turned, breath catching in my throat. And there he was, Nash’s dad, Michael Miller, leaning against the fence post like he’d been waiting just for me. His silhouette was cut sharp against the morning haze, coffee mug dangling lazily from his fingers, smile razor-thin and mean.

The kind of smile that told you he’d already made up his mind.