Total pages in book: 196
Estimated words: 186555 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 933(@200wpm)___ 746(@250wpm)___ 622(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 186555 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 933(@200wpm)___ 746(@250wpm)___ 622(@300wpm)
“All I have left are a few notebooks, but Kaden took all the best stuff.” I swallowed. “That’s the only reason why he and his family kept me around for so long. Because I could help them, and I couldn’t bear to go through that again.” I shook my head. “All those songs… they were about my mom. You’d be surprised how easily you can turn just about anything into a love song. I wrote them when I missed her the most. When my heart felt like it couldn’t keep beating much longer. The best things I ever wrote were while I was hurting, and decent stuff came while I was happy, but it’s all gone now. All of it. I don’t know if it’s ever going to come back. Like I said, I’m fine with it, but I don’t want anyone else to be let down. Especially not you two.”
Their eyes were wide.
“And I wasn’t leaving-leaving. I was only planning on spending the night. All my stuff is still over there, silly,” I admitted, looking at Rhodes too, who was staring over like I’d magically disappear. “I thought I screwed up and you both weren’t going to want me around anymore, or at least not for a while. I was sad, but I know it was my fault, that’s all.”
I pressed my lips together, feeling the tears pool in my eyes, and lifted a shoulder. “I keep losing the people I consider my family, and I don’t want to lose you guys, too. I’m sorry.”
Rhodes dropped his hands about halfway through me talking. Just as I was finishing, those big, booted feet led him over, and from one blink of an eye to another, he was crouching in front of me, his face right there, those intense eyes boring a hole straight into me. Two hands I didn’t see coming were on my cheeks before I could react, keeping me there as he said in a voice rougher than I’d ever heard, “You’re mine. Just as much as Am is. Just as much as anybody will ever be.”
A tear slid down my cheek, and he wiped it off, his eyebrows dropping low.
“You are a part of us,” he said gruffly. “I told you before, didn’t I?” One of the hands on my cheeks moved, and he took my earlobe between his fingers. “I don’t know how anybody would let you walk away, and it isn’t going to be me. Not today. Not tomorrow. Not ever. Are we clear?”
I leaned forward and let my forehead drop to his shoulder, the weight of his words settling around me. The hand he had on my ear fell away and dropped to my back. He stroked it.
His breath tickled my ear as he whispered, “I’m not some rich guy, Buddy. I’m never going to be... I can’t imagine what you were used to—no, don’t start shaking your head, I know now that I had time to think about it, that that doesn’t matter to you… but I’ve got a lot more I can give you than that moron ever did. I know it. You do too. No, don’t cry. I can’t stand it when you cry.”
“You’re using your bossy voice again,” I said into his shirt as more tears slid out of my eyes, and I swore some went down my throat, and it was okay because those arms of Rhodes’s closed around my body and pulled me into his chest. Into him.
His voice dropped. “I’m sorry I was jealous. I don’t give a shit about your money or your notebooks or if you never write a single word down again.” Rhodes’s arms tightened around me, and I was pretty sure all of the muscles in his upper body did too as his voice got even more quiet. The soft puff of his breathing tickled my ear as he whispered, “We love you—I love you—because you’re mine. Because being around you is like being around the sun. Because seeing you happy makes me happy, and seeing you sad makes me want to do anything I have to to get that look off your face.
“I want you to come home. I don’t want you thinking these things that aren’t true at all, about us not wanting you around or wanting you to be with us for the wrong reasons. You matter, angel, and I want you here with us. You decided, remember? You don’t get to change your mind anymore. I’m not your ex, and you don’t get to leave. We go through things together, we don’t give up on one another, and not over something like this. Isn’t that right?”
I nodded against him, swallowing back my tears before sliding my arms around his neck. He kissed my forehead and cheek, the stubble on his chin rubbing my face in a way I loved.