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)
I blinked.
And that blink must have said exactly what I was thinking—no, I don’t want to talk to you—because he rushed out, breathlessly, “I came to see you.”
It only took him nearly two years, I thought and just about laughed.
Two years later and he was here. Here! God bless America! I should be so lucky!
I knew better now than I had even six months ago that life was way too short for this shit.
I tried my best not to make a face; I wanted this over. “So did your mom, and I told her I have absolutely no interest in seeing or talking to either of you ever again. I meant it. I meant it then, I mean it now, and I’m going to mean it years from now. We aren’t friends. I don’t owe you anything. The only thing I want to do is go inside,” I explained about as calmly as I possibly could.
Kaden’s head jerked back, looking genuinely wounded. I had to fight not to roll my eyes. “We aren’t friends?”
I didn’t know what it said about me that I almost laughed at how ridiculous this conversation was. I’d been through so much and this… this was so stupid. “I’m going to say this without the intention of wanting to hurt your feelings, because I just don’t care enough to even bother doing that, but yes, we aren’t friends. We stopped being friends a long time ago. We’re never going to be friends again, and honestly, I don’t know why you’re here after this long. Like I told your mom, there is nothing I want to hear from either of you.”
“But I—”
I cut him off. “Don’t.”
“But—”
“No,” I said. “Listen. Let me live my life in peace. I’m happy. Go be happy or don’t be happy. It’s none of my business anymore. I don’t care. Leave. Me. Alone.”
Kaden Jones, Country Music Star of the Year twice in a row a decade ago, frowned in a way that reminded me of a little boy as his features formed into a stunned expression. “What?”
How could he manage to still act surprised? What did he expect? Just when I didn’t think anything could shock me anymore, it happened.
Today had been a pretty good day after a string of pretty shitty ones, and I wasn’t going to let it go to hell.
“You heard me, Kaden. Go home. Go back on tour. Go do whatever it was you were doing before you came here. I don’t want to talk to you. I don’t care to see you. There’s nothing you can say or do that will get me to change my mind. I meant it, all of you need to leave me alone. I’ll take you, your mom, and everyone you know to court if you don’t let me live my life in peace.”
It was like he remembered his bodyguard was watching, or maybe he cared that Rhodes was seeing this happen, but Kaden’s pale face flushed in anger and embarrassment. He took a step closer, gaze wide, looking damn near desperate for the first time ever. “Roro, you can’t mean that. I’ve been trying to reach you for months.”
For months. It had been months since he had last messaged me. Months since they found out where I was, and he was just barely getting around to come and see me? Didn’t that just say more than any of his words ever could?
Rhodes’s hand rubbed at my upper arm, and I glanced up to see him looking at me with an extremely blank face.
“I’ve been trying and trying.” Kaden kept talking as Rhodes’s mouth twisted down at me a little. “I fucked up. I know I did. It’s the biggest mistake of my life. Biggest mistake of anybody’s life.”
One corner of Rhodes’s mouth went up just a little.
Hadn’t those been his exact words?
“I miss you. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I’ll spend the rest of my life making it up to you,” Kaden pleaded, genuinely sounding heartfelt.
But his words were going in one of my ears and out the other, especially when Rhodes was looking at me the way he was looking at me.
“Please. Please, talk to me. You can’t throw away fourteen years. You can’t. I’ll forgive you. None of this has to matter. We can put it all behind us and forget about it. I can forget you being with somebody else.”
Only then did Rhodes’s little smile disappear at the same time his head lifted and his gaze landed on my ex.
Rhodes was in his old Levi’s, this crazy cute zip-up wool sweater that Amos’s aunt had given him for Christmas that was maroon, and dark gray boots. He hadn’t even bothered with a jacket, but there was one in the car. And he was the best-looking man I’d ever seen as he reared up to his full height, holding onto me just as tight as ever, and said in that voice of his, “She’s going to be forgetting someone, and it’s not going to be me.”