Page 41 of Untruly With You

“Let’s just get home.” She’s about to object, so I add, “I promise I’ll let you doctor me up there. For now, there might be napkins in the jockey box.”

She finds only one napkin, and my blood quickly saturates it after only a minute against my head. Fearing I’ll stain the truck’s headrest, I yank my shirt over my head, balling it upbefore handing it to Laine. She tries to protest, but I insist. “It’s an old shirt. Don’t worry about it.”

“You’re sure you’re alright?” Laine asks, scooting to the middle of the bench seat so she can keep my shirt planted firmly against the back of my head. She uses just enough pressure to keep the mess contained and bleeding under control without hurting me. Her other hand presses against my bare chest, as if she’s afraid I’ll fall into pieces if she doesn’t physically hold me together.

She spends the entire drive like that, her eyes never leaving me aside from the few times her gaze flicks down to my torso. Each time, her face looks a shade pinker.

“You look beautiful,” I whisper as we near the end of our drive.

Laine scoffs. “You must have hit your head harder than I realized.”

18

LAINE

“When didyou first realize you liked Sutton?” Frankie asks from behind the sound desk.

“I’m supposed to be the one asking the questions, remember?” I glance at Frankie from under my eyelashes. Fake relationship or not, my skin flushes at the mention of Sutton. “Why did you want to buy the radio station?” I ask, desperate to focus on work.

Frankie drums her fingers along with the rhythm of the song playing. “I never thought I would buy it,” she explains. “I don’t know if I even trulywantedto. But you remember Clive?”

I nod, thinking back to the old, weathered man who was working at the station earlier.

“His wife’s family started the radio station, and his wife took it over. After she passed, Clive tried to run it himself. He was old, though, and was having a hard time learning the ins and outs. I was working at U of M’s student radio station, so when I heard what happened, I offered to work at Clive’s whenever I was home. Eventually, Clive told me he was going to sell the station. It was hard to find anyone who wanted torun a station in a tiny town. He was going to settle for selling the transmitter to a bigger station, maybe one in Missoula that could use it to broaden their reach.” Frankie’s face twists.

“And you didn’t want that to happen?”

“No,” she says, nearly a gasp. “The station is forWest River, not for the big city.”

I try not to laugh at the thought of Missoula, Montana—population seventy-five thousand—being “the big city.”

“We broadcast things like the school lunch menu, birthdays, community events, lost and found. It’s all about the locals,forthe locals. It ties the community together, keeps us close-knit. I couldn’t stand to see us lose that.”

“What did you major in at U of M?”

Frankie grins and says proudly, “I got my Bachelor of Arts in Music with an emphasis on Composition.”

“You didn’t want to be a rancher like your father? Or teach dance like your mom?”

“My mom had me in dance from the time I was two all the way up to my high school graduation. But we both knew I cared a lot more about mixing tracks for the recital than actually dancing in it. And while I love being on the ranch part-time—a bit more than part-time with everything going on lately…” Her voice trails. She shakes her head, her expression dropping for a split second before she repaints a wide smile across her cheeks. “Anyway, I need a bit more creativity in my life than the ranch alone can offer. So now, I live the best of both worlds and split my time between the station and the ranch.”

I nod, jotting down interview notes. “Do you still compose your own songs?”

Frankie narrows her gaze. “On the record, you can say something poetic like ‘songwriting will always have a piece ofmy heart.’ But off the record, no. I haven’t been able to write anything since breaking up with Caleb.”

She says his name as if I’m supposed to know who that is, but I just raise my eyebrows.

“Sutton never told you about my ex?” After I shake my head, Frankie clarifies. “Caleb Carter?”

“I don’t think so…”

“And the name doesn’t sound atallfamiliar?”

I’m drawing a blank. “Should it?”

Frankie laughs, and her freckled nose crinkles. “As if I couldn’t love you more. You have no idea how refreshing this is. Okay, still off the record, I dated this guy, Caleb Carter, all throughout high school and half of college. We started a band together. Well, convinced he was the one with all the ‘star power,’ he put our songs—which I wrote, by the way—out himself. One went viral, even hit number one on the country charts, and he took all the credit. And now, he’s one of the most popular up-and-coming country artists.”

“You’re kidding!” It’s hard to think about anyone being able to do Frankie wrong.

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