Page 56 of To Bring You Back
She pulled off her helmet, wishing he’d do the same. Instead, his head swiveled as if he were watching for photographers. The moment she’d missed at the wayside wouldn’t happen here.
Maybe it was better this way.
She stepped back with a wave and let him go.
The next day,Gannon found John studying the lake from the overlook on the cliff. Brown and gray tinged the waves under the cloudy sky. His dogs played nearby, deep in a game of tug-of-war.
Gannon took a seat on the bench that ran along the three-foot-tall wall. “This thing with Adeline’s doomed, isn’t it?”
Amusement tugged John’s expression. “Is there a thing now?”
“No.” Though he’d almost tried to start one. He’d narrowly resisted kissing her at the wayside yesterday, telling himself he had to leave her better than he’d found her. “In a few weeks, we’ll leave. Between the press, Matt, our schedule, and distance, I don’t know how it could work long term. If I start something more than a friendship, isn’t that making promises I can’t keep?”
Trigger, the gray pit bull, barked as Camo lay down, chewing on the toy they’d battled over. John stepped away long enough to throw the toy and restart the game, then returned. “You’ve got cold feet.”
“We went to the cemetery. If I’ve got cold feet, it’s from standing on a grave.”
“Stand ongrace.”
Grace and grave. A one-letter difference that could change everything—or stand between him and Adeline forever.
His phone sounded, and he scrambled to pull it from his pocket, hoping to see Adeline’s name.
John chuckled as he and the dogs wandered off.
But the caller was only Harper.
He lifted his phone and answered. “Where’ve you been?”
“Who’s this girl?” Harper sounded as if she’d opened her dressing room to find it occupied by someone else.
The “girl” had to be Adeline. His pleasure at getting to talk about her proved one more time how much of a goner he was. But with Harper, he had to be careful. He scanned the lake. “What girl?”
“This small-town mystery girl I’m looking at.”
“I don’t know what you’re looking at.” But he could guess.
Harper was addicted to gossip sites, the kinds that could get miles of copy out of one blurry photo of him and Adeline on a motorcycle.
“Adeline Green.” Harper pronounced the name as if she had to sound it out one syllable at a time. “She’s cute, I guess, if you’re into plain.”
Plain? Adeline’s silky hair could beat out Harper’s teased and heavily sprayed styles any day. Instead of makeup, all it took to bring out Adeline’s eyes was that smile he saw so rarely or a little sunlight, which highlighted her brown irises with honey.
“She’s a hot dog vendor?” Harper’s laugh rang like a wind chime. “You can’t be serious about this, Gannon.”
He put the call on speaker to search for the article, see what they’d written, and decide if he ought to warn Adeline or not. “Why does it matter to you who I’m serious about? You’ve got a boyfriend.”
“Don’t you hear anything? Colton dumped me. He wants nothing to do with me. No one does. I’m disposable to everyone.”
“Don’t talk like that.”
“What? I am. You can’t prove otherwise.”
He’d find the article later. The breakup could only be good news. Though he doubted Colton had attacked Harper since he hadn’t been on the security tape, the relationship had been responsible for many of Harper’s ups and downs. Once she got past the sting of it, maybe she’d even out.
He switched off speaker and brought the phone back to his ear. “My texts and calls prove I care, but you chose to ignore them until you got jealous.”
“Don’t pretend you mind the attention. We’ve been dancing around this for months. With Colton out of the picture, you don’t have to settle for less.”
