Page 57 of Her Hometown Man
All she had to do was turn her car around.
“I don’t know what we’re going to do when we get to Vermont,” Case told Boomer, who was happily looking out the passenger side window. He didn’t care where they were going or what Vermont was. Case had promised the dog they’d find Gwen, and he got to the ride in the truck. Boomer was happy.
Case had made itmaybetwenty minutes. The sound of her car pulling out onto the street and accelerating away had echoed through his very soul, making it hard to breathe. He’d tried to distract himself by emptying the dishwasher with the radio too loud. He’d even tried sitting on the floor and rubbing Boomer’s belly.
He’d made it twenty minutes at the most before he realized he couldn’t let her go this way. It couldn’t be over.
But he had no idea how he was actually going to find her. She had a post office box, so he couldn’t plug her address into his GPS. And he’d been in such a rush to go after her, he hadn’t thought to ask Ellen or Mallory for her address. He could call one of them from the road, but he wanted to leave that as a very last resort just in case this mad dash wasn’t enough and they really were over. It would be crushing enough without the Sutton women knowing about it.
He had a rough idea of where she lived—he knew the name of the town and that she lived on the outskirts of it—but short of going door-to-door, he wasn’t sure how he was going to find her when he got there. His best chance of avoiding somebody calling the police on him was to catch her before she turned off the primary route, but he’d had to stop for gas. Now he was trying to find a balance between going fast enough to catch her without being reckless, but he didn’t know the winding road at all.
He was almost to the bridge over the Connecticut when he spotted her car parked at what looked like the end of a dirt driveway for a farm. Putting his right arm across Boomer, he braked and took the unexpected left turn.
“Stay here for a minute, buddy,” he told Boomer, who’d had a pee stop not too many miles ago and was content to curl up on the seat.
Leaving the truck running so Boomer wouldn’t get hot and could listen to the radio, he got out and scanned the area.
His breath caught in his throat when he saw her, standing on the bridge and looking out over the river. He started toward her, not taking his eyes off of her as she took a photo. Then her shoulders lifted as though she’d taken a very deep breath and she put her phone in her pocket.
When she turned, presumably to walk back to her car, she saw him before she’d even taken the first step and froze.
He was just going to say it, he thought as he kept walking toward her. He was going to lay it all out there—everything he felt and wanted for their future—and no matter what happened after that, at least he would have tried.
There were tears in her eyes when he reached her, and he wanted to wipe them away, but he was afraid if he touched her first, he wouldn’t get all the words out.
“I’ll go with you.” He realized he’d jumped right over some important stuff to say, so after taking a deep breath, started over. “I love you, Gwen. I love you and I want to spend the rest of my life with you, and if that means spending the rest of my life in Vermont, then I’m ready. The maple syrup isn’t quite as good as ours, but other than that, it shouldn’t be too hard an adjustment. We’ll hire on a foreman for the tree service, and I can do administrative stuff from Vermont until we make a decision on what we want to do about it. And Boomer’s on board with it.”
Even though a tear had spilled over onto her cheek, she smiled. “He is, huh? Did he wag his tail extra hard?”
“Actually he was pretty mopey and when I asked if he wanted to go see you, he perked up and sprinted to the truck.”
“Sprinted, huh?”
“Okay, it was more of an enthusiastic lope, but for Boomer, it was practically a sprint.” He wiped the tear from her cheek with the pad of his thumb. “We both want to be wherever you are, no matter where that is.”
“Do you know why I was standing on this bridge?”
The question confused him for a second. “I thought maybe you were stretching your legs. I saw you taking a picture. And I was happy you stopped, to be honest, because I didn’t think you had that much of a head start and I was trying to catch you because I don’t actually know where your house is. You might want to read up on these things we have called speed limits, by the way.”
She laughed, and then she reached out and took his hand, threading her fingers through his. “I was giving myself permission to turn around.”
He started to open his mouth, but he was terrified suddenly that he was misunderstanding her. Maybe she’d given herself permission to walk back to her car and finish driving home. Or maybe she’d wanted to turn around to stop at some shop she’d talked herself out of stopping at. If shedidn’tmean that she was going to turn around and return to him, he wasn’t sure he could stand it.
“As I got closer and closer to this bridge—to crossing over into Vermont—I found myself driving slower and slower.”
“That doesn’t make me feel any better about not catching up with you sooner,” he said, because he needed to hear her laugh again. “Why were you turning around?”
“I was turning around because I’m in love with you, Case, and when I strip everything else away—my family and the annoying people in that town and the image of this life I’d built for myself—all I want is you. All I really need in this life is to be with you.”
It was starting to sink in that Gwen had been coming back to him, and he wondered if she could feel his hand shaking. “I’m willing to move to Vermont if that’s what you want. I meant that.”
She looked over the river and exhaled slowly before smiling up at him. “It means everything to me that you’ll do that.”
“I can be packed up by the end of the week.” Selling the house would take longer, but Ellen and Lane could help with that, and it wasn’t as if he’d be in Alaska.
“There were a couple more light bulb moments while I was walking around,” she said. “Obviously being in love with you was the high-wattage one, but I also like how close I am with my family again. And I like being a part of something that honors my dad, but even more, that we all built together. But mostly there’s you. I love theyouthat you are now and taking you away from Stonefield would change you.”
“Moving back to Stonefield changesyou.”
