Jill Shalvis - Then Came You

“Don’t you?”

“No! And then when you didn’t put any money away and Mom got sick, you were wiped out with her medical bills and couldn’t go anywhere.”

He looked around. “I like this place.”

“But Mom could’ve been the one living in the Malibu Hills—”

“And she still would’ve died,” he pointed out gently.

“Yes, but it could’ve been easier,” Emily said, throat thick, remembering those lean, awful years.

“Honey.” Her dad put his hand on hers. “You take great care of me. That’s what you do, you take care of things. People. Animals. Whatever you can. I get that. You make a plan and you go for it, blinders on.”

“You’re missing my point, Dad.”

“No, you’re missing my point. I am living my dream. I’ve got two wonderful daughters, and I’m doing the work I love, and I married the love of my life. We had a great run.”

She stared at him.

He squeezed her hand. “Do you want to know why I loved Sunshine for you? Because it wasn’t on your plan. It wasn’t even on your radar. And every time I talked to you, you sounded alive.”

She sighed. “L.A. will work out, too. Even if I did treat a purple poodle today.”

“Honey,” he said in an amused tone, but there was something else there, something behind the laughter.

She was afraid it was a little bit of horror about the purple poodle, and also the knowledge that they both knew her life wasn’t exactly going as planned, L.A. or not.

“Emily, I’m happy with my choices. Can you say the same?”

She opened her mouth, and then closed it.

“If your mom taught you one thing,” he said. “It’s to follow your heart. Always. No regrets. Yes?”

Yes. But she also knew that following her heart caused pain. So much pain. She’d watched him suffer so much when her mom had been dying, had watched him grieve . . . “I didn’t follow my heart,” she admitted. “I followed my brain.”

And her calendar.

Yeah. So many regrets.

“You can change that,” he said. “It’s not too late. It’s never too late.”

“I can’t.”

“Why?”

Because Wyatt didn’t care that she was gone. Her heart squeezed hard at that, and she rose to her feet. “I’m going to get us dinner. Thai or Mexican?”

He met her gaze but didn’t answer.

“Dad, if you say follow your heart on this, I’m going to—”

“Italian.”

“Okay, then.” She and Woodrow headed back to the car. The dog jumped in, knocking her purse to the floorboard. She had to crouch down and reach beneath the driver’s seat to gather everything—

She stared down at the napkin lying there next to her purse. It was a small square napkin with the words Sunshine Bar on it, but that wasn’t what had her heart stopping.

No, that honor went to the scrawled penmanship— horrible penmanship—that she immediately recognized as Wyatt’s. The first line read:

Dear Emily,

Don’t fucking go.

That line was crossed out.

Twice.

She stared at the words, let out a choking half laugh, half sob, and covered her mouth with a hand as she read the rest, which wasn’t crossed out.

I want you to have everything you want, even if it’s not what I want. But I can’t let what I want come before what you want.

Ever.

But. . . I want you to stay. Please stay.

Love, Wyatt

She stared at it until the words blurred.

“Honey.” Her father stood in the doorway. “Your cell phone rang and I picked up. Work wants to know if you’ll go in early tomorrow.”

She tore her gaze off the note. “No,” she said. “I can’t.”

“It’s your job,” he said.

She clutched the napkin to her chest. “My job’s in Sunshine.”

Still sulking?” Darcy asked Wyatt.

They were in the front yard of the house, Wyatt and his two sisters. It had been a mandatory Saturday clean-the-yard day. He was on a mission to get as much done for them as he could, because he’d hired an architect and gotten a building permit on his land. It was going to happen.

Zoe understood.

Darcy, not so much. She was still pissed off at him. “I don’t sulk,” he told her. “And you’re the one barely talking to me. Even after you lied and said you wanted me to move out.”

“I get why you want your own place,” she said, ignoring this. “We cramp your style.”

“You cramp his style,” Zoe broke in. “I’m not the one who told Emily he wet the bed until he was twelve.”

“Five,” Wyatt said through his teeth. “Only until I was five.”

Darcy was lying flat on her back in the grass that was turning brown for winter, staring up at the sky. He nudged her foot with his.

She nudged back.

That she even could was a miracle, and he crouched at her side. “I’ll be only three minutes down the road,” he said.

“Maybe that’s not far enough.”

There hadn’t been much to smile at this week, but he smiled now. “You’re going to miss me. That’s why you’re being such a shithead.”

“I’m going to miss the lobster ravioli.”

“That’s not what I’m going to miss,” Zoe said.

They both looked at her.

“I miss you being happy,” she said to Wyatt.

His smile faded. When he’d first come back to Sunshine, he’d let the familiarity, the sense of community, fill him. He belonged here, and it felt right. That rightness had only grown as he’d worked at Belle Haven. Settled into friends and a routine. Hell, even living with his sisters had given him a sense of belonging.

And then Emily had come, and she’d been like icing on the cake. The very best part.

They’d fit. With her, everything else in his life had gotten better.

“Sucks,” Darcy said. “Falling in love.”

Yeah. Sucked hard. He hadn’t wanted Emily to leave. He’d been unnerved by the magnitude of what he’d grown to feel for her, but it was nowhere near the magnitude of how he felt about her leaving.

And yet he’d let her go. He’d let her go with nothing but a damn note.

“You should’ve told her you didn’t want her to go,” Darcy said.

“AJ has a big mouth.”

“And you’re a complete dumbass if you really let her go without a word.”

“Don’t.” He shook his head. They’d been over this. In great detail, at high decibel volumes, several nights this week already. “We’ve had this fight. We were dragged around all our lives,” he said. “I’m not going to tell her—”

“Oh my God!” Darcy burst out, and tossed up her hands. “Get over it already!”

“Just call her,” Zoe said.

“Or take the pussy route,” Darcy said. “And write her a stupid note on a stupid napkin.”

Wyatt scrubbed his hands over his face. “Not my finest moment,” he admitted.

Which didn’t matter, since Emily hadn’t responded to the note in any way. Not even when their L.A. intern had left after three days because of horse allergies.

Or, as the staff had rumored, due to Sunshine’s lack of Thai takeout.

“At least call her,” Zoe said.

It was nothing he hadn’t told himself every single moment of every single day all week. “I’m already packed,” he said. “I leave in the morning.”

Zoe blinked, and then grinned.

Darcy whooped and gave him a kick that would have knocked the feet out from beneath him, knocking him to his ass, if the sweetest sight he’d ever witnessed hadn’t suddenly appeared.

Emily’s piece of shit pulling into the driveway.

He was sitting up and straightening his glasses as Emily parked. The car was bug-ridden and covered in dust. She tumbled out, not looking much better. She had a left-side-only sunburn. Her hair looked like she’d stuck her finger in an electrical outlet, and he wasn’t sure what the mysterious stains were on her clothes. Not to mention she smelled like the inside of a 7-Eleven, but she’d never been more beautiful to him. Five cans of Red Bull fell to the sidewalk before she shut the door.

Zoe gasped at the sight of her. “Were you mugged?”

Emily stopped short and looked down at herself. “Despite what it looks like, no.”

Darcy grinned. “It’s called two days of driving.”

“Yeah. And I didn’t have the route mapped so I nearly ended up in Canada by accident when I was practicing what I was going to say instead of concentrating on the drive.”

“A speech!” Darcy said, and kicked Wyatt again. “She has a speech! Let’s hear it!”

Wyatt gave her a long look and gestured with his chin to the house.

“Oh no,” she said. “You’ve been brooding for days, you’re not going to make us leave now.”

“You’ve been brooding?” Emily asked him softly.

“Zoe,” Wyatt said.

“Yeah, on it.” Zoe grabbed Darcy and pulled her up. “We’re going to give them privacy. I realize you don’t know the meaning of the word, but—”

“Fine! Just hang on one second.” Darcy pointed at Emily. “I know he screwed up, but he is screwed up. Don’t you screw him up even worse, got me?”

Jesus. Wyatt opened the front door and shoved both his sisters inside before slamming the door. He turned back to Emily, heart pounding uncomfortably hard. “Hey.”

She came close. “Hey,” she whispered back.

He had to touch—had to—and yanked her into him. “God, you’re a sight for sore eyes.”

“You should probably know that I’m punch-drunk tired,” she said muffled into his chest, her hands fisted at the back of his shirt. “Which isn’t the same as being plain out drunk, of course.” She shoved free and gave him a long look. “Because if it was, I’d be writing what I want to say to you on a friggin’ bar napkin!”

“Is that why you’re yelling at me?” he asked.

“No, I’m yelling because I’ve had five Red Bulls!” She stopped, drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I’m yelling because you were careful to keep your feelings to yourself. I had to guess, Wyatt. Hell, I’m still guessing.”

He opened his mouth, but she poked him hard in the chest with a finger. “You showed me with your body, and okay, you showed me with your actions all damn day long, every day, but you were stingy with the words. And I needed the words!”

“I know,” he said. “I—”

“Who leaves a note under the driver’s seat? Tell me that. Who does that?”

“It didn’t start out beneath your seat,” he said. “I set it against the gearshift. It must have slipped to the floor.”

“I repeat,” she said. “Who leaves a note”—she pulled it from her pocket and waved it under his nose—“telling a woman he wants her to stay?”

“Yeah, okay, it was a really stupid idea,” he admitted. “But it made perfect sense to a drunk man.”

“Oh good,” she said, nodding. “You were drunk. I was afraid you’d paid a third grader to write it for you.” She went hands on hips. “Let me make sure I have this straight. When I was here, falling for you, hard, you didn’t say a word. When I was here, thinking that I’d finally found the first something really good in my life—” Her voice broke, which sliced at his heart as she poked him again, in case he hadn’t figured out that it was him that was the something good in her life.

He caught her hand and pulled her in again, holding tight. “Emily,” he said softly.

“Did you know?” she asked. “Did you know how I felt?”

“I knew you cared for me. I knew you wanted to be with me.”

When she tried to pull away, he held her still and met her stormy gaze. “I didn’t want to crowd you. I didn’t want to make a decision for you, or worse, dictate your plans. My hope had been that if you wanted more, you’d say so.”

“I wanted you to ask,” she said softly. “Or better yet, tell me. I wanted to hear you say it.”

“I know,” he said with real regret. “I want to make that up to you. What I don’t want is to lose you.” He tightened his grip on her, and when she did the same, he felt the knot in his chest loosen. He sank a hand into her very tangled hair and tipped her head up to his. “I missed you,” he said against her mouth. “So fucking much.”

“Yeah? So much that you were just sitting on the grass having a little chat with your sisters?” she asked.

“It was more of an intervention, and if you looked inside my truck right now, you’d see my duffle bag. I was coming to you in the morning.”