her heart was knocking around in her chest as if it was trying to get away. “But...but. You can’t. The BSLS says you have to be dating someone for a minimum of six months before that can come up.”
He lifted her hand to his mouth and kissed it. “Honey, we both know I’ve been a fool about that. The BSLS is just B.S.”
She’d kind of thought that herself, but... “No, Baxter. Please don’t say that. Please don’t say any more of this.”
“You don’t feel anything for me?”
She felt so much that it scared her. But this wasn’t pretend time, this wasn’t fantasy. “Addy March doesn’t get the golden guy,” she whispered.
“Not so golden,” he replied. “Think about it. I don’t have a job, I don’t know what my future holds. I only have wishes. That you care for me. That you might be in love with me, too. That you’ll let me start my adventure by going to Paris with you.”
Paris with her! She closed her eyes at the thought and images flashed through her brain. Hand in hand on city streets. Holed up in the back row of a dark cinema. A sidewalk café table for two. Swallowing hard, Addy opened her eyes. “Do you speak French?”
He shook his head. “Can’t even claim that. I’ll have to rely on you.”
“Baxter.” She was whispering again, as if a normal voice might burst the hope that was building in her chest. “Baxter, I...”
“If you’re in love with me, say it,” Baxter urged. “Or if you aren’t, go ahead and tell me. I can take that, too.”
“Well, of course I’m in love with you,” she told him, a bit annoyed that he might doubt that. Yes, he’d been her go-to crush for years, but she was a grown-up now who knew the difference between made-up emotions and real ones that were lodged in her heart.
He grinned, and she realized he might have been a bit nervous himself. “Addy.” He pulled her close and kissed her.
She came up for air some minutes later, breathless and thrilled and...scared all over again. “Oh, my God,” she said, and tried scooting out of his arms. “This is going to be a disaster.” She was whispering again.
Baxter put his forehead against hers. “Now what?”
“It’s really going to hurt to say goodbye now.”
“I told you, I’d like to go to Paris with you.” His mouth pressed against hers once more, a quick firm kiss. “If you’ll let me.”
“I mean, when it ends. When we end.”
He groaned and pulled her into his lap. “I’m not looking for endings. I’m counting on forever.”
She turned her face into his neck, breathing in the spicy male scent of his skin. Yes, her feelings for him were real, but to believe in a relationship... “I’m afraid that it won’t last.”
“Addy, people do find lasting love. My parents are devoted to each other and happy. My aunt and uncle are the same.”
“I know,” she mumbled. But her parents’ marriage had been so ugly and the divorce no prettier.
“My darling pessimist.” Baxter’s arms tightened on her. “What if I could show you a sign?”
“What kind of sign?” she asked, suspicious.
Without answering, Baxter kissed the top of her head and then reached toward the carton of ledgers. “I found some of that personal correspondence you’ve been searching for when I was looking through the business records.”
She stared at him. “I didn’t give them more than a glance.”
“Then it’s a good thing I took longer with them than you did.” With a little flourish he pressed a paper into her hands—a delicate sheet of stationery covered in blue ink.
Addy swallowed and glanced at Baxter. “It’s dated 1927. That’s when Sunrise stopped making movies.”
He nodded. “Read.”
Addy turned her attention to the handwriting, which was feminine, though not particularly elegant.
Dear Max,
To commemorate this day you are closing Sunrise for good, I wanted to tell you all that is in my heart.
I know you loved the movie business and you’d be happily making pictures into the future, but you’ve given it up for me and I’ll be forever grateful. I couldn’t take the rumors and backstabbing any longer. I felt as if the critics and gossips had found a loose thread and were pulling on it harder and harder, faster and faster, until soon I would be naked and exposed, with no protection whatsoever. Perhaps I could have survived that with you as my buffer, but then came the rumors of the affair and the cruel way you were portrayed