Murphy's Law (Havenwood #2) - Riley Hart Page 0,20

hand. “As you can see, I didn’t.”

I took in my surroundings, walking around and exploring. The space…well, shit, it couldn’t be more Law. Open concept—the living room, dining room, and kitchen all this large space. There were wooden pillars throughout the area, knotty and rustic. And it was all dark colors—browns, blacks, hunter greens—with large, plush, chocolate-colored furniture. The photography on the walls was all random—an old truck and a lake, a sunset and an open field—but it felt full of heart, if that made sense.

Bear ignored me, walking over and climbing onto the couch, out like a light the second he lay down.

“This place…it’s you,” I said with my back to him. It was full of so much stuff, of life and comfort, obviously more than mine was, but even if I had lived there for years, I wasn’t sure it would look like this.

“Makes sense, considering I live here.” He had a sharp edge to his voice, anger or resentment, that had only ever been directed at me when he’d been struggling with the secret part of our relationship.

“Can I sit?” There had never been a time where things were this stilted between us, not even the first night we met, when we didn’t know each other.

“Yeah, sure, might as well since you’re here. You want a drink?”

“No, thanks. I’m good.”

I sat on the chair that matched the couch. There was a shirt on the coffee table, and Law tugged it on before joining Bear.

I wrung my hands, trying to sort through my thoughts, to pick the right place to start, and find a way to speak when I’d never been real good at doing that. “I lost my music,” was what I settled on, and by the set of his cut jawline, I could tell it was the wrong thing.

“And you came to my hometown to get it back? That doesn’t make sense, but I can’t say I’m surprised this is about your music.”

“It’s not only about that. I haven’t been the same for six fucking years, Law, so don’t trivialize what we had and pretend I never cared about anything other than music.”

“Well, how in the hell would I know you haven’t been the same when you never contacted me? Not. Once.” He raised his voice on the last two words. “And I know you cared about me; you just cared about music more. Maybe it makes me an asshole for resenting that. Maybe I should have been more understanding, but I’m not, and I wasn’t.”

I sighed, feeling weighed down by the tension, the years of pain and anger between us.

He added, “And I don’t know how you could have lost it. It wasn’t that long ago that you came out with a new album. You just finished a tour.”

The album hadn’t been mine. Not really. I hadn’t loved it, hadn’t bled my heart into it. I’d done what my manager and label pushed me into. “Yeah, but I’ve lost the passion behind it. The love of it. Music doesn’t feel right anymore. It doesn’t feel like it’s mine, when other than you, it’s the only thing that has ever been mine. I came here to get it back. So in some ways, that part is true, but I chose Havenwood because of you. Come on, you have to know that.”

He looked down, closed his eyes, took a deep breath. Bear seemed to sense Law needed him. The dog gave me a dirty look before putting his head on Law’s lap, under his arm. Lawson leaned back and petted him.

“I know I fucked up. I know things will never go back to the way they were. I’ve accepted that. I also know it’s my fault, but I…I miss you,” I admitted. “I miss that feeling of rightness that flooded my veins when I was with you, that feeling of being enough. I thought maybe being here would make me feel closer to that. It was a stupid idea, but I’m here now.”

Law didn’t look at me, didn’t reply, simply sat there and petted his dog, his blond curls almost like a curtain between us.

“I came looking for you, ya know,” I said softly, and his gaze snapped to mine. “I don’t know what I planned to do when I saw you. I probably would have fucked it all up and hurt us both more. But I missed you. You were still in Charlottesville.” I realized I knew nothing about him after that. Had he stayed there?