his soul. “It’s a little different for me. Because if you weren’t Willow, you wouldn’t be sitting here at all. I’m so conflicted when it comes to you and all the lies because I’m so damn mad at you, but it makes me the biggest hypocrite in the world. You forgave me for the unimaginable and I can’t seem to let this go.”
“It’s because of all the boxes.”
“What the hell are these boxes you keep talking about?”
“Ian said you compartmentalize everything. And, now, you have me in three different boxes and you can’t decide who I am. Sometimes you hate me because of what I told you. Sometimes you feel guilty because I’m the little girl from the mall. And sometimes you miss me because I was the woman you were…” I paused, not wanting to say the words.
He laughed, sad and resigned. Rolling to his back, he took me with him, my head resting on his shoulder. “For the record, I currently only hate Ian.”
“Don’t be mad at him. We ran into each other at the grocery store. He was trying to help.”
He stared up at the ceiling with one arm wrapped around my shoulders, his other hand resting in the center of my chest. “I’m not mad at him. He knows me better than anyone else. And he’s right. I’m all fucked up over this. But I don’t for a second wish you weren’t Willow.”
“I’m sorry,” I told him, peering up at the underside of his jaw. “Really and truly sorry.”
“I believe you. And that’s one more reason why I’m so messed up about all this.”
I waited for him to say something else.
I waited for him to tell me that it was going to be okay.
I waited for him to leave.
But after what had to have been close to twenty minutes, all I got was his heartbeat in my ear as his breathing evened out.
Nothing had been solved.
Nothing had changed.
But we were there together.
Caven and Willow.
And that was enough to make me fall asleep too.
CAVEN
I snuck out of the guestroom around four in the morning. I didn’t want to go, but I also didn’t want Rosalee to wake up and find me in Willow’s bed.
The only heroic task I’d ever performed was forcing myself out of that bed. It’d felt right, being there with her. Like it was the way it was supposed to be.
Our cruise ship’s worth of baggage aside, Willow would have been the perfect woman for me.
Smart, beautiful, funny, and incredible with my daughter were the obvious things.
But she was also a soothing warmth to my cold, guilt-ridden soul.
She understood me on levels no one else could.
And most of all, I had faith that if I’d just let her in, she could teach me to forgive myself too. That could be her heroic task.
Ian wasn’t wrong about my confusion. I’d yet to be able to land on any kind of solid emotion I felt for her; that pendulum inside me swung hard and fast.
But there was one common thread that ran through all the boxes I kept this woman in.
I loved her.
I loved her as Willow, the girl from the mall.
I loved her as Hadley, the woman who’d traced her fingers over my tattoo and cried in my arms.
I loved her as Rosalee’s family—the one who’d cared enough to give up everything she had to be a part of my daughter’s life.
The mountain to any kind of future together was tall and the terrain grueling. But I wanted to try.
However, Willow wasn’t the only one who had secrets. And if there was any hope of starting over with her, of building a foundation that didn’t revolve around my father or her sister, we needed to start fresh.
But before we could be strangers, she needed to know the real Caven Lowe.
Eighteen years earlier…
“Get in the fucking car!” Trent yelled as he skidded to a stop on the gravel outside the trailer we shared with our father.
I dove through the window when I heard Malcom behind me, yelling, “You are dead! Do you fucking hear me? Dead.”
My legs were still dangling out the window as Trent peeled out.
“Jesus, Cav,” he rumbled, grabbing the back of my shirt and dragging me the rest of the way in.
My face was covered in dirt, and my ribs ached from rolling around on the floor and fighting with my father.
He’d caught me in his room. I’d needed a fucking clean undershirt to wear to work, but what I’d found was a