“You think I can’t let it go.”
“Nope.” Justin walked to the door and flipped the lock, the sound of metal sliding into place echoing through the room. “You’re the one who thinks you can’t. The gallery is my way of not letting the past control me. The mill could be yours. The Rise. Those ugly-ass cotton fields you love so much. Just let yourself love them. Take it in like a fresh breath. Own it.” He dimmed the lights and adjusted the shades, looking every bit the owner-slash-artist in residence. “Your attachment doesn’t have to have a damn thing to do with him, Camp. Just like my fondness for Promise—if that’s what I’m calling it—doesn’t have anything to do withmyfather. They weren’t noble men, admitted. But they’re gone. And we’re here. I’m not living my life for or about him ever again.”
Campbell perched on the edge of Justin’s desk, rolling his glass between his palms. “I want to be a good man. Everything they weren’t. I want to be, this one time, the man who cares too much. Who caresmore. Who tries, maybe too hard, pride be damned.”
“What’s stopping you? Be the good man.”
“I don’t know, but something is. Fear, I guess.” He openeda desk drawer, rooting around for a hidden liquor bottle, a stale pack of cigarettes,something. He’d left his toothpicks at the Rise. “This love thing’s fucking scary.”
Justin’s brow rose—only the one, which had always driven women bananas. All 007-ish. “Love? Whoa, color me shocked.”
“Just wait until it bites you, asshole.”
“It did once.” Justin’s smile dimmed. “Longggg time ago. Done with love at eighteen, lucky me.”
“Lainey Prescott, the one who got away. You talked about her for two years straight.” Getting desperate, Campbell yanked the drawer out as far as it would go. “Itishelping me, though, to hear you sounding all wistful and tender.”
“The sexy landscaper?”
“Sure, who else?” He came up with a cigar wrapped in blue that saidNew Babyand brandished it like a trophy. “Light?”
Justin stared down the wine bottle again. “Fire and artwork make a bad combo.”
Campbell threw the useless smoke back in the drawer. “She’s fine to babysit my dog, by the way.”
His cousin glanced over, confusion twisting his features. “Dog? Whatdog?”
“She’s babysitting my dog and my kid brother while I’m on a shoot in Atlanta. Leaving tomorrow for two days. Kid wanted a dog, so now we have Boomer. Mixed-breed rescue who loves destroying Italian leather.” He held up a hand. “I’ve tried all kinds of sweet gestures, don’t bother with advice. Flowers, notes on her windshield, more lights in her damn garden, etcetera, etcetera. The lady is not willing.”
“Campbell True, romantic. Who would have imagined?”
Campbell lay back on the desk and closed his eyes, his head starting to spin. A third bottle of wine had been a horrible idea. “Romance is dead.”
“You aresonot driving home, Photographer Boy.”
Campbell threw an arm over his face to block the slice of light sliding in the front window, drilling straight into his brain. “You drove, you idiot.”
“Huh. You’re right.” With a stretch and a yawn, Justin collapsed into a chair, crossing his ankles atop the corner of the desk Campbell wasn’t occupying. “Well, I ain’t driving either.”
Campbell groaned, cursing the minion already beating a drum inside his skull.
Alcohol wasn’t helping as much as he’d hoped.
The impulse to call Fontana gripped him, talons digging deep. But she thought they were wrong for each other, when she was the best thing that had ever happened to him. For so many reasons.
And,damn, did he miss her amazing nipples.
When he came back from Atlanta, he was going to make her listen. Sit her down, tell her he loved her, then fuck her silly.
“Sounds like a plan,” he whispered.
“A great plan,” Justin agreed with a yawn. “Forgot to say, I’ll be best man if you ask nicely.”
“Screw you, Just.”
“Love you, too, bro.”
FONTANA
