“Well, hello to you too, darlin’.”
My heart bursts into a million beautiful, glittery pieces around me. In just a few days, Ryder has managed to be a better partner to me than Russ ever was, and that should make me sad, but it doesn’t. It makes me so unbelievably grateful to be in his arms instead.
“Has anyone ever told you you’re perfect?” I tease as I reluctantly pull away from him.
“Not that I can remember,” he says, tapping his chin. “But I’d love for you to be the first.” He winks, and sparks zip up my spine from that alone.I’m in so much trouble.
I ignore my brain’s warning. “You”—I point directly at his chest—“areperfect, Ryder Lockhart.”
“Right back at ya, darlin’,” he tells me, warming me from the inside out. He reaches for a plate beside him, piled high with food, and shoves it toward me. “Now, go eat. I’ll grab us some drinks and be right there.”
He takes a seat across from me a couple of minutes later, and instead of the awkward silence that had always encompassed meals spent with Russ, we jump right into casual conversation.
“Do you remember the time in second grade when Ashley McAllister decided on the first day of class she didn’t like you?” he asks.
“How could I forget? That little brat put glue in my shoe!”
“She didn’t get much better as we aged either,” he says with a light chuckle. “I swear, she enjoyed bullying you more than anything, including arts and crafts.”
“She did.” A smirk curls my lips. “Untilsomeonepushed her into an ant pile, and when she yelled at that someone, claiming he couldn’t do that because she was a girl, he told her it would be sexist not to treat her the same way he’d treat any boy.” A sharp laugh bursts out of me at the memory.
“She was lucky it hadn’t been a fire ant pile,” he says. “And I stand by my words. She was a tyrant then, and the fact that she works in politics now makes entirely too much sense. Though I don’t believe it was the ant pile that got her to leave you alone,” he tells me with a quirked brow.
“No? Do tell.”
“Did Mayte ever tell you about my tenth birthday party after you had gone home with a sore throat?”
I shake my head no. “All I remember after that party is you stopping by to bring me a slice of cake after everyone went home,” I say with a smile.
He casts his eyes downward before snapping up to meet mine again. “Well, after you left, Ashley made a nasty comment about you, and Mayte nearly flew across the table. She grabbed the first thing she saw, which happened to be a full rack of baby-back ribs covered in barbecue sauce. She slung that thing across that girl’s face so hard she fell out of her chair. Mayte screeched about there being more where that came from if she ever bullied you again. Ashley called her mom crying, and after she picked her up, my mom gave everyone an extra bowl of ice cream with dessert.” He lets out a loud laugh that matches my own. “And she gave Mayte the biggest scoop.” His shoulders quake with laughter as he admits his mom condoned the whole thing. I can’t say it surprises me in the least.
“The fact that no one ever told me that is criminal,” I wheeze out between laughs.
“Sorry, darlin’,” he says, averting his gaze, the smile that had been present just moments ago seems to melt away, and my spine goes rigid, preparing for impact. When his eyes meet mine again, he reaches across the table andtakes my hands in his. “I don’t think I can properly express how sorry I am for not seeing through Lemmon’s fake niceties. I hope you know that if I’d known, I never would have married her.” The words hit me right through the heart, and even though he’s told me this before, it’s never meant as much as it does coming from my husband.
I give his hands a gentle squeeze. “It hurt, Ry, it did. But Idoknow that had you known, things would’ve been different. I shouldn’t have hidden it from you, but I was just so determined not to let her know that her antics bothered me as much as they did that I refused to tell you. I knew you’d try to fight my battles for me, and it’s not what I wanted.”
“I just keep thinking that I should’ve paid more attention. It’s hard for me to understand how I missed it.”
I shake my head. “She very rarely bullied me when there were witnesses, Ry. She was good about keeping her torment to private spaces or making it look like an accident. She’d had the nice girl act down pact for so long, I’d thought there was something wrong with me because everyone else seemed to adore her.”
He clenches his teeth, the muscle in his jaw ticking. “Believe me, Lola, I’d thought there was something wrong with me for not realizing everything she’d ever said to me was with the intention of making me feel safe enough to confide in her, only for her to prove to be the most dangerous person I knew.” It kills me to know what she’d put him through, and even more at the thought that I probably don’t even know the half of it.
“I want to apologize too,” I tell him, blowing out a breath.
His brows knit, and he tilts his head. “What for? You’ve done nothing wrong.”
“Please don’t do that. You’re not the only one to blame for our failed relationship. I should’ve known you wouldn’t just move on after Logan’s death. I should have done more to help you, to be that safe space for you to let it all out when you needed me. Maybe if I’d tried harder, you wouldn’t have endedup the perfect target for Lemmon.” My throat feels thick, eyes burning.
“Lola, listen to me. I wanted you to stay in Dallas and accomplish everything you set out to. I’d have been far worse off if you’d up and left to run to my rescue. That’s a guilt I’d never be able to live with.” He peers up at the ceiling, blinking away tears. “Do you think this could be our second chance, darlin’? Could we just promise to work toward being better together and agree to get over the guilt we’ve both been carrying with us for things we’d done when our frontal lobes were barely formed?”
That makes me crack a smile, relief washing over me, but there’s still the thread of tension weaving through my heart. Of course I want those things, but I need to be more careful with my heart this time around. It’s what pushes me to say my next words. “I think if we can forgive each other, then the next step should be forgiving ourselves.”
He gives me a small smile. “Thank you, darlin’. That means more to me than you could ever know.” The thing about that is, I do know, just as well as I think he does.
We continue eating with comfortable conversation, and when we’re done, Ryder scoots out of his chair. He gathers our plates and takes them to the sink.
“Hey, I’ll get those,” I tell him, but he waves me off.
