Everything after that initial siege of panic was a blur.
Somehow she ended up upstairs.
Somehow she wound up on the porch with her carryon hastily packed.
Somehow she was sliding into the backseat of a cab she didn’t remember calling.
And somehow she found herself at the airport, buying a ticket for the next available flight to San Diego.
It was only when she entered the gate that Mia became aware of what she was doing, and once she did, a flashflood of guilt whipped through her.
She fumbled for her phone, horrified that she’d left the ranch without saying goodbye to Jackson. Without thanking his family for their hospitality. Without apologizing to Tiffany again.
But despite the deep remorse seizing her insides, she couldn’t bring herself to go back. She wanted to go home and sleep in her own bed, to take advantage of Danny’s absence and really think about what all this meant.
What loving Jackson meant.
Fighting back tears, she sent Jackson a brief text letting him know she was at the airport and flying home early, and then she shut off her phone and sat in the gate until it was time to board. Luck had been on her side—the flight was scheduled to leave in twenty-five minutes, and somehow she’d managed to check-in before the kiosk closed and zip through security without a hitch. It had all gone so smoothly she felt like one of those unrealistically fortunate characters in a movie.
Like The Runaway Bride.
Or maybe The Worst Girlfriend on the Fucking Planet.
She took a breath, trying not to let the guilt consume her, but that was an impossible feat. For the next two hours, guilt seemed to be the only emotion she was capable of registering. It plagued her during the two-and-a-half-hour flight, constricted her heart when she arrived in San Diego and followed her all the way home.
Exhaustion crushed down on her chest as she climbed up to the third floor of her building. It was nearly two in the morning, and she was desperate to slide under the covers and pretend tonight had never happened. She hadn’t even turned her phone back on, for fear that Jackson would call and she might be tempted to answer.
She couldn’t hear his husky voice right now. She’d be liable to burst into tears if that happened.
After dropping her bag on the floor out in the hall, Mia rummaged in her purse for her keys, then unlocked the front door with shaky fingers.
The apartment was engulfed in shadows when she walked inside. She welcomed the dark, the silence, the familiar sturdy hardwood beneath her feet.
But the overpowering relief she experienced from being home was suddenly replaced by a burst of sheer terror as a blurry figure lurched into her line of sight.
The indistinct monster wielded an aluminum baseball bat that gleamed in the darkness, swinging it around in a menacing whirl that promptly took ten years off Mia’s life.
“Don’t move!”
The ominous command sent her pulse careening—but then she blinked, recognition dawning in her eyes.
“Danny?” she screeched.
“Mia?” he exclaimed at the same time.
Her heart rate steadied, but the alarm rushing through her only increased, drawing an incredulous question from her mouth.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
Chapter Nineteen
“I figured you’d show up.” Shane was standing on the porch of his small, A-frame cabin when Jackson’s boots connected with the dirt ground.
He slammed the door of his dad’s pickup and strode toward the cabin, no hesitation, nothing but steely determination on his face.
“I figure you’d be expectin’ me,” he replied with a shrug.
When he reached the porch, he noticed the two unopened beer bottles sitting on the ledge.
Shane followed his gaze and smiled wryly. “I thought we’d need the liquid courage.”
Jackson had to chuckle. “Probably a good idea.” His eyes strayed toward the door. “Is Tiff all right?”
“She’s fine. Just sufferin’ from a case of embarrassment and some bruised pride.” Remorse flickered in Shane’s brown eyes. “She doesn’t blame Mia for what happened back there. Tiff knows she provoked it, and she feels dang crappy about it. She’s already planning on drivin’ up to the big house tomorrow to apologize to your girl.”
“Mia feels bad too,” he said roughly. “You don’t know her well, but trust me when I tell you that she’s not the kind of woman who goes around wailin’ on folks.”
Shane let out a low laugh. “A wee lil’ thing like her? I doubt she’s ever thrown a punch in her life. C’mon, why don’t we go ’round back?”
Beers in hand, the brothers rounded the side of the cabin and settled in a pair of rustic Adirondack chairs on the gravel patio. Jackson noticed that Shane and Tiff had made a lot of changes to the sprawling land behind the cabin—a large wooden gazebo stood on what had once been an empty stretch of grass, and natural flagstone paths now wound through newly planted flowerbeds and stone planters overflowing with greenery.