“You don’t belong here.”
“You have a strange habit of following me around telling me I don’t belong where I am. It’s getting on my nerves, honey.”
Honey. She would not cry at that. She’d hold on to it, though, deep in her heart, and always remember his reason for using that endearment. “I actually mean it this time. Because I’m not scared. Well, I am scared that you’re going to tell me I really did mess this up irreparably, but I’m not scared of the truth. Or not scared of it enough to pretend it isn’t there.”
“Mel.”
“You look perfect in that suit,” she blurted. He opened his mouth to cut her off again, but she wouldn’t let him. “But no matter how perfect you look, no matter how charmingly you smiled at all those idiots asking you those stupid questions when anyone can see you’re telling the truth, you don’t…it’s not you. I’ve seen the way you light up with an idea, the way you smile after a hard day’s work, how much you bizarrely enjoy those demon creatures. That ranch is a part of your soul, and it’s where you belong.”
“I know all that. Why are you telling me? If you thought I was leaving for good, you’re an—”
“Buck told me you were coming back Wednesday. I’m saying all this because I want you to see how much of a lie it was when I said I don’t believe in you. That saying you wouldn’t stay was just reflexive panic because you staying threatened me. And I wouldn’t have felt that panic if I actually believed you wouldn’t stick. As much as my weird stuff is about, you know, people leaving and people not caring, it’s possibly a little deeper than that.”
“Possibly.”
She was trying to be good and give him his space, wait for him to make the first move, but she found she couldn’t keep going if she didn’t touch him, even if it was just the scratchy sleeve of his suit. “I have gotten through rough things by pushing through, always moving forward and doing what had to be done. If I ever stopped to think, or reflect, or God forbid feel, I couldn’t do that, you know? And then, we told Dad about Summer, and he knew. He knew about her the whole time, and he had his reasons and whatever, but then he walked away. He shut us all out and down, and I don’t want to do that. I don’t want to shut the good stuff out too because the bad stuff threatens my…ability to get through it.”
“It took you this long to figure that out?”
“I’m an incredibly slow learner, if you haven’t noticed.”
“So you don’t want to be your father, shutting everyone out. That doesn’t mean you love me, Mel.”
Possibly it was the wrong move, but she had to do something, so she slid her hand up his arm, to his neck, fingers brushing the skin above his stiff collar. “You’re right. It doesn’t mean that, but I do. Dan, I do love you, and there is nothing easy about that for me. But you are funny and strong and…you put yourself out there. I love you, I…respect you. I know this doesn’t change what I did.” She let her fingers glide along the smooth length of his jaw.
She wasn’t giving up, but who knew how many opportunities she’d get to touch him if he didn’t forgive her.
She swallowed. “I think you had to learn something when you came here, and you did. Well, I had to learn something about…love and life, and I’m sorry it took hurting you to see it. I hope you can forgive me, but even if you say you can’t right now, I’m not giving up on you. Because you love me and I love you, and I won’t give up on that when I’m finally realizing how important it is.”
She swallowed again, and then stopped trying so hard to stem the tide of tears. Because this was about showing her emotions, not being afraid of them, of feeling. She took his chin between her fingers and forced him to look at her.
When his eyes finally met hers, some of that hard tension in his jaw loosened. “Tears are not fair,” he said gruffly.
“Nothing is fair.”
He stared at her for a long time, silent, muscles tense. “You’d really keep trying if I said I can’t forgive you and you broke my heart irreparably?”
She swallowed at the slice of pain. “It isn’t irreparable if we both want to repair it.”
He finally moved—just a slight shift, curling his hand into a fist and then uncurling it, his gaze moving past her. There was a moment she was sure he’d say no, tell her to get out of his car. A band tightened in her chest, somehow choking her breathing but making the tears fall harder.
“Besides, I need you to teach me how…how to change. I taught you how to ranch. You owe me.”