Chapter 8
8
Roxie Tucker. Here. At my house.
For the first time in a very long time, I feel like I can breathe again. Like some unknowable weight has been lifted.
The weight of letting her go, and always knowing she was out there, alone and unprotected. The weight of knowing she could never be mine.
It’s only now, with her standing in front of me, that I can see it all clearly.
The past six months have been hard in a lot of ways, but hard is what I’m used to. I had to keep my head down and become the man my family needed me to be. And now I’m doing the same for Daisy.
I haven’t looked up for ten fucking years.
And it’s come at a cost. I’m not sure I know who I am or what I offer outside of my commitments to this family. Work and responsibility have consumed me for so long that it’s easy to forget what it feels like to simply enjoy someone else’s company.
Roxie Tucker isn’t just someone , of course.
She’s the addiction I’ve fought my whole life.
She was the one who was able to draw me out of my shell, even as kids. She was a rough-and-tumble little tomboy who could give as good as she could take. She was smart and sassy and she lit up every room.
They’re the same age, but Roxie has always seemed older than Dakota. And even Tobias. More savvy and more focused. While Tobias and Dakota were figuring out what directions to take with their lives, Roxie jumped into the role of managing her brothers’ band when she was barely out of high school—and did a damn good job of it. She is and always has been a firecracker.
There was nothing I could have done about our undeniable connection back then. She was still a kid.
After that night in the barn, which lit a fire in me I’ve never, ever been able to put out, I built a brick wall between us and made sure it stayed there. I did my best to put her out of my mind, for good.
It never worked.
Since then, the brick wall has remained up. Not just between me and Roxie but between me and most of the people I meet.
It’s been staunchly in the way of me getting close to any and every woman I’ve ever been with. It’s why they always accuse me of being cold and unfeeling. Because I am.
What’s crazy is that here she is with her Pink Kisses lips and her sledgehammer. The brick wall in the middle of my soul suddenly feels like it’s got a big fucking hole in it.
It’s hard to explain how good that feels.
Sitting here with Roxie, I don’t feel cold or uncaring or distant. My whole body is running hot and I want to pull her onto my lap, kiss her like I did that day in the barn, and watch the sun go down with her in my arms.
That’s only the beginning of what I want to do to her.
Roxie clinks her glass against my beer bottle, her eyes twinkling. “Do you remember that time we waited until your parents and Aunt Lou and Uncle Earl were asleep and then snuck out to go night swimming in the pond?”
I smile at the memory. “Yeah. I threw stones at your window to give you guys the signal to sneak out and cracked it.”
She laughs. “We got in so much trouble for that later. Kade climbed out the window and down the drainpipe and ended up falling into Aunt Lou’s prize roses.”
“Ma was waiting for us on the porch when we got back with the wooden spoon she used to threaten us with.”
“I remember that spoon. But it was always an empty threat.” She laughs. “Aunt Lou said she was going to ground us for the rest of the summer, but in the end she was more worried about Kade’s scratches than the flattened roses. The next morning she cooked us pancakes and we were out the door before she could finish scolding us.”
Her smile makes my pulse feel hot. I have to look away before she notices me staring at her lips, remembering how fucking sweet they tasted.
“And then there was that camping trip where we saw that shooting star,” Roxie muses. “I must’ve been, what, twelve or thirteen?”
“Something like that.” I watch her, struck by how the starlight still glimmers in her sapphire-blue eyes all these years later, just like it used to. “You made us all promise to make a wish before it disappeared.”
Roxie nods, looking wistful. “I wonder if any of those wishes came true.”
“Maybe some of them did.” Not all of them. Then again, she’s here. Our gazes hold for a second before she looks away. “At least one of your brothers must have wished for fame.”
“Yeah. All three of them probably did.”
When was the last time I sat with someone other than my family and just talked? I used to with Jed and Laney, of course, but we’d known each other so long, they practically felt like a few extra siblings thrown into the mix.
Roxie touches my arm as she recalls another memory that brings the laughter to her eyes, and I’m damn near consumed by the urge to pull her onto my lap and kiss her, to feast on the sweetness of her that hooked me all those years ago and never let go .
I want to, more than I’ve wanted anything in a really long fucking time.
But I’m not the carefree boy she remembers. There are new burdens now. Where would Roxie even fit into the precariously-balanced life I’m on the brink of losing control of every second of every day? There are a lot of balls in the air and I’m constantly worried about dropping them. She has her own busy schedule of sold out tours and life on the road.
But damn. She’s so fucking beautiful .
Her hair was always pretty, but now it’s thick and glossy, hanging in waves almost to her waist. She’s still slim but she’s filled out, from that skinny little tomboy into a full-blown woman with curves for miles, which I’m trying very hard not to stare at like a lovestruck fool. Her cowgirl style is more sophisticated now, with the fancy Nashville boots and the designer jeans—which I can’t help noticing fit her like a fucking dream.
It’s been a long time since I’ve felt the feverish pull of white-hot lust—and it’s never felt this raw.
Lust isn’t something I’ve had a lot of time for lately. I single-handedly run a three-person business and I’m the legal guardian of an orphaned six-year-old.
But the sudden appearance of Roxie Tucker is reminding me that I’m also a big, rough, red-blooded animal with needs that have been put on the back burner for far too long .
Take it down a notch, cowboy. It’s Roxie Tucker we’re talking about here. She’s a hundred percent off-limits.
Or at least she used to be.
She catches me staring. Heat rises to her face, at my expression, maybe, and she bites her lip.
“Rox?”
“Yeah?”
I don’t know what I’m about to say. Something, though. Something real.
The screen door slams open and Dakota walks out. “Mission accomplished. The princess is clean, snuggled into bed, all three nightlights are on and her two favorite stories have been dutifully read. But she wants to say goodnight to Uncle Nate. You ready, Rox?”
Roxie’s gaze is still fixed on me and she does her best to hide her curiosity. And her disappointment. At the unspoken words. “Oh. Yeah.” She adjusts her expression, smiling at Dakota. “Sure.”
But that’s the story of us, after all. All the things we’ve never said.
Or at least it was. Until now. Because I’ve made a decision that has already forged itself into my hot-beating heart.
“Bye, Nate.” There’s a long-buried sadness behind her smile I understand only too well. “Thanks for the wine.”
“See you around, Roxie Tucker.” I didn’t mean to say it like that—the exact same words I said to her that night in the barn .
Roxie’s eyes are blue as all hell in the moonlight as she glances back at me.
She’s the most stunning creature I’ve ever seen.
And that old ember of regret has suddenly lit itself into a bonfire, like a fucking phoenix rising from the ashes, transforming itself into resolve, lust and the kind of true love that only happens once.
Fuck regret. The memory of the girl I’ve always loved ghosted around me for years. And now the goddess who just turned up on my doorstep is quite literally the woman of my dreams, one and the same.
I want her. I want everything.
She’s real.
She’s perfect.
And she’s here. For the entire weekend.
It’s complicated. She’s insanely busy and I’m a workaholic with a six-year-old in tow.
Then simplify it. Figure it out. If there are barriers—and there are—fight your way through them like a fucking Viking until she’s knocked up with your baby and so happy all she wants to do is let you love her.