Chapter 32
Chapter Thirty-Two
Rhett
I wasn’t thinking when I pulled her in close to me. It seemed like a fun and playful thing to do, but now that our faces are only an inch apart, I can’t even think straight. I’m still not where I want to be with Olivia before I kiss her. I want that certainty. I want to know I can go all in with her.
A pebbled wet nose nudges into my arm, and claws drag from the top of my ribs down to my hips. I let go of Olivia and turn to find Maverick trying to wedge himself between Olivia and me. The adorably obsessed rascal protectively inserts himself between the two of us, trying to corral Olivia back toward the shore, glancing over his shoulder, giving me the eye as he does so.
“I’m okay, Maverick. It’s okay.” Olivia’s gaze flickers back up to me, and there’s something in her eyes that makes it clear her mind is spinning just as much as mine. I wish I could fix that, solve all of her problems, and try to put her mind at ease. I guess that’s what today is for.
She climbs out of the water, cooing to Maverick. “Should we get you a stick to chase?” She plucks one from the shore, letting Maverick sniff it and approve.
When the stick launches over my head, and I hear her splash back into the water, I finally look back her way. “So, what do you think?”
“This spot is great! How’d you find it?”
“According to Callie, she grew up coming out here. They’d come here to drink as teenagers, swim in the summertime, and do just about every stupid thing you could think of. I think the kids found a new spot nowadays. I’m not quite sure.”
“Hmm, well I like this spot. Thanks for bringing me here. And for taking me to Copper Hill. It was cool to see where you work and visit my friend Maggie again. I think maybe in another life, I could live on a ranch and just be out in the fields working with my hands around animals every day.”
“It doesn’t have to be in another life. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”
“Even if I stayed here, I’m not going to work on a ranch.”
“Why not?”
“It’s just not who Olivia Parker is.”
“Then who is she?”
She purses her lips. “That’s a good question. I think I’m still figuring that out.”
“That’s okay. I think I’m still figuring out who Rhett Lawson is too, and I have a two-year head start on you.”
She gives me an appreciative smile. “We can figure it out together.”
Maverick comes swimming back toward me panting with the stick still in his mouth. Olivia takes it gently from Maverick and throws it again for him. He rushes off after it with excitement.
“Maverick is quite the fish, huh?”
“Yeah, I guess so. It doesn’t surprise me. You’ve said he’s perfectly at home on the ranch. I think he likes having a purpose. It’s in his blood.” She glances at him lovingly as he determinedly makes his way back to where Olivia is treading water. When he reaches her, she takes the stick and chucks it before saying, “And I guess he loves the water, so there’s no stopping him now.”
“We’ll have to come back again.”
“I think he’d like that.”
“What about you?”
“Yeah, I’d like it too.”
* * *
Sitting on her rumpled towel, leaning against me, Olivia happily munches on the apple chips I packed. Maverick dozes to her side with his whole back pressed up against her outstretched leg, and she looks at peace. I don’t want to speak, don’t want to move, don’t even want to breathe too loudly out of fear that I will ruin this perfect moment that I’m trying to engrain in my memory right now.
But Olivia finally breaks the silence. “I love it out here. I could get used to this. We’ve got snacks and look at this view. It’s just breathtaking.”
I follow her gaze to the scene set in front of us. The swimming hole shimmers in the sun. The live oaks that surround us in a canopy open up about ten feet behind us to create a small plain of long grass and wildflowers that blow in the gentle breeze. Birds chase each other overhead, singing a cheerful tune. It’s stunning, but the only sight I care about right now is the kind-hearted woman by my side, with freckles dusting her cheeks and her oversized t-shirt hanging off her shoulder in typical Olivia fashion as she gently sinks her fingers into the thick tufts of fur on Maverick’s back.
“Yeah, it’s pretty great,” I say, keeping my eyes steady on her.
Her cheeks flush when she catches my gaze on her, and she quickly busies herself with rolling up the bag of apple chips. When I snatch my hat from the ground and place it on backward, the blush on her cheeks grows brighter.
Olivia’s lips curve into a slight smirk before she leans back against her palms and sighs contentedly. “I know you didn’t grow up in Roots, but were your summers still spent like this when you were younger?”
“Yeah, my summers were pretty similar to this. Granted I didn’t usually hang out with beautiful women.” She looks down at the ground, clearly uncomfortable with taking the compliment. “I spent most of my summers with a couple of buddies that lived on my street. We got into all kinds of trouble.”
“I would’ve liked to see teenage Rhett and all the shenanigans he got into.”
“My parents let me get away with probably too much. That was back when they liked me.” I laugh, trying to keep the mood light. “That’s probably why I connected so well with your parents. I never really had people in my life who were strong and loving parental figures.”
“My parents think of you like a son. My dad particularly loves having you around. I know he loves me, but I also know he would’ve loved to have a child who he could teach about trucks and watch sports with. Now he has that with you.” After a beat, she adds, “I’m sorry about your parents. I’m willing to share mine, but you can’t have them all to yourself.”
“I still had a pretty great childhood. I had good friends, and we had lots of adventures.”
“Tell me a story. I want to hear about some of your adventures.”
“Hmmm.” I lean back, letting the hot sun beat down on my face as I think. “My freshman year of high school, I went dirt bike riding with a couple of my friends. I’m not sure how familiar you are with riding a dirt bike, but the throttle is on the handlebars, so you have to grab it like this.” I make a fist with my hand and show her the motion of grabbing onto a handle and then pulling my knuckles toward me to throttle. She nods along in fascination. “We had been going for a little over an hour, and I was starting to feel confident when I accidentally grabbed a handful of the throttle on my way up a jump. I flew through the air, and when I landed, my front tire hit the dirt at the wrong angle. I got tossed from the bike and broke my collar bone.”
“Oh my god!”
“It didn’t hurt that bad.” She narrows her eyes at me. “Okay, it hurt like a bitch, but it was actually pretty great because the accident helped my parents stop fighting for a little bit while they focused on taking care of me.”
“They fought even after they divorced?”
I nod. “All the time, probably even more than before they got divorced. It was like the divorce allowed them to openly hate each other.”
“How long did they stop fighting?”
“Maybe a week, but it was the best week of my life. My mom made me breakfast in bed. My dad would come and watch old movies with me. Sometimes my mom even joined.”
“Do you talk to either of them much anymore?”
I shake my head, and she must recognize that I’m reaching my limits for how much I’m willing to share because instead of asking why, she asks me for another story.
“You have to tell me something about you first. It’s only fair.”
She nods in agreement, pursing her lips as she thinks. It’s funny because I’m used to asking people about themselves as a way to deflect, to move the attention away from me and keep my past hidden, but this time, I genuinely want to know more about Olivia. I want to learn every little detail about her. I want to know the basics like her favorite color and her favorite season, but I also want to know the deeper things like how she got that scar along her right shin and what makes her think she doesn’t deserve a life free of stress and full of joy.
“I don’t think I have any stories that are as funny as yours.”
“That’s okay. It doesn’t have to be funny. I just want to hear something about you from before we met. Tell me a favorite memory of yours or a least favorite. I don’t care. I just want something.”
She sits up a little straighter, turning to face me straight on. “I don’t know if I can definitively say this is my favorite memory because it’s a little bittersweet, but it’s one that sticks out to me.” I nod along encouragingly, keeping my mouth shut so as not to interrupt her. “When I was a freshman in high school, my best friend since first grade started dating some jock, and she started to fall in with the cool kid crowd. This went on for a few months. We still hung out outside of school, but she would practically ignore me during school hours and it stung. It got way worse when rumors started going around the school about me, and she didn’t do anything to stop the rumors from flying.”
She must see the pity on my face because she smiles at me, patting my knee, and says, “I promise the story gets better, but it’s going to get just a smidge worse before it comes back around. Stick with me.”
I chuckle, feeling oddly protective over her even though this was years ago, and I can see her smiling about it now.
“I came home one day absolutely bawling because I had just found out my friend, Natasha, had been the one to spread a particularly nasty rumor about me, and it just felt like the world was ending. When I got home, my mom took one look at my face, grabbed her purse, and dragged me right back out the door. She took me into town for ice cream, and we wandered around these little shops near the beach that were about half an hour away. I loved those shops. It was my perfect day, if you ignore the whole best-friend-betrayal that started it off, but it was a very special moment with my mom. We’d always been close, but I think that’s when I started to see her as my best friend, not just my mom.” She glances down at her towel, finding a loose thread. “You know how much I love Taylor Swift, right?”
“Do I? Everyone in town must know by now with the way you blast her music in your Volkswagen.”
“Well, my favorite song is actually one of her older ones. It’s called ‘The Best Day,’ and it’s sung from the daughter’s perspective to her mom, talking about how her mom is always there for her and like her best friend. It speaks to my soul . It’s one of my all-time favorite songs, and I don’t think many people know that or the meaning of the song for me.”
She continues picking at the thread on her towel, focusing hard on it.
“I love how close you are with your mom. Things were a lot more forced when you first got here because she was desperate to connect with you, but it seems to me like you two have found a good balance. You’ve gotten back to that friendship you used to have.”
“Yeah, it’s been a little terrifying to let her in again, but I love my mom so much. I missed having that closeness.”
Silence settles over us for a beat before I ask, “Can you play the song for me? I want to hear it.”
“Sure!” She eagerly plucks her phone off the grass and presses a few buttons before a joyful tune slips through the speaker. I try to focus on the words, picturing a younger Olivia with her mom. Having this new piece of Olivia makes me fall just a little bit more for her.
The song ends, and I watch her face change as she begins chewing on her lip. She places all her focus on scratching behind Maverick’s ears, and I give her the space she needs after this moment of vulnerability.
Finally, she says, “I don’t want this day to end.”
“I can’t do anything about the sun eventually going down, but I can cook us dinner and then we can find one more Roots adventure before midnight if you’re up for it.”