Chapter Fifty
Cooper
Lockie drives us down the winding roads and into Taunton Falls, hands steady on the wheel, the window cracked just enough for crisp air to slip inside. Everything feels different compared to LA. Crisper. Cleaner. Less artificial.
Welcome to Taunton Falls.
I lift my head slightly, eyes glued to the back of the sign in the side mirror. It should feel comforting, right? It’s home. Where I learned music, where I became me. So why does it feel like we’re driving into somewhere new?
“Is it always like this?” Lockie asks eventually, breaking the quiet.
“It’s autumn,” I mutter, leaning against the glass, watching burnt orange leaves flutter down from branches. “Everyone’s home, wood stoves burning, watching hockey highlights. That kind of thing.”
With a grunt, his eyes scan the road and the surroundings. “Looks like the first ten minutes out of a Hallmark movie. Or a horror film.”
I huff a laugh. He’s not wrong.
My fingers won’t stop tracing the rough seam of the seatbelt. The farther we go, the louder my pulse seems to get. The town edges into view; the high school, the old diner, the corner where the taco truck used to sit in the summer. The rink.
Everything in me drops. Same dark blue cladding. Same doorway Declan used to drag me through, smug as hell.
“You okay?” Lockie asks, not missing my reaction.
“Yeah,” I lie. “Just…thinking.”
Lockie drives on, and I absorb the details. Small-town storefronts flicker past; some new, some stubbornly unchanged. When we pass Plucked, a smile ghosts over my lips as I sit a little straighter, pointing toward it.
“I used to work there. My old boss let me try out all the new acoustics before anyone else.”
Lockie hums, glancing over.
“I haven’t been back since…”
Since Reign Cooper swallowed Cooper Riddick whole.
Lockie’s fingers tap once against the wheel, his gaze flicking across the console to watch me for a beat, giving me space to keep going if I want. I don’t, my thoughts skidding sideways, rushing some place else as the street narrows into a stretch I know by heart. “Wait, stop.”
He brakes sharply without a word, and I lurch forward, grabbing the glove box, already pushing open the door, my boots hitting the sidewalk before the car’s fully stopped. My entire body feels like it’s been unplugged, rewired, short-circuiting all at once.
The Lost Compass stands in front of me. The exterior is familiar, the brickwork, the huge wooden door out front.
It’s beautiful, different even, upgraded in ways I would never expect.
String lights crisscross above a patio that never used to exist, glowing through half-bare trees.
The sign above the door is new, the lettering crisp and modern against the weathered brick, the etching of a compass hidden behind mountains a beautiful touch, too.
I swallow, fingers twitching uselessly at my sides.
It feels ridiculous to feel like an outsider at a bar, but this wasn’t just a bar.
This was my first real stage. Not the school auditorium for plays or talent nights.
This was the first place I played where people actually listened.
Where someone believed in me enough to hand me a mic and say go on, kid.
“Cooper, you can’t just bolt out of the…” Lockie trails off, stopping beside me, his gaze lifting. He reads the sign above the door, taking a second to place it, before whistling low. “This where it all started?”
“Yeah.” It’s barely above a whisper.
“You going in?”
“I…” I hesitate, then nod.
My skin warms instantly when I push open the door, the scent of wood polish and beer carrying in the air the moment I step inside.
The old paneling has gone, replaced with exposed brick gleaming under dim, backlit shelves displaying rows of liquor.
The beams across the ceiling—once dark and rugged—are whitewashed now.
Brighter. Reflecting recessed lighting that wasn’t there before.
The red worn booths have been switched with green ones, and there are new screens playing sports highlights fixed onto the walls.
It looks…amazing.
I slowly turn on the spot, soaking in everything that’s changed, but it’s the stage at the back that I pause on. It’s bigger now. Sleek. A work of art, like it was always meant to be the centerpiece.
A traitorous ache curls under my skin, and I dig my knuckles into my sternum, chasing away the feeling that settles like betrayal. This place has grown, adapted, moved on…without me.
Forcing my gaze behind the bar, I scan the faces, looking for something—someone—to tether me to this place. But there’s nothing. No one I recognize until I spot a hat-covered head at the end of the bar. At least one thing hasn’t changed.
I smile as Jerry nurses his beer, watching some sports game on the giant TV.
A small comfort, but not exactly the one I’m looking for.
Disappointment lines my veins as I look around again.
And I totally didn’t think this through.
What if he was here? Then what? Because what the hell do you even say to the guy you spent every waking hour with, only to up and leave and sort of… lose touch with?
The door behind me swings open, and a tall guy behind the bar lifts a hand. “Hey, boss.”
Lockie shifts subtly beside me. It’s automatic, the way he moves closer, body angled to see the entire room. Protective without being obvious. But I notice. Years of watching him has taught me to.
The boss steps around us, a crate balanced effortlessly on his shoulder.
Veins trail down his forearm, sleeves pushed up, flannel stretching across solid muscle.
And when he bends over… I shouldn’t be staring, but holy shit.
Of course the universe gives me a front-row seat to a perfect ass in tight denim.
Lockie elbows me. “Close your mouth before you embarrass us both.”
Heat rushes up my neck, and I tear my gaze away, horrified at myself. Months without looking at anybody and, suddenly, I’m eighteen again, brain short-circuiting because some guy in flannel has glutes I want to bite.
“Vince, there’s a couple more in my truck. Give me a hand bringing them in?”
I can’t move. My knees lock up, goosebumps scattering across my skin, my eyes widening to the point that they burn. That voice…it’s one I haven’t heard in years—
He turns, tugging off his beanie as he moves.
Dark hair spills free, longer than I remember, messier too, like he runs a hand through it in the morning and decides it’s good enough.
His fingers push through the strands in one absent sweep, the motion so familiar it aches.
He’s broader now, older in a way that has nothing to do with age and everything to do with what life’s thrown at him.
And Jesus, does he look good. The beard surrounding his mouth is a new addition, fuller, framing his lips in a way that shouldn’t affect me as much as it does.
And yet, it’s still there, that same quiet confidence he always carried.
The kind you either envied or leaned into. Nothing flashy or loud. Just… Declan.
Every line of him hits like a memory I wasn’t ready to face, the familiarity gutting me.
My gaze drags over him—his shoulders, his jaw, the curve of his neck. I shouldn’t be staring but, fuck, I can’t stop.
And then he looks up. Brown. Deep, relentless brown.
The exact shade I’ve carried around like a secret for years.
For a moment, no one moves, the bar fading into shadows, his gaze enough to knock me off balance.
I drop mine first, pretending that in one look he didn’t see too much, see how much I’m rattled, how much I want to cross the space and bury my head against him.
“What the fuck?”
His voice cuts through the air, flat, cold, pulling my attention from the ache in my chest so abruptly that I flinch. The words sting more than I’m prepared for, like he aimed them straight at the softest part of me.
I swallow, forcing my mouth to form words. Any words. “Dec.”
He stiffens at the nickname, shoulders coiling tight, his dark eyes narrowing slightly. He doesn’t move toward me, doesn’t smile, doesn’t do a damn thing but stare like he’s trying to decide if I’m real or a ghost from his past he’d rather ignore.
“Hi, Dec,” I try again, softer this time.
“What are you doing here?” It’s not angry or curious, more guarded and closed off in a way he never was with me before.
My mouth opens, but nothing comes out. Because how do I say it? How do I tell him I’m exhausted? That I’m so fucking burnt out I want to give up? That each time Reign Cooper gets on stage, another piece of Cooper Riddick disappears.
That I miss the version who didn’t have this hollow hole inside him?
Declan exhales sharply, the muscles in his jaw flexing once.
“Reign.”
The name lands like a wrong chord in the middle of a perfect melody.
He’s not supposed to call me that. Everyone else, sure. The industry, the fans, but not him.
Never him. And hearing it now feels like a door slamming in my face.