Chapter 37
Honey
Honey fumbled with her phone, blinking against the tears that blurred the screen. Her fingers trembled too hard to type.
“Ruby,” she whispered, willing the message to form even though she could barely see it. Come get me. Tell me I did the right thing. Tell me this wasn’t the stupidest, most self-destructive choice I’ve ever made.
But the letters swam, dissolving into a mess of black smudges on white.
She couldn’t make out a single word. All she could see was the echo of that hug in the review room.
Ethan’s arms wrapped tight around Leticia.
The small sound she made when he held her.
The look in the girls’ eyes as if the world had snapped back into place for them.
Honey had no right to be upset, she tried to tell herself. That was their mother. Their family. Honey was the intruder here, a warm body that had been allowed to play house for a while, but never meant to belong.
Her chest ached as if someone had hollowed it out with both hands.
She’d promised herself she’d do anything to right her mistake and save the Hale family, but suddenly she wasn’t sure she had the strength to stand in the aftermath.
Saving the orchard meant tying herself to Brim’s Hollow.
It meant living every day with the knowledge that she was on the outside of a door she wanted desperately to open.
She had to figure out how to let them go while still living in their world. While bumping into Ethan and Leticia on Brimrose Lane. While hearing the girls’ laughter echo down Main Street. While pretending she didn’t care every time Ethan’s eyes flickered toward the past instead of toward her.
She staggered toward the fountain, desperate for air, for space, for something that didn’t smell like apples and heartache. The stone rim swam into view through the blur of tears, but she placed one foot in front of the other anyway.
She was halfway there when—
“Honey, wait.”
She froze mid-step. Every instinct screamed at her to keep going, to run until the ache in her chest loosened its grip, but her body betrayed her by going still.
She couldn’t turn and couldn’t let herself look at him.
If she did, if she saw his face, she would crumble into pieces right there in the square, and she couldn’t afford that right now.
Not when she’d needed to be strong enough to let go.
“I really should get back,” she said, the words brittle. “I need to tell Mr. Aldridge about my relocation. I need to pack. I need to say goodbye to my friend.”
“I can’t ask you to give up your job and your life here to save my family.”
His family. The truth of the words sliced through her.
It was never hers, no matter how many late nights in the orchard she’d shared, no matter how many dinners at that worn wooden table, no matter how the girls had looked at her like maybe she belonged.
She’d wanted it to be theirs so badly she hadn’t noticed she was already dreaming beyond her place.
“It’s fine,” she said, forcing the tremor from her voice as best she could. “Really. It’s my pleasure, Mr. Hale.”
“Please,” he said, closer now, his voice rough. “Please stop calling me that.”
She turned at last, her eyes brimming. The question cracked out of her. “What do you want from me?”
He stepped toward her, and she saw it then. The rawness in his eyes. The walls he always carried with him stripped bare. “I want you to stay.”
Honey’s breath rushed out of her like she’d been sucker-punched.
“I know I’ve messed up,” he said. “I’ve spent so long trying to keep everything standing that I forgot how to let someone in. I didn’t know how to accept help. Or love again. But you—god, Honey—you walked in and didn’t just fix things. You saw us. You saw me.”
Her heart twisted, wanting so badly to believe him, to fall into the space he was holding open, but the memory of that hug, of the family reknitting itself in front of her, was still too fresh.
She forced her lips into a shaky smile. “I’m glad it all worked out.”
“Did it?”
“It seems so. You got everything you needed.”
“Then why are you walking away?”
She wrapped her arms around her stomach as if she could cushion herself from the pain there. “You got your wife back.”
“My ex-wife,” Ethan said gently. He reached for her hand, his thumb brushing against her trembling fingers.
“She knows where we stand. I’ll always care about her.
We built a life once, and we’ll always have the girls.
But she left. She chose another path. Even if she wants to be part of their lives again, that doesn’t mean she’s still mine. Or that I’m hers.”
“You should try to make it work,” Honey said, even though it killed her. “It’s the right thing to do.”
“Honey,” he said her name like a plea. “Don’t tell me what the right thing is.”
He was so close now she could see the lines of strain around his eyes. “Tell me how to run my farm. Scold me about the girls' need for routine and punctuality. Rearrange my cabinets until I’m dizzy in our own kitchen. But don’t tell me how to feel or who to love.”
Love. She gasped and her hand flew to her mouth.
“I want you,” he said, “I want you to move my measuring cups every other week because it ‘makes more sense that way.’ I want you scolding me when I forget the girls’ lunches, then pressing a bag into my hand because you already packed one.
I want to buy you all the baby goats you could ever want.
I want your spreadsheets, and your highlighters, and the way you hum when you’re concentrating. ”
He swallowed hard. “I want the life that only makes sense if you’re in it.”
Honey’s lips parted. It was everything she’d dreamed of, but she couldn’t make herself say anything. Her feet felt anchored to the cobblestones, caught between her fear and the pull of what he was offering.
He strode across the courtyard without looking back, and before Honey could gather a single thought, he stepped straight into the fountain, water splashing up around his boots as he climbed inside.
“Daddy, what are you doing?” Melly called from somewhere behind them.
The world narrowed until there was nothing but him standing knee-deep in the water, his chest rising and falling hard. His eyes locked on hers as though she were the only person alive.
“I don’t have a coin,” he called out. “But if this thing listens to people who care enough to be fools, then I’m making my wish anyway.”
He pressed a hand to his heart. “I wish you’d come home. Not just to Brim’s Hollow. To me. Wherever you want that to be. Whatever it looks like. I want you.”
The water shimmered around him. The sunlight rippled across the surface.
Honey couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t even blink. Her whole body vibrated with the ache of wanting and the terror of trusting.
Ethan’s gaze softened, and his voice dropped. “You can rearrange everything. My kitchen. My life. All of it.”
A tear slipped down her cheek.
“Just come home, Honey.”
For a suspended heartbeat, neither of them moved. The courtyard faded to nothing but the fountain roaring in her ears along with the thundering of her own pulse.
Then she exhaled and bent to tug off her shoes. She let them drop against the cobblestones as she stepped to the fountain’s edge.
The cold water soaked through her pants, the fabric clinging to her legs as she waded toward him.
Ethan’s mouth parted, but he just stood there, staring at her like he didn’t dare believe she was real.
She waded toward him. Every step was a choice.
Every breath a promise, until she stood before him, water swirling around their legs, heart hammering so hard it hurt.
“Okay,” she whispered.
Ethan hauled her against him like a man who’d waited a lifetime. One hand cradled the back of her head, and the other anchoring her tight at the waist. He kissed her with the force of everything he’d held back, dipping her low.
Somewhere behind them, a cheer went up. Then another. Until applause broke out across the square, and the sound swelled around them.
But Honey only felt Ethan, only heard the echo of his wish in her bones.
Because at last, impossibly, he was hers.