18. Dallas
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Dallas
The first Monday after New Year’s is always a slap in the face.
The holiday lights are still up, the snow hasn’t melted, and half the county is still pretending it’s socially acceptable to eat leftover pie for breakfast. But school is back in session, which means alarms, real pants, and early morning noise.
Lila’s braids are lopsided because she insisted on doing them herself, Ellie is vibrating from the sugar cookies she snuck before breakfast, and Boone looks like he slept maybe three hours, which means Rose probably slept two.
Business as usual.
Buckhorn Elementary is already buzzing when we pull up. Kids in puffy coats spill out of cars, backpacks bouncing. The front doors are wide open, letting out blasts of warm air mixed with the smell of crayons, floor wax, and the faintest whiff of cafeteria pancakes.
Lila holds my hand as we walk up the shoveled path.
Her mitten is tiny and warm in my palm.
She glances up at me, wide-eyed. “Daddy, are you sure I can’t stay home one more day? Just one? I think I might still be a little… holiday sick.”
Boone snorts beside us. “You mean lazy.”
Ellie gasps. “School is important. We learn stuff there.”
“I stand corrected,” Boone says. “Clearly, you’re the academic leader of the family.”
Ellie beams.
Lila glares at him.
I squeeze Lila’s hand gently. “Nice try, darlin’. But you like school.”
She sighs dramatically. “I do. But I like pajamas more.”
Inside the building, the hallway noise hits us in a wave. Kids shouting hellos, lockers banging, boots squeaking on polished linoleum. Posters about reading goals and winter safety hang on the walls. A paper snowman army smiles at us from the bulletin board.
Mrs. Mildred Price, principal, gatekeeper of all childhood bedlam, and terror of every parent who ever forgot picture day, spots us immediately.
“Well, if it isn’t the McCoy men,” she says, marching over with the same brisk energy she’s had since I was a student here. Her silver hair is pulled back in a no-nonsense bun, and her glasses hang on a bright red cord around her neck. “Late on the first day back? Shameful.”
“We’re two minutes early,” Boone says.
“And yet you feel late.” She clicks her tongue. “That means you are.”
Lila giggles. Ellie hides behind Boone’s coat.
Mildred softens, just a little, and turns to Lila. “Miss Lila McCoy. Ready for a new semester?”
Lila nods, shy but proud. “Yes, ma’am.”
“She’s been reading chapter books,” I say, unable to keep the pride out of my voice. “On her own.”
Mildred’s face lights. “I know. Her teacher wrote it in her progress notes. Says she’s ahead of the curve in literacy and comprehension. A strong student.”
Warmth blooms in my chest. I try to play it cool, but Belinda would’ve cried hearing that. She wanted so badly for Lila to love reading. She’d sit by the fireplace and read aloud for hours. Picture books, fairy tales, even ranch manuals if Lila was fussy enough.
Lila is her mother’s girl through and through.
There are days I still expect to turn and see Belinda leaning in the doorway, arms crossed, pretending she’s not listening while she soaks every moment in. Losing her didn’t just hollow me out. It rewired me. Every choice I make now carries her absence in it, like a shadow I can’t step out of.
Mildred pats my arm. “You’re doing well, Mr. McCoy. She’s doing well.”
“Thank you,” I say quietly. “Really.”
She nods once, brisk again. “Go! Get out of my hallway. Adults loitering make children nervous.”
Ellie gives Lila a giant hug. Boone ruffles both their hair. We watch them hurry off toward their classrooms, little backpacks bouncing.
And just like that, the hallway swallows them.
Boone lets out a low breath. “They’re getting big. Five and six now. It’s wild, isn’t it?”
“Too fast,” I murmur.
We stand there another beat, staring down the hallway.
Finally, Boone elbows me. “Coffee?”
Hell yeah. “Coffee.”
The Rusty Mug smells exactly of salvation. Fresh coffee, cinnamon buns, and a hint of fried bacon clinging to the air vents because Laura still refuses to fix the kitchen fan.
We hunch into a booth near the window, frost feathering the outside glass. Buckhorn’s Main Street is quiet this time of morning, just a few trucks parked by the feed store, Christmas lights still dangling from the light poles. The town forgot it’s January.
Laura appears with two mugs before we even ask.
“Large, black, and strong enough to put hair on your teeth,” she says, sliding mine over.
“You’re an angel,” I tell her.
She snorts. “Flattery gets you nothing except maybe a refill.” She turns to Boone. “And you want your usual sugared-up nonsense Rose has got you addicted to?”
“Extra whip,” Boone says proudly.
Laura rolls her eyes and stomps back to the counter.
Once she’s gone, Boone leans back in the booth and folds his arms across his chest. He studies me with his “I’m about to start shit” expression.
“So,” he says slowly.
“So.”
I stare at him.
He stares harder.
“Don’t,” I warn.
“What?” Boone lifts his brows innocently. “I’m just sitting here. Enjoying my morning. Thinking about coffee. And Faith.”
I close my eyes. “Christ.”
“Oh, is that her name? I keep forgetting.”
“You’re hilarious.”
He sips his whipped cream monstrosity, watching me over the rim. “You gonna talk about it?”
“No.”
“Gonna pretend it didn’t happen?”
"Yes."
“Gonna pretend you didn’t look like a kicked puppy for two straight days since then?”
“I didn’t…”
Boone snorts so loudly that half the café turns to look.
I scowl at him.
He leans in. “Dallas. Come on. Something is eating you alive. Might as well spit it out.”
I grip my coffee as if it’s going to solve all my problems.
Truth is, I haven’t been sleeping. Or thinking straight. Or functioning as a sane human man since that night outside the barn.
Every time I close my eyes, I feel her hands on me again. Her mouth. The soft sound she made when I kissed the hollow of her throat.
It has been hell.
Beautiful hell.
Addicting hell.
Impossible to forget hell.
“I shouldn’t have let it happen,” I mutter.
“Well,” Boone says dryly, “considering it takes two people to have sex, that’s weirdly self-blaming, but go off.”
“That’s not…” Heat crawls up my neck. “Look, it shouldn’t have happened because she’s… Faith.”
Boone tilts his head. “And what does that mean?”
“She left,” I say, too sharply. “She ran from a wedding. From a life she built in the city. From a man her father picked. I don’t even know what pieces she’s still trying to put back together.”
Boone watches me carefully.
“And if she leaves again,” I add, quieter now, “it’s not just me that pays for it.”
“She came back, Dallas,” Boone says simply. “You ever think about that instead of the part where she left?”
I glare at him.
He ignores it.
“And,” he continues, “you ever think maybe she’s not the only one scared to let someone in?”
My stomach twists.
“I’m not—”
“Dallas.” Boone softens, turning serious in a way he reserves for middle-of-the-night emergencies and tough love interventions. “After Belinda… you shut the door on the whole damn world. We all saw it.”
My throat knots.
“And I know it’s been years,” Boone adds quietly, before I can bristle. “I’m not pretending time fixes that kind of loss. Losing your wife doesn’t stop hurting just because the calendar keeps moving.”
I stare at him.
“It isn’t wrong,” he says gently. “We understood it. Hell, I would’ve done the same. But you’re allowed to feel something again. You’re allowed to want something again.”
“Wanting is fine,” I say quietly. “Losing is the part that ruins you.”
Boone nods slowly. “I know. When you’ve already buried the woman you built your life around, wanting someone else feels like tempting fate. Like you’re daring the world to take another swing at you.”
“What do you mean?”
“Rose almost died having Wyatt,” he says. “Did I tell you that?”
I look at him sharply. “No.”
“Bad bleed. Really bad.” He swallows. “For a second I thought… it doesn’t matter. The point is, when I finally got to hold her afterward, I realized the same thing you did: if I lose her, I’ll break somewhere that won’t ever fully heal.”
Silence thickens between us.
“So what’d you do?” I ask.
“I stopped pretending fear had to be the boss,” he says softly. “Because life’s too short to let it make your decisions for you.”
I rub a hand over my jaw, trying to breathe evenly.
He doesn’t stop.
“And Faith?” Boone shakes his head. “Man, she looked at you like you hung the damn moon. At the dance. At the ranch. Everywhere. She likes you. She probably always has.”
“She hasn’t called.”
“Neither have you.”
Boone points at me with his spoon. “You two stubborn idiots are sitting twenty miles apart, both convinced the other one regrets what happened. Meanwhile, the whole damn town is rooting for you.”
“I’m not…” I break off, because saying I’m not ready feels pathetic, and saying I want her anyway feels worse.
Boone sighs. “Look. I know you’re scared. Scared of losing Lila’s stability. Scared of losing yourself. Hell, scared of losing another woman you care about.”
A muscle jumps in my jaw.
“But Dallas,” he says, “sometimes good things come back around. Even if you don’t think you deserve them. Rose came back to me, remember? Not just when she had Wyatt. A couple of years ago. A long time after I never thought I’d see her again.”
I stare into my coffee until the surface stops rippling.
“And Belinda doesn’t stop being Lila’s mom just because you might love someone else,” Boone says. “You’re trying to protect that, too. I get it.”
He’s right.
I know he’s right.
I also know I’m not the same man I used to be. The one who loved Belinda fast and hard and without hesitation. That version of myself died the day she did.
And now?
There’s emotion growing inside me again. Warm and frightening and alive. Something with Faith’s green eyes and soft laughter and the way she said my name that night, as if she’d never stopped wanting to.
It terrifies me.
Because wanting her could crack me open again.
Because losing her again could finish the job.