Page 42 of Love Me Again

Shane held up his hands. “Your word. Not mine. And please don’t use it around Micah.”

It almost made her want to laugh. Which was so damn annoying.

“Okay, why do you think he married me and didn’t tell you guys? Kept me hidden away for six months?”

Shane rubbed his hand over the back of his neck, tipping his cowboy hat down. “Well, usually I’d say that’s his to tell you, and I shouldn’t butt my nose into it.”

Exactly. “I think I’ll pass on⁠—”

“But, since I promised I’d tell you the truth,” he interrupted, before she could shut the door in his face. “My belief is that… You see, Boone’s always had a hard time with things being good. It frustrates me, always has, and I think it’s because I didn’t understand it. But he said something to me last night that… Maybe it clarified some pieces of him to me.”

Josie should probably cut Shane off and tell him it was none of her business. Did she really need to know this stuff if Boone wasn’t going to be the one to tell her?

But Shane kept talking and the bottom line was Josie wanted to know.

“Boone was only six when our dad died. I was twelve. Gavin was ten and Molly was nine. Especially in those first years of him being gone, the three of us older kids had a lot more memories with Dad. I think in a weird way, Boone felt…a lot of guilt for not being as devastated as we were as time went on. Everything still changed for him, but it wasn’t the same, and he was too young to fully deal with why.”

Josie could see how that made some sense in the context of Boone, but she didn’t see it having to do anything with her.

“You know, he’s never been as open or honest with me in his whole life as he was last night. And the only thing that’s changed in the past few days is you being here, so it’s got to connect, I think.”

Josie couldn’t see how. All she’d done was tell him she couldn’t stay and let him talk her into staying. Either way… “I’m not in charge of fixing him.”

“No, you aren’t. Me neither—though that’s a lesson I’m not sure I’ve fully accepted yet. Because when you love someone, you want to fix things for them. That’s not such a terrible thing, is it?”

Josie crossed her arms over her chest, because her heart hurt. “It can be.”

Shane nodded slowly. “I guess so.” He smiled a little sheepishly. “Look⁠—”

Before he could finish that, a door slammed. They both looked back at the waiting truck. Cora waved happily from the passenger seat, but Micah was charging toward them.

“Can we go yet?” he demanded when he approached.

“Josie’s still deciding,” Shane told him.

The teenager peered up at her with squinted eyes, like he was taking her measure. “Sarah makes better cookies than even Grandma Maisey.” He said this matter-of-factly and as if it was the only piece of important information in making decisions when Josie didn’t even know who Sarah was.

“How can you pass that up?” Shane asked.

Josie was going to find a way to. She was going to find the words. She was. But before she could, Micah spoke again.

“Were you there when Boone got hurt?” Micah asked.

The question stabbed her right in the heart, but she answered all the same. “I was.”

“That sucks.”

Josie managed to nod. “Yeah, it did.”

“At least he wasn’t alone though.”

She would look back on it a million times and still not understand what it was about that simple statement that got her into the truck, but soon enough she was in the back of a Shane’s vehicle, driving through Gracely with, technically, her brother-in-law, sister-in-law, and nephew.

“Holy shit. He did it.”

Boone turned to where Molly was gesturing. Saw Josie in the back of Shane’s truck with Micah. For a moment, everything in him just stopped.

Shane got out then rushed around to help Cora ease her way out, while Josie stepped out and squinted against the sunlight before Micah bounded up to her side and said something to her that made her laugh.