Page 162 of Stay Wild Darlin’

He laughed, low and easy, as he cut the engine. “If I was kidnapping you, darlin’, I’d have brought rope and snacks. This is a detour.”

“You own rope,” I muttered, trying not to smile.

“And you like that I do,” he shot back, opening his door with a wink.

“Seriously,” I said, staring out at the pitch-black stretch of gravel and trees as he opened my door and helped me hop down. “Where are we?”

The last few hours had been a whirlwind. Brooke showing up out of nowhere. The lake. Cora’s birthday party. I was running on emotional fumes, and I wasn’t sure how much more my heart could hold.

“I need to show you this. I know it’s late, but my plan was to show you after the party, with Cora, but . . . well. Everything happened. We’ll bring her tomorrow.”

He was talking so fast I could barely keep up. My heart softened, overwhelmed and aching, and without thinking, I stepped forward and wrapped my arms around his middle.

He stilled and exhaled into my hair.

“Let’s go,” I whispered into his shirt. “Show me.”

Because whatever he was so desperate to share with me, I didn’t have it in me to say no. Not when his excitement was pulsing through him like light. Not when he was still choosing joy after the wreckage of the day.

We walked down the gravel path, hand in hand, the crunch of our footsteps the only sound in the still night. The trees parted, and the moonlight spilled through, casting a faint silver glow over the landscape.

When we rounded the bend, I saw it—and my breath caught.

The house.

The dilapidated old farmhouse I always pointed out whenever we drove to Beau and Fable’s. The one with the wraparound porch and the sagging roof and the weathered wood that begged to be loved again.

“The house I always loved,” I murmured, heart thudding. “I can’t believe⁠—”

Dalton grinned, watching me take it in like he’d been waiting for this exact moment. He didn’t say anything at first.

I blinked and glanced over at him. “Wait, are we trespassing?”

“Not when the owner is holding your hand.”

My knees nearly buckled.

“You bought the house,” I whispered, the words barely forming as I stared at the crooked porch railing, the way the moonlight kissed the battered siding. “You actually⁠—”

“I did.” Dalton gave me that boyish grin, the one that always made my stomach tumble. “Come inside.”

“Dalton . . .”

“You always looked at it like it already belonged to you. Figured it was time to make that official.”

He pulled a key from his pocket and led me up the creaking steps. The porch gave a little under our feet.

“We’ve outgrown my house. Cora’s stuff is everywhere. You’ve got your throw pillows and plants and all your weird rugs⁠—”

“They’re not weird.”

“—and I wanted us to have something that was ours. Something we chose. Together.”

I turned in a slow circle in what used to be a living room, heart swelling so fast it ached.

“There’s a barn in the back. We could fix it up and get some animals. Couple chickens. Maybe a goat. Cora’ll lose her damn mind.”

Tears prickled at the corners of my eyes again, but this time they didn’t come from grief or confusion.