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Just like always.

I squeezed my eyes shut and let the tears come. For Thad. For Wells. For myself.

For everything I lost.

For everything I didn’t know how to want.

WASTING ALL THESE TEARS

“Rose?” I called out, my voice cutting through the thick silence.

Nothing.

The house felt hollow, too quiet. Like something was missing.

I found Granger sprawled on the couch, his tail thumping lazily against the cushions as I ran a hand over his head. “Where’s Sunshine, buddy?”

He wagged his tail in response.

A strange feeling tugged at my chest as I made my way upstairs. Rose’s door was open. Not just cracked—wide open.

I hesitated for half a second before stepping closer, my pulse hammering in my ears. I knew I shouldn’t look, but hell, I was already here.

Inside, the room was still. The bed untouched. But what caught my attention was the dresser.

The sunflowers.

The ones I had left outside her door, thinking she’d probably toss them without a second thought. But there they were, laid out neatly beside the notes I’d been leaving her every morning with her coffee.

She kept them. She kept all of them.

My chest tightened. Rose didn’t seem like the sentimental type. If anything, she acted like half the things I did annoyed her. But she hadn’t thrown these away.

Did that mean something?

I dragged a hand down my face, pushing the thought aside as I stepped back into the hall. The bathroom door was open. The whole upstairs was empty.

She wasn’t here.

Where the hell did she go?

“Why me?”

The cry echoed in the distance, raw and broken, slicing through the night air. My stomach dropped.

Rose.

I shrugged off my blazer and bolted down the stairs, my boots pounding against the hardwood. I reached for the four-wheeler key.

Gone.

Shit.

I didn’t have to think twice. I knew exactly where she was.

The flower field.

These boots weren’t made for running, but I didn’t give a damn. I took off in a dead sprint, my lungs burning, my heart slamming against my ribs with every step.