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“Why?” I whisper.
He runs a hand over his face, smoothing his short beard. “There’s someone I’ve been wanting to work with who’s in a tight spot, and Jamie wants me back to write half his album.”
“Oh,” I say. “Okay.”
I blink hard. Why does it matter to me if he leaves? He’s barely been here at all. The lump in my throat won’t smooth out, no matter how hard I swallow, and I don’t know why. “You leaving tomorrow?” I manage.
He shifts, hands on his hips. “I am.”
“Okay.”
“And I was…kinda hoping you’d come along for the ride.”
My jaw drops, and I cycle through every emotion in the book. His eyes are guarded. Is he fucking with me? Hope rises in my chest, then drops abruptly, turning into anger and fear he doesn’t mean it. Or that he thinks I’m a groupie or something, willing to throw my life away to tag along with him. My forehead scrunches hard.
“Did I say something wrong?” he asks.
I shrug. “You don’t know me like that.”
It comes out harsher than I meant, and he recoils slightly. A tiny flinch. He clears his throat and looks me in the eye. It’s a naked stare that makes me want to squirm.
“This isn’t what you think,” he says.
“What do I think?”
“I’ve never asked this of anyone before.”
Does that make me feel better or worse? I can’t tell. It’s like something out of a movie. A tall, sexy music producer and songwriter shows up, sweeps me off my feet, shows me the best sex I’ve ever had, then asks me to travel across the country with him, all without even knowing my middle name. I can’t wrap my head around that, but more bewildering than all that is the realization I want to go with him.
I’m dying to be on the road. I have been for so long. I’m desperate to see all the things I’ve only witnessed on the TV, read about in books, or heard on my favorite records. I want to drive with the windows down, desert air slipping through my fingers. I want to stop at cheap motels on the side of the road and drink beer on the curb while the sun goes down. I want to be free of the weight I’ve carried for so long, to let someone else take the wheel and allow the ocean to carry me on the tides. I want to see all the things he writes songs about.
“You could be a serial killer,” I say.
He laughs once. “I’m not.”
“And I have to take care of Dad.”
“I thought your aunt was coming. This is the perfect time. I can fly you back before she leaves.”
“Fly me back?”
“I’m planning on driving there and writing the album along the way. Why? You don’t like road trips.”
Hunger so intense, it shocks me floods my body. If I push my family out of my head, and the ranch with it, I can feel wanderlust so powerful, it rivals what I felt with his hands on my body.
What if I said yes?
What if I let him open the gate and just…ran?
“I can’t,” I whisper. “What will Serena do?”
He clears his throat, giving me that faintly amused stare. “I don’t know your sister well, but I’m pretty sure she’d tell you to go.”
“Yeah, but she’s reckless. She doesn’t think things through,” I sniff.
“What if you were like that? Just this once?”
He’s right. Serena would tell me to go, but she does all kinds of crazy things I would never do, so that means nothing. My lashes are wet as I shake my head.
