Me: Ha! Sounds like her. It’s still over two months away. She’s something else.

Presley: How are you? Did you decide on the expansion?

What she wants to say is: Are you still sobbing every night? Do you miss him? Why don’t you come back?

My answers: Yes. Yes. Because I’m not a doormat.

Instead I reply.

Me: I’m good. Erin and I are going to hold off.

Three solid knocks sound on my front door, and I hop up from my seat on the couch. I’m sure Nate forgot something. “Did you forget—” the question dies on my lips when I see him.

His dark brown hair, beautiful light brown eyes, face with a light layer of scruff, green shirt with his tight jeans takes my breath away. My memory has done nothing to preserve the way he looks. Everything about him was dull in comparison to real life. “Expectin’ someone?” his Southern drawl is more prominent since I haven’t heard it in a while.

Wyatt Hennington stands in my doorway, taking up every inch of space.

At first, I feel joy. He came here. He’s in Philadelphia, clearly looking for me. I’ve dreamed of this night after night, and finally, he came. Then, another wave of emotion hits, this time it’s confusion. Why the hell is he here? He watched me walk away almost three weeks ago. Did he get lost and end up here? I don’t get it. He made it clear how he felt. Each day that he stayed away, he made a choice . . . what changed?

Finally, I settle on the most prominent feeling I have—anger. So now he shows his face? Out of nowhere and without so much as a text? After letting me feel this horrible pain for weeks? Yeah, well, fuck him. He’s seventeen days too late.

“Not you.” I slam the door in his face.

My back rests against the door, and I hold on to the hurt and anger. Those are emotions I can work with. My heart races as I picture him on the other side of the door.

“Angie.” He knocks again. “Please, baby, open up.”

I spin around and glare at the door. “I’m not your ‘baby’.”

“Can we talk?” he asks. “Please?”

“Nope. Go home, Wyatt. I have nothing to say to you.” That’s not exactly true. Actually, that’s completely untrue. I rip open the door and put my hands on my hips. “You know what? I do have something to say. Screw you. Screw you so hard your dick falls off. I can’t believe you have the balls to show up here like this. You promised me you’d be there for me. That you were going to fight to show me how much I should love you. Good job, jackass. You did that, and then you tossed me out like last night’s trash after we’d just lost our baby! Our daughter died, and you couldn’t man up. We’re done. I’m done crying over you, waiting for you to show up at my door, and I’m fixing this gaping hole you left in my heart myself. I. Am. Done!”

“Good,” he says and steps forward. “We’re both done with the same thing.”

“Yeah? What’s that?”

“Waiting to show up at your door.”

I move back as he comes closer. Then I hear the door shut behind him. “Just go, Wyatt. You don’t belong here.”

“No.” His eyes hold mine. “I’m not leaving. Because I love you. I love you so much it fucking hurts. I love you with every part of my soul. I never understood why people spewed crap like that, until I met you. You’re inside me, and I tried to let you go. I pushed you away because I thought this was what you wanted. I thought I was giving you the life you really missed.” He takes a deep breath through his nose, “Then, I stopped caring about that.”

My mind struggles to keep up. He loves me. I knew this deep inside, even though he tried to tell me different, I knew. Wyatt did more than just push me away. He was blunt force trauma to my heart. Now he says he loves me, but where was all that love three weeks ago? How could he love me and watch me fall apart? Whether he thought he was doing the right thing or not, he still did nothing. Now he’s here, saying all these things. Damn infuriating cowboy.

“You stopped caring?” I take another step back as he approaches.

“I wasn’t myself, baby. I stopped caring because I broke you and me in the process of doin’ what I thought was right. If it hurts being away from you this much, it ain’t right. I can’t sleep in that house without lookin’ for you. I can’t go to the stables without seein’ your face. I can’t go to the bakery because I wait for you to come out from behind the counter. I can’t breathe without you, Angie.”

He’s right about one thing. He broke me. The girl who loves this boy hates seeing him in pain. We’ve been through so much. But the woman who had this man tear her to pieces, doesn’t give a shit.

I’m not sure which side I’m teetering on, but I know I can’t take him back, not when I feel like I can’t trust him.

Because essentially, that’s what he broke . . . my trust in him and in us.

I step off to the side and grip my neck. I don’t know how, once again, I’m going to do this. “You should go home.”

“You are my home.”

“No.” I put my hand up to stop him as he takes yet another step toward me. “You bulldozed our house that night. You set fire to our home.”

“I can rebuild it. I’ll build you a whole new house.”

“Please, stop.”

This is the Wyatt I remember. The one who says exactly the right things. It’s never orchestrated—it’s what’s in his heart.

My anger starts to abate, and I try to hold on. I can’t let him waltz in here and sweet talk me. I have to be strong. I can’t go through another three weeks of what I just did. The crying, the stomach pains, and listlessness. That was hard enough. It’s still hard.

“I know I hurt you.” He follows me when I retreat some more. “I know I wasn’t the man you needed.”

“Stop.”

“No. I was stupid. I was trying to save you, Angie. I was tryin’ to love you enough to let you be happy.”

I huff. “How did that work out? I’ve been miserable. You wouldn’t listen to me. You were doing what you thought was right and didn’t hear what I was saying.”

He stands in front of me and touches my chin. “I love you.”

“I don’t know if that matters right now.”

He lifts my head. “Before we lost Faith and you got that machine at the bakery, I kept thinkin’ how you were leaving anyway. I didn’t understand why you’d want that. You kept talking about needin’ to go back.” He shakes his head and drops his hand. “I kept waiting for you to tell me you wanted to stay.”

“I asked you.” I push back. “I asked you to talk to me, but you kept ignoring me and saying it was nothing. It’s late, Wyatt. I’m tired and I’ve had a horrible day.”

He glances around the apartment, seeing it’s a complete pigsty. The look changes in his eyes. “You had company?”

I look at Nate’s beer, which is still sitting next to my wine glass. “Yes.” I know this is going to piss him off, but at the same time, it’s not my problem. There would’ve never been a visit with Nate had Wyatt not sent me away. Maybe he should think about that. “Does that matter?”