BEYOND GLAD TO have finally finished packing the last of her things, Rory kneeled to tape shut a box of books. Was she nervous about the decision she’d made? That was an understatement. But she was done hiding. Done running. She had hidden and run for so long she hadn’t even realized she was still doing it until she’d gone back home.
Until she’d fallen in love with Jake all over again.
Not exactly accurate. That love had always been there. She’d just refused to let herself feel it anymore, and staying away from him had let her stuff it so far down it had lain dormant until being with him again had brought it all to the surface.
Maybe he’d never trust her...maybe he’d never let her be in his life again the way she wanted. Maybe the love he’d had for her was gone in a way hers never would be. But hiding in LA wasn’t going to help her have the life she wanted.
It had taken nine long years of hiding, but she finally felt like herself again. The woman who went for what she wanted.
Jake would shake his head if he heard her say that, but once in a while her stubbornness just might be her best asset. Because she’d decided she wasn’t taking Jake’s rejection lying down. Until she’d done everything she possibly could to convince him she loved him, that they belonged together and that she’d never, ever leave him and Mika and Eudemonia, she wouldn’t accept that it was over for good.
The doorbell rang and she figured it was the moving guys, ready to get all her things on the truck to take to Alaska. She squared her shoulders. This was it. The first step toward her new life. A better life. A life where she could see her mom whenever she wanted. A life in the town she loved.
A life with Jake and Mika, if all went as she planned.
And if it didn’t she’d accept that pain. Because even trying to have a life with the two of them would be worth every second of the heartache that would follow Jake’s rejection of her love, if that’s how it turned out.
She wiped her sweaty hands down her jeans and went to answer the door.
When she opened it her mouth fell open and her heart dove straight to her stomach.
“Jake. What...? Why...? How...?”
“Lots of questions there, Rory.” He gave her a crooked smile, but she could see the tension in his eyes. “Can I come in?”
She swung open the door, unable to find her voice. They stood in the small foyer of her apartment—the place she was leaving behind for good—and stared at one another for long seconds before Jake finally spoke.
“It’s been a month since you showed up at my door to tell me you love me.” He reached for her hands, tightened his fingers on hers. “Every day and every night of that month I’ve thought of you. Missed you. Wished things could be different between us. But I was too scared to let myself be with you again. Too cowardly to risk my heart again.”
“I know,” she whispered, hardly believing that he was here, that he was talking about what had happened the last time she’d seen him. That he’d missed her and thought of her. “I understand. I was cowardly, too.”
“I planned to stay being that coward, wrapping myself in a self-protective blanket of mistrust, convinced it was what I wanted and needed to do. Until two women named Beth and Wendy came to my office.”
He drew her closer, and her heart pounded so hard in her ears she feared she wouldn’t be able to hear what was coming next. “And what did those two women say to you?”
“They pointed out that hiding away in Eudemonia, refusing to see what could be between us again, was no way to find my future happiness. I’d convinced myself I was plenty happy until you came back. But that was when I knew there was a big piece of happiness missing from my life, and that piece is you.”
“Oh, Jake.” She swallowed down the emotion filling her chest and stepped toward him. “All I want is a chance. A chance to prove to you how much I love you and that I’ll never, ever leave you again. That’s all I want.”
“Me, too.”
He cupped her face in his hands and her heart shook hard at the sweetness, the love she saw so clearly in his eyes.
“Which is why I’m moving to LA to be with you. Me and Mika. I’m going to take a job here, and we’ll see where being together again takes us. We’ll be away from the bad and the good memories of Eudemonia that might cloud things up and confuse the issue. It’ll just be you and me, finding out what’s still between us. A new beginning. What do you say?”
She sniffed back the tears that threatened and flung her arms around him. “I’d say I love that idea almost as much as I love you. Except there’s one thing—I didn’t take the job. I packed all my stuff and it’s going to be trucked to Eudemonia today.”
“What?” He stared down at her. “You didn’t take the job? You’re planning to move back to Eudemonia?”
“Yep. When I came back here I wallowed in misery because you didn’t trust me and didn’t want to be with me—didn’t want to love me, and let me love you and Mika. But then I realized I’d wallowed for nine long years and I was done with it. I decided to be the stubborn Aurora Anderson you teased me for being over more years than I can remember. I decided to come back to Eudemonia and pound on that heart of yours until you let me inside again. I love you too much to quit now. And if you never love me back, I will know that at least I tried.”
He pulled her close and buried his face in her hair. They stood for long minutes, just soaking one another in, until he finally lifted his head.
“I do love you, Rory Anderson. I love your stubbornness and preparedness and adorableness. I love your adventurous spirit and toughness and sweetness. I love everything about you. Even when you hurt me I loved you. And what I’ve accepted this past month, let myself appreciate and be happy about, is that I will always love you, no matter what.”
His mouth lowered to hers in the most beautiful kiss of her life, which slowly moved from tender to hot until they finally broke apart.
She looked up into the brown eyes she loved so much and tightened her hold on him. “If you want to move to LA I’ll stay. But what I really want is to move back to the place I belong. The place we both belong. With you.”
“Other than hearing that you still love me, those words are the best thing I’ve ever heard in my life.”
He kissed her again, and when they came up for air his smile was so dazzling her heart squeezed tight with the overwhelming love she’d felt for him forever.
“Come on. Eudemonia and Mika are waiting for us to come home.”