“Some difference.” She couldn’t pull her hand away if she tried, but she didn’t really want to. After her emotionally draining day, the human contact warmed a piece of her she wasn’t sure she should thaw. “I didn’t even realize Tonya was pregnant. It’s so obvious now....”
“Hindsight is always clearer. You were great with her, and she trusted you. She showed us that over and over.” Max rubbed his thumb across her knuckles. “You didn’t have to confront her about the test. She came to you. That’s huge.”
True. And the trust exercise was a large part of what had prompted the confession. Maybe she hadn’t completely lost her skill, but what did that say about Cody? Was it really that different just because she was his mom? Max had gotten through to him in ways she couldn’t, and he was Cody’s father.
But he didn’t know.
Her chest tightened. Maybe that was the difference. If she confessed before the graduation, she could literally mess up Cody’s entire progress. Before, it’d just been a fear and a gut instinct prompting her toward that decision. But now, it seemed more like proof. The odds were already stacked so high against Cody, and the fact that the kids were continually picking on him as the runt of the litter didn’t help at all. It only urged him to prove himself harder and faster—with more rule breaking and chest thumping.
She really missed the days of superhero sheets and cracker crumbs and stepping on building blocks. They were alone, but they had each other, and life was so much easier. Back when only Emma knew what they were missing, and she could make it up to Cody in the form of ice cream cones and tent sleepovers.
Now she had nothing. Nothing to offer but a court ordered camp and a desperate arsenal of prayers.
Would it be enough?
“I want to start over.” Max’s confession blasted like a shotgun in the silence of the star-studded night. “I want another chance.”
She stared at him, mouth slightly open, all too aware of the responding pound of her heart.
Then before she could decide what to say, he broke the silence for her.
His mouth against hers was familiar in a bittersweet way, but the gentleness in his fingers threading through her hair was brand-new. So was the caution he exhibited as he kissed her, carefully, as though she was a treasure that might break. Gone was the selfishness from the touch she remembered years before. And in its place lingered something she wanted to hold on to forever.
She kissed him back with more than a decade’s worth of longing, then turned away, her lips trailing across the stubble along his jaw. He let out a ragged breath in her ear, his hands gripping her waist firmly even as he pushed away, putting distance between them while keeping her balanced on the fence.
“I know you have your own life in Dallas.” Max rested his forehead on hers, snuck another kiss, then backed away completely as if realizing he just couldn’t get that close.
Own life. Dallas. Yes.
The fog cleared, and snatches of life—real life—pressed back to the surface. But she didn’t want real life. She wanted to stay in this pocket of stillness, where teen pregnancies and teen rebellion and life-altering secrets didn’t exist. Where there was only the twinkle of the stars and the love in a certain cowboy’s eyes and the whisper that life—her life—could still be different. Could be restored.
“But maybe...” His voice trailed, and he tucked a wisp of hair behind her ear. His touch burned a trail along her cheek and she shivered. “Maybe.”