I’d said what I needed to; I’d survived the speech. I couldn’t stand to look at Josie’s pained face any longer. I couldn’t stand knowing I was responsible for it. So I tipped my hat at Jesse and Rowen, set down the mic, and headed out of the tent. I needed a hell of a lot more than fresh air, but it was a start. I made it all the way to the giant maple tree way back on the Walkers’ property. I couldn’t decide what I wanted to do more: keep walking until I’d found the end of the earth, then take a flying leap off of it, or drop to my knees and curse at the stars for shining so brightly when my own personal darkness was setting in.

I’d said what I needed to—I’d apologized—and Josie knew how I felt. She knew I loved her, just as she’d suspected. After all I’d said, she hadn’t done anything about it. She’d stayed in her seat, her eyes pained, her mouth closed, and I feared, her heart closed as well. Fifteen years of build-up to when I finally confessed my love for her, and I was two months too late. As usual, my timing sucked. Knowing Josie was back in that tent, sitting beside some other guy, and that she could have been mine if I hadn’t turned my back and run . . . the emotions bottled inside of me exploded. The old maple took the brunt of it.

“Now what did that tree ever do to you?” The voice came from behind me as I considered going back at it for another round.

If they weren’t already, my toes were about to break if I kept kicking it. “Nothing. But in case you haven’t noticed, I do a lot of fucked-up things to things and people who don’t deserve it.” I wiped the tree bark from my knuckles and watched Josie come toward me. In that light purple dress, with the way the moon and stars were shining, she really was an angel gliding toward me. It was such a beautiful sight—almost painfully so—the breath caught in my lungs.

“I noticed,” she replied, stopping in front of me. Her face gave nothing away, but her eyes did—that fire was back.

“Are you going to slap me?” I braced myself for it.

“I’m thinking about it, but I’ve got a couple questions for you to answer first. Then I’ll decide.” I nodded. “That was some speech in there, Black. Was it real? Was it the truth?” Josie’s voice was flat and emotionless. I knew mine would be neither.

“Every word.” I didn’t think it was possible for a voice to wobble so much over three syllables.

Her eyes closed then flashed open. “I’m here with Colt.”

That was a dagger through my heart, but instead of keeping it there and letting it slow me down, I pulled it out and dropped it at my feet. “You might be here with him, but your heart isn’t here with him.”

That fire in her eyes spread to the rest of her face. “Who are you to tell me who I do and don’t love? Who the hell do you think you are?”

I maybe should have been flinching for a forthcoming slap, but instead I stepped closer. “The person you love. The person who loves you. That’s who I am.” My voice didn’t wobble that time. “The person who will love you every second of every day until our days run out. Until we’re buried beside each other under an old tree like this. I’m not running away anymore. I’m not going anywhere, so if any of that love you used to have for me hasn’t turned to hate, tell me. Please, Joze, tell me. Do you still love me? Do you still want to love me? Because I know I’ve been piss-poor at showing it, but I meant what I said in there—I’ve loved you since the day I met you. And I meant what I just said out here—I’m going to continue loving you until the day I die.” I had so much more to say, but I’d said the important things. If she turned her back on me and I never saw her again, at least she’d know the important things. If she threw her arms around me and decided to be with me like I hoped, I had the rest of our lives to fill in the rest.

“You said I was wrong about something. Wrong about when you fell in love with me.” I nodded and waited as she put her thoughts together. “Well, I was wrong about something else, too.” A tear slipped out of the corner of her eye, and when I lifted my hand to wipe it away, she didn’t flinch away from me.

“What else were you wrong about?”

“When you walked away from me a couple of months ago, that love I had for you did change—like I thought it would.” Another tear fell, followed by another, so I just kept my hand pressed against her cheek to catch them.

“It changed to hate. I walked away, and your love changed to hate.” Saying those words was a thousand times more painful than thinking them.

“No.” She shook her head, her eyes dropping. “It changed when it grew. I realized that even though you were gone, there was no one else I wanted to love. I had no love that didn’t belong to you left to give.”

Oh my god. Was she saying what it sounded like she was saying? I wasn’t sure, so I needed to ask. I needed to know, and hopefully my question didn’t sound as lame as the one I’d asked myself. “Joze, are you saying what I think you’re saying?” So much for not sounding as lame. “Are you saying you still love me?”

Her head bobbed. “So much I’ve been sick with it these past two months.”

She still loved me. Josie Gibson still loved me, and I was finally ready to accept that love. I’d waited for that moment for so long, I didn’t know what the hell to say. Or do? What did I say to that . . .? “I love you, Joze. I love you so fucking much. Yeah, I realize saying fuck while confessing one’s love probably isn’t romantic—”

My confession was cut short when her mouth crashed into mine. Her arms wound around my neck while I drew her close and kissed her back. That whole time I’d been anticipating a slap when I should have been expecting a kiss. The story of my life. Josie kissed me so forcefully, she managed to back me up into that old maple, and then she kissed me for so long, I’m sure the sun was thinking about rising before her lips left mine.

She was smiling with that fire still burning in her eyes. “I came here with Colt you know.” Her smile went higher on one side.

“Yeah, yeah, too bad for him because you’re here with me now, and I’m not letting go.” Drawing her back to me, I lowered my mouth just outside of her ear. “Finders keepers.”

I felt her smile on the side of my neck. She was still smiling when that sun did finally rise. It was the start of a new life for me. A new life for us. I had everything I needed right in front of me.

I didn’t need eight seconds of glory when I had a lifetime of it in my arms.

I WAS BACK on the bull again. Not in the way the saying goes, but on an actual bull that could have been Bluebell’s uglier and meaner older brother. Rodeo season had been in full swing for a while, but it was my first ride since Josie and I finally figured out our shit. Well, since I’d finally figured out mine. The past two months had been the best months of my life. They’d been so great—I’m talking delirious, insane kind of happy—I’d come close to convincing myself I was living a different life. Josie said I’d just stopped fighting life at every turn and opened myself up to living it instead. She was probably right—she usually was.

Really, it didn’t matter. Whether Josie’s theory or mine was the right one, it didn’t take away from the fact that the girl I’d spent a lifetime loving from afar, I’d get to love up close for the rest of my life. I got to touch and kiss and hold her as much as I wanted to . . . and I wanted to all the time. Luckily, she didn’t mind.

So maybe I was back on the bull again in the way the saying goes, too. I don’t know if I’d ever been on the bull in the first place when it came to life, but again, it didn’t matter. I was there now. I was learning how to let the good things in and let the bad things pass through me, one day at a time, one lesson after another. It was a slow process and one hell of a grueling journey, but I got to experience it with Josie at my side, so fuck the rest. I was a lucky man.