I left bright and early the next morning, when Simon and Margo were still asleep. I’d told them of my early flight the night before, so I just scrawled a quick note thanking them for their hospitality.

It had included hours of packing Simon’s threadbare death metal T-shirts, but whatever. I’d enjoyed that window into his life.

I was greedy for glimpses of my family. Margo had even let me touch her belly while the baby kicked. She was a little spitfire.

Life moved on. For them, and maybe for me too.

I took an Uber to the airport. My flight was on time, and once I was in the air, I took out my leather notebook. The words came far easier today than they had yesterday and the day before. The blockages in my chest and gut had loosened just from the afternoon and night I’d spent with family.

I had a family. Now I would see if I could build on to that base.

I’d come up with two more songs by the time I reached New York. I stepped off the plane into a solid wall of wet heat that instantly reminded me I’d used the last of my sunscreen in Tennessee.

Which brought back memories of Zoe slicking it onto my skin. And covering me with aloe when I burned.

Just what I needed, to walk through JFK with a hard-on.

I rented a car and marveled at the simple pleasure of slipping behind the wheel. I didn’t often get to drive these days. But there was something so satisfying about programming the GPS and seeing Zoe’s location—I hoped—triangulated on the map onscreen.

I’m coming for you, Magic.

Leaving the city and traveling into the more rural part of the state was a revelation. I laughed aloud when I saw cows grazing behind wooden post fences. Then there were horses, from the deepest brown to black and white. Corn grew high in the fields and the sun beat down through the open moonroof on the sedan I’d been given. I’d be burned when I finally reached Zoe, but I couldn’t close it. The sun and wind along my skin felt like glory as I zipped along the rural highways and neared my love.

Close. I was so close now.

The sign for Happy Acres Orchard made my heart trip. I clutched the wheel and let out a dazed laugh as the song I’d sung with Flynn poured out of the speakers.

And I didn’t turn it off. Just let it play.

Our voices were so different. Our styles more a clash than a complement. Yet there was harmony in the discordance.

Just like me and Zoe. Or there had been once. If I had any lucky straws left to pull, there would be again.

I drove up the gravel drive to Happy Acres and parked at the back of the lot. My palms were sweaty, and not just because of the relentless summer heat.

There were people milling all over. Families and children, running and laughing. For a place that grew apples—among other things—the place was bustling despite the fact that autumn was still to come. But from my research before I’d set off, there was a general store and a lodge, along with a distillery being built. They also sold other crops during the off months. And the mention of entertainment had caused a little buzz along my spine.

Surely this wasn’t a proper environment for me. But maybe.

Maybe.

I wanted to be part of Zoe’s world, just as she’d endeavored to be part of mine.

I might not understand farm life, and I might have had to do a reverse image search on the picture of growing corn I’d snapped to get a read on what crop it actually was, but that just proved I was willing to learn.

And I was willing to meet her family. I fumbled my cross out from under my shirt. After the tracker had been removed from it, it had been returned to me. Now was the perfect time to call upon its powers.

There was a reason meeting the parents had merited an entire movie. Add in meeting the rest of the family too and I was ready to find a hotel to try again tomorrow.

Perhaps next week.

But I got out of the car and walked up the slight rise to the general store. Gravel crunched under my feet and children whooped and screeched.

Instead of making my ears ring, I smiled. I hadn’t awakened and taken back my wish for children. If anything, their joy was cementing my desire even more.

Foolish? Could be. But I was a man who had dreamed of singing for his supper and I’d made it happen, by hook or crook. No dream was too fanciful for someone who used the airwaves as his diary.

Nor was any apple taco too strange to sate a tired traveler, I soon discovered.

I’d ducked into the café tacked onto the general store first and filled my belly. I sucked down a cup of truly delicious coffee and felt ready to face the world.

Straightening my shoulders, I shifted my guitar case from hand to hand as I approached the counter I’d just checked out from. I had a different purpose now.

A kindly woman with snowy white hair mixed with the occasional hank of honey blond smiled at me. “Come back for more? You can put it away, can’t you?”

“I can and do. It was all delicious, thank you.” I returned her smile. “Actually, I was hoping you could point me in the direction of Zoe Manning.”

At once, her expression changed. Not to one of animosity, but of curiosity. It sparkled in the depths of her denim blue eyes as she tilted her head. “She picked well,” she murmured.

“Excuse me?”

“You’re Ian Kagan.”

Being identified so easily took me aback. “I am, yes. And you are?”

She held out a hand. “Call me Laverne. I’m Zoe’s aunt. Do you know my Lila as well?”

I cleared my throat as we shook. “Um, we’re acquainted, yes.”

Laverne’s laughter was as rich as her coffee. “She’s quite the ballbuster, isn’t she?”

I blinked. “Yes. If I may speak frankly.”

“Seems as if you already have. So, you’re here for Zoe. Are you going to break her heart?”

Clearly, this woman had some knowledge of our…situation. “No.” I certainly didn’t intend to. Not again. “I want to prove to her that I love her.”

“A summer love?”

I felt the back of my neck warm. “No. A forever love. If she’ll have me.”

“A poet with sad, dreamy eyes and an accent. She was sunk from day one.” But she smiled as she came around the counter to me. “I’ll show you where you can find Zoe. But first, a tour?”

“Sure. I would love to see where Zoe grew up.” And where she’d returned to find sanctuary, though I didn’t add the second part.

We toured the property from the bakery cases to the general store with its shelves of odds and ends and fun little apple doodads. Along the way, Laverne shared family tidbits or memories that made me smile. Especially when she described a young, pig-tailed Zoe trying to adopt a squirrel she’d found that had sneaked in an open door.

“Her heart is soft, but it’s strong. Sometimes she protects it with an extra layer of barbed wire to ensure whomever makes it through is worth it. You must have, or she wouldn’t love you as she does.”

Present tense. Hope surged through my body. “She spoke of me? Of us?” I’d known she must have for Laverne to instantly know who I was. But hearing the confirmation was a different thing entirely.

“She did. You wounded her. As I’m sure she wounded you when she released you. Love causes as many bruises as it does hickeys.”

I coughed into my fist. “Uh, pardon me?”

“You heard me.” She let out a bawdy laugh and motioned to an older man with salt and pepper hair. “Fred, come meet Zoe’s young man. And take his bags. He’s going to wither away hauling around these cases under this hot sun.”

“Hot sun? But we’re indoors—” I trailed off as Fred came over to look me up and down and to shake my hand. Vigorously.

We spoke for a moment and then he took my bags as requested. The next thing I knew, we were outside all right and walking toward rows and rows of trees at the back of the property. I couldn’t slip Zoe’s sunglasses back on fast enough.

Laverne was right about the sun. I was about to sweat through my T-shirt and jeans. I’d need to find some shorts if I stayed.

If Zoe didn’t boot me out on sight.

A huge hulking man with muscles barely contained by his overalls emerged from between the trees, a pail of cuttings in one hand. He took one look at me and snarled.

“It’s him.” He took a threatening step toward me and Laverne held up a hand.

“Easy now, Beck. There will be no bloodshed out there. You know it’s bad for the roots.”

“Fine.” He set down his pail and I was grateful that he hadn’t chosen to swing it at my head. “Let’s go inside and I’ll do what needs to be done.”

“So, you’re Zoe’s brother. Which are you? Larry, Curly or Moe?” I didn’t know why I said it, outside of a certain death wish. I didn’t know their names in any case.

His mouth curled in a sneer. “Go back to your own country and leave my sister alone.”

Laverne gasped. “Beckett Manning, you mind your manners.”

“This guy dances on tables with women while my little sister is pining after him. Damn rockstar.” He might as well have spat on the ground.

“Is she pining after me?” From Beckett’s growl, perhaps I’d asked that a little too happily.

Not that I wanted Zoe in pain. Far from it. But I’d missed her so. Imagining she might miss me too was a relief.

Maybe I wasn’t too late.

Assuming Beckett didn’t squash my head under his size fifteen boot like an overripe grape.

“Also, as for the table…incident, I’d had a bit too much to drink. I wasn’t dancing with women. I was dancing alone. And almost as soon as I got up there, I got down. Because of Zoe. How could I want any other woman after having her?”

“You better not be talking about sex with my little sister, British boyo, because I’ll—”

“Beck, for God’s sake. Zoe is a grown woman with needs. Just as you have needs.”

Beckett looked skyward and lifted his folded hands to his mouth as if he was praying. “Not now, Aunt Laverne. I can’t with your sex talk.”

“He’s too repressed,” Laverne said in a whisper that so wasn’t. “Forgive him. I think the hot sun might play a role too.”

Beck dropped his hands and gave me a hard stare. “I will end you if you touch my sister again.”

I took a deep breath before nodding and stepping forward and lifting my fists. “Then have at it, because I intend to do more than touch. I want her to be mine forever.”

Beck frowned then looked past me to his aunt. “Who is this guy?”

“Ian Kagan. I thought you knew who I was.” Then I cleared my throat. “Ahh, I see, that was a rhetorical question. And no, it’s not because I’m British. I’m quite offended that everyone thinks that. A person’s country of origin doesn’t define them.”

Never mind that I’d been conceived in the States. Irrelevant.

“That was my second guess. The first was that your baby ponytail was too tight.” With a disgusted sigh, Beck picked up his pail and stomped off.

I dropped my fists and turned toward Laverne, who was smiling at me. “Well, that went well.”

She patted my arm. “Don’t let the brute put you off. He’s more bark than bite. Usually. Besides, he’s had all his shots.”

“That’s comforting.”

“Come now, time for the best part of the tour.”

Side by side, we walked past the growing apple trees nearing maturity. We seemed to walk forever, but that might’ve been impatience talking. When the barn came into sight, I frowned. It was alone, off to side. Almost put there as an afterthought.

“This area gets good light. Something all artists need. What about you?”

“I’ve created in dark all my life.” Hearing myself, I let out a self-conscious laugh. “That sounds far too emo—”

“It sounds like truth. She sees you, you know. Kindred spirits.”

I swallowed as we walked through the newly cut, lush green grass toward that isolated barn. She was in there, I could all but feel it.

My heart was beating in time with hers already.

“Not sure she’d like that assessment.”

“Truth needs no approval. She’s a sweet one, my Zoe, but she has her prickly side too. Withstand one, embrace it even, to deserve the other. Darkness for sunshine. They go hand in hand always.” Laverne gave me an encouraging smile as she closed the last few steps to the barn. We went around the side and found the door wide open.

Music blasted out of the space. A hip-hop beat mixed with a tangle of voices. I sucked in a breath as Zoe’s voice matched theirs.

My girl could rap. Sort of.

With a smile and a twinkle of her pretty blue eyes, Laverne patted my arm one last time and left us alone.

I stood outside and watched Zoe streak paint onto the canvas she was working on. Even as she rapped along with the song, her concentration was evident. Her head was bent close as she added in details, her butt somehow wiggling independently. And the wiggle was obvious, seeing as she had on overalls with the shortest shorts I’d ever seen and a nude T-shirt that was the color of skin.

My breath caught before a quick rub of my fist at my breastbone got it going again. She was so beautiful it hurt to look at her.

To look and not touch.

I stepped out of the sunlight into the slightly darker barn. Sweat rolled down my temples as I slid off her sunglasses and pocketed them. The back of my T-shirt was clinging to my spine but I didn’t remove it.

Didn’t move period as I absorbed her essence as if it was oxygen.

She turned, still singing, and her paintbrush fell from her hands.

I didn’t know what she felt as our eyes locked. But a tumble of emotions washed over me, pleasure and pain both, setting my heartbeat to a gallop.

She stalked to the speaker and wrenched it off. Then she propped her hands on her hips and lowered her head. One strap of her overalls fell down, nearly exposing the side of her breast in that clingy flesh-colored material.

My mouth went dry even as my gut twisted. “Zoe.”

“You came.” She turned toward me, and her eyes were like a fire blazing in a barrel, twin gold flames. “Walked right into the lion’s den.”

“I’d walk into hell itself for you.”

“How did you find me back here?” She shook her head, letting out a laugh. “Which Judas painted you a map? Let me guess. My aunt Laverne?”

I didn’t want to give her confirmation. Instead, I moved closer to her canvas, needing to get the scope. As I walked, the image came into brutal focus.

She’d been painting me.

“Christ, Magic. You’re angry I’m here yet you’ve made your own likeness of me?”

“I didn’t say I was angry.” She spun the canvas around until an innocuous blank one faced out. “And musicians are a dime a dozen. Don’t flatter yourself.”

“So, that wasn’t me? Those rings on his hands, the way he gripped the microphone—”

Seeing myself as she saw me was startling. Humbling. My head had been down, the spotlight above me giving me a halo effect I so didn’t merit. I’d clung to the microphone, silver rings winking. A flicker of hope in endless dark.

What she was to me. Still. Always. Even now that there was a hint of dawn on the horizon, she was still my north star.

And she said nothing. Nothing at all.

“I came here to tell you I made a mistake.”

Her snort of laughter didn’t reassure me. “Which one?”

“Innumerable ones, but in particular, my biggest was not fighting for us. You were right. I put too much on you. I can’t live for you. But I can live with you. These past weeks, I’ve made changes.” As if it was all the proof she could need to see I was trying, I held out my arm. The puckered flesh on my inner forearm was back to merely a scar. I hadn’t touched a cigarette since before we’d broken up. And even in the depths of my despair, I hadn’t touched a flame to my skin. “If you’ll have me.”

Her gaze dropped to my arm before sliding back to my face. “I’m glad to see that. I truly am.”

I waited for the but.

After a moment, she swore and whirled around, shoving her hands into her hair and ripping apart her braid. “I saw you.” Her voice was like a whip. “Dancing at some bar as if you were having the time of your life.”

“Everyone saw me,” I muttered. “Including your brother.” And God knows who else.

“You like the spotlight. Don’t lie. You enjoy being center of attention.”

“Why you put me under one. You wanted my narcissism on display.”

“Aren’t all artists narcissists? How else can you expect someone else to pay for your thoughts and hopes and dreams?”

I had no answer for that. For she saw too much, as always. But she’d missed one vital part of the picture.

“I wasn’t having the time of my life. For weeks, I didn’t touch a drop of liquor. I wanted to be clear-headed and to stop leaning on crutches. But that night, I went out with Flynn and Rory. I have friends now, love. Can you imagine? People who like me for me. Well, Flynn in any case. Rory, I can’t say for sure. He’s a contrary bastard.”

“People always liked you for you. You just couldn’t see it.”

“Maybe that’s my narcissism too.”

“Exact opposite in that case.” She turned back to me and took a deep breath that caused her breasts to rise and fall. I didn’t want to notice, but I was only a man.

A very flawed one.

“A woman behind the bar offered me a shot and her arm sprinkled in salt to go with it.”

Zoe narrowed her eyes, but she didn’t turn away. She was strong enough to face my truths, so I would give them to her.

And to myself.

“I couldn’t even do that much. Laying my lips on another woman’s skin felt like a betrayal. So, I took my misery and poured into a bottle. And then I climbed up on that table and danced around like a bloody fool. Do you know what happened next?”

At her silence, I walked toward her, my footsteps even and measured on the hay-strewn barn floor. Dimly, I was aware of more of her canvases surrounding us and a ladder that led up to a loft.

And the smoke in her eyes that didn’t lessen the impact of the fire in her gaze, just intensified it. I wanted to feel the burn. Her fury was a lit match that would set both of us ablaze.

“I imagined you. That first night you came onstage. When we came together in your apartment that day of our singalong on the beach. How I’d forgotten myself and drove into you without anything between us. The cries on your lips. The tears on them when you told me we were done.” I stopped before her and fisted my hands to keep from gripping her chin to lift her face to mine. “I couldn’t escape you even in a bottle. Do you really think I can find another woman? Is there a substitute for the sun?”

She shoved me back and I caught her fist in my hand, holding it against my chest so she could feel the wild thrum of my heart.

“You think you’re the only one who paints canvases. My paint is words. You’ll hear a song on the radio, if you listen. Those words are yours. And I won’t pretend they’re for someone else. They’re for you. Only you.”

Tears gleamed on her lashes, starring them for an instant before she blinked and the wetness vanished. “Nothing’s changed.”

“Oh, love, that’s where you’re wrong. So much has. I’ve gone to see my brother. I spent the night with him and his wife, and I have a chance. They might forgive me. God, his wife already has. But perhaps one day, Simon will too.” I swallowed deeply. “My brother. My family. It’s more than I could ever ask for.”

She curled her fingers into mine, her fist opening up just the slightest bit. The only softening she allowed herself.

Allowed me.

“I made friends. I’ve been writing songs. So many of them. You’re woven through them all, a perfect tapestry. Without your love, I wouldn’t have believed I was worthy of trying again with Simon. But it gave me a base to do the rest. And I’ve started to build. Today, the house is small and the foundation is slight. Tomorrow, it’ll be a skyscraper.” I lifted her balled hand to my mouth and kissed her knuckles as she let out a shuddering breath. “And the biggest change of all is that this time, I won’t leave. You can push me away, you can kick out at me and tell me to go. But this time, I’m fighting for us. Fighting for our fucking lives, and all that we can have.”

Much as it pained me, I released her hand and stepped back. “I’ll see you soon.”

Her brow wrinkled. “You’re staying?”

“For the whole of my life, if that’s what it takes.” I exhaled and felt a weight drop away as her eyes met mine one more time. She could lash out at me all she wanted, but she couldn’t deny the feelings that played across her beautiful face. “I made mistakes, and I’m still learning. But the best part of me is still in love with you.”

Her lips trembled, but she didn’t turn away as I backed out of the barn.

Finding the sunshine once again.