I stood in my driveway, dust and gravel kicking into the air as Cooper’s car pulled away. It took all my strength not to chase after him, not to beg him to stay, to listen to me and talk more.

We’d said all there was to say, and he made so much sense in those final moments, I knew he was right.

He needed me whole and certain.

I needed him the same.

So, with my heart cracking, I watched the man I loved drive away from me, hoping like hell it wasn’t the last time I saw him.

Then, as difficult as it was, I went back to work and I started taking steps to do exactly what I promised Cooper I would do.

Heal enough so I could come to him whole.

Turned out, I had an incredible support system of friends and family behind me who I’d neglected for far too long. Also, my neighbors were more incredible than I ever knew, and on top of that, my stepping foot back into Carlton Christian Church meant everyone who attended, who had also known me since birth, took my re-arrival as their opening to welcome me back into the fold.

I suspected Gloria for that last one, but I no longer cursed her pesky meddling beneath my breath.

I was busier since Cooper left than I could ever remember being. On the weekends, Brooke brought her boys to run around and play with the animals while we did everything from homemade facials and manicures to overindulging on vodka lemonades. We took them horseback riding, and out to swim in the natural spring.

At nights and on the weekends, Kelly and I, or even me by myself, became regulars at the golf resort, either at the restaurant or getting massages and pedicures.

I walked through town with my head held high, only occasionally glancing for a look of Jenni Akers. Once, I spied her at The Tavern when Jordan and I met up with Ryan and Kelly for a few drinks and a couple games of pool while we watched the Kansas City Royals battle it out with the St. Louis Cardinals.

She glared at me and then smirked as she grabbed Gavin’s hand and pulled him out of the restaurant. Both of them looked like baseball or beers were the last things on the mind. I pushed the look on her face and their presence out of my mind. Good riddance. Nothing else had happened to my cattle or my fences, so I assumed Samuel had been telling the truth, and it was his nephews that had fired those guns. Still didn’t mean I trusted either Gavin or Jenni, and I never would. But I had smiled that night, watching them walk out together. Both of them were rotten people who probably deserved whatever misery they’d bring each other.

And best of all, Gloria and Peter sent me Tomas. Tomas had been the Whitman’s hired hand since his parents immigrated from Venezuela before he was born. He’d practically grown up on Whitman’s land, and he knew both their land and mine, like the back of his hand. He came every morning, showed up well before five-thirty when I woke up and was already in the fields. He took over the cattle, watched them closely with calving season upon us again. Daily he was with the cattle, ensuring I didn’t lose anymore and when it came time to work the cows like we did every summer, running them through the equipment to ensure they were all vaccinated and tagged properly, I barely had to lift a hand. It was hard work, and it took us days to get done with the two of us. He repaired large stretches of fencing, moved mineral buckets and feed, and took over the hay.

I essentially did nothing except the goats and the chickens.

Plus, he was old enough to be my own father, which meant Cooper didn’t lose his mind when I told him.

That didn’t mean I hadn’t taken stalking to Brooke’s levels and put Google Alerts on my phone. I was notified several times a day whenever his name popped up, but even those alerts were slowing down.

His return to Los Angeles, camping out in a penthouse during the filming of his movie sent waves through paparazzo and gossip columns. Everyone wanted to know about his summer fling and his divorce being finalized.

Then, an up and coming pop star got caught with her pants down, literally, and worse she was with a B-List actor and a Reality TV star on film during the moment, and everyone forgot about Cooper Hawke.

Fortunately for me, we spoke daily, many days multiple times. And while I still despised the phrase ‘absence makes the heart grow fonder,’ there was something to be said for taking the physical element off the table and only being able to use our words to connect.

We talked every morning and night. As the days went by, I almost became concerned he missed Pepper as much, if not more, than he missed me. I also teased him relentlessly for it, often taking his calls in the goat’s penned area with Pepper on my lap.

He confessed he told his parents about me, and once he managed for us to Skype. Meeting parents via a video call was a first, yet during what ended up being an hour-long call, I gave them a quick walking tour of the ranch and afterward, his mom, Annie, insisted they come out for Thanksgiving.

I’d flubbed my way through accepting. Cooper stepped in and took over.

And later, when it was just the two of us on another video conference call, we used our words to do everything we couldn’t do physically.

It’d been a month without him and in less than a week, he started filming. As it approached, he became more animated, more focused on his role, sharing with me all the parts of what went into making a movie. He sent me photos of his stunt double, a man who was commonly hired to work in place of Cooper during some of the most dangerous scenes.

I was busy prepping the animals I was set to show at the fair the following week. Two chickens, Pepper, and his mom, and Hope, a cow I’d shown almost ten years in a row, who had already won several ribbons.

This year, I was secretly hoping to bring home a ribbon for Pepper.

Cooper would probably celebrate the victory by framing that ribbon and hanging it by his own awards, he’d be so proud.

As if he knew I was thinking about him, my phone rang with his ringtone. I pulled my phone from my back pocket.

“Hey, good morning. Were your ears burning?”

“Why, were you talking about me to someone?”

“Just to Pepper.”

His laugh radiated through the phone and I could picture him, hip against the counter in his penthouse, one hand on his phone, the other holding his morning cup of coffee. There was most likely a script or a newspaper spread out before him, and reading glasses I hadn’t even known he owned or needed until that day he left.

The memory sent a prick of pain to my chest and I kicked it to the ground.

“And how are you two doing today?”

He was a nut. He treated Pepper more like a child than I did and the goats were my dream. Still, his words still sent a heat to my cheeks. I tucked a chunk of hair behind my ear and dipped my head, like he was standing in front of me, making me blush. “We’re good. Busy day. They’re saying storms are heading our way so Tomas and I are heading out soon to check the fences. There are some trees he’s worried about near the fence lines and we might just take them down so they don’t fall.”

“Busy day indeed,” he sighed. “I wish I was there helping.”

I did too. “What’s on your agenda for the day?”

“A few meetings with the producers, but to be honest, nothing. Tell me about the storm. Is it supposed to be bad?”

“Yeah. I guess. I suppose it depends. It’s August and we’ve been spared most of the dangerous weather, but they’re predicting tornadoes later this afternoon.”

It was a part of life in Kansas. I had already double-checked the cellar outside so that just in case I needed to take shelter, I had it ready. I also considered heading into town and spending the night with Jordan or one of my friend’s families. Storms on the ranch were scary enough, but I’d worry less if I was closer to the animals in case something happened.

“You’ll be safe?” Cooper asked, the tightness in his voice was clear.

“Don’t worry, Hollywood. I was raised with these. Plus, you’ve seen the cellar.”

“Yeah and I still think there are ghosts, or maybe rats down there.”

The cellar wasn’t attached to the house, and our house was old enough we didn’t have a basement. After that first thunderstorm with Cooper, I’d showed him where we’d head if there were tornadoes, but I hadn’t had to use it yet this summer. The walls were built with cement blocks, lined with wood shelves that stored canned goods. I had a flashlight that didn’t need batteries, a weather radio, a few changes of clothes in case and important documents in a small safe in case we ever lost the house, and my favorite warm blanket.

All I needed down there was electricity and I could live there for days if I needed to.

“I worry about you there,” Cooper said. “Last time I was gone, something happened. Tell me you’ll be safe, Rebecca. Always.”

“Of course I will,” I said. “I promise. And, if it gets bad, I’ll call you okay?”

“You better. I’ll let you go, I know there’s work to do, but give Pepper a kiss for me, would you?”

“You and your goat,” I teased.

“Yeah, but don’t worry. I’m saving all my good kisses for you when I see you next.”

It was the first time either of us had talked about seeing each other outside apparently hosting his family for Thanksgiving. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. God, it’s killing me to not be with you. You know that, right?”

I’d assumed. “It feels better to hear it.”

“I love you.” His voice turned gritty. “I miss you every damn day out here, Rebecca. I feel like I’m losing my mind.”

“I love you, too.” It came easier now, fell off my lips without thought and not always in response to him but because I couldn’t hold it in.

For the millionth time, I wished I wouldn’t have served up everything that day he left. Had I been more honest upfront, not fumbled everything, had I been able to tell him everything I felt before that day, before it became a breaking point, would he be here helping me?

Nightly, I kicked my own butt for pushing him away when he sat there, telling me he chose me and it didn’t seem like giving up anything but walking toward everything.

Still, even that wasn’t completely true.

I was healing. My time was spent for me, working on me, and I’d made more than one important decision. The first was to forgive Joseph. Without having answers, without having the arguments and the closure I needed, my only choice was to forgive him. So every time I thought of him and that niggle of hatred and anger crept into my mind, I forced myself to think of five true, five good things I remembered about him.

It seemed backward, but every time I thought of the way Joseph made me laugh, or the way he held me, or the time he tried to boil lobsters on our first anniversary, but instead spent the night mopping up boiled water all over our kitchen floor because we’d forgotten about them getting lost in other activities, my heart healed a little bit more.

Sometimes it felt almost treasonous to Cooper, to be thinking of such wonderful memories of a man who hurt me in order to get over him, but for me, I needed it. I needed the reminder that there were parts of us that were really good, parts of me he’d loved, parts of my life I wouldn’t change for anything.

But at night, when I was lonely, it was Cooper I missed, Cooper I wanted next to me, and while we didn’t talk about him coming back, permanently or in any manner outside Thanksgiving, I’d been making plans for him already as well.

One week, I spent the quiet nights sipping wine, re-decorating the office. I removed all the old, original dark woodwork bookshelves that lined an entire wall and my father’s L-Shaped writing desk. The shelves held mementos from my parents, family pictures of Jordan and I growing up, and wedding photos from my great-grandparents down to me and Joseph. It was the last remaining photo I had of Joseph I still left out, but now, all of them besides the photo of my great-grandparents were put away in a scrapbook along with all the other family photos I took down.

This was my house, my home, not just something handed to me. I wanted to honor my heritage and the home’s history. But the house needed to be made mine.

And, hopefully someday, Cooper’s.

Now, the room still fit the farmhouse, the bookshelves replaced gone to make room for two matching desks that were inspired from old barn wood, refinished and refined to look classy but masculine. Beneath the front window, I’d set up a sitting area and off to the side, a small wine and whiskey cart. I’d never seen Cooper drink anything harder than the occasional beer, but one night when I was in there working, I looked out the window, the empty space in front of it, and imagined us sitting in chairs, me sipping wine, him a scotch while I flipped through a romance novel on my e-reader I hadn’t used since before Joseph’s death but had recently recharged and used daily. Cooper would sit in the other chair, thin, gold-framed reading glasses propped on his nose, his head bent while he scribbled notes in the margins of whatever script he’d be doing next.

I wanted that for him. I wanted him to have it all, even if it meant that sometimes, it meant not having him next to me.

And if he didn’t want that…I’d take him then, too.

I didn’t care he was Cooper Hawke, Golden Globe winner, whispers already chasing him of his upcoming film being an Oscar nominee.

I just cared that he was kind. He made me laugh, he treasured me, and he loved me. That he had a way with his sexy, strong hands and body molded to perfection were very yummy side benefits.