Page 22 of Coming Home to Maverick

Did she have any right to expect that he’d be single? No. Did she have any right to be annoyed that Tiff had her hands all over him? No. But Bailey was more than annoyed. She was spitting angry and knew she had to leave before she laid into Maverick like they were still in high school.

He was probably standing in the parking lot, fuming mad at her, too. She kicked her boots against the pavement. At least Gracie’d had a ride home. No need for her to see her mama like this.

Once she’d pounded the full two miles back to her house, she felt much better and a little sheepish. She wanted to get drinks with Maverick. But she didn’t know how to get ahold of him. He’d probably already gone out with the gang, taken Tiff up on her offer.

She climbed the porch stairs and nearly jumped out of her skin when her dad said, “Maverick still being a gentleman?”

She swallowed twice and caught her breath. “Oh. Ha. Yes, Daddy. He’s the best kind of gentleman.”

“Then why is my baby girl walking her own self home?”

“Oh, you know me. I had to get something out of my system.”

“Come sit by your old man.”

She laughed. “You’re not old.” But really, he was getting up there, and the thought made her throat clench.

“So, what did he do?”

She shook her head. “Oh, Daddy, honestly, it’s more what I did. I messed up, and I don’t know how to make it all right…again.” The despairing thought that her whole life could be summed up as a list of mistakes she didn’t know how to fix only made her feel worse.

He patted her shoulder. “We all do that sometimes in our life, I reckon. Do you know a single person who hasn’t messed up pretty bad?”

She snorted. “Yeah. No one here has ever messed up as bad as I have.”

“Oh, I’m sure they have. Just no one’s anxious to talk about it, are they?”

“Mm.”

“Yours just happens to be more public than most.”

“Yeah, I wish so bad I could turn back time.”

“Don’t we all. But where would you be then? What would your heart be telling you?”

She thought about it and admitted, “To run off. My dumb, selfish heart would be calling out for the chance to make it big, telling me all of this wasn’t good enough.” She shook her head.

“Now, that’s not such a bad thing for a heart to say. You love singing. You always have.”

She wasn’t gonna let her father help her feel better about running away.

“I’m not telling you that you went about it the right way. You about near broke your mama’s heart.”

She sucked in a breath. And then nodded.

“And now this ain’t easy, realizing we missed out on five years of our precious granddaughter’s life.”

Bailey shrank in her chair.

“But you’re here now. And what can we do but focus on that?”

“I was sick, Daddy. I was desperate. I wanted to be someone. I guess it took me hitting rock bottom to realize that was never gonna happen.”

“And that’s the whole beauty of what happened.”

“Me hitting rock bottom?”

“Yep. I don’t like hearing any news of you being sad, but look where you are. You’re not the same person who left, are you?”

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