Page 33 of Made for You
Worth loving.
The thought made my throat tighten.
“Sweetheart,” Dad said softly, pulling me back to the present. “From the look on your face, I’d say you might know a thing or two about that.” His eyes crinkled at the corners, the sameway they always had when he was trying not to smile. “This wouldn’t happen to have anything to do with that cowboy from the restaurant, would it? The one you swore you were completely immune to?”
My breath left me in something between a sigh and a laugh, all my practiced composure slipping away in the face of my father’s quiet understanding. “Yeah,” I admitted. “That’d be him.”
His smile deepened, gentle and knowing. “I thought so.”
I hesitated, my throat thick, then said the words that had been sitting heavy on my tongue all morning. “Daddy, I love him.”
There was a long pause, filled only by the faint crackle of the gas log across the room. Then his expression softened into something I’d never forget—tenderness, pride, and a kind of recognition that made my chest ache.
“Siena,” he said quietly, “I know you’ve always believed you didn’t need love. You remind me so much of myself at your age—driven, determined, convinced that success was enough to fill every empty space.” A small, wistful smile tugged at his mouth. “But it’s a lonely path. One I didn’t realize I was walking until I met your mother and saw how empty it felt without someone to share it with.”
He leaned forward, his voice steady, his words sure. “You don’t have to choose, sweetheart. You can have both—the life you’ve built and the love that makes it worth living. Don’t turn away from that out of fear. Success is wonderful, but love…” His eyes softened, shining faintly. “Love is what makes the rest of it mean something. There’s nothing else like it in the world.”
My eyes stung, and I blinked hard, forcing a watery smile. “You make it sound so easy.”
He chuckled, the sound laced with fondness. “It wasn’t. But it was worth it.”
We said our goodbyes a few moments later, and when the screen went dark, I sat there for a long time, staring at my reflection in the glossy black. The same woman who’d stared back a thousand times before, but for the first time, I wasn’t sure I recognized her.
It was me… and yet not. I was changed in some deep, fundamental way.
I closed the laptop and leaned back in my chair, pressing my palms against my eyes until colors bloomed behind them.
“This can’t be happening,” I whispered into the empty office, my voice catching on a laugh that wasn’t quite a laugh at all.
But even as I said it, I knew the truth: itwashappening. Had happened already.
I’d fallen for Gage, and I didn’t have the faintest idea what to do about it.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The aromaof freshly-brewed coffee wafted through the house, greeting me before I even set foot into the kitchen. Jake was leaning against the counter, thumbing through an honest-to-goodness newspaper, just like our dad used to do, back when he was still alive. Colt stood at the stove, spatula in hand, expertly flipping pancakes that sizzled on the cast iron griddle, while Nash sat hunched at the table, his dark-rimmed glasses sliding down his nose as he pored over a dog-eared paperback, nursing what was probably his third cup of joe of the morning.
I shuffled into the kitchen, my boots scraping over the hardwood floors. “Morning,” I muttered sheepishly, my voice still rough with sleep.
I ran a hand through my unkempt hair, wincing as my fingers moved over a spot that was still tender from where Siena had tugged on it while I made her see stars. The clock on the microwave showed it was nearly eight o’clock—more than an hour later than I was supposed to have breakfast on the table for my family.
Thank God, Colt had stepped in to pick up my slack. I’d have to make it up to him somehow, but after last night, I couldn’t bring myself to care what he might ask for in return.
“Look who the cat dragged in,” he murmured, spatula pausing mid-flip. “Your meeting run long?” His shoulders shook slightly as he chuckled under his breath.
Jake’s newspaper crinkled as he lowered it, his dark brows drawing together. “What meeting?”
If anyone thought finding love again would have mellowed my oldest brother, they'd have been dead wrong. If anything, his protective instincts had only gotten more intense, made him even more vigilant about the comings and goings of his younger brothers. And ever since Senator Rafferty had made it clear he was interested in me getting into local politics, Jake had been especially vigilant about mine in particular. He hadn’t pressured me into making any decisions, but I knew he hoped I’d give it serious consideration.
Colt spun around to face the room, while the latest batch of pancakes cooked, his hazel eyes gleaming with pure mischief. “I’m sorry, did I say ‘meeting’? I actually meant hookup.”
Heat crawled up my neck and flooded my face. I crossed to the cupboard, focusing on the familiar worn handles to avoid three pairs of knowing eyes. “It’s not like that,” I muttered.
Except ithadbeen like that. At first, anyway. A way to scratch an itch, to burn off the tension that built up every time I thought about Siena Bellrose and all the things I wanted to do to her.
Only somewhere between then and now—waking up this morning with her hair spilled across my chest, her breathing soft and even—everything had shifted. Now all I wanted was to spend every night tangled up with her, to wake up to her sleepy smile for the rest of my goddamn life.
The problem was, I had no idea if she wanted the same thing. Sure, we’d hashed out our differences, cleared up our miscommunications, but beyond that, we hadn’t talked about what, exactly, we were doing. This morning, it had certainly felt like we were moving toward something real, something true, but every time I thought I knew where I stood with Siena, I seemed to have the rug pulled out from under me.
