“Why should I even give her a chance to explain herself?”

“Why should you not?” she counters.

“What is it with you?” I’m irritated and hate that for the last week all she’s done is grill me on this. “Aren’t you supposed to be on my side? Aren’t you supposed to be telling me what she did was shitty and shady and that you understand how I feel?”

“She was shady and shitty and I do understand how you feel, but man . . . what I saw between the two of you was real. It was clear as day.”

Her words punch me in the gut because I felt the same way. I thought what we had was real too.

Ellie has no idea how many sleepless nights I’ve had since Chase left. How many nights I’ve picked apart our every interaction, looking for any evidence from our time together that proves that what we had wasn’t real.

I couldn’t though, other than the obvious.

And that makes the knife cut that much deeper.

“But real isn’t built on lies. Real is built on honesty and trust and being straightforward.”

She nods and twists her lips. “It is.”

“She came here looking for the old me to use.”

“Maybe you’re right. Maybe she was going to exploit war hero Ryan for her own good. Maybe she wasn’t. The problem is you don’t know if she was or wasn’t because you never gave her a chance to explain why she was searching for you in the first place. And you sure as shit haven’t done anything more than delete her texts or messages.”

I close my eyes and lean my head back on my chair. “I’m so sick of thinking about this. Of second-guessing myself. Of missing her and hating her at the same time.”

“As one does with heartbreak.”

“It never would have worked anyway. She’s from New York, and I’m from here. She has her big-city life and I have the bar and this town, The Center—”

“And you keep on talking yourself out of every coherent reason why it might be feasible.” My loud exhale is the only response I give. “People change, Gun. And to use your words, she came looking for the old you. What if the woman who showed up here originally was the old her? A different version of herself from before she met you that she’s not one hundred percent proud of anymore? What if meeting you made her look through a different lens? A lens that changed how she viewed things. Viewed Ryan Camden?”

I hate that I want to hold on to Ellie’s words and take them as truth, but more than anything, I want to stop talking about this. About her.

As it is, Chase owns my thoughts more than I want her to.