She laughs and it’s so pretty. Like chimes in the wind. One of the first things I noticed about her that day in the coffee shop.

“Well, if we can’t joke about it, things will get awkward. I figure we’re stuck together for the rest of our lives with Summer and Rhett.” That reality hits me like a wrecking ball. “One day, years down the road, we’ll be gray-haired and soft in the middle section, drinking an enormous glass of spiced rum and eggnog around the Christmas tree. I’ll make some joke about the night I offered friends-with-benefits to you. Rhett will howl. Summer will roll her eyes, because I’m going to tell her tomorrow, and she’ll think I’m ridiculous for bringing it up so many years later. Your small-town wifey will throw a hand over her chest”—Willa imitates the motion—“and act scandalized all night. In fact, she’ll give me the cold shoulder for the rest of our lives. And I’ll outlive her, so that’s fine. Joke’s on her. I win. And my husband will be accustomed to my antics, so he’ll just roll his eyes and continue drinking.”

It’s funny and I should laugh. But I’m caught on the part where she’s married to some man who rolls his eyes at her. A man who isn’t me. And I have somehow failed to wrap my head around the fact that I’m going to be connected to this woman for the rest of my life.

“Red, don’t marry a man who rolls his eyes at you.”

“You roll your eyes at me all the time.”

Fuck, I need to stop doing that. She deserves better.

“Don’t marry me either.”

She shrugs and carries on, undeterred. “He’ll go back to obsessively checking his investment portfolio, and everyone will hear us fight about it later that night. Christmas morning will be awkward because he’ll leave, and everyone will talk about how obviously the third time is not the charm, because Willa’s third marriage is about to fall apart.”

I laugh now, a fist over my mouth, shoulders heaving under the strain of not waking Luke. “Red, you’re nuts. But I like that about you. You’re like a goddamn hurricane.”

Her mouth curves, sinfully wicked. “Sometimes I feel like that. Out here though? I don’t know. There’s something about the endless stretches of land around me that’s just . . . soothing? Like there’s nothing else that needs doing. I feel very settled for the first time in a long time.”

“The eye of the storm,” I say, allowing myself to study her.

It’s hard to meet her gaze. Her eyes are so green. Her lips so tempting. No wonder I can’t stop thinking about her. She’s looks like a doll and cracks jokes like a cowboy.