Chapters (43)
- Cover
- Dedication
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-one
- Twenty-two
- Twenty-three
- Twenty-four
- Twenty-five
- Twenty-six
- Twenty-seven
- Twenty-eight
- Twenty-nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-one
- Thirty-two
- Thirty-three
- Thirty-four
- Epilogue
- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
- AUTHOR’S NOTE
- Readers Guide
- QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION
- About the Author
- What’s next onyour reading list?
And just like with her and a horse, LJ’s gift needed its match, too: the music and an audience. It wasn’t for the attention, though he seemed to thrive on it. It was the way he saw the tiniest hints of emotion on their faces and translated them into his songs until each listener’s expression blossomed into something different. It was the near-supernatural push and pull between him and dozens of strangers.
She couldn’t imagine how he’d survived through the months in Montana, only practicing alone in his apartment with no band, no spectators. It twisted her stomach to think of it. She could no longer imagine her life without LJ in it, but the longer she was here, the more she realized how much of him had been missing when they lived in Montana.
She wanted him to have everything he loved. Horses and music and his family and friends. The boisterous, aged streets of New Orleans and the open range. She wanted to be one of those essential pieces of his life. But that was a fantasy, wasn’t it? A world made out of contrasting puzzle pieces that didn’t fit together.
He loved her; she knew that. But he was LJ. He loved so many things, and he couldn’t have them all. In the end, what would prove to be the most essential?
She hugged herself tightly, her thoughts pressing in until she felt all but invisible in the crowded street.
LJ nudged her, waiting until she looked up. He grinned at her, so comfortable in his own skin. Everything she wasn’t. “This next song goes out to my lady.”
That tugged a smile to her lips, and their eyes met for a long moment, as if he were hungry for the reassurance of her approval and he didn’t want to waste an instant of it. And then he dipped his head and began to play.
It started easily enough. Smooth, like everything he did. As the notes grew, it wasn’t the kind of sadness that felt like weight. It was the kind that wound between your cells and made you want to beg for more. And when the song crested, tears came to her eyes as she began to grasp that the beauty of the sound held loss inside of it. It was love, ending. As all things did. All things would.
The feeling expanded, threatening to burst all the boundaries of her. She had to look away from LJ’s face, from his sculpted cheekbones and downswept lashes, but her gaze only collided with that of a gallery owner across the street. The woman leaned against the doorway of her shop, tears sparkling in her eyes just like Andra’s. She couldn’t help but wonder who the woman had lost. Who she was worried about losing.