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She looked at me. "Earn what?"

"Your trust."

The corners of her mouth lifted slightly and her eyes warmed. "That could take a while."

I shrugged. "I've got time."

Her gaze fell to her hands and a sad smile tugged at her lips. "You’ve got four days."

"Four days or forty years, you deserve to have people in your life who are honest, show up, and do what they say they're going to do."

She stared at me. Then she exhaled and rested her head on my shoulder. I wrapped my arm around her and felt something significant pass between us. For a long time, we sat in silence.

There were things I wanted to say. I wanted to tell her I’d been crazy about her for two years. That she didn’t have to be strong for me. That I wanted every version of her. The bossy one. The sarcastic one. The vulnerable one sitting beside me with tears on her cheeks.

I wanted to be the person she called when her world fell apart. And the one she called when something wonderful happened.

"Can I ask you something?" she finally spoke.

"Anything," I said, bracing myself for the sort of question that wasn’t really a question at all, but an accusation.

"Why don't you ever take anything seriously?"

I made a show of clutching my chest. "Wow. Straight for the jugular."

"I'm serious," she said, the words flat and unwavering.

"Yeah." I grinned. "I gathered that from the question."

She turned then, and she looked at me straight on, those big, beautiful brown eyes trained and unblinking, like she was lining up a shot she couldn't afford to miss. "Everyone talks about how charming you are. How funny. How you're always the life of the party. But is that who you are? Or is it…" She trailed off, leaving the sentence to die an awkward death in the air between us.

I looked out over the valley, watching the shadows stretch themselves silly across the hills. "Growing up, Dawson was always the responsible one. Dean was the smart one. And Dylan was the wild one."

"And you?"

"Comic relief."

She nodded. “Right.”

The silence that followed was a gentle nudge, the sort of silence that wanted an explanation but was too polite to ask. She waited, and I got the sense she could outwait me if it came to a contest of stubbornness.

I sighed, then found myself saying, “I figured out pretty young that if I could make people laugh, then things didn’t seem so bad."

She looked thoughtful and nudged her chin toward me. "Were things bad?"

I wanted to say no, but the answer caught somewhere in my throat. “My dad was gone a lot for work. He’s still gone a lot. Mom was running the ranch and raising four boys on her own, which, between us, is basically like signing up to lead a small paramilitary insurgency. She had dreams for the ranch, but money was always tight. We weren’t poor, but we weren’t comfortable, either. There were arguments about bills, supplies…stuff I didn't understand until later.”

I could feel her watching me, but I couldn’t look away from the horizon, I felt like if I did, I’d lose my nerve.

"I love my family. I love the ranch. But sometimes I wonder if everybody's so used to me being the guy who never worries about anything that they don't realize I do."

She shifted a little closer, her voice softer now. “What do you worry about?"

I hesitated. "Letting people down. Not being what they need." The words tumbled out, almost by accident, and left me feeling exposed in a way that was both terrifying and exhilarating. "I watched my mom ask for what she needed from my dad, and he never gave it to her. He always had a good reason—business, obligations, travel—but it meant she was alone a lot. I swore I’d never make anyone feel the way she did.”

"Is that why you don’t do serious relationships?"

I looked over at her.