“Did you tell her you’re sorry?”
I grinned. “I did, but I’ll be sure to do it again.”
“Doesn’t your sister know how nice you are? You’re the nicest person I know. You wouldn’t hurt her on purpose.”
No, no, I wouldn’t, but that didn’t change the fact that I had. Emotions didn’t abide by logic. Humans were flawed, and when it came to the heart, one plus one didn’t always equal two. “Like I said, it’s complicated.”
“I bet if she saw you two together it would help. Mama says it makes her weak in the knees when she sees how you look at each other, but I don’t know what that means. She says it like it’s a good thing.”
An unexpected laugh fell from my lips. “Yeah, well, it would probably be a little different for Maddy.”
“What’s so funny over here?” I looked up from where we sat on the floor to see Ryder and Luke.
“We’re talkin’ about ya!” Layla said. Just as I replied, “We’re playing Barbies.”
“Is that right?” Ryder looked at me and cocked a brow. “Was Hutch saying how awesome I am?”
“No, he said you’re stinky,” Layla teased, and we all chuckled.
“That’s my girl!” Luke joked. “Also, we were wondering if you and Ryder would perform a concert for us.”
Ryder said, “I told them I wasn’t sure. We’ve never played together, and I’m not the best on the guitar they found for me here.” He was giving me an out. It wasn’t an extremely solid one, considering he’d used this guitar before so he didn’t have to bring his back and forth, but it was an out all the same. He knew playing was connected to my father for me, but he also knew I’d been doing it more since everything went down. I couldn’t figure out why I was, though, why I suddenly needed to play.
“Please, Hutch! Please!” Layla begged.
There wasn’t anything I could deny her, so I nodded. “Yeah, of course, Princess Layla.”
She beamed at me, just as Ryder held his hand out. I grasped it and let him pull me to my feet. “You sure?”
“Yeah, she loves it. Plus, if we play together, everyone will see how much better I am than you.”
Ryder snickered. “You wish, Doc.”
He grabbed the guitar, and I went over to the piano.
“Ryder and Hutch are going to play for us!” Luke announced, making everyone head our way.
Ryder pulled up a chair beside me. They had books for both instruments, but Ryder was able to play more by ear than I was. He had that natural talent where he could hear music and play along.
We started off with something easy and upbeat—“Old MacDonald Had a Farm”—and then worked our way up from there. It took us a minute to settle in well together, but it wasn’t long before we did.
We kept glancing at each other, gazes catching and holding on, some for just a second, others for two beats, three, four, then five. Every time he smiled, I couldn’t help doing the same. It was ridiculous and cheesy, and as we went into the next song, Layla and Luke cheering louder than everyone else, for a moment I forgot to be sad. How could I be when this man smirked my way and looked at me like I somehow lit his soul on fire?
At one point, Ryder blew a playful kiss at me, and I fumbled the notes.
Layla shouted, “I saw that!” which made the two of us laugh.
By the third song, some of the parents had made it into the room, but we didn’t stop. They requested songs, or Ryder would throw one out to see if we could play it. When someone mentioned Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah,” we looked it up on our phones and gave it a try. Layla made her way up to the bench with me, watching closely, staring at me like I was her favorite person in the whole damn universe. My gaze went from her to Ryder and…fuck, I was lucky. Life was a mess, but whether I deserved it or not, I had so much good too.
We were at it for close to an hour before Gabby said, “I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but we have to call it quits for the day. We’re way over time already.”
There was some grumbling and complaining, but I found myself saying, “We can do it again. If Ryder agrees, that is.”
“Are you kidding? I think we need to do this every week. We can go on the road together.” He winked.
We said our goodbyes to the kids and their parents, before doing what we always did, walking out together.
“That was fun,” Ryder said.
“Yeah, it was.”
He stopped me, brushed the back of his hand over my cheek. “It was good to see you smile.”
“Did it turn you on?” I waggled my brows, trying to make light of the situation.