Like You Love Me (Honey Creek 1)

I know I have to tell Sophie. Clearly. I also know I don’t want to.

My stomach churns as I try to imagine the look on her face when I tell her. Will she be sad? Angry? Will she cry?

I don’t know how to do this. How do you do something you don’t really want to do?

How do you break your own heart?

The idea of walking away from her causes me physical pain. Bile creeps up my throat. My shoulders get so tight that I wince. My chest threatens to cave in on itself.

But no matter how I think about it, there’s no way to have both. I can’t have my cake and eat it too. I can’t get the job and future in veterinary medicine that I want, that I’ve dreamed of for my entire life—the job I promised my mother I’d get someday—and have Sophie here so she can keep the Honey House too. There are too many obstacles down an already bumpy path.

She deserves a man who will be with her day or night and help her live her best life.

That man’s not me.

I don’t think.

Pap watches me with the eye of a man who’s trained to discern every tiny detail about behavior. Of course, he’s particularly good with animals, but he’s not bad with the human variety either.

“How do you think she’ll take it?” he asks. His tone is careful, cautious, as if he’s feeling me out. He suspects there’s more to the story.

“Good, I think,” I say with much more certainty than I feel. “Montgomery stayed with us last night. She’s completely aware of what’s going on.”

“And she’s all right with it? It’s so hard to believe that she’d leave everything she’s ever known.”

I shrug. “I guess so. I mean, she knew all of this before we got married.”

That’s why we got married, but I can’t tell you that.

Pap walks by me and toward the coffeepot. He pours himself a cup and adds a teaspoon of sugar. He stirs it slowly, as though if he keeps doing it, some magic answer will be written out in the steam.

Hell, if that were the case, I’d fill a bathtub up with the stuff to get a clearer answer faster.

I try to take a drink of my coffee and nearly choke.

“You know what?” he says. “The only thing I can tell you is to follow the sun.”

“Do you mean your heart?”

He grins. “No. I do not. I mean follow the sun.” He takes a sip of his coffee and lets that sink in. “Most mammals find their way home by scent. But many animals, everything from birds to dung beetles, follow the sun.”

He moves around the counter and stands in front of me.

“When I met your grandma, something happened inside of me that I couldn’t name. It was like a light turned on deep inside my soul. Whenever I was with her, I felt warmth. It’s the only way I can describe it.”

I nod, understanding that feeling. It’s the same thing that happens when Sophie is around. I haven’t been able to label it, but warmth? That sounds about right.

“The same thing happened to me the first day of vet school,” he says. “I felt lit up on the inside. Like . . . somehow every part of me was brighter and better. Things made sense when I was working with animals too.”

“Yeah. I get it,” I say. “You remember that I almost went to medical school, right?”

He laughs. “Yes. And you called me and said you hated people, so you wanted to know more about veterinary medicine.”

“And when I walked into that building on campus, it was like everything clicked.”

I take a drink of my coffee and remember that day. I had a meeting with a professor to see if it was an avenue I wanted to pursue, and I walked out of there knowing it was exactly what I wanted to do for the rest of my life.

So why is this decision not as easy?

“Follow the sun, kiddo,” Pap says. “Go where your soul feels warm. Cause the least harm to those around you, and bring the sunshine to those that you can. You’ll know what choices you need to make in life if you follow the sun.”

The door opens behind us, and Grady walks in. Pap tosses me a final smile. Then he cuts Grady off and ushers him into an exam room.

“How’s that garden today, Grady? Any tomato plants left?” Pap asks before the door closes.

I sit on a stool behind the counter—the one that Dottie usually uses. I grab her pen and find a sticky note and write her a little message.

You were really late today. Good thing some of us can be on time.

Handsome

I toss the pen down and sit back in the chair.