“Lady,” the guy said, setting the boxes on the back of the truck. “You’ve gotta go. And move your car, or I’m calling the cops.”

She clasped her hands together and tried to do that sweet, desperate-female thing that Sophie had perfected at the age of seven, but Brynn could never bring herself to try. “Please,” she said. “It’s really important that I find him.”

The guy looked at her for several seconds before jerking his thumb over his finger. “Don’t forget your shoes when you go.”

Brynn’s hands fell to her side as he hoisted himself into the truck and began scooting boxes toward the back. Watery eyes fell on the shoe lying discarded on the lawn. She didn’t even know where the other one was.

The stupid boring pump represented everything she hated about herself.

Everything that had driven Will away.

“Keep the shoes!” she hollered as she opened her car door. “I’ve got a boyfriend to win back.”

* * *

“What do you mean you shouldn’t say?” Brynn said, clutching her cell phone and pacing her living room. “I’m your sister. You can’t even tell me where he is?”

“He’s my best friend,” Sophie said softly. “You hurt him.”

Brynn knew that. Had known from the look on his face when she hadn’t said she’d loved him back that it had cut him deeply. But hearing it out loud felt like someone was squeezing her heart.

“I know,” Brynn said quietly. “It’s why I want to make it right.”

Her sister was silent for several seconds on the other line. “I don’t know, Brynny. He seemed really…done, you know?”

Brynn swallowed painfully, her gaze locked on Will’s deserted house. “Done, how?”

Done with me?

Sophie’s continued silence confirmed her worst fears, and Brynn felt the urge to throw up. How could he be done? He’d said he’d loved her forever. He’d waited so long. That kind of love didn’t fade in one evening, did it?

Except…she’d behaved horribly.

Really, truly, awfully horribly.

Maybe he’d realized what Brynn had been realizing all day. That she didn’t deserve him.

But she had to try. “Soph, please. Please. If he’s completely done with me, I’ll walk away and leave him alone. I just need him to know how I feel.”

“And you’re really sure about how you feel? You’re sure this isn’t just wanting what you can’t have?”

“That’s not it. I’ve never even thought about him as someone I could or couldn’t have. I really didn’t know.”

“And now that you do know that you can have it, you’ve all of a sudden decided you want it.”

“Stop saying it like that!” Brynn yelled into the phone.

She pinched the bridge of her nose. She’d done more yelling in the past week than she had in a lifetime. She’d yelled at Will, yelled at the movers, yelled at Sophie. Yelled at herself.

She’d done a few things quietly too. She’d quit her job. Or at least she was in the process of it. The legalities of turning over an orthodontist practice would take some time, but when she’d let Susan know that she was looking to sell, her partner could not have been more supportive. Probably because she was tired of Brynn’s dead weight around the office.

She’d also talked to her parents. Explained to them that although they would never see her tattoo, the tattoo did in fact exist. She’d confirmed that Will had seen it. Up close. Really close. She hadn’t added that last part, but she was pretty sure they knew it anyway.

They hadn’t seemed all that surprised about her and Will. Neither had any of her friends when she’d told them. Brynn was definitely getting the feeling that everyone else had known what she hadn’t.

That she and Will belonged together—had always belonged together.

Now she just had to convince him.

“You really care about him, Brynn? Really?” her sister asked.

Brynn’s fingers subconsciously moved to the written words on her hip. “I love him.”

She could hear her sister thinking things through.

“Okay, then,” Sophie said finally. “Here’s what we’re gonna do…”

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Brynn, that guy is totally looking at you.”

Brynn didn’t pause in the dance steps she was trying to master. She’d always thought cheerleading was a lot of waving pom-poms in the air, but this was hard work.

“Ohmigod, that’s Will Thatcher.”

Still, Brynn didn’t look up. If she’d learned anything in her first four months of high school, it was that most girls thought most guys were uhhh-mazing. But most of the ones she’d seen so far had been overhyped.

“Whoa, Brynn, do you know him or something? He’s eating you up with his eyes.”

Brynn finally registered that the rest of the freshman cheer squad was gawking at someone over her shoulder and curiosity finally won out.

Her eyes collided with a tall, blond-haired boy and her stomach did a full flip. The girls had gotten it right this time. This one was hot. Seriously hot. He was taller than most of the other guys, but not in a gangly way. He had dark blond hair that flopped perfectly over his forehead.

She was too far away to see the color of his eyes, but she could feel his gaze. It was piercing.

Who was he? Her eyes never broke contact with his. It didn’t matter that he was standing on a crowded football field with the rest of his team or that she was standing with the rest of her squad on the sideline.

It was as though they only had eyes for each other.

She mentally scolded herself for the ridiculousness of her thoughts. She didn’t even know the guy.

But it felt like she did. Or felt like she was supposed to.

Stop being an idiot.

“Who is he?” she asked out loud.

“Will Thatcher,” Amy repeated. “Pretty much the hottest guy in the junior class. He was already starting quarterback last year even though he was only a sophomore.”

Brynn couldn’t care less about what he was on the football team. She wanted to know who he was.

Dimly, Will became aware of a man yelling, “Thatcher! Thatcher!” and his eyes reluctantly tore away from hers, looking back once over his shoulder before he jogged to his coach.

Brynn watched his back for several more seconds, ignoring the jealous giggling of the other girls.

“Will Thatcher,” she said softly, out loud. It felt right.

And even though she was only fifteen…even though her brain insisted that nobody fell in love at fifteen, her heart said something different.

Her heart said, This one.

* * *

Brynn loved her sister. She really did. But she should have known better than to think that Sophie would have a plan other than show up and wear your most low-cut shirt.

Especially when “show up” meant flying across the country.

Because when Will ran, Will ran far. The thought made her smile as she impatiently waited for everyone to file off the cramped airplane. It was just like him to do things drastically. When he’d wanted to win her, he didn’t just move back to the same city. He’d moved next door.

And when he’d wanted to flee her, he’d jumped time zones.

She was already a sweaty mess by the time she wheeled her suitcase to her rental car thirty minutes later.

Chicago in the summer, Will? Really?

But she would have flown to Madagascar if she’d had to.

Trouble was, she wasn’t exactly sure what came next. Sophie had given her the name of the hotel where he was staying until he figured out his more permanent housing. The house hunt Brynn planned to put a stop to immediately, because the only permanent housing he was going to need was with her.

But right now, her strategy looked a little something like: show up in the hotel lobby and camp out there 24/7 until she saw him. And then beg.

Not her best plan.

But he wouldn’t respond to her calls, texts, e-mails, or any other form of communication she could think of.

He’d told Sophie the name of the hotel only for emergencies, and then had gone off the grid. Sophie had called him a dozen times, but he wasn’t even picking up for his best friend.