“I’ll be back,” he said and left the table.
“Told him he’d want to stick around for this,” he heard Levi tell James before he was out of earshot.
Collin made his way around the staging area. Thunderous applause shook the ground when Savannah finished singing.
“Okay, okay, thanks for bearing with me. Now, give it up for Twila Jones,” she said, and the crowd went wild.
“Is that an amazing song or what? You better give me first crack at it for recording, girl,” Twila said, and then the music went hot as she started her set.
Collin didn’t know why he was back there, other than to make a fool of himself again. He needed to apologize to her. Needed to see for himself that Savannah was okay after that performance.
He crossed behind an extra set of stage lights and stopped short. Savannah sat atop an old wooden spool the builders must have left behind when they’d finished construction earlier that day. Her feet tapped along with the music and she swayed side to side.
He couldn’t see her face, but she seemed happy.
Collin sucked in a breath and started forward.
“Van,” he said, using her family’s nickname for her. She stiffened in her seat and then slowly turned to face him.
“Collin,” she said. Her voice was flat.
“Could we go somewhere to talk?”
She pointed to the main stage. “I’m kind of on the job,” she said, raising her voice to be heard over the music.
“This won’t take long.”
She considered him for a long moment and Collin couldn’t help the feeling that she might somehow find him lacking. Too late now, he was here, and this needed to be said.
They left the area and crossed the street, passing by Bud’s and continuing along the new dock that had already been built to replace the one destroyed by the tornado. At the end, Collin gestured for Savannah to sit beside him.
Side by side, they stared at the middle of the lake for a long while. Twila’s set raced on behind them, the crowd hooting and hollering along with her songs about breakups and girls’ nights.
Finally, Savannah said, “Well, this was enlightening, Collin, thank you.”
She stood to go.
“I’m sorry.” He forced the words past his lips. These two, he knew, would be the hardest. He’d never liked admitting he was wrong and “I’m sorry” meant exactly that.
“For walking out on me? For repeatedly ignoring my calls and texts? For that day at the lake? Or the afternoon at the cabin or any of the days or nights we spent in the loft?”
He stood and turned to face her. “All of it,” he said, and when her face paled, he wanted to take the words back. He couldn’t take them back, though, because they were the truth. “I’m sorry that I walked out and for everything after. I’m sorry for starting all of this on a lie.” Savannah blinked. “I’m not who you think I am.”
“You’re Collin Tyler, Orchardist, Plum Tree Planter.”
He smiled and shook his head. “I’m all of those things. But I’m also an idiot who has a problem seeing any viewpoint that is different from his own.
“My father wasn’t a traveling salesman, and we didn’t come to live here because he was gone too often. Samson and Maddie Tyler weren’t cut out for parenting. They didn’t like the structure or the responsibility. From the time I was small, I can remember them leaving the three of us home alone. I was the oldest and so I was expected to care for Mara, and when Amanda came along, her, too. That way they could... I don’t know, go to Las Vegas or Mexico or whatever places sounded better then Kansas City or Tulsa or Little Rock or whatever town they decided to move us to.”
“How could they...how were they not reported?”
The smile he offered her was sad. “How could your biological parents get to the point they left you on the steps of a building? People abandon their children every day in a hundred different ways.”
“What happened?”
“I was ten. Maddie told me Samson had a job interview, but she had to drive him. I knew what that meant. They needed a break. She left two twenties on the table, told me to make sure we all got to school and to order pizza for dinner.
“When I woke up the next morning, Amanda had a fever, so I knew she couldn’t go to the babysitter’s. I told Mara we had a free day, and she hated school so she didn’t complain. What I didn’t account for were the ten days we’d already missed that year. The truancy officers banged on the door and they had a woman from children’s services with them. She slid her business card under the door.”
Savannah sat back down at the edge of the dock.
“We avoided the truancy officers and the aid worker, but the money Maddie left only lasted three days. By the fourth, it was impossible to keep the girls from crying, and I knew if anyone found us, we’d be taken and maybe separated. I knew if we weren’t together I couldn’t protect them.”
“My God, Collin, you were just a baby.”
“I’d seen Maddie pack this red book with us every time we moved, and I figured it had to be important. I thought maybe there was money hidden inside or something. There wasn’t. It was an address book. I called five numbers before I found anyone who admitted to knowing us. It was Gran and Granddad. They came to get us the next day and we’ve been here ever since.”
“But I’ve met your parents. Maddie and Samson.”
Collin nodded. “They come here from time to time, usually when they need money. Sometimes when they’re feeling nostalgic for family. Every time, they leave as suddenly as they came.”
Savannah didn’t say anything for a long moment. Collin gripped the dock tightly, his legs swinging a bit over the water.
“I know what it is to be abandoned, to not know why the people who are supposed to love you don’t. What I didn’t understand, not until tonight, was that I never allowed myself to truly feel that void. I had to be strong for my sisters, and then I wanted to make sure Granddad knew I was a good worker so he wouldn’t send us away.”
“I felt the void.”
“I know. And I should have realized it when we talked about it that night, but I couldn’t wrap my head around why you would blame yourself.”
“And now you do?”
He nodded. “Because I finally felt the void. Without you.”
* * *
SAVANNAH DIDN’T WANT to hear any more. Not about Collin’s parents, who had abandoned him not once but several times. Not about his determination to be strong for his sisters.
Definitely not the part about her being the cause of his void.
God, if he said that again she was going to crumble. She was going to fall into his arms and pretend he hadn’t shattered her when he’d walked out of the Slope that night. And when something happened that he didn’t like, he would leave and she would be shattered again. Only she wasn’t sure she could pick up those pieces again. Savannah wasn’t completely sure she’d picked them all up this time. There were still some jagged edges she kept scraping up against.
Edges like the way he looked sitting beside her. There was a vulnerability in his gaze she hadn’t seen before, and she thought she’d never seen anything sexier. And sexy was definitely not where she wanted this conversation to go.
“Don’t say that,” she said. “We were barely dating—”
“‘All this time, I was waiting for a rescue. I didn’t realize the rescuer was you. I didn’t realize I could rescue you, too’.”
“Don’t quote my song lyrics to me.” Don’t, Collin, please.
“You wrote that.” She could only nod. “You wrote it for your mom.” Savannah nodded again, wishing she could stand and walk away.
Why was it the guys who always did the walking? She wanted to be the one to walk. And yet, she stayed.
“I think it’s
about you. I think you wrote it not about a mother who saves an unwanted child, but about the unwanted child finding worth in herself.”
“Stop.” Savannah couldn’t do this, not with Collin. Not when he was sitting there telling her what she was feeling after he’d walked out on her.
“You were always worthy, Van. It was the people around you who weren’t. I wasn’t.” He paused. “I didn’t want to admit that I needed anyone. I wanted to be that solo person, free from baggage and responsibilities, at least on a personal level. Turns out, I’d filled my life with responsibilities so that people would need me. So that I couldn’t be left behind. Gran and Granddad. My sisters.
“You didn’t need anything from me, so I pushed you away, and when I didn’t want to push you away anymore I convinced myself that I was what you needed. My solid, straightforward, Boy-Scout-wannabe persona would solve the problems of the wannabe country girl singer with anxiety.”
“You’re pretty good with that Boy-Scout thing.”
“I’ve practiced it nearly my entire life, I should be. I never admitted to myself that I needed you. I admired your spark and fire. Your willingness to change your life. I admitted that I love you, but I still didn’t want to need you.”
He said love. Savannah tried not to read anything into the word, but it roared through her veins like the winds that battered the cabin. Love was present tense. Love was possibility.
“I need you, Savannah Walters.”
Her hands trembled in her lap. She drew in a long breath. “I’m not the woman you need, Collin,” she said.
Savannah stood and walked off the dock.
When she crossed the street, Savannah ducked inside an open door leading into what used to be part of the farmers’ market. She leaned against the cool wall and tried to breathe.
Collin might think he needed her, but he was wrong. And she was too scared to take a chance on his being right. He couldn’t need her. No one needed the lost little seven-year-old with the dirty clothes.
“You can walk away a million times and I’ll come after you a million and one,” Collin said from behind her. He’d followed her into the cavernous room. “You don’t have to love me back, and you don’t have to need me the way I need you, but I want you to hear me. I need you, Savannah Walters. Not for sex, and not to volunteer in the orchard and not to give my baby sister advice on finding her purpose—”
“Technically, I was advising myself. She took it to mean her. I’m not sorry she took it as advice for herself, though, because every human being needs purpose.” She bit her lip. “I want you to know that.”
“Then I know it.”
His expression was earnest, his hands hanging loosely at his sides.
“How do I know you won’t just walk out again?”
“How do I know you won’t?” Collin reached across the space between them and took her hand.
The touch sent a jolt of awareness through her that settled into a warm buzz.
“What I know about you is that you are strong. You were left alone in the cold when you were seven. It cracked you, but it didn’t break you. When my parents walked out, it broke me. Every single time. And until I walked out of the Slope the other night, I didn’t realize how badly. Because what you did before we were together, it’s the past. We all have regrets, Van, and I don’t want us to be a regret.”
Savanna looked up, focused on him for a long moment. “You don’t mean that. What I did—”
He cut her off. “The baggage we carry shapes us, but it doesn’t have to define us. I don’t want mine to define me, not any longer. I want to define myself. With you.”
His hand was gentle along her jaw and Savannah leaned into the soft caress.
“I can’t change the past or how it affected me.” She swallowed. “Walking onto that stage this afternoon took every ounce of courage I have. I don’t have any left to walk away from you.”
“Then have the courage to just stand,” he said. “I can promise you, I’ll stand right here with you.”
Savannah looked into his eyes. And though her impulse was to run, she stood still.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
COLLIN TURNED OFF the truck lights as he pulled to a stop near the newly constructed grandstand. The construction took up most of the area where the old warehouse had stood, but there was a section off to the side that remained empty. The work crews had hauled off the last of the debris just before the benefit concert.
“It’s after midnight. Do you really think anyone is going to notice we’re out here?” Savannah asked, whispering even though they were in the truck with the windows rolled up. No one could hear them.
“It only takes one busybody to ruin the moment,” he said. He opened his door and then said quietly, “Let’s get this in the ground before one of James’s deputies comes out on patrol.”
Savannah stepped out and joined him at the back of the truck. “I still say we could have just told them we were planting a tree.”
Collin shook his head. “Savannah. Dear, sweet, over-fifty Savannah. Have you never done anything illegal in your life?”
“Well, (a) I’m under thirty. And (b) planting a tree isn’t illegal.” She reached for the tailgate latch and it banged open.
Collin winced.
“Sorry, forgot how heavy that thing is. You should really spring for one of those new trucks with the self-releasing gates.”
“I like this truck, just like you like your Honda.” He reached into the bed and pulled a sapling from it.
Savannah grabbed the shovels and followed him. “I heard they’re thinking of making this part of the grandstand area a park.”
“Good thing we’re going to give the park some shade, then.” He set the tree to the side and began digging a hole.
Savannah kept her flashlight trained on the soft earth, making it easier for him to see what he was doing. “I can’t believe I let you talk me into this. I’m changing my reputation, you know.”
“In case you hadn’t already noticed, people here don’t care about what happened in Nashville. Some of them didn’t even connect you leaving the tour with Genevieve’s claims.” He shot her a glance. “Also, and I can’t stress this enough, I’ll like you even if your new reputation becomes tarnished.”
“You’ll love me,” she said, and there was laughter in her voice and a softness in her eyes. At least, he thought he could see softness, it was hard to tell in the dim light of the stars and the flashlight.
“Forever,” he said, and finished digging the hole. “Start the water,” he instructed, and Savannah climbed into the truck bed. She inserted the hose into the water tanks he used during the driest of summers to nourish the trees. The tanks had gotten a lot of use over the past couple of weeks with the new plantings. Water began to drip from the hose, and Collin took it.
He let the water flow over the tree roots for several minutes, making sure to soak the ground so that the sapling wouldn’t die.
Savannah slid her arm around his waist and clicked off the flashlight. Moonlight glistened on the lake and a few cicadas buzzed in the grass.
“How about the sign?”
“Behind the seat.”
Collin turned off the water and grabbed the wooden sign, made from the same oak as the sapling they’d just planted, and began to work it into the soil.
When it was placed, Savannah took his hand and read, “‘The strength to rebuild is one of the finest acts of courage,’” along with the date of the tornado. “Fitting, since the oak symbolizes courage, I think.”
“You looked it up?” he asked, though he didn’t know why he was surprised. The quiet girl he’d thought Savannah was all those years would have looked up the meaning of the tree they were planting as a memorial. It stood to reason that the strong woman he knew her to be now would look it up.
“As soon as Amanda said live oaks were what she would want if she ever got trees of her own.” She’d looked up other trees, too, but since the planting of them seemed to be a Tyler thing, she hadn’t brought up trees of her own. Although, if she could get the music program idea off the ground, she would definitely look into specific trees for that.
“I’m going to have to remedy that situation, and soon,” he said.
“She has a birthday coming up. Her eighteenth.”
“An important birthday, for sure.” He squeezed his arm around her waist. “Thanks for coming with me tonight.”
“Thanks for inviting me to commit a random act of tree planting that neither of us is sure is entirely legal.” It was the first time she’d been invited to tag along on a mission that, to her, seemed like something her brother and their friends would have done as kids. It made her feel as if she was part of their group. Part of him. She liked that.
“Speaking of legal, we’re probably really pushing our luck that no one has come by yet.” Collin wrapped the hose and stowed it, along with the other tools, in the back of the truck.
Savannah wasn’t ready to leave just yet. She stood near the tree, arms folded over her chest, just watching it. Collin came back, put his arms around her middle and pulled her against him in the darkness.
Savannah leaned against him for a long moment, content. “There’s something I need to tell you.” Something she’d wanted to tell him since the night of the benefit, but there had been too much to do. She’d needed to get back to the staging area, then everyone had been celebrating, and although the benefit was less than a week in the past, she’d found a million more reasons to keep this to herself. She didn’t want to keep it to herself anymore, though. She wanted him to know just how important his love was to her.
“Anything.”
“The song I wrote for the benefit?” She drew in a slow breath, wrapping her arms around his. “I didn’t only write that song about Mama Hazel or Dad or Levi. I wrote it about you.”
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