Meant to Be

by Maggie McGinnis

  “You gonna sing with him?”

  “Um…” She wrinkled her nose. “Little rusty, I’m afraid.”

  “Didn’t sound rusty to me.”

  “Well, that was in a closed office, in an empty store, with nobody listening.”

  Liam let his eyes scan the crowd. “Not too many more people than that here now.”

  “I know.”

  “He’s dying up there. You gotta rescue him.”

  Shelby laughed quietly. Cooper was anything but dying. He held the entire flipping café in his hands right now.

  Liam was silent for a long moment, fiddling with the sugar container on the table. Then he took a deep breath and touched her arm, just a whisper, before he spoke.

  “Your daddy would want you to get back up there.”

  Chapter 22

  “My—what?” Shelby felt her eyes go wide as she struggled to keep her voice at a whisper.

  “Your daddy. The man you sang with before you could probably walk. The same one who’d pull you up onstage to sing with him. The same one you smiled at like he was your best friend and your father rolled up in one package.”

  Shelby felt her breaths coming faster as she darted glances at Cooper. Had he told?

  “He didn’t tell me.” Liam’s voice was quiet, reprimanding, like he knew she’d had the thought, and was pissed she’d allowed it to surface, even silently. “Like I said the other day, I saw you in Denver a hundred years ago. You were fifteen, I was fifteen, and I was sure you’d marry me someday, if I could just convince you I was worthy.”

  He paused like the memory half-pained him. “But then you took a different path from your father’s, and…well, here we are.”

  Shelby took a shaky breath. “When did you realize I was…me?”

  “When you were in my store, singing in the office. You’ve got a voice from the angels, honey. Nobody sounds like you, even when they try to cover you up with all that synthesized shit they try to pass off as real music.”

  Shelby laughed, then sobered. “Unfortunately, it’s not really up to me, Liam. I’m still under contract.”

  And I need the money. More than you can imagine, even.

  “Well, that’s a damn shame. How many more albums?”

  “Just this last one, but it comes with the whole gamut of tour and promo and all the other garbage, so…” She trailed off, feeling her stomach clutch with anxiety. “It’ll be awhile yet before I can shake off Tara.”

  He nodded, not looking at her. “You could shake her off right now, at least for tonight.” He pointed at the stage. “He’s just about done.”

  Cooper played the last notes of the Vince Gill song that had made Shelby’s knees go to Jell-O on his cabin porch, and then he set his guitar down beside him as he tipped his hat graciously at the tiny crowd.

  “Thank you for not throwing any tomatoes. Appreciate it.”

  Jasper laughed from the café bar. “We don’t stock ’em. Otherwise, who knows?”

  Cooper looked straight at Shelby then, and it took everything she had not to melt in her seat at his glance. Then his eyebrows went up—an invitation—and she was powerless to say no.

  She nodded, just the tiniest nod in all of nod-land, but when his face broke into a grin, she knew he’d seen it. He picked up his guitar and leaned toward the mic once more.

  “We’ve got a guest in our midst who apparently has decided she doesn’t mind being seen with me tonight—at least in here, where nobody’s looking.” Shelby took a deep breath as people laughed and turned their heads to see who he might be talking about, their glances landing squarely on her.

  Clearly she was the only stranger in their midst tonight.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, I’d love to welcome my friend Shelby to the stage.” He held out a hand, and before she could talk herself out of it, she slid her chair back and walked to where she’d left her new guitar.

  Polite clapping accompanied her to the stage, and Jasper pulled another stool next to Cooper’s, then grinned as he headed to his previous position behind the coffee bar. Liam sat back down at the table closest to the stage, his eyes closed and his arms crossed, a secret smile on his face.

  Cooper covered the mic with one hand as he put the other on her shoulder—just a gentle touch, but proprietary, nonetheless.

  “What should we play, princess?”

  His use of the nickname made her smile, and tension whooshed out of her chest as she looked up to see just a group of friendly faces—not an invisible, front-lit audience she had no hope of connecting with on any more than a superficial level.

  She suggested a duet they’d sung the other night, and he smiled as he adjusted the strap of his guitar and strummed the opening chords. She took a couple of deep breaths, waiting for the music to capture her, but her fingers felt shaky on the strings, and she wondered suddenly if this had all been an epically bad idea.

  “Hey.” Her head snapped up at his voice—soft, but commanding. “I’ve got you.”

  His eyes were intense, and she let herself fall into them as her fingers finally found their way to the melody. He smiled softly as he glanced at her hands, then back at her face. Then he took the first verse of the song, letting her find her footing for a few more moments.

  When she joined in and their voices met, a low, zingy hum took hold down deep in her stomach, then traveled all the way up her spine and out her limbs. Their voices blended like they’d been meant to sing together, and she loved the contrast of his depth and her lightness as they broke into the chorus of the song.

  And then she looked out at the audience, somehow needing to know whether they were finding the music even half as magical as she was.

  They were.

  She could feel it. She could see it. She could sense it from the smiles, the nods, the lips mouthing the words to the well-known song.

  And she loved it.

  She felt a huge smile break out on her face as she met Liam’s eyes, and he nodded affectionately, like he was responsible for all of it.

  When the song was over, the audience erupted in hoots and whistles as they clapped, and Shelby couldn’t help but lean over and hug Cooper, who stood up and motioned toward her like all the credit should be hers.

  “Want to do one by yourself?” he asked, grinning as he rolled his eyes toward the audience. “Like they’re going to give you any choice now?”

  “I think maybe I do.” She smiled, feeling like yes, she really did.

  “Okay.” He grabbed the mic and held out a hand to shush people. “All right, everybody. Hold your tomatoes for just one more. Shelby’s offered to give us a song on her own.”

  The small crowd clapped, and before she could lose her nerve, Shelby started picking the intro to a tune she knew everybody here would know. It’d been on the radio a hundred times a week for months straight last year, and yeah, maybe it was a cop-out, but it was a way for her to sing, without risking one of her father’s songs…or her own.

  She played and she sang, and as she watched the faces of the people gathered at the café, she felt her shoulders relax. She felt her voice gain strength. She smiled, and she played, and she felt.

  Three songs later, she let her fingers fall off her guitar, sure the audience had finally had enough. But the applause said otherwise, and she took a deep breath, looking at Cooper, who’d leaned himself against the bar with Jasper as soon as she’d started singing.

  He nodded, and the smile on his face gave her courage like nothing else ever had before. Not since Daddy.

  “Okay, guys.” She pulled the mic closer to her mouth. “I’m a total hack at the songwriting business, but I have a little something I’ve been working on. If you don’t mind, maybe I’ll play it for you?”

  Jasper and Liam clapped the loudest at her question, and she laughed as she launched into the first notes of a song she’d written over the past couple of days—one she honestly loved, but wasn’t sure had even one iota of commercial appeal.

  But as her fi
ngers skated over the strings, and as her voice traveled the soft melody she’d penned, the café grew quiet. It was just her voice and her guitar—a tiny circle of sound, but she felt the entire room listening, felt them lean forward, felt them feel the love and pain and fear and hope in her words.

  And it was magic.

  When she finished, letting her fingers linger on the final note, there was a long silence. For a moment, she feared the worst. Had she completely misinterpreted their reactions?

  But then Liam stood up, clapping slowly, and Jasper pushed off from the bar, clapping beside him. And then, through a mist of tears, Shelby saw everyone rise, heard their hands, smiled as the whistles hit her ears.

  It was like the old days—like those afternoons in those sunny parks with Daddy right beside her. She swiped quickly at her eyes as she sent a quick prayer upward, and then she stood up to take an awkward bow.

  “Thank you,” she spoke into the microphone. “Thank you for letting me play.”

  She looked at Cooper, and his face quieted any last nerve that might have still been twitching. I told you so, his grin said.

  I believe in you, his eyes said.

  When the applause died down and she stepped off the stage toward Cooper, he pulled her into a bear hug that ended with a square-on-the-lips kiss. It was a move so unplanned, so natural, that it made her laugh while zingy, happy fireballs rocketed through her veins.

  How had she gotten so lucky to have found him, right when she’d most needed him? When she hadn’t even known she had needed him?

  Jasper stepped up to the mic. “Well, folks, I say we leave it there. I pity the person who tries to follow that act up. Welcome to town, Shelby. Sure hope you’re staying!”

  Shelby laughed again, squeezing Cooper’s waist.

  Then she sobered.

  Because…dammit.

  She wasn’t.

  Chapter 23

  The next morning, after a night whose utter, perfect harmony and exhaustion had slayed him for any other woman in the universe, Cooper felt a gnawing ache in his gut that was only growing more painful as he watched Shelby eat the pancakes and bacon he’d cooked.

  “Aren’t you hungry?” she asked, winking. “I’d really have thought you’d have an appetite this morning.”

  He smiled, but the almost imperceptible narrowing of her eyes told him she’d registered that he was forcing it. He wished he was a better actor, but the voice message that had been waiting on his phone this morning had left him wavering between anger, fear, and abject, horrible loneliness.

  He had to go back to Boston.

  He had to go back to court, damn it all.

  But he’d be damned if he was going to drag Shelby with him, figuratively or otherwise.

  She took a bite, swallowing carefully, like she wanted to ask what was wrong, but was too afraid there would actually be an answer.

  “So what did you really think of my song last night?” She pointed with her fork. “And be honest. You’re not on my payroll, so you’re excused from buttering me up.”

  “I loved it.”

  “Yeah?” She smiled, and it lit her face from within.

  “You had them in the palms of both hands, princess.”

  “Best. Feeling. Ever.” She grinned as she took a sip of her orange juice. “This is probably the part where I should thank you for dragging me downtown, right?”

  “Yup.”

  She laughed. “Thank you.”

  “I was right, wasn’t I?”

  “You were. It was just—just like the old days. The really old days. With my dad.”

  He watched her face fall for a moment, and he could swear he felt her pain in his own chest.

  What the hell?

  “Hey, Cooper?”

  “Yeah, princess?”

  “Do you think I’m a sellout?”

  “A—what? No. Why would I ever think that?”

  She sighed, shrugging slowly. “I don’t know. I mean, I could have followed in Daddy’s footsteps. He could have helped me make it happen. But I got blinded a little bit by my own glitter, you know? All the promises, all the attention, all of the adoration—most of which turned out to be false, in the end.”

  She took another drink, her eyes wandering the room aimlessly. “Or maybe it was false the entire time. I don’t even know.”

  “I’m sure it wasn’t. You have millions of fans. You don’t get that level of attention falsely.”

  “Some people do.” She rolled her eyes. “It’s a machine, Coop. The machine decides who’s going to be the biggest, brightest star. And talent is less a part of that equation than any of them would ever openly admit.”

  Cooper leveled her with a look. “If you’re questioning your own talent here, you might get to see my mad side for the first time.”

  “I’m not. Not really. It’s just—you know, I didn’t actually hate pop music at first. Those first couple of albums? They were kind of fun. And I embraced the whole tour-goddess thing with the craft tables and the assistants and the costumes and glitter. I was all in.”

  “So when did it stop working for you?”

  She tipped her head. “I’m not even sure I can pinpoint it. It was a series of little things that just kept getting bigger. Or maybe they didn’t actually get bigger—maybe I just got less patient with it all. The more I grew up, the more I started to realize I was in control of just about nothing in my own life—not my clothes, not my hair, not my makeup, not the food I put into my own body, not my home…nothing. And that’s not even the music I’m talking about.”

  “Did you ever try talking to your father about it? He’d been in the business a long time—seems like he might have been able to pull some strings or something.”

  “Country music is its own animal, Coop. He had influence in his own music family. He had no influence in mine.”

  Cooper pushed his pancakes around his plate, the pit in his stomach growing even bigger. He had to go back to Boston—to an unknown he couldn’t even wrap his head around yet—and here he’d gone and started something with a still-vulnerable, still-grieving woman he’d be leaving behind as he fought for his freedom…again.

  He was an ass.

  He never, ever should have showed up with spaghetti the first time, let alone last night.

  But he hadn’t been able to resist her. He’d fallen hard, and no amount of talking himself out of it had worked. And now? What was he supposed to do? She was nearing the end of her time here at Whisper Creek, and he’d just received his engraved invitation back to a Boston courthouse. What the hell kind of future would he be able to offer her? Ever?

  None—that’s what kind.

  He closed his eyes, feeling a cold, granite stone lodge in his gut, all sharp edges and puncturing corners as he pictured his attorney’s office, the paparazzi camped out in front of his condo, the blade of fear he’d swallowed every time he’d opened his mailbox for months.

  He pictured the old headlines.

  He pictured the new ones.

  And then he pictured Shelby’s name joining his in those headlines.

  Oh, holy hell. What had he done?

  “What’s the matter?” She straightened up.

  “Nothing.” He took a deep breath, trying to figure out how to say what was far too crystal-frigging-clear to him, because if he waited any longer, he was even more of an ass than he’d already proven to be. “Maybe—something.”

  “Okay?” Her eyes took on that scared look she’d sported when they’d first met, but this time, it was his fault.

  “You remember what I told you about what happened back East?”

  “It’d be a little hard to forget, Coop. Of course I do.” She set down her fork.

  “Well, it turns out…it’s not over.”

  He watched her swallow hard as she scanned his face. “What do you mean? You were already acquitted. The case was…closed. Wasn’t it?” Her pitch crept higher as she crossed her arms protectively over her stomach. “Cooper?�
�

  “It was.” He closed his eyes, hating every frigging thing about this moment. Hating that he had to go face another trial, hating that he had to leave Montana at all, hating that he had to break Shelby’s heart in order to save her.

  Because that’s what he had to do.

  And he hated that he was also breaking his own damn heart in the process.

  “Was?” Her voice was a whisper now, raw with fear.

  “The case is being reopened.”

  He felt the words land between them like they weighed more than the table could hold, and her eyes widened.

  “What do you mean?”

  “New evidence, according to my attorney.” He ran a frustrated hand through his hair. “New planted evidence, I’m assuming, but it doesn’t matter. Whether it’s real or fabricated doesn’t change anything.”

  “Well, it kind of changes everything, doesn’t it?” She stood up and paced toward the window. “You were acquitted, Cooper! How can they just find new evidence and put you through this again? Isn’t there some sort of statute against that? Double jeopardy or something?”

  He sighed. He wished. “I don’t know.”

  “So what does this mean?” She fingered the silver necklace around her neck, her fingers shaky. “Do you have to go back to Boston?”

  “Yeah.” He closed his eyes in pain. “Yeah, I do.”

  “When?” Her voice was so quiet that he barely heard the question, and he’d have given anything to not have to answer it. But he had to be truthful. A part of him had briefly considered leaving at the crack of dawn without telling her, just to save them both from this horrible scene, but he’d discarded it as soon as he’d thought of it. Only the biggest asshole coward would do that to a woman.

  And he might be a lot of things, but he’d be damned if anyone called him that.

  “Come here.” He put his arms out, dying to fold her against him, but she didn’t move.

  “Oh, my God,” she whispered. “You have to go right now, don’t you?”

  “No. Not…immediately.”

  “When, Cooper?”

  “Tomorrow.” He spit out the word like he hated it, and he watched it hit her like a dagger.