Mind Games - Page 237

“It’s pretty,” she agreed as she got out of the car. “And quiet. But it’s pretty and quiet at home, too.”

“Couldn’t wait. There’s something I want you to hear. Have a seat.”

He pulled out his phone. “I’ve been trying to decide the best time to play this for you, and realized when I was waiting, it had to be now.”

He cued up the song, hit play.

She smiled at the opening chords. She’d heard them flowing in the air.

I see her in sunlight, and she shines.

When she heard the words, his voice, she knew. When her eyes met his, everything else faded away. As her heart filled, the tears came. From gratitude.

“I called it ‘I See Her,’” he said when the last chord drifted away. “I see you, Thea, and I love everything I see. It’s the first song I’ve recorded in a long time. I recorded it when I went to Philadelphia right before Bray’s birthday. Maybe that’s why I reacted the way I did when I thought you didn’t have real feelings for me. Because I was already in love with you.”

“I’ve loved you for years. I think the reason I fell so hard at sixteen, the reason I could never feel quite that way about anyone else is part of me knew. Part of me always knew I was yours. I was yours, Ty.”

“I want to be yours.” He reached for her hands. “I come as a set.”

“I love him.”

“I know.”

“Maybe you could hold on to me now. It’s been a hell of a day.”

Rising, he drew her to her feet and held on.

“It’s a beautiful song, Ty. You couldn’t have picked a better time to play it for me.”

She lifted her face, met his mouth with hers in the sunlight, with the autumn breeze whispering through the pines.

“How do you feel?”

“Loved, free, grateful.”

“Sounds like a good time to bring up this other thing. I’m going to record more, when the mood strikes.”

“That’s wonderful.”

“But Redbud Hollow doesn’t run to music studios. I can change that. I’m going to change that,” he corrected, “and build one.”

“Did I say wonderful?” Laughing, she hugged him hard. “What’s several levels up from wonderful?”

“I like stupendous,” he decided. “So I’m going for that. But then if I want to pull in other artists here and there, I need a place to put them.”

“There’s the inn right in town, and—”

“Yeah, a couple places, but I’m thinking Knobby could work some magic with the house. Add on, fix up. Plenty of land for it. It could be an option for artists to bunk where they work.”

“That would be—I’ll go with stupendous, too—but I can’t imagine you’d want all those people basically living in your home, even for short periods.”

“No, I wouldn’t want that. That’s why we’d need to move in with you.”

“I…” After she blinked, her mind went blank. “Oh.”

“Need a ring first?”

“A … I have to sit down again.”