“Just like this, driving around for the fun of driving.”

The trees finally opened, parting to expose a small body of water with a grassy shoreline. The big trees overhung the tranquil spot, shading the shore while sunlight shone directly on the pool. It was, quite simply, one of the most beautiful places she’d ever seen.

Wes parked the bike, shut off the engine, and pulled off his helmet, then turned to help Rubi remove hers. She gazed out over the clear water fed by a creek, small rocks and bigger boulders worn away by time and creating mini waterfalls.

“Oh my God, Wes.” She didn’t know why she was whispering. But after having Nickelback screaming in her ear, priming her for hot and dirty sex, this was not what she’d been prepared for. “This is amazing.”

He gazed out over the sight for a long moment, seeming to take it all in. The absolute lack of man-made sound created a blissful tranquility of trees rustling, birds singing, creek gurgling. “Yeah,” he said, his mouth turning slightly but his expression melancholy. “I love this place.”

Rubi swung her leg over the back and slid off the bike. Wes followed. He opened a side compartment and pulled out towels, a blanket, and a couple of Ziploc bags of food. She grinned. “Okay, now I get it. You’re fulfilling an outdoor-sex fantasy.”

Wes set everything down in a smooth, grassy area. “Baby, all sex with you is a fantasy come true—indoors or out.”

He spread out the blanket, dropped the towels, then turned toward the water and peeled off his jacket.

She wandered up beside him as he sat down and pulled off his boots. He patted the blanket beside him and lay back, hands behind his head. “Lie down. It’s really cool to look up into the trees. If I do it long enough, I feel like I’m floating.”

Rubi took off her jacket and lay down next to him, a towel for a pillow. Overhead, reds, oranges, and yellows burst from the trees like flame. All against a crisp blue sky. “God, that’s…impossibly beautiful.”

Wes said nothing, and silence stretched and deepened until Rubi imagined the quiet reached into her body, releasing all her tension. But she found the lack of tension, of stress, of worries…the sheer comfort, tranquility, and happiness swamping her so foreign, it created a stress of its own.

“Is this where you brought your girlfriends to get lucky?” she asked playfully. “Somewhere you could go while you were living at home?”

“No.” His answer was mellow, so completely calm. “I’ve never brought anyone here. Not even Wyatt or high school football buddies. My parents don’t know this exists. Melissa doesn’t know this exists. I always came alone. It’s always been my very own. This is where I came to think problems through, to chill before a big race, to let my temper cool off after a fight.”

Rubi rolled to her side and propped her head in her hand. Wes kept his gaze skyward. His eyes were more blue than gray, as if the sky was reflected in his irises. Outlined by thick gold lashes. Her chest squeezed hard.

She couldn’t be in love with him. The mere thought kicked off a panic attack. Yet another part of her couldn’t deny the emotions twisting her inside out. Emotions that rushed in without warning and took over until everything she’d ever known was upside down and backward.

“Why’d you bring me here?” she asked, her voice barely a whisper.

He hesitated, a slight furrow appearing between his eyes. “I wanted to share something with you that I’ve never shared with anyone. I wanted you to have this piece of me I can give only you.”

Her throat thickened, tightened until she had to force herself to swallow. “That’s…” How could she possibly explain how she felt when even she didn’t understand? “That…”

His head turned slowly, and his gaze locked on hers, intense and meaningful. “Scares you.”

A breath of laughter escaped. Tense, shaky laughter. And with it, tears that rolled over her bottom lashes. Tears she hadn’t realized were coming. Rubi closed her eyes and nodded, wiping at her cheeks. “I’m sorry. I’m just…not wired right.”

“Come here.”

Wes stretched out his arm, and she went to him with the same unabashed need as Rodie showed her. She laid her head on his chest, pressed her face into the warm muscle of his pec, and breathed him in. Burrowed closer. “It’s so much easier to just have sex.”

His laugh rolled through his chest, shaking Rubi, and laughter bubbled out of her too. He wrapped both arms around her, pulling her close. And then just held her.

“I won’t disappear, baby,” he said after a long silence. “I won’t open that trapdoor and let you fall.”

She wanted to believe, but she’d believed so many times in the past. Her mother, her father, her nannies, her friends, her early boyfriends—they’d all left her. Some repeatedly, after she’d allowed them back into her life. Lexi was the only person who’d ever stayed. The only person who truly understood her and loved her anyway. But hadn’t Wes seen her worst sides? Stilettos. Her hatred for her father. Her pathetically superficial life. Yet…

“I know you won’t mean to,” she whispered. “But I’m just…hard to love, I guess.”

She’d never thought about it like that before. Of course, she knew all her flaws, even if she’d failed to improve on them. But…was she really so hard to love?

Wes rolled toward her, easing her onto her back and hovering over her. He lifted a thumb to wipe away the dampness on her cheeks and met her eyes steadily, seriously. “You are not the least bit difficult to love. In fact, you’re so easy to love, I’ve been fighting against it. The only hard part about being with you is fighting those walls.”

She nodded. “I know. I fight them too.”

“Tell you what.” He smiled, the expression so soft, so loving, it pushed more tears from her eyes. “Let’s fight them together. They’ll never have a chance.”

She was laughing when he lowered his mouth to hers.

Wes felt like he was flying as he sped down the back roads toward Wyatt’s house with Rubi leaning into him, holding him tight, her giggle tickling his ear every time he surprised her by speeding over a rise or leaning heavily into a turn.

She loved him; he knew she did. Beyond that, she was in love with him. He just needed to let her get used to it. He could wait to hear the words. When he and Rubi were as connected as they were now, he didn’t need the words. Not really. At least that was what he was telling himself for now.

One day at a time with Rubi Russo. One day at a time.

And with days like this, he was okay with that. Because every day with Rubi was ten times more exhilarating than one day with anyone else.

She was the one.

He’d realized it lying there on the blanket while she’d been feeding him grapes and kissing him between each one. Grapes his mom had packed up the minute Wes had told her he was taking Rubi on a ride. Then, as she’d packed drinks and chocolates, she’d drifted off on a tangent, suggesting he set up a really nice picnic for her by stringing lights in the trees. Whitney hadn’t helped with her input that Wes should bring his iPod and speaker so they could dance in their private retreat. The fact that they’d liked Rubi enough to insist he make such an effort pleased him. But he knew Rubi better. She needed just the right balance of romance and nonchalance to keep her comfortable. Wes hadn’t quite figured out the ratio yet and didn’t need anything tipping the slow progress they were making toward becoming a solid, committed couple.

He turned off the highway to Daughtry’s “On the Inside,” singing about running to escape but failing because “it’s still just you on the inside,” and wondering if that was what Rubi had been doing all these years. When he turned down Wyatt’s street, his thoughts hit a brick wall. Across the street from Wyatt’s house, Melissa stood beside her car.

Shit. Wes had purposely called Tori this morning to ask when Melissa would be gone before he brought Rubi over.

But as Wes neared, his mind flipped in another direction. A man stood between Melissa and her car. Her ex, Dillon Stark, was a big guy, a head taller than Melissa. His body language was both angry and aggressive, sending an immediate sizzle of alarm across his shoulders.

“Isn’t that Melissa?” Rubi’s voice sounded soft in his ear.

He reached up, shutting the music off, and parked several houses down. “Yeah.”

“What’s going on there?”

She sounded sincerely concerned, which gave Wes one more thing to love about her. Every other girlfriend had been jealous of something in Wes’s life—actresses he’d worked with, the travel and long days his job required, his friendship with the other Renegades. Melissa was a truly beautiful woman in that wholesome, country-girl-next-door way that every one of his previous girlfriends would have taken issue with.

“Don’t know. And I don’t want to know.” He shut off the bike. “He’s her recent ex-fiancé.”

He pulled off his helmet at the same time Rubi did.

“Another one?” she asked quietly.

Wes shot her a sidelong grin. They both returned to watching the argument, waiting for either escalation or diffusion.

“Wes…” she whispered, concern in her tone. “Do you think—?”

Rubi’s words cut off with a gasp as the guy made an aggressive grab for Melissa’s arm and shook her.

“Fuck.” He didn’t want to get in the middle of this, but what the hell else could he do? Wes climbed off the bike without taking his eyes off the pair and handed his helmet to Rubi. “Stay here.”

He started toward them at a slow, casual pace, unzipping his jacket for freedom of movement—something he hoped he wouldn’t need. “Hey, Missy.” He waited until Dillon—a guy he and Melissa had gone to school with—looked at Wes, then said, “Dillon. Long time.”

A few deep breaths passed before Dillon’s furious gaze swung back to Melissa. “Is that what this is about? Him?”

“Nothing between us has anything to do with Wes.” Melissa clenched her fists at her sides. Her face was pink and wet from crying. “Get in your car and leave, Dillon. If you don’t stop this, I’ll call the police.”

Wes stopped ten feet away, far enough to stay out of the middle, close enough to act.

Dillon swung toward Wes. “You didn’t fuck her enough when you lived here?” he said, taking two menacing steps toward Wes. “You have to come all the way from California to fuck her now too?”

Wes clenched his teeth. “I’m here to see my brother. There’s nothing going on between Missy and me.”

With one more giant step closer, Dillon’s voice lowered. “Then stay the fuck out of this.”

“If you leave, I’ll stay out of it.”

Wes saw the punch in Dillon’s expression long before the man’s body ever moved. When his fist finally came at him, Wes pulled back and stepped aside. Dillon’s momentum turned him in a one-eighty.