But then he stood up and walked over to her, as warm and real as anything as he gently shut the door behind her and said, “Hello, cariad.”
There were a million things she wanted to say to him, to ask him.
But all that came out was, “You have . . . an office.”
“I do.”
“And a desk.”
“Even so.”
“And you’re . . . here.”
“Noticed that, did you?”
“Why?”
Blowing out a breath, Rhys put his hands in his pockets and shrugged. “Well, you see, I went back to Wales, business as usual, only the thing was, I was completely fucking miserable. Just the saddest bastard you’ve ever seen in your life. So sad, in fact, that Wells—Wells!—told me I was a sad bastard, and as he is president of the Sad Bastards Club, I found this very distressing.”
Vivi’s face was aching, and she realized it was because she was smiling.
Rhys was smiling, too, as he continued. “And so I thought what I could do to make myself less of a sad bastard, and I realized the only thing for it was to be with you. Or at the very least, near you. And it turns out that when a college is named after your family home, they’re fairly willing to let you teach the odd class, so here I am.”
“What about your business?” Vivi asked, still feeling a little dazed, and Rhys nodded.
“Still got it. Can run it from here, no problem, but Bowen said this moment needed a big gesture . . . I mean, I decided this moment needed a big gesture and received zero help from my brother at all.
“Besides,” he went on, “I wanted to prove to you that I was serious about this, about staying here. Putting down roots. This isn’t a lark, Vivienne.”
He stepped closer, and Vivi breathed him in, her hands already going to his chest, where his heart beat a steady tattoo under her palms. “I realize that uprooting my life and moving to Georgia for a woman might fall into the reckless and ill-thought-out category, but the thing is, I’m very much in love with that woman.”
He leaned in a little closer, lowering his voice. “That woman is you, by the way. Wanted to make sure that was clear.”
Vivi laughed even as she felt sudden tears sting her eyes. “Okay, good, because I really can’t compete with Aunt Elaine for your heart. My baking is atrocious.”
“Your only fault.”
Rhys took a deep breath, reaching out to cup her face, his fingers resting on the back of her head as he looked into her eyes. “I love you. So very, very much. And I know that I’m flippant sometimes, or make a joke rather than say the truth, but I want you to know that you’re everything to me, Vivienne. Everything.”
Leaning in, he rested his forehead against hers, eyes closing as Vivi reached up and put her hands on his wrists. “You’ve had my heart from the moment I saw you on that bloody hillside, and I hate that I wasted nine years without you, but I’m not wasting a single second more. If you need to be here, then I need to be here. Simple as that.”
Stepping back, Vivi looked into those blue eyes. Rhys might have been The Fool, but maybe she was, too, because she realized that the image, a person walking merrily off a cliff, wasn’t necessarily about being reckless.
It was about taking a leap and trusting something—someone—would catch you.
“I want to go to Wales with you,” she blurted out, and Rhys’s brow furrowed in confusion.
“Did you miss the part about how I’ve moved here?”
Laughing, crying, Vivi shook her head. “No, I mean . . . it doesn’t have to be either-or. You here or me in Wales. We can do both. We can have both. And it’s going to be messy and hard sometimes, but it will be worth it. Because I love you, too. You’ve had my heart just as long, and I trust you with it.”