Total pages in book: 95
Estimated words: 92417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 462(@200wpm)___ 370(@250wpm)___ 308(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 462(@200wpm)___ 370(@250wpm)___ 308(@300wpm)
My heart stumbled over its next few beats.
“So?” Xander said as soon as we hit the road. He’d left his SUV at my house so we could make the thirty-mile drive in my truck, which meant I was stuck with him for the next half hour.
“So what?”
“So how’s it going with Veronica?”
“Fine.”
“That’s it? Fine?”
“Yep.”
“Does that mean it’s still on?”
“It means what it means.”
He thumped my shoulder. “Don’t be a dick. How’d it go in Chicago? She get her stuff?”
“No. But I did get to punch her ex in the face.”
“Nice.” Xander sounded impressed. “So now what?”
“Now she has to buy some new clothes.”
“I mean, now what for her? Will she stay in Cherry Tree Harbor?”
“Just for the summer,” I told him. “In the fall, she’s going back to New York.” As I said it, I realized how much I hated thinking about it.
“Why?”
“She misses her life there.”
“You can’t convince her to stay?”
I frowned. “Why would I do that?”
“I don’t know. Because you’re into her?”
“I’ve known her for less than a month, Xander. I shouldn’t even be messing around with her.”
“But you are. She’s the first woman I’ve seen get under your skin.”
“We’re just friends.” I rolled my shoulders, wishing he wasn’t right. “We have a good time together. But when the kids come home on Sunday, it has to stop.”
“Why?”
“Are you serious?” I shot him a look. “Because it’s not okay to fuck the nanny—or anyone else—with the kids in the house.”
“Is that what she thinks too?”
“Yes.”
He shook his head. “I don’t get it.”
Of course he didn’t. When Xander saw something he wanted, he always went for it. “Look, if I’d met her under different circumstances, maybe I’d go down that road, see where it led, but as it is, things between us end when the kids get back.”
He was silent for a moment, the hum of the tires on the highway filling the cab. Then he asked, “You really think that?”
“Think what?”
“That if you’d met Veronica under different circumstances, like maybe if she’d just been a girl you saw one night at The Broken Spoke, you’d have gone down that road? Because I don’t believe it.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t know. I just don’t. Somehow you always have a reason why you can’t ultimately do the thing that would make you happy.”
I scowled. “Right now I can’t think of a single fucking reason not to throw you out of my truck right here on the highway, and that would make me very happy.”
Xander exhaled. “Never mind. Sorry I brought it up.”
I was annoyed for the rest of the trip, giving short, dickish answers when Xander asked my opinion on anything at the lumber yard and barely nodding my approval at the gorgeous barn wood he chose for the bar, even though I was excited about working with it.
What he’d said had hit a nerve.
Of course I wanted to be happy. But you couldn’t just go around doing whatever you wanted without thinking about the fallout—at least I couldn’t. The one time I’d acted selfishly, carelessly, I’d gotten Sansa pregnant.
At the same time, I hated thinking about what it would be like not to have Veronica in my bed at night. See her naked. Touch her when I wanted to. I felt like a kid who’d just opened the best Christmas gift ever only to hear that he couldn’t keep it.
By the time we loaded the lumber in my truck, my mood had soured to the point that Xander didn’t even bother talking to me on the drive back to the house. We unloaded the wood in silence, and he uttered a quick thanks before he left.
I closed the garage door and headed for the house, wondering if I had time for a run before dinner. I felt like I needed to work off some of this tension or else I was going to take it out on Veronica.
She could tell something was up the moment I walked into the kitchen, which smelled so good my stomach growled.
“Uh oh,” she said, wiping her hands on a dish towel. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” I ditched my work boots by the back door and tossed my keys on the counter.
“Are you hungry? Dinner is ready.”
“I was thinking about taking a run before dinner if I have time. Is that okay?”
“Sure.” She glanced behind her at a pot on the stove, and I felt guilty.
“You can eat without me if you want.”
“That’s okay, I’ll wait.” She looked at me again and bit her lip. “Do you want company on your run, or would you rather be alone?”
“I’ll run alone.” I headed out of the room, but only made it as far as the stairs before stopping. Fucking Xander’s voice was in my head again. Making me question things.
When I re-entered the kitchen, she was putting the lid back on the pot. “I changed my mind about company,” I told her. “Do you still want to run with me?”