Total pages in book: 62
Estimated words: 78696 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 393(@200wpm)___ 315(@250wpm)___ 262(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78696 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 393(@200wpm)___ 315(@250wpm)___ 262(@300wpm)
If you were seen in the diner with someone, especially someone of the opposite sex when you were very single, everyone in the town would know it within thirty minutes.
It was one of the “perks” of living in a small town.
Didn’t he know what this would say to folks? Even if that’s not what it means, that’s what they’d think.
“You do realize that by going in there and sitting down at a table together, you’ll be sending a message, whether you mean to or not. You’ll be involving me in your life, something you said you didn’t want to happen just a few weeks ago,” I told him.
He stopped at the front door and turned to face me.
I studied his face. His eyes. The way his beard had appeared to have grown out.
He was so handsome.
Not clean-cut, movie-star handsome, but rugged, rough-around-the-edges handsome.
“I know exactly what it’ll say the moment we walk in there together. But the truth is that I’m tired of being away from you. Tired of fighting feelings that I’ve never had before,” he answered honestly. “Tired of staying away from you.”
My mouth went dry.
“You…what?”
He smiled. “You heard me.”
I blinked, but before I could get my wits about me, he opened the door of the diner and said, “Get in.”
I ‘got in.’
Fran, the only waitress to work the diner at this time of day, gaped at us.
“Two,” Griffin’s deep voice blasted through the quiet diner.
The rest of the patrons turned to look at us, and I blushed.
Jesus, you would think these people didn’t have anything else better to do!
Fran jumped to attention and smiled at the two of us.
“Take the one in the back,” she replied.
Griffin took my hand and led me to the back booth, sitting me with my back to the door so he could see it and whoever came in through it.
I sat and stared at him.
Waiting.
He didn’t disappoint.
“Why’d she write that article?” He asked. “I saw you both yesterday. What did you two fight about that pissed her off so much?”
“She said some cruel things to me about my Pap, and I couldn’t help myself from informing her that her boyfriend was cheating on her,” I answered tiredly.
He blinked.
I turned to look out the window.
He was sitting across from me at the busiest eatery in town, which happened to be directly on the banks of the lake.
Most people accessed it from the bayou side.
I never went on the lake.
Ever.
And although it was a quietly beautiful view, I didn’t find it calming like most everyone else did.
“Tell me about your Pap,” he rumbled softly, surprising me.
“He was my best friend. Confidant,” I said. “He used to live at home with my family. When I moved out, he decided to move closer to where I was going to college. He was in a retirement community about twenty minutes from my campus.”
“I was supposed to go out to lunch with my Pap. But when I got out of class, my stomach had started hurting, and I ended up throwing up for two hours straight once I got back to the dorm and completely forgot about everything but myself,” I said. “When I realized I missed the lunch date, I called him right away. But he’d already left because he was worried about me since I never missed any of our lunches. He pulled out onto the highway that led to the campus and was struck by a hit and run driver. He was killed instantly.”
Griffin’s eyes closed, and my head tilted as I studied him.
He looked torn.
Like he wanted to say something, but didn’t quite know how to say it.
“I’m sorry to hear about your Pap,” he said, finally opening his eyes.
I smiled sadly.
“It took me a long time to realize that it wasn’t actually my fault. I stayed in school. Finished my degree a year later…then moved home,” I explained.
Uncertain had always been home for me.
We’d lived about ten miles outside of town for the majority of my life.
“But I came home and I just couldn’t stay there. Reminders of my grandfather were everywhere. About a month after I moved back home, I couldn’t take it anymore, so I moved out. Got my duplex and have been there ever since,” I said softly.
“You two know what you want?” Fran asked.
I opened my mouth, but a rude voice interrupted what I was about to say.
“So, Lenore, I see that you’re the star of the newspaper,” Jenna said loudly from the corner of the room.
I’d seen her there when I walked in, I just didn’t think she’d be ballsy enough to bring it up with Griffin here.
Apparently she was.
Griffin stiffened at the mention of the newspaper article, then, slowly…oh so fucking slowly, got up.
He turned his massive body until he was standing directly in front of me, then addressed Jenna.
“I think,” he said softly, “that you should carefully consider what you say to her from now on. You wouldn’t want to upset your children’s godmother, now would you?”
I was fairly positive I hadn’t mentioned I was Remy’s children’s godmother.
But it didn’t surprise me that he knew.
He could’ve picked it up from almost anyone.
Everyone in Uncertain knew my business. Just like I knew Fran had liver cirrhosis because she drank from the time she got up to the time she went to bed.
And how Judge Kubrick, the local grocery store owner, cheated on his wife every Tuesday and Thursday while his wife was playing Bunco.
And also how Remy and Jenna were having marital problems.
He was working his ass off to keep her in the lifestyle that she wanted, which meant he wasn’t home like she wanted him to be.
She had gotten drunk at The Cloud, the only bar in town, and she had a habit of gabbing about all of her woes to anyone that would listen whenever she was drunk.
“You can’t threaten me,” Jenna smiled at him.
If she were my friend, I would’ve smacked some sense into her. Since I didn’t like her all that much, I didn’t.