Total pages in book: 162
Estimated words: 153946 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 770(@200wpm)___ 616(@250wpm)___ 513(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 153946 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 770(@200wpm)___ 616(@250wpm)___ 513(@300wpm)
I’d also learned you couldn’t have a conversation with a woman wearing sound-muffling headphones to write while you hammered away on her stairs. Though she had ordered another pizza. I’d decided to consider that our third official date.
You haven’t actually taken her on one of those yet.
Because she didn’t want romance.
The biggest issue was time. As in, I needed more of it, and it was passing too quickly. Speaking of, I took out my phone to check it again. Where was she?
I should let her know Morgan might try to put a kibosh on the car situation. She’d practically said as much, and if you were dating someone, you gave them a heads-up if they might be walking into a potential intervention.
You just want to check on her. And you’re not really dating.
We were painting the living room together and I’d been making her come on a regular basis all week. As far as I was concerned, we were in a relationship. I was calling her.
I walked quickly along the fence line until I hit the driveway, where I nearly bumped into my sister.
“I thought you were inside,” I said dumbly. “I’ve got to make a call, but Phoebe’s potatoes are in the back—”
Bernie poked my chest with her finger, hard enough to shut me up and get me to focus on what she was wearing. That was her Get Me Some outfit. And lord, I wish I didn’t know that about my own sister. The black vest topped snug black jeans, showing off the three small birds in flight on her shoulder—her “Don’t Worry About A Thing” tattoo. She’d gotten that without telling me when she was sixteen. Right before she told me she was pregnant.
According to August, she’d done it on purpose. The tattoo, not the pregnancy.
“What’s with the poking?” I asked, rubbing the sore spot on my chest. “And why are you dressed like that?”
“I can wear what I want. And I have a late date with a frisky construction worker who wants me to move to Hawaii with him. See how I tell you things as soon as you ask?”
I grimaced. “Unlike you, I don’t need those kinds of details. Unless you’re taking him up on it. Are you moving to Hawaii?”
“Don’t be stupid.” She poked me again. “Your turn. Spill your guts.”
“About what?” I asked warily, glancing over at the house to make sure no one was listening.
She must have had the same thought, because she lowered her voice. “First you fix her car. Then you move into her apartment, save her from a falling tree and give her a job. Now you’re in the icehouse whenever she’s in the office or behind the bar, mooning like a lovesick old dog and making her blush. I know you’ve got a thing, Wade. Phoebe knows you’ve got a thing. Tell me I’m lying.”
I couldn’t do that, so I hedged. “I asked her to do paperwork for the same reason you offered her those shifts. Because you didn’t want to do them.”
She rolled her eyes. “Of course, that’s why I offered. I have my own business to run and no patience for drunken idiots with wandering hands. But I didn’t think she’d take it. Why would she accept a menial job that pays shit for tips? What?” She huffed in amusement when I didn’t answer. “Did the royalties stop pouring in from those books of hers or something?”
She studied my face. I was aiming for stone, but she knew me too well. Or maybe I didn’t have the poker face I thought I did.
“That’s it, isn’t it? It’s not a thing—she’s having money troubles and doesn’t want Morgan to know.” She nodded as if answering her own question, sounding disappointed. “That makes so much more sense.”
What the fuck was that supposed to mean? “Why would you say that?”
There was no small amount of pity in her expression. “Because you’re you. You see a problem and you Wade in to fix it. You’re big-brothering her, just like you do to the rest of us. And here I was hoping it was something juicier.”
“I’m not big-brothering her.”
She made a dismissive clicking sound with her tongue. “Please.”
I wished she didn’t know exactly how to push my buttons. “You want the truth? Fine. I’m not sure where it’s going, but there is a thing. It’s a mutual thing that we don’t want to share with the rest of the class yet. Happy now?”
She hadn’t blinked since I started talking. “Bernie?”
“This is so much information,” she whispered, almost maniacally. “Why would you give me this power over you?”
“I’m already regretting it,” I said ruefully. “Try to keep it to yourself, because I can’t convince her to take a chance on sticking around if everybody’s getting in her face or gossiping about us.”
She jumped on that slip. “Sticking around? Phoebe said her friend offered her a place to stay back in San Diego.” Oh great, Phoebe knew about that now? “She says August is thinking about it. She wouldn’t tell me any more than that.”