by Cindi Madsen
Of course I wanted that, but honestly, I wanted it to be me doing the sitting and reading. I wanted to pretend for just a little while that this house was mine and I had a reading nook, and…and that I had a guy like Jackson who’d build one just for me. I bit my lip. “What about the budget?”
We’d pretty much blown through most of my savings, and I couldn’t justify expensing some of the upgrades because they were more for me anymore, even though I also hoped it’d make the house sell for a higher price.
Jackson skimmed his hands down my sides and rested them on my hips. “Well, I’ll give you an amazing deal on the labor, considering you’ll be doing part of it, and I already have all the supplies but the window. Which means a couple hundred, and since I got a deal on carpet for up here—as long as you agree on what I picked out, which you should, because like I said, it’s a good deal—it would still keep us within the budget.”
“What does the carpet look like? As I recall, we don’t have very similar tastes.” I glanced over my shoulder at him, and he flashed me a wide smile.
“Just let me build you a damn reading nook, woman.”
I was about to argue again that it wouldn’t be my reading nook, but then he nipped at my ear. “We can use it for other things besides reading.”
A shallow breath escaped my lips. “Sold, to the guy with the dirtiest mind.”
He laughed and then pulled out his trusty notepad and went to writing figures and numbers, and I found myself wishing yet again that I was different or he wasn’t set on a conventional family. Or that I could jump into the fog without being too afraid of getting hurt.
But I knew there was no guarantee, and my battered heart couldn’t risk any more heartbreaks.
See, I wished I could say I didn’t understand my mom’s desperation that infamous night, and how she could do something like take a bunch of pills in order to make it all go away, but I did. At my lowest, right after that relationship with Tyler ended and I found myself desperately alone, I’d had the thought that no one would miss me if I was gone.
Logically I knew it wasn’t true, but when I was depressed and spiraling, logic wasn’t involved.
It’d scared the crap out of me. And here I was approaching the point of no return with the guy currently using a tape measure to widen the window I used to stare out of as I dared to dream Mom would stop serial coupling, and we’d finally stay for good this time. Back when optimism was a luxury I could afford.
But with this renovation project and my mom getting ready to move, and my life in upheaval in general, I wasn’t sure I was strong enough to cut off our with-benefits arrangement early.
Just a little while longer. Then I promise I’ll let him go…
If I was lucky, we could part as friends, the way we hadn’t been able to the first time I cut things off.
But I wasn’t particularly lucky.
And I didn’t think it was possible for me to be friends with Jackson without accidentally wanting more.
Chapter Twenty-Four
I slowed my steps as I neared the lecture hall where my best friend was giving her 12 Steps to Mr. Right workshop. While I didn’t exactly subscribe to her system to find the Mr. Right—because I was all about Mr. Right Now—I admired how strongly she believed in it.
She had an inspirational quote to use for any and every situation, and while I’d heard a few of them more than once, I was always in awe of how many she had at her disposal. I liked to tease her about it sometimes, as did her fiancé, but like I said, I was proud. Maybe a little envious that she’d found her true calling, but my happiness for her far outweighed it.
Her passion bled into her voice as the click of her heels told me she was pacing the front of the room, doing her thing while a PowerPoint slide with inspirational thoughts and most likely bright colors flashed up front.
I snuck in as Step Eleven flashed onscreen.
Step Eleven: Don’t let your past heartbreaks get in the way of your future. Don’t hold potential guys responsible for the way you’ve been treated in the past—remember you’ve let that go. You believe a guy out there will restore your faith in love. When you find him, drop your walls, open your heart, and don’t be afraid to fully love.
I’d seen her steps before, but this one struck me harder than expected. What she didn’t understand was that my past heartbreaks left me broken, and hell yes, it’d changed the way I looked at my future. I didn’t think it was in the way, though. More like the building block to learning to be okay on my own.
Savannah gave me a subtle nod as she continued her lecture, and I slid into an empty chair—the only empty chair in the entire room. Her workshops sold out crazy fast and had become even more popular since the mayor married one of her former attendees. The announcement of Savannah’s engagement to Linc spurred even more women to sign up and learn how to find their very own Mr. Right. So much so that she now taught two sessions, one for this group who came in on Wednesday nights and another group who met on Fridays.
“I get it, no one likes getting their heart broken,” Savannah said. “Let’s be honest, it sucks. And it’s not easy to pick ourselves up again after someone hurts us, especially a guy who we thought we might spend our entire lives with…”
I couldn’t help thinking of Tyler. I rolled my eyes at my naive college self, who thought she was breaking the cycle, not realizing she was already in it. It hadn’t been his personality or even his looks or charm that’d drawn me to him. It was that he wanted me. And when it started to seem like he didn’t want me as much, I clung to him harder, desperate not to have to go back to being lonely. Like this poor, defenseless girl who just wanted to be loved, even if the love was toxic.
Then Linc came to visit me. We’d grown up together, one of my few touchstones besides Dixie. When he met Tyler, he immediately hated him, and Linc didn’t hate many people. And when Tyler treated me like shit in front of him, the way he’d started to do more often than not, Linc threatened him. Because he was an idiot, Tyler took a swing.
While I was sitting on the couch, icing his blackened eye, Tyler told me I wasn’t worth it. Then he’d added that gem about how I had too many issues, enough that’d he’d rather break up than stay together “just for the great sex,” making it clear that for him, that was all it’d been.
Stupid me, I was heartbroken. And I did the one thing I swore never to do: I acted exactly like my mom, as if her genetics were strong enough to overpower all common sense.
I don’t think I ever thanked Linc for standing up for me. Probably because I was too ashamed to admit to letting myself be treated that way.
I shook my head, returning to the present.
“Remember, a bitter woman says, ‘All men are the same.’” Savannah paused for emphasis. “A wise woman decides to stop choosing the same type of men.’”
Was I being paranoid, or did my bestie glance my way?
I liked my type. Hot and unavailable, just like me.
“Next week will be our last session,” Savannah said, “and we’ll top it off with one last field trip to Azure.” Doubling up on field trips meant alcohol sales were higher at Azure on Wednesday and Friday, which in turn made Tony less likely to kick Savannah out for scaring off his male customers who shared my same urge to flee from commitment. “This week, I want you to focus on the fact that you now believe there’s a guy out there who will restore your faith in love. Dropping your walls isn’t easy, but you can’t find the kind of love you want if you keep them up. Love is a risk, but it’s also worth it when you find the right person to open your heart to.”
Man, the girl almost made me believe in happily-ever-after. Or maybe that was just my recent desire to believe, thanks to a guy I knew was one of the good ones. Even if he did occasionally make me crazy.
I can only imagine how upset she’d be if she found out I’d ignored her wishes and started fooling around with Jackson, too selfish to stay out of the way like I’d said I would. The guilt I’d gotten a minor break
from drifted to the surface. Ensuring Savannah and I never ended up like my mom and Dixie was all the more reason to stick to my previous assertions that Jackson and I keep things light and temporary. And very secret.
Honestly, we should end it now, before Savannah somehow found out and the three of us ended up hurt and mad at each other. But my willpower was too weak with him under the same roof, looking sexy all the time and putting his hands on me and making me feel things I’d never felt before.
Physical things only. Liar.
Denial used to be so much easier. The close proximity wasn’t the only thing making it impossible to shut it down. Not when he showed up to help with kitten births in the middle of the night and pushed me to have serious conversations about my career, and not when he knew exactly what I needed to hear after dealing with my mom. We’d drifted into full-blown relationship territory, and the waters looked deceptively calm on the surface, but I knew the sharks were circling. One bad storm could rise up out of nowhere and brutally tear us apart.
Savannah talked about letting go of the way I’d been treated in the past, but it wasn’t that easy.
Sure, my breakup with Tyler left a scar and hurt more than my high school relationships, but the ones from every guy my mom dated were there, too. From Dixie and Rhett drifting out of my life. Once I’d told my mom not to worry, that if we teamed up, we could take on the world together.
When she reacted like she couldn’t imagine a worse fate, it taught me that I wasn’t enough for her, and maybe I wouldn’t be enough for anyone, but I’d made a goal to be enough for me.
I need to focus on my career. That’ll give me the fulfillment I’m missing.
Savannah dismissed her attendees, and once everyone had cleared out, I made my way up front to help her pack. “Oops,” she said. “I forgot to ask for the phone numbers of their smart, asshole exes. Did you want me to call them back in and get you some digits?”
I laughed. “I think I’m good for now.” Especially since I already had my hands full with a guy who often fit that description.
“Sorry I went a little long. You know me when I’m talking about this stuff.”
“I do,” I said. “You’re really good at your job. Have I ever told you that?”
“Usually I get more wrinkled noses over the monogamy talk.” Savannah narrowed her eyes on me. “Did you already start drinking?”
I gave her a light shove. “I was trying to be a supportive friend. Last time I ever do that.”
She grinned at me. “Sorry. Thank you. And you are a supportive friend. Have been since the very beginning, and let’s not forget how you talked sense into me when I was about to let Linc get away for good. You told me that when you’re in love, your head isn’t supposed to be straight.”
“And your head’s been quite crooked ever since.”
Savannah laughed, but I had the fleeting thought that my head hadn’t been straight for just over a month. Which was a ridiculous notion, one I was shutting down right now.
I shouldered the bag with her projector. Linc was out of town, so we were headed to her place for girls’ night in. Just her, me, a movie, and some spiked ice tea. “Let’s get this show on the road, because I suddenly feel the need to start drinking.”
“I’m so ready for some girl time. I just got this facemask that makes your skin feel amazing. Wait till you try it, you’re gonna love it.”
“Sounds perfect.”
“Oh, and we can talk about that guy you like that you’re sleeping with.”
Sounds like a disaster waiting to happen.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Talking became more and more difficult. Savannah nicknamed the goop she’d put on me the “paralysis face mask,” and it had tightened to the point we could hardly move our mouths, which made talking difficult and hilarious.
The Sweetest Thing, our go-to movie since college, was playing in the background. Which led Savannah to ask if I’d named the puppy, a line from the movie that basically boiled down to using a guy’s name instead of calling him anything but to keep him at a safer distance.
“It’s jus…temp-ary.” Seriously, talking without the full use of my cheek muscles made me feel even more ridiculous. “No point in namin’ him.”
Savannah leaned forward, and even though her face wouldn’t let her pull off a canary-eating grin, I could see that sentiment sparkling in her eyes. “But you have.”
“Was this yer plan all along?” I circled a hand in front of my face. “Render me incapable of movement and then interrogate me?”
“Of course,” Savannah said, then she laughed, and I laughed, and I could feel the mask cracking.
“Thish is the girliest thing I’ve ever done.”
“And you’re loving every minute of it. Admit it.”
I reached for my drink, which I now had to sip out of a straw. The sweet tea and Southern Comfort burned a little as it went down. Nice and strong, the way I liked it, and we were already on our second round. Or was it third? “Ish just what I needed. But what I’m more interested in talking about is my career. Only I can’t do it with this on my faaash.” Ventriloquism definitely wasn’t my strong suit—I was butchering words right and left.
Savannah looked at her phone. “It’s time to wash it off.” She paused the movie, and we squeezed into the bathroom of her loft to rinse off the mask and free our facial muscles.
I leaned closer to the mirror, checking out my skin and running a finger down my cheek. “It does feel amazing.”
“See? I told you.”
We finished the beautifying process off with moisturizer and then returned to the living room. Savannah lifted the remote, then suddenly dropped it and turned to me. “I want cookies.”
“Mmm, that sounds amazing.” In the best of times, Savannah and I were more of the order-food-in than cooking type, and I doubted being tipsy would make us better bakers, but now that she’d mentioned cookies, I couldn’t stop thinking about sugary, chocolate chip dough. “Now we have to make them.”
As we mixed ingredients together in her kitchen, Savannah asked me to update her on my thoughts about my career.
I told her about feeling like I was stuck in a rut. “I want something more. I’m really loving fixing up Dixie’s house. I just don’t think randomly begging people who have homes for sale to let me have at them is a career, unfortunately.”
“Let’s see. There’s interior design…”
“Pretty sure I’d need to go back to school for that one. Why’d I think I wanted a political science degree?”
“Because you could actually understand it, unlike most of the population?”
“Maybe. But now I’m thinking I should’ve gone into something more practical.”
“We are not practical girls.”
“True,” I said with a smile, then handed her the eggs when she gestured for them.
She cracked one and then frowned into the bowl. “Oh, shit. The egg kind of shattered.” We both went to look in at the same time and knocked heads.
I rubbed my forehead but couldn’t stop giggling. “I think we’re a wee bit drunk.”
Savannah held her fingers up, about an inch apart. “Little bit.” She chased out the shell shards and wiped them on a paper towel. She glanced at the recipe, pulling it closer, then holding it farther out. “I hate that cookies always call for softened butter, like you know when you’re going to be craving them and have butter out all soft and ready to go.”
“I’ll just pop it in the microwave.”
“What about like on Leap Year?”
“How do they microwave butter on Leap Year?”
Sputtered laughter shook Savannah’s shoulders. “I mean for your job. Amy Adams—whatever her name was in that movie—she stages houses to help real estate agents sell them faster.”
“Probably something I could look into. And I have a few spare pieces of furniture I could use.”
“Ooh, like your coffee table? Once Linc and I decide if we’re
going to live here in the loft for a while or buy a house, I want you to make me one.”
I nodded. “Consider it a wedding present.” I tapped a finger to my lips, thinking about the staging suggestion. “I don’t have enough pieces to do that on a wide scale. I’ve loved the construction stuff, but it’s not like I can do it without help, and I don’t have the experience to get a full-time job with a bunch of dudes who I’d have to ask for help from—that’s kind of my nightmare.”
“You are the worst at asking for help. That’s why I just had to send Jackson in.”
“I’m still not sure I forgive you for that,” I said, light enough she would realize it wasn’t true. I sighed. “I don’t know. Maybe I should look at other jobs in other fields.”
“No way. If this is what you want to do, we’ll find a way.”
I took the butter out of the microwave—it was more boiling liquid than softened, but how much difference could it make? I handed it to Savannah, and she dumped it into the bowl.
“Jackson would probably know more about which career fields you could branch out into. Have you talked to him about it?”
I paused and schooled my features, since a flutter had gone through my stomach at the mention of his name, then said, “Yeah, a little bit. He was pretty encouraging about me finding a job that I’m more passionate about, actually.”
“See. You guys can get along when you really put your minds to it.” She paused and raised her eyebrows—she’d told me before that she wished she could raise just one, but that her eyebrows liked to present a united front. “So, you guys are…getting along?”
“We’re managing. We might even be able to part as friends.” My heart tripped over its quickening beats, and I worried I was about to get busted, and then our girls’ night would take a bad turn.
Quick, change the subject. “Do you think you could do some research and make up some charts with possible career options?”
“Um, you know I love charts. And research.”