Bundle 0f Lovel

by Erin Wright

  “Of course it is. Anything your mom puts her mind to, she gets it done. Now, I heard that you want to buy my car from me?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Kylie said, her hand still in Ruby’s. She didn’t seem to be uncomfortable at all with the close proximity to Adam’s mom, and for that, he was grateful. Kylie just seemed to get people. It was an underrated talent in Adam’s book.

  “Well, I’m glad to hear it. Adam will look it over and make sure it’s in good shape before you start driving it around. I don’t want you stuck on the side of the road from a flat tire or something. It’s a good car – it’s lasted me a long time but I don’t drive anymore, so there’s no use in it just sitting in the garage, rotting away.”

  “I appreciate it, ma’am,” Kylie said earnestly, squeezing her hand.

  His mom laughed. “You can call me Ruby; everyone does.”

  Adam broke in before his mom could start in on the story about where her name came from; if she started reminiscing, they’d be there all night. “Hey Mom, Kylie needs to go grocery shopping in Boise to get her settled into my old place, and I thought since she doesn’t have a working car yet, I’d take her over. I’m sure you’ve got a list of things you’d love for me to pick up?”

  His mom’s face lit up like a light bulb. “Oh, yes please!” she said with a delighted grin. “I haven’t wanted to bother you, what with you being so busy lately and all, but I’m running dangerously low on coffee and a few other things. The list is on the side of the fridge, if you want to go grab it.”

  He headed into the large country kitchen and pulled the top sheet off the notepad that was stuck to the side of the fridge. His eyes skimmed down the list, easily reading her shaky handwriting. His stomach sank as he looked at how long it was. She didn’t just need coffee; she needed just about everything that could be found in a grocery store. She hadn’t said a word to him about needing him to buy food, and he felt guilty that he hadn’t noticed on his own.

  What was the point of moving in with his mother if he wasn’t even going to do the simplest of things for her, like keep the fridge stocked?

  He was a godawful son, there was no two ways about it.

  He came back just as his mother was finishing up one of her favorite stories about him: The time he ate an entire raspberry pie out of the kitchen window and then had tried to blame it on a passing squirrel, not realizing that he had pie filling all down the front of his shirt while he was telling the tall tale.

  Kylie looked up from her kneeling position on the floor and laughed. “You were an awful child!” she teased him.

  Adam tried to laugh in return, but honestly, at that moment, he kinda felt like he was one even now. “I’m sorry I waited so long to go grocery shopping,” he told his mom.

  She shrugged her thin shoulders. “You’ve been plenty busy lately. We haven’t starved to death. Now you two go on and have some fun. I’ve got a wonderful cozy mystery to read. It’s set in a quilting shop, and I’m just sure I know who the murderer is!”

  Adam kissed her on the cheek, Kylie squeezed her hand, and then they headed out the front door. “You want to check out the car now or later?” Adam asked, closing the front door behind them.

  “Now would be great,” Kylie said with a big grin. “I just love your mom,” she continued. “She sure is lucky to have you here to take care of her.”

  Adam nodded, trying to hide his worries that out of all of the things he was accomplishing right now, taking care of his mom wasn’t even in the top ten on that list.

  His mom deserved more but Adam was damned if he could figure out how to get more hours out of a day.

  Chapter 18

  Kylie

  Kylie tried to keep her eyes from crossing as Adam began explaining the repairs and checks he was going to do on the car. There were alternators and mufflers and hot plugs involved, or maybe they were spark plugs, and black thingies everywhere.

  He finally stopped.

  “You don’t understand a word I’m saying to you, do you?” he said dryly.

  She grimaced. “Am I that transparent?” she asked with a small laugh.

  He raised an eyebrow.

  She decided to keep talking before he could actually answer her rhetorical question.

  “Honestly, what I know about cars is that when I put the key in the ignition and turn, it starts up. I’m many things, but mechanically inclined is not one of them. I can out-clean, out-organize, and out-cook almost anyone, but please don’t ask me to find my timing belt.”

  He opened up his mouth, and she was just sure he was going to tell her where the washer fluid was and she was already mentally groaning at how literal men were about everything, and then his mouth snapped closed. “You know what? You’re right. You don’t need to know this. As long as you keep sending my invoices for the clinic out on time, something I don’t think I’ve managed to do even once, I’ll be happy to change your oil and check your washer fluid for you. It’s more than a fair trade!”

  She let out a happy sigh of relief. “Good!” she said. “Now let’s go buy some groceries.”

  They headed back out of the old-fashioned garage, pulling the dangling cord to close the overhead door behind them, and then over to Adam’s truck. He helped her up into the passenger seat, and just his hand on hers sent tingles through her.

  Which was ridiculous, of course. Being helped into the truck wasn’t in the least bit sexy – she was sure he did exactly the same thing for his mom whenever she actually left the house – but she was starting to realize that Adam had this amazeballs ability to make anything sexy.

  Which really shouldn’t be legal but somehow, it was.

  “So, you like to cook?” Adam asked as they took some back roads to head out of town.

  “Yes, very much,” Kylie said happily, already excited about the upcoming shopping trip. It’d be a little weird to cook food only for herself; she was used to cooking for her roommate or Norman when he was in town—

  She stopped the line of thought right there. Any thought that included Norman wasn’t a good idea.

  “Anyway,” she said after an awkward pause where she attempted to gather her derailed thoughts, “I just like how cooking makes me feel. I can take all of these ingredients that are nothing special on their own, and can mix them up to make magic on the tongue. With just my hands and a few ingredients, I can feed people – their bellies and their souls. I love experimenting and watching people’s faces light up with pleasure when I’ve hit it out of the ballpark. Browsing through cookbooks is fun for inspiration, but I don’t tend to follow the recipes very closely. In my world, recipes are more along the lines of a suggestion rather than a step-by-step guide.”

  Adam let out a belly chuckle at that, and she asked him, “What? What’s so funny?”

  “I’m just thinking how nice it is that not everyone is good at the same thing,” he said with a shrug and a flash of gorgeous white teeth. “If everyone was like me, all of our vehicles would be in tiptop shape and every animal out there would be vaccinated, but there’d be nothing but peanut butter, jelly, and bread at the grocery store, because I don’t know how to cook anything more than that.”

  “Are you trying to tell me that the pinnacle of your cooking repertoire is PB&J?” she said with a disbelieving laugh. “Not even scrambled eggs or bacon make the list?”

  He shrugged. “I can make scrambled eggs and bacon, sure, but that requires time, and honestly, that’s not something I have a whole lot of.”

  She nodded thoughtfully. “I figured a small-town vet would be busy, but I don’t know if I’ve ever met someone as overbooked as you are, and I’m including my mother in that list. She’s busier than a centipede in a toe-counting contest, and somehow, your calendar is even more packed!”

  “Centipede in a toe…” Adam repeated, and then bust out laughing. “I need to remember that one.”

  She grinned impertinently at him. “And when you were hiring me, you didn’t even ask about all of the fun say
ings I know! You lucky soul, you, getting that extra feature without even needing to ask.” He let out another belly laugh at that. She grew more serious, and asked quietly, “Have you always been this busy, or is this just a lately sort of thing?”

  He tapped his chin as he drove, thinking. “It just sort of snuck up on me, I guess,” he said finally. “Years ago, I was married, and Wendy…God, she was so much help. We spent all day every day together at the clinic and we only came close to murdering each other a couple of times. Which I figure is pretty damn good, really.” He flashed Kylie another panty-melting grin. “But, after she died, I stupidly tried making it on my own at the clinic. Eventually, I realized that it wasn’t possible to be everywhere at once, and I hired on Ollie. Which, he does wonderful things with the animals in the back, but when it comes to people…well, I’m sure you’ve noticed that they’re not exactly his specialty.”

  Kylie laughed lightly at that, not wanting to admit that she’d absolutely noticed that – it just didn’t seem right to pile on Ollie that way. And anyway, her mind couldn’t get past his dead wife. How had she died? When did she die? How long had he been alone? Her heart hurt at the idea of someone as thoughtful and kind as Adam losing a spouse.

  Fate sure wasn’t kind some days.

  “My dad died just weeks before I was born; a farming accident,” he continued. “My mother never really moved on. Told me that she’d loved enough for one lifetime and she was happy with just me. She really liked Wendy and Chl–another girl I…well, another girl,” he stumbled out. Kylie’s mind was going a million miles an hour. This was the mysterious renter before her, she was just sure of it.

  “So after Wendy died and Mom’s health started going downhill, she asked me to move back in with her. She didn’t want to leave her house that she’d lived in her whole life – it’s literally the house she was born in – but she needed some help around the house. I agreed, but honestly, I’m not sure how much help I’ve ended up being. I get up early, I come home late, I’m always dragging ass…now she’s asking me for a CNA to come over and I feel guilty because I haven’t been there enough myself.

  “And because I have amazing timing,” he sent her a sarcastic grin, “I started the horse therapy camp in the last year, which is a shit ton of work, and then my tenant moved out and I had to take over those animals too, and…it just sorta stacked up. There are days where my eyes are crossing from trying to keep track of it all.”

  Kylie nodded. That made sense to her. It explained why he’d been able to stay in business for as long as he had, despite having very little office expertise or desire to keep up on the paperwork himself. It explained why he drank a pot of coffee a day. It explained why he was living with his mother to help her out and yet, seemed to be very rarely at home.

  She could see where his thoughtful and kind nature was in serious conflict with reality. He instinctively wanted to help the whole world, and hadn’t yet mastered the concept that he was just one person.

  He couldn’t do it all, no matter how many pots of coffee he drank.

  And here she was, just another burden on him. Sure, she was taking care of the animals at his old place (kinda) and she was taking care of the office work at the clinic (that, she was a lot more successful at, thank heavens), but she still needed things like rides to Boise to go grocery shopping, and for him to spend time fixing up a car for her.

  She vowed to herself to work her ever-lovin’ ass off for him over the coming months. No matter how hard it would get as her belly grew in size and maneuvering became an Olympic sport, she wouldn’t be yet another burden for him.

  Maybe she should start where she was always good at starting – in the kitchen. She could make easy-to-eat snacks and bring them with her to work. She doubted he was eating like he should be, so maybe some hearty muffins and some washed and sliced fruits and veggies would keep him going.

  She straightened up, feeling better already. Mom didn’t raise her to become a mooch, and Kylie wasn’t about to start now.

  * * *

  That evening, after Adam dropped her off with a promise to pick her up in the morning to take her to work, Kylie set about putting her groceries away. She’d only bought the absolute basics this trip; running off a partial paycheck like she was, she couldn’t afford to buy everything she’d wanted to, but she’d paid close attention to what had caught Adam’s eye as they’d wandered down the aisles of Winco together, so she could be sure to buy those items later. Just as soon as another paycheck or two came in.

  But once all of her groceries were put away, she began wandering around her house aimlessly. She was tired, and couldn’t seem to grasp and hold onto a thought for more than a few seconds.

  She came to a stop in front of the small pile of boxes in the corner of the living room, and stared down at them. She really should be putting this all away, but focusing seemed like a gargantuan task at the moment. It would require her to make decisions, and that…well, that just seemed impossible.

  Just as she was debating between a nap and a long, hot bath, she remembered.

  Oh, duh! I need to take care of the animals. This twice-daily routine was a damn lot to get used to.

  But after a mostly successful milking and egg collecting and animal gathering expedition to the barn, she found herself at loose ends again. Had she always had this much free time on her hands? She tried to remember what she’d spent most of her time doing back in Oregon, but could only come up with cooking and cleaning up after her roommate, and pining after Norman.

  Neither of which she was doing any longer, thank God.

  Norman…

  Without thinking about it; without making a conscious decision of whether to do it or not, she somehow found her phone in her hand and she was pulling up her Facebook app. She paused for a second, trying to convince herself to put the phone away, but even as she was telling herself that, her thumb tapped into the search bar.

  Well, okay, she’d just take a quick peek, nothing more. Just to see…

  When they’d first started dating, she’d asked him if he was on Facebook, thinking that she’d friend him and start tagging him in the selfies that they took together. He’d haughtily told her that he didn’t see any point in joining a social media site like that; after all, it was such a childish activity. She’d felt stupid for asking him; for being such a baby compared to him, but now…

  She had to know.

  She typed his name into the search bar at the top and began scrolling through the results. Just a half-dozen or so down the list and there was his smiling, confident face. He was snuggled up against his wife, taking a selfie as they laughed together.

  Kylie’s eyes burned with unshed tears even as her finger tapped on his profile. It was all there – his beautiful wife, his two adorable kids, even his damn dog. He was living the American dream…without her. Thankfully, of course – she didn’t want anything to do with him now – but still, the ache of what she thought she had with him versus the reality of the situation washed over her.

  She’d been his mistress, the other woman, and had been inadvertently breaking up this happy family.

  Well, not so happy, as it turned out. She wondered wildly if the wife knew; if she knew what Norman did on his sales trips through Bend, Oregon. Hell, he covered all of the Pacific Northwest as a salesman; he probably had a half-dozen Kylies scattered between here and the Redwood Forest.

  How many of them had he gotten pregnant? How many of them had he thrown money at and told them to “take care of the problem”? How many of them had he made feel like a child because he sneered at them for wanting to friend him on Facebook?

  How many other Kylies were there?

  Kylie sank down the living room wall, the cool hardwood floor under her ass offering no cushion, no comfort. She was alone in the world, just her and this unplanned baby, and a mom who didn’t want Kylie living with her, and a boss who saw her as someone to keep animals fed and invoices filed…and nothing more.

  S
he had no friends and no prospects. The person who she’d believed was her forever love was actually a cheater, a liar, and an asshole.

  Kylie curled up on the hardwood floor and cried like a baby.

  Maybe Norman was right about one thing – nothing good came from Facebook.

  Chapter 19

  Adam

  Adam came strolling up to the front door of his rental early Monday morning, a happy grin on his face. After spending most of the day with Kylie yesterday, he’d gone back home and had been able to get the barn cleaned out, and had even started in on her car.

  It wasn’t nearly enough, of course, but with a to-do list a mile long, it was never enough. Even though he hadn’t completed 1/100th of the must-do’s on his list, after his mom’s huge smile and hug when he’d unloaded all of the groceries, he’d still felt ten feet tall.

  And now, he had a whole week to look forward to, where he got to see and work with Kylie every day of it. He couldn’t squash the feeling that he’d been handed a gift; a rare and precious gift.

  He knocked politely on the front door; although he owned the house, he couldn’t just go barging in. She was his tenant, not his roommate. But when she opened the front door, she wasn’t smiling and happy like normal. Her eyes were red, her thick blonde hair was in the sloppiest ponytail he’d ever clapped eyes on, and she just looked…exhausted.

  His cheerful greeting died on his lips. “Are you okay?” he blurted out.

  She nodded and shrugged, shifting her purse higher on her shoulder, her lunch bag gripped tightly in her other hand. “I’m ready to go whenever you are,” she said mechanically.

  Adam was stunned. She must’ve used that phrase in conversations with him a half dozen times before, but this was the first time where she’d said it while looking like she was facing an executioner.