“I’m outta here,” Nash called, hurtling past her. “Get your thinking cap on tonight, Kenzie-meister. We’re counting on you.”
“Uh, same goes for you.”
“I’ve got a hot date.”
“Are you saying you can’t do two things at – never mind.” She cut herself off. What was the point? Nash prided himself on being bad at multi-tasking. It was a badge of honor for him that if you called him while he was buying coffees, he’d end up getting you the wrong one.
“And what makes you think I haven’t got a date tonight?” she muttered at his retreating back. On her way out, she stopped to put her head around the door of the giant greenhouse where Jackson was busy with the hydroponics.
“Night! Have a good one,” she called.
“Night, Kenzie!” he called back, returning immediately to his work. She had no clue how long he worked in the evenings, but she suspected he was often in there until late. He was single – as far as she knew – and she sometimes wondered whether the long hours he put in were a result of too much work, or loneliness.
She knew what loneliness was like. Back where she came from, guys didn’t like curvy girls like her. Sure, they’d hook up with her, for a one-nighter. But they always wanted to date the skinny girls, the cheerleaders. The only guy who’d wanted to be with her so far was her cousin, Art, and that was only so he could get his hands on her family business and inheritance. And that was why she’d come to Hope Valley. She’d jilted the arrogant asshole at the church, and fled from the town with nothing but the wedding dress on her back and a small suitcase she’d packed for her honeymoon. Then she’d driven blindly through one small farming town after another, until Hope Valley popped up on the map. It had a pretty name that sounded kind of familiar, and God knew she could do with a little hope, she’d thought.
It turned out to be a very charming town, and the people were warm and welcoming, but things were hard at first. She’d spent the first month living in a motel, getting later and later on her bill, until she got the job at Jackson’s. Then she’d found a small apartment on the outskirts of town, and started to put her life back together. But it wasn’t easy. Her cousin kept sending her threatening texts and voicemails, saying he was going to find her and drag her fat ass all the way back to Fairfield County. She didn’t think he’d have an easy time finding her. She was very cautious about what information she shared online, and she’d even taken the step of formally changing her last name. She’d been very glad to do it, to shuck off the old family name she shared with her cousin, and it helped her feel like she was starting again. But there was still that fear that he’d turn up on her doorstep and force her to go back home with him. And that fear increased her sense of solitude. She didn’t have any friends in Hope Valley yet, and spent her evenings alone, so finishing work for the day was never that exciting.
But tonight, she had a reason to rush home. She strode over to her old Honda sedan and roared off, as fast as the speed limit allowed.
2
Half an hour later, Kenzie burst through the door of her one-room apartment, dumped her coat and boots, then went straight to the fridge and investigated the contents, before her gaze fell on a plate of wings. She took them out, put on a pot of coffee, and collapsed onto an old, tattered couch, reaching for her laptop at the same time. As she opened her browser, and the inviting interface of Hope Valley Friends filled the screen, her stomach began to tingle. She clicked on ‘Writers and Readers Unite’, and held her breath as she scanned the list of users who were currently online. MisunderstoodGuy. He’s here. She gave a little whoop. As her fingers hovered over the keys, a private chat window popped up. She tapped “accept” and the tingling in her stomach got a lot stronger.
MisunderstoodGuy: Hey there, how was your day?
Kenzie broke into a grin, flexed her fingers and began to type.
AdventureGirl: Hey yourself :) It was a little stressful. There were some issues at work. But hopefully nothing that can’t be resolved. Just glad to be at home relaxing.
MisunderstoodGuy: I’m sorry to hear that, but I’m sure you’ll be good at finding a solution. Can I ask you something, AdventureGirl?
AdventureGirl: Sure.
MisunderstoodGuy: You know, I look forward to talking to you as I’m driving home from work every day. But this evening, I started to wonder if I’m being selfish. If I’ve trapped you in this habit, and you’d be doing something a lot more constructive if it wasn’t for me?
Kenzie’s heart gave a little jump.
AdventureGirl: No, not at all! I feel the same. I love that we have this routine every day. To be honest, if I didn’t open my laptop to speak to you, I might not open it at all some days, and I’m only starting to work through some of the things that I’ve been putting off doing for a long time.
See – you’re actually motivating me!!
MisunderstoodGuy: Are you sure?
AdventureGirl: Absolutely!
MisunderstoodGuy: Whew, that’s a relief. I was prepared for this to be the last of our nightly chats. I would’ve missed you, AdventureGirl.
Kenzie grinned at the screen. He was so kind and considerate. Nothing like the guys back home. As hard as she’d tried to keep her thoughts platonic, and remind herself that he could be anyone, at all, she couldn’t help daydreaming about him, wondering what he looked like.
MisunderstoodGuy: Have I ever told you that you inspire me?
AdventureGirl: You’d better not be turning me into one of your characters in your screenplay!
MisunderstoodGuy: Ha! No. I’m thinking of basing my next heroine on one of my workmates actually.
AdventureGirl: What’s she like?
MisunderstoodGuy: Well, the character is supposed to be virginal and self-possessed. One of those people who don’t need anybody else.
AdventureGirl: And that’s your workmate?
MisunderstoodGuy: That’s her to a tee. I mean, she’s not a bad person, but she’s kind of uptight. We clash a lot actually.
AdventureGirl: I can’t imagine you fighting with anyone. You seem so chilled.
MisunderstoodGuy: (embarrassed face) A guy’s gotta have a work persona ;) Seriously, I think we just push each other’s buttons. Anyway, we’re not supposed to be talking about our real lives. Are you making any headway with that problem you mentioned?
Kenzie bit down on her lower lip. That “problem” was her cousin, and figuring out how she could prevent him from finding her and dragging her back to Fairfield to be his wife. She spent hours stalking him online, trying to figure out how he was reacting to her disappearance.
AdventureGirl: Not exactly. I mean I keep thinking the same things over and over, and not coming up with a solution. It drives me a little crazy sometimes.
MisunderstoodGuy: I feel like sometimes you just need a change of scene to give you a fresh perspective. I often go run in the woods if I’m stuck with something. But then I start enjoying running so much that I forget to think about my writing, and I get back two hours later and I’m no further along with my problem. (Flaky guy).
AdventureGirl: How’s the new screenplay going?
MisunderstoodGuy: I started a draft, then scrapped it. I think it was too close to home, to be honest. Sometimes, writing about things that have actually happened scares me. I feel like I’m giving too much of myself. I mean, if I put my true feelings out there, then I have no personal barriers left. You know? Or does that make no sense at all?
AdventureGirl: No, that makes sense. I guess you have to find a balance that works for you, between writing as honestly as possible, but fictionalizing it enough that it doesn’t feel like you’re pouring your heart out.
MisunderstoodGuy: Wise as ever, AdventureGirl. Thank you for your intelligent advice.
AdventureGirl: No problem. Now, if I could only find the solution I’m looking for!
MisunderstoodGuy: Are you a math genius and you’re trying to discover a new theorem?
AdventureGirl: Nope!
MisunderstoodGuy: Are you deciding what to wear to your best friend’s wedding?
AdventureGirl: Math genius to clothing catastrophe…. lolol. And, one guess per day. We agreed!
MisunderstoodGuy: I know. You’ve just got me curious, that’s all.
AdventureGirl: You know what they say about curiosity…
MisunderstoodGuy: I just noticed something – we’ve been talking online for 3 months today.
AdventureGirl: Wow. Ever since we both happened to be looking for an apartment at the same time, and I emailed you a real stupid question. The time’s gone fast.
MisunderstoodGuy: It has. But no, in another way, I feel like we’ve been talking to each other forever. Without knowing a single concrete thing about each other :p
P.S. It wasn’t a stupid question.
AdventureGirl: (Dramatic sigh) I guess we’d better stop talking and start working.
MisunderstoodGuy: I love your stage directions. They really help me to imagine you.
AdventureGirl: Oh, really? You’ve been imagining what I look like?
MisunderstoodGuy: Of course. It’s like when you read a novel. You imagine what the characters look like, even if the author does a crappy job of describing them.
AdventureGirl: What do you think I look like?
MisunderstoodGuy: Well (embarrassed pause). I guess I don’t imagine your face exactly – I mean, neither of us knows how old the other is for one thing – more a sense of you, like the way you’re sitting. I think of you curled up on a sofa, a cup of coffee beside you, in a nice cozy room. I imagine dark hair for some reason.
AdventureGirl: Haha. You’re wrong about the coffee. It’s currently getting cold in the kitchen.
MisunderstoodGuy: But right about everything else?
AdventureGirl: Maybe.
MisunderstoodGuy: Okay, I’ll quit bugging you. Goodnight, AdventureGirl. May you wake up tomorrow with all your problems solved.
AdventureGirl: Until tomorrow, MisunderstoodGuy. May you write like a demon.
Kenzie put her laptop down with a warmth in her tummy, and more than a tinge of regret. It was getting harder and harder to tear herself away from their conversations after the agreed 30 minutes. Today, she’d been very tempted to grab a glass of wine instead, and suggest they chat for a little longer. But she didn’t want to be selfish. He had his screenplay to write, and probably plenty of other commitments in life. And she needed to sort her own life out too. Recently, she’d gotten so eager to speak to MisunderstoodGuy every day that she’d stopped going to the store on the way home from work, and she wound up ordering delivery when they’d finished chatting, then eating the leftovers over several days.
She went into the kitchen to retrieve the coffee. It was now barely warm. She poured a cup, thought better of it, threw it away and brewed another pot. She had a feeling she’d need plenty of caffeine to get herself through the evening. So, MisunderstoodGuy has been wondering what I look like? Of course, she’d been doing the same. Not to the extent that she’d imagined every single feature, but in her mind, he was her ideal guy: tall, dark, broad-shouldered, with a ready smile. Late twenties or early thirties. We can’t ever meet, she thought. Either he’s going to be as old as my granddad, or he’s going to be super hot, and the look of disappointment on his face when he sees me is going to kill me. Maybe he’s even married. The whole time I’ve been imagining that he’s single like me, but maybe he shuts his laptop down and goes and plays with his kids, or helps his wife prepare their dinner. At the thought, her chest tightened with yearning. She wished she had a boyfriend so badly. Someone to go on dates with, to snuggle up with on those cold winter nights. To spend vacations with.
But she had that opportunity already, and she threw it away. By now she should have been married to her cousin, living with him in her family’s ancestral property. Probably even pregnant with his first child. Gross. The thought of being intimate with him sickened her, deep down in her soul. Luckily, the feeling seemed to be mutual, and the only time he’d tried to kiss her was at the engagement party, and it had been no more than a chaste peck on the lips. No, it wasn’t her body he was interested in. All that asshole cared about was getting his hands on her family’s land. And he’d stop at nothing to achieve it. She wished she been stronger, wished she refused him before it got to the point where she was about to walk down the aisle. But at least she’d managed it in the end. Although, the price she had to pay was having to look over her shoulder the whole time, wondering when he was going to come after her. Of course he was – it was a “when”, not an “if”. A man who would willingly marry a woman without love or desire – just for money – wasn’t a man who’d allow her to get away from him.
She put a fresh cup of coffee down on the coffee table, and typed her cousin’s name into her Internet browser, as she’d done a hundred times before. The problem was that she had no idea what she was looking for. There were a lot of entries for his name in their town’s local newspaper, where he was being commended for various things – donating to this charity, helping out that business. But it was all lies. She seemed to be the only one who knew the truth about her cousin: that he never did a single thing unless it benefited himself. She looked at the latest entry, where he was being praised for speaking at the town hall meeting, and saw that it was dated two days earlier. That’s a good sign, she told herself. It means that he’s still in town. He’s not running around the country, looking for me. But then another thought crossed her mind: Art never does his own dirty work. Why would he? He’ll just pay somebody else to do it for him.
“I’m so goddamn naïve,” she muttered, as a chill ran all the way through her. His cronies could be everywhere, watching her, and she’d never know. She clicked on the X at the top of the browser window and closed it down. That kind of thinking can drive a person crazy. But thinking these thoughts all by herself, and not having a single person to share her problems with was killing her. She needed to get somebody else’s advice. An impartial observer, whose mind wasn’t clouded by the panic she was constantly in. It was funny – earlier, she’d been on the point of telling MisunderstoodGuy about her situation. Even though she knew nothing about him, she sensed that she could trust him. Maybe I could tell him about my situation without giving any of the specifics?
She imagined him giving her some wise advice. But more than advice, she needed protection. Someone to look out for her and make sure her cousin never tried to take what was hers again. She imagined her version of MisunderstoodGuy putting his arms around her and keeping her safe, and a tear came to her eye.
She wiped it away angrily. Enough. I have to stop mooning over this guy.
Why don’t I try to do something constructive instead – like figure out how I can help Jackson, so he doesn’t end up losing his business, and I don’t end up out of a job?
What Jackson really needs is marketing for the garden center. For years, he’s relied on word-of-mouth and the company’s reputation, but he needs to adapt to the twenty-first century, to avoid being swallowed up by the big corporations. She used to work in marketing. And she was pretty good at it, she reminded herself. She didn’t have a college degree, but she’d managed to get promoted through the ranks of her previous company faster than any of her peers.
She took a pen and a paper and started to write down some ideas.
The town she’d passed earlier today popped into her mind. What was it – Hunters Gap? If there was ever a town that needed to make use of the garden center, that was it. There were no plants or shrubs in front of any of the houses. No window boxes or lawns. What if we started advertising there – encouraging people to make their homes a little more cheerful? Maybe it could catch on across the whole town? She felt a flicker of excitement, as she always did when she got a good idea. I’ll mention it to Jackson tomorrow morning – no, maybe I should run it by Nash first, since he’s known Jackson a lot longer than I have.
“And let’s see how that goes,” she muttered
, rolling her eyes at the thought of having a sensible conversation with her irritating colleague.
3
Nash laced his hands behind his head and stared at his computer screen blankly. He always felt a tug when AdventureGirl ended their conversations. He had no idea who she was, but he was beginning to feel a weird connection to her. She seemed to understand him like no one else, and he had the sense that he could share anything with her. She was the only person that he didn’t have to put a mask on for. As soon as her name popped up on the forum, his wolf’s ears pricked up. And recently, it wasn’t the only thing pricking up. He tried to remind himself that she could be anyone – she could be married with kids; she could be as old as his grandma – but in his mind, she was dark-haired and stunning, with ripe, luscious curves. And she’d be happy to accept a half-breed wolf shifter as her mate. As he read her words day after day, laughing at her jokes, sympathizing with the problems that she hinted at but never described in detail, he imagined her voice – strong but feminine; wondered if she had sweet, round cheeks, and a full cleavage that bounced when she laughed. She seemed so independent, but something about her brought out his protective urge and he imagined himself taking care of her.
He began to scroll aimlessly through the forum. But the truth was that, even if she turned out to be exactly as he imagined, he’d already blown it with her by lying about himself. He wasn’t really writing a screenplay. There was no heroine, based on his hot but uptight colleague. Sure, he had a plan for movie. He wanted to tell the story of his upbringing, reimagining himself as the hero, instead of the one who’d been rejected by his people for not being pure enough. But he wasn’t a writer and that was never going to happen. He didn’t even know why he told AdventureGirl that he was a writer during their first ever conversation. It had just seemed kind of cool at the time, and he never imagined that their conversations would continue day after day in the way that they had.
Shiftr: Swipe Left For Love (Nash) BBW Wolf Shifter Romance (Hope Valley BBW Dating App Romance Book 10) Page 2