Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 91461 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 457(@200wpm)___ 366(@250wpm)___ 305(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91461 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 457(@200wpm)___ 366(@250wpm)___ 305(@300wpm)
“I wanted to do something nice for you for my birthday.”
“That makes no sense,” I told him. “It’s your day, not mine. You should have gone and done the bourbon trail in Kentucky with all your buddies.”
He let his head fall back on his shoulders. “I don’t want to go and do something with my friends. Remember the horrible fishing trip on Lake Shelbyville where everyone whined about their ex-wives?”
“Wasn’t there a lack of showering as well?”
He ignored me. “And then last year we went to Mexico and I got shot with a spear gun?”
I choked on a laugh that I could not hold in.
“My birthdays away from you are not great.”
I leaned against him.
“I just wanted a nice, quiet, romantic birthday.”
“We should have stayed home and watched movies and gotten drunk and fooled around.”
“See? That sounds great.”
“Then?”
“My kids would show up.”
“You love your kids.”
“I do, you know I do, but sometimes I would also like to just do stuff alone with you now and then.”
“Or with your friends. All-grown-up time.”
“Yeah, I like that too,” he said with a sigh.
“So maybe we call Aja now and tell her to invite everyone over on Saturday, all your favorite people, for an impromptu birthday party. What do you say?”
“But what about all this?”
“All this can be cancelled,” I soothed him.
“It was a lot of money.”
“We drove, so there’s that, and the cost of the room we will live with if the nice people at the historic house say we have to.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Let’s see what you can do first.”
“Not me, you,” he insisted. “You're better with people.”
Fifteen minutes later, Sam stood there as I began talking to the manager.
“What?” he asked, sounding frantic but not in a bad way. That sounds strange, I know, but more as though he was happy to hear what I was telling him and at the same time a bit overwhelmed. “You’re telling me you don’t want to stay?”
“Yes,” I said as a woman charged up to the counter.
I mean, we were alone one moment, and the next she was there, staring at us. She came so fast, in fact, that Sam put a protective arm around me, because, from the expression on his face, she freaked him out just a bit.
“Do you want to cancel your reservation?”
“We do,” I said, smiling at her.
“My daughter is getting married this weekend,” she explained. “Everyone else was good, got their room, but me, her father and I got divorced and I moved from Green Bay to New York. It’s been great, and so has opening an art gallery, but I got busy and––”
“Forgot to make a reservation?”
“Yes,” she gasped.
“You did everything else for your daughter,” I surmised. “Got all the perfect things she wanted, and were here, hoping things would work out.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “My ex and his new wife were told they got the last room.”
“Not true,” Sam chimed in, and we all looked at the manager.
“Does the room need to be cleaned?” he asked me.
“No, sir,” I answered, and turned to the woman. “I swear, we just rolled luggage in there and then went to find a place to have lunch.”
She grabbed my hand like a lifeline. “You’re saving my life.”
Five minutes later we were back in the car, Shelby Reynolds was unpacking in her suite, and the world was good once more. I called and spoke to Aja, and she said she would take care of everything. I then called Hannah, told her she and Jake didn’t need to babysit, and she was happy we were coming home.
“I like spending Dad’s birthdays with him,” she cooed.
He agreed, rumbled happily, and then I called Aaron and thanked him for the gift of the black-tie whatever it was, and said we would reimburse him.
“No,” he sighed, distracted, “I’ll call and have them use it as a donation, which I was meaning to do anyway. It all works out.”
“We’re coming home so Sam can have his birthday with everyone he loves.”
“Love is laying it on a bit thick, but I expect you there,” Sam told Aaron.
“You do?”
“Of course I do,” Sam groused at him. “Stop thinking we’re not friends, that just you and Jory are. It’s not true.”
Aaron was quiet on his end.
“Hello?” Sam snapped. “Are you mad about the black-tie thing?”
“Of course not,” Aaron replied hoarsely.
“He’s just emotional over you saying that you two are friends.”
“Oh for crissakes,” Sam grumbled. “I’ve said it before. How can you be Aaron Sutter out there in the world and then worry about crap like this?”
“Because I don’t have a lot of true friends, Sam, so when you’re telling me that––”
“It’s what I’m telling you,” Sam said with a huff. “We’re not friends because of Jory or Duncan. Somewhere in the course of—Jesus—like, almost twenty years, you’ve grown on me.”
“I feel the same,” Aaron said stiffly.