Total pages in book: 118
Estimated words: 113270 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 566(@200wpm)___ 453(@250wpm)___ 378(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 113270 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 566(@200wpm)___ 453(@250wpm)___ 378(@300wpm)
Tad: How about you just worry about feeling better. Take a nap. Rest up. Tom and Betsy will be good, but you let me know if you need anything.
I stare at the message for a second too long, warmth spreading through me despite the dull throb behind my eyes. That man. The same man who not so long ago vanished for a full twenty-four hours and made my stomach twist with worry is checking on me to make sure I’m feeling okay.
Whatever that dark day was for Tad, I guess it’s behind us. For now, anyway. We’ve spent the past five days falling back into the companionship that always seems to come so easy.
I know we started out as hot sex and a casual fling, but now I don’t really know what to call it. I don’t know what to call us. But then again, I don’t even know what in the hell I’m doing with my life, so uncertainty is pretty much at the foundation of everything.
I still have questions—a million of them, actually—about Tad’s past, about what made him disappear for twenty-four hours, about whatever he feels is so dark he doesn’t want it in my head.
Maybe a lot of women would be demanding answers. Maybe I should be demanding answers. But I know what it feels like to be pushed before you’re ready, and I refuse to do that to him. He’ll talk when he wants to. Until then, I’m content with the way he shows up for me. I’m content with whatever this is between us.
And really, who doesn’t carry some darkness these days? At least Tad’s comes wrapped in kindness and quiet strength. He’s never been anything but a gentleman to me.
Well, except when we’re in bed.
But clearly, that’s an exception. A very hot, very manly, very much makes me melt faster than butter in a cast-iron pan exception.
I set my phone down beside me on the bed, glancing at the half-knit blanket in my lap. My latest attempt at domesticity. It’s soft and crooked and, like everything else in my life right now, unfinished.
Crosby still wears the yellow scarf I made, and Tad laughs every time he sees it.
But this new project is for Tom and Betsy. The twins are growing like weeds but still sleep curled together in the barn beside Mabel. Tad told me they don’t need the blanket, that sheep are supposed to be able to tolerate the cold, but I’m a you-can-never-have-enough-blankets kind of gal.
My phone buzzes again, and I see another email notification from headhunter David Smith pop up on the locked screen. I still haven’t responded to any of his messages. Haven’t even attempted to set up times to chat with all the museums and galleries he says want me. I’ve tried—trust me, I’ve tried—but every time I’ve started an email draft to him, I…close right back out of it.
It just…doesn’t feel right. And I can’t decide if it’s because that world simply doesn’t feel like me anymore or if I’m pushing it all away because I’m scared.
Or maybe it’s because Red Bridge isn’t feeling like a detour anymore, but a place you’re putting down roots you didn’t even know you had.
I don’t know what I want yet. I just know that I’m not running toward anything—or away from it.
I’m just here. In Red Bridge.
I let out a long exhale and focus back on my knitting. I’m halfway through another crooked row when raised voices break the quiet.
“What the fuck!”
Sharp, escalating, very male voices break the sound barrier of my bedroom wall, jarring my attention away from the blanket and drawing a knot in my brows instead.
My heart thuds, a sudden sense of panic building as I try to make sense of the argument between Bennett and some unknown foe. My ears are perked, my attention set, but because the honest people of the early 1900s cared about quality construction, I can’t understand a damn thing.
It’s all just…muffled. Like the parents on Charlie Brown.
I don’t like not knowing who Bennett’s opponent is—not a surprise since the ambiguity of the unknown has always been one of my biggest fears—and with the way Red Bridge does small-town vibes, it truly could be anyone.
Norah isn’t home yet from getting her nails done—at least, I don’t think—and Autumn went down for a nap a little over an hour ago. As the only hen left in the house and fighting a migraine at that, I chose seclusion in a dark room.
But I would’ve never guessed a street fight would break out in the living room.
When I toss my needles to the side quickly, my knot comes undone and unfurls all the yarn I’ve been weaving for the last half hour, the tiny piece of blanket I’d conquered promptly no more.
“Shit.” Moisture stings my eyes with raging disappointment I don’t understand. I already know Tad is right and Tom and Betsy don’t really need a blanket to keep them warm at night, but I am emotionally distraught.