Total pages in book: 123
Estimated words: 116708 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 584(@200wpm)___ 467(@250wpm)___ 389(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 116708 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 584(@200wpm)___ 467(@250wpm)___ 389(@300wpm)
I tossed the primer can into the dumpster. “If you’d have seen the mess we pulled out of there, you’d be asking me why I didn’t set it on fire and collect the insurance money.”
“It’s gone? All of it?”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “That depends. Who are you?”
His eyebrows drew together. “Huh?”
“Who are you tonight? The nice guy sitting on the porch, cracking jokes, or the one who slammed the door in my face?”
His lips thinned. “I guess that also depends. Is Cooter here?”
I couldn’t help the smile that stretched my mouth. “You call her Cooter? With a straight face?”
“I don’t call her anything, but that’s how she introduces herself every damn time she sees me. And let’s be real, the woman is a loon. Cooter might be the only name appropriate for her.”
“Touché,” I replied.
He scrubbed a hand over his bearded jaw. “But to answer your question, I don’t know who I am any night, Gwen. Especially recently.”
“Why recently?”
“You mean besides the obvious?” He gave me a pointed head-to-toe that I assumed was supposed to be teasing, but for reasons I refused to acknowledge, his scrutiny caused my face to heat.
Okay, that was a lie. My whole damn body heated.
Quickly turning away before he could see the color in my cheeks, I started toward door and waved for him follow. “Lucille isn’t here. But consider yourself warned, she is working for me now. I had a long talk with her the other day, so she knows to keep her mouth shut from here on out.”
“Appreciated,” he mumbled, his footsteps sounding behind me.
I stopped at the door and turned to meet his gaze again. “Look, if you can play nice, so can I. Deal?”
As soon as he nodded, I swung open the door and stepped aside to allow him a clear view inside.
His inhale was sharp as he froze in the doorway, beautiful disbelief etched on his face.
I’d been there every day for a week, so I was used to the changes already. I tried to imagine seeing it through his eyes. The space appeared smaller now that it was empty. The bare concrete floors and half-primed walls only added to the illusion of desolation, yet in the corner, a single booth stood as the lone beacon of familiarity.
“Gwen,” he rumbled, so much packed inside that single syllable it caused chills to pebble my skin. “You kept it?”
I popped one shoulder. “What kind of host would I be if I invited you here and then expected you to sit on the floor?”
He didn’t move for a long second, his dark gaze locked on the booth. As his breathing sped and the muscles at the base of his neck swelled, I couldn’t tell if he was relieved or terrified.
Nerves erupted in my stomach as I suddenly felt like I’d done something wrong. Shit, had I kept the wrong one?
“Truett,” I prompted.
“Thank you,” he choked out. “You have no idea what this means to me.”
Wasn’t that the damn truth.
Fortunately for him, compassion didn’t require understanding.
“You’re welcome.” I reached out and gave his forearm a lingering squeeze.
His palm covered mine so fast it was as if our hands had become magnetized. We were north and south, total opposites, connecting together in the most natural way possible.
I hated that it felt right.
I hated that I’d craved that connection for the majority of my life.
But most of all, I hated when he let me go—in the past and the present.
Slowly, as if he were afraid it was nothing more than a mirage, he walked over and trailed his fingertips across the tabletop. A gentle laugh escaped his throat, a sound both tender and bittersweet, as if he were welcoming home an old friend. The reunion felt so personal I debated if it was wrong to watch. However, as Truett slid into the booth with a profound reverence, I found myself unable to look away.
He drew in a shaky breath, his head lolling back as if he were absorbing a necessary nutrient he’d long been deprived of.
And then in the most confusing moment of my life, I was struck by a thought so rancid it burned my throat.
In that booth, Truett seemed at home.
A place he had once found with me.
Nope. Nope. Nope. I was not going there. I was doing a good deed, not driving a bulldozer into the past. I needed to remember that—for both of our sakes.
I shook my head in a frenzied effort to dislodge whatever insanity had caused garbage to spew all over my frontal lobe. “Is it going to bother you if I paint?”
His eyes popped open, and for a brief moment, he appeared disconcerted. “Where? In here?”
I pointed to the full paint tray a few steps away. “That was kinda the plan.”
His eyes shifted from side to side. “Oh. Yeah. That’s fine.”