Total pages in book: 92
Estimated words: 85565 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 428(@200wpm)___ 342(@250wpm)___ 285(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 85565 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 428(@200wpm)___ 342(@250wpm)___ 285(@300wpm)
I heard him clap his hands. “Excellent! You’ll have to make the reservations, the hostess hates me. Pick me up at six. See you then, ’kay? Byeeeee!” And with that he hung up.
I felt my shoulders drop as I looked out at the family being photographed on the bluff. A young couple in the group was clearly in love, and I realized it must have been an engagement or wedding shoot of some kind. The parents and other adults all smiled and chatted, looking over at the couple with sweet affection, like the entire world was there for the taking now that the young couple was on the cusp of joining their lives together.
Fresh starts and lifelong companionship.
I wanted that. I’d always wanted that. Someone to spend my life with, sit next to on the roller coaster over the years. Someone whose hand I could cling to while the car swooped low and then shot back up. Someone I could comfort during the scary bits and shout excitedly during the adventurous ones.
My relationship with Richard had been such a desperate attempt at the white picket fence. Who in the world could ever see a free spirit like him being content with a steady life at home? The man rarely slowed down. We hadn’t been like peanut butter and jelly, but more like peanut butter and Gucci luggage. I could see clearly now that it hadn’t been fair of me to expect Richard to settle down.
I looked back in the direction of where Sawyer had driven off in his jeep. Finally, I’d met a man who wanted nothing more than family and stability—a white picket fence that had been the Gilleys’ for generations—and not only could I not have him, but I was here to rip it away from him.
Thankfully, the photographer broke me out of my sullen mood as he raced up to me with a now familiar frantic look on his face.
“Do you know where I can find a tiara, a conch shell, and an old wooden buoy?”
I stared at him for a beat. “Uh…” I thought of the bar where Sawyer worked, the Bee Tee Dub. “Actually, I think I do.”
16
Sawyer
I raced through my work at the pub, getting the new kegs set and tapped and prepping the dining area for dinner service. If Karlie noticed I was preoccupied, she thankfully didn’t say anything about it. Instead she merely smirked as I finished things up and started for the door. “Tell your lawyer friend I said hello!”
I shot her the bird over my shoulder as I left, and her cackling laughter followed me out to the parking lot where I passed the quirky photographer from the inn. “Hey, Brant,” I said with a wave.
His head jerked up. “Oh, hi. It’s Brantley, actually. Um, James sent me here to find a few props I need for the Lovejoys. He thought you might be able to help me?”
My stomach swooped at the mention of James. “Yeah, head on in. Karlie is working and I’m sure she can help you.”
The man’s face turned bright pink, and his eyelashes started flicking up and down rapidly. “Oh. Oh right. K-Karlie. Um, that’s… she’s your… girlfriend, right?”
I bit back a smile. “My cousin.”
“Not your, um, wife?”
The poor guy was worse at fishing than the most ignorant client my uncle Brian had ever taken on his deep-sea charters. “Nobody’s wife or girlfriend, I’m afraid. Single.” I narrowed my eyes at him. “But beloved and protected by tons of family. Tons. You feel me?”
His head nodded like a bobblehead. “Yes, uh, sir. I f-feel you? I mean I understand.” He hustled into the bar as I stifled a laugh and hopped in the jeep.
It was full dark by the time I returned to the Sea Sprite, and while normally the mostly empty parking lot would cause my gut to tighten with anxiety about our dwindling clientele, tonight it only meant more privacy for James and me.
Before I’d left, I’d casually mentioned to Ana Lucia that I might be doing some late-night construction on the room I was renovating, so she might not want to book any guests into that wing so they wouldn’t be disturbed by the noise. It was only half a lie—I was worried about the noise, just not from the construction.
I parked my car and started down the walk toward James’s room when a sliver of light through a cracked door caught my eye. I slowed my steps as I neared—it was the room I’d been renovating. Judging by the off-key singing, there was clearly someone there. Cautiously, I pressed my hand against the door and slowly eased it open wide enough to glance inside.
It was James. Holding a sledgehammer. Between his legs. Belting out the lyrics to Rihanna’s “Umbrella,” Tom Holland style. He wore plaid pajama bottoms and tennis shoes, but his chest was bare and glistening with sweat. He swung the hammer up over his head, using it as a prop as he writhed and danced. I watched, mesmerized as the muscles along his arms bunched and bulged. His back contracted with every swivel and gyration of his hips.