Total pages in book: 149
Estimated words: 145731 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 145731 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
This isn’t just sex.
It’s never been just sex.
And I have no idea what to do about that.
For now, on the way out, I leave the blanket in a bin marked laundry, then trudge across the snow, the far-off flames guiding us.
When we reach the fire pit, Hank gives me a chin-nod, and a warm smile. His wife does too.
“How was everything?” he asks.
Isla reaches for my hand and cuts in with, “Oh what fun it is to ride in a one-horse open sleigh.”
41
MY CALENDAR ISN’T AS FESTIVE AS ME
ROWAN
Mendacious.
It’s December twenty-first, and that’s the word of the day on my app? It means false, fabricated, fake.
Maybe the app is seeing into my soul, demanding I do a little searching on whether my feelings are fake at all. Those thoughts run through my head as I slip away from Isla’s love shack in the morning, after giving her a soft kiss on her forehead while she’s still asleep, then sending her a note that I needed to take off.
On the way to my car, I’m shaking my head as I check the app. Four days before Christmas and the word of the day ought to be something like…jocund. Mirthful. Vivacious. Some synonym for joyful.
As I reach for the door handle of my car, I freeze. Stare into my reflection in the glass on a chilly December morning.
Who the hell even am I?
I can’t believe I’m wishing an app would be more festive. I shake my head then yank open the door.
Must be this town. Must be overexposure to Christmas. The lights, the decor, the incessant music. That has to be it.
Or, as I slide behind the wheel, I turn over another possibility.
Maybe, just maybe, it’s the woman.
That thought chases me as I drive to my parents’ place.
Maybe it’s Isla’s love of the holiday that’s rubbing off on me?
Or maybe it’s that your heart is growing bigger.
That can’t be possible. Can it? Nah. My heart size is just fine. That organ has enough room for my family and my daughter and my teammates and my dog.
I arrive at the cabin my parents are renting on Wilder Blaine’s property—though they’re more like chalets the billionaire owns—and do my best to put these foreign thoughts far, far away.
I clear the steps two at a time, then rap on the door lightly a few minutes before Mia should be waking up. The sun has barely peeped its head above the horizon. But my mom is an early riser.
As I wait for her to answer the door, a kernel of guilt slithers through me. I’ve spent a couple of nights this week away from my kid and in Isla’s bed. But then, Mia loves my parents fiercely. And they love her just as much. It’s good that they’re helping me raise her. Takes a village and all.
Mom tugs open the door, arching an eyebrow. Wanda sure looks to be too, yapping at me demandingly, as if to say, “Where the hell have you been?”
Yeah, Mom’s been taking care of my dog as well. And she’s also been dressing her. Which means Wanda’s wearing a Metallica jacket.
But the trouble is Mom is wearing a cat-who-ate-the-canary look. She parks a hand on one hip, tapping her foot. “Well, isn’t this just like in high school when you liked a girl. Staying out all night and showing up first thing in the morning like I wouldn’t notice.”
I scoff as I toe off my boots in the foyer. “I didn’t do that,” I say, denying it.
I so did that.
She rolls her eyes. I swear Wanda rolls hers too. “You definitely did that when you liked a girl,” Mom says, then swats me with a kitchen towel.
As she shuts the door, her words echo in my mind. When you liked a girl.
Of course I like Isla. I know that. I’ve known that for over a year.
It’s more than that, dumbass.
Ignoring the annoying voice in my head, I join Mom in the kitchen as she waggles a carton of eggs. “Want a mushroom omelet?”
I smile. A little stupidly. “I made Isla one the other day. She loved it. Thanks for teaching me to cook.”
Mom sets down the carton with a smirk. “You really like her, Rowan Bishop.”
Our romance is fabricated, I want to say. It’s false. It’s pretend. It’s fake. But those words don’t come out of my mouth.
Instead, a pretty soprano voice carries down the hall. “He likes her so much, Grams.”
I fight off another smile. But it’s a struggle because my kid is right. When she hops on a stool next to me, I give her a hug.
“So, so, so, so much,” Mia adds, looking like a satisfied cat.
Mom stares at me with a look that says I was right. She is, but she’s also not.
Because I’m wondering what the word is for more than like.