Total pages in book: 54
Estimated words: 52975 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 265(@200wpm)___ 212(@250wpm)___ 177(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 52975 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 265(@200wpm)___ 212(@250wpm)___ 177(@300wpm)
She used to want me, but that was a long time ago. Now we’re both adults and she’s important to me, but only in a friendly way. That’s why I want her to dump Shitty Shane. He doesn’t get her.
Someday, years from now, some other man will see how bright, brilliant and funny she is. I’ll shake his hand and wish him well.
Probably. Thinking about it is only making me do a Clint Eastwood scowl because she’s still so young and I don’t want her to settle down anytime soon.
That has to be it.
A few hours later, my dog Bruce goes to the window, barking at Lainey’s old silver car. I’ve been watching for her from the front of my house, and when I walk out my front door, Bruce follows.
She’s only been to my house a couple times when she’s come with Eric to see my games, but I swear my dog recognizes her. She parks her car and gets out, giving Bruce her full attention.
He eats it up, his whole back end wagging. It’s a problem that I’m kind of feeling the same way.
Her shoulder-length red hair is up in a little ponytail and she’s wearing green-rimmed sunglasses.
She makes her simple gray V-neck T-shirt and cutoff jean shorts look good. Damn good.
The girl who always had at least one scraped-up knee every summer, if not two, is now a woman. She has been for a while, but I guess I only noticed recently that she’s not Little Lainey anymore.
I can’t let on that I find her sexy as hell. Not only would Eric flip his shit, she would, too. She used to have a thing for me and I shot her down.
She moved on. And I’m fine with that—as long as she’s not moving on with Shane.
Chapter Two
Lainey
* * *
I’m barely out of my old Camry when Bash’s dog, Bruce Wayne, comes out to greet me, drool flying from his mouth as he runs.
I bend, smiling at the huge gray Great Dane. “Hey, Brucey!”
He prances in a couple of excited circles, then shakes his butt as I rub his back and head. A gentle giant, he’s a hundred and sixty pounds of well-trained cuddle bug.
“Hey, you made it.”
My heart does a little leap when I see my brother’s longtime best friend walking down the wide stone stairs of his home’s front entrance. He’s not my crush anymore, but my nervous system didn’t get the memo. Bash is wearing gray shorts, a light-blue polo and—damn him—a backward baseball hat.
Adrenaline floods my bloodstream and my heart rate kicks up as he approaches, grinning lazily. I reason with myself. It’s not really butterflies in my stomach—it’s blood diverting from my digestive system toward my organs and muscles.
That backward baseball hat and grin still get me every time, even after all these years.
“Leave her alone, Bruce.”
* * *
His distinctive gruff baritone voice stimulates the butterflies to flap even harder. He used to deejay at the high school radio station, and I never missed a second of his airtime. I had it so bad for him, even at age twelve.
He’s six foot two and I’m five foot five, so when he hugs me, my face only reaches his shoulder. It’s kind of like hugging a brick wall, his broad chest and shoulders hard with muscle. But brick walls don’t smell like eucalyptus and rich, woody amber.
I pull back, overwhelmed by being so close to my childhood crush, smelling his cologne and feeling his pecs.
“Did you know amber comes from fossilized tree resin?” I blurt, trying to get my racing heart to calm. “It takes thousands of years for the scent to develop. That’s why perfume makers combine other scents to replicate amber.”
A corner of Bash’s mouth lifts in amusement. “No, I didn’t know that.”
I’ve always loved science, and Bash knows that. But I can’t have him thinking I just randomly spit out science factoids.
“Your cologne has notes of amber in it,” I explain. “That’s what made me think of that.”
“Amber, huh?”
I nod since talking isn’t going so well for me right now. Guilt stabs me in the gut because I’m only supposed to get butterflies for Shane, my fiancé.
A glance around the driveway of Bash’s house brings me back to reality. This is where I humiliated myself seven years ago. My adrenal medulla hits the brakes on the flow of epinephrine into my system. Finally.
“I better get my stuff inside.”
“I’ll bring your stuff in. Go grab a drink and sit down.”
That—that right there—is what makes it so hard for me to kill those butterflies Bash gives me. He’s a gentleman. Always holding doors and bringing me drinks. Even on that horrible day seven years ago, he did everything he could to try to make me feel better.
Not that any of it worked. I can still remember every giant landscaping boulder in his yard I wanted to crawl under that day and never return from.