Total pages in book: 69
Estimated words: 69775 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 349(@200wpm)___ 279(@250wpm)___ 233(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 69775 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 349(@200wpm)___ 279(@250wpm)___ 233(@300wpm)
“My grandmother may be old, but she hears all the gossip there is to hear.”
I snorted. “Don’t I know that firsthand?”
He smiled, though it didn’t reach his eyes. “What if she hears that we’re engaged?”
“Oh.” I paused. “I guess I wasn’t really thinking about that all that clearly when I joked about it with your mother.” I winced. “I was just trying to make her angry.”
“Well, I’m sure you succeeded.”
He went quiet again, and since it was obvious he was thinking things through in his head, I let him be.
At least, until we got into his place and the door shut.
“What else?” I asked.
He stripped off his coat and tossed it over the back of his couch before turning to me. “I love you, Nettie.”
I licked my lips.
“And I know you love me, too.”
I didn’t bother to deny it. There would be no point. Even a random man we met on the side of the road could see that we were both gone for each other.
“That was never our problem, though,” I pointed out.
“I’d go kill her right now if it meant that I could have you for the rest of my life.”
I blinked.
“Shoot her right in the head, in the middle of her four-poster bed and silk sheets imported from Italy if I could say, at the end of the day, you would be mine.”
I stripped off my own jacket, suddenly hot.
“I want to give my grandmother the knowledge that you and I are back together before she dies,” he continued. “That’s one of her last wishes, you know. That we’d find our way back to each other.”
I did know.
Margery never stopped telling me that Boone was dying without me.
But…I was scared.
I didn’t want to feel the pain of loss like I had already once.
I didn’t want to ever feel that pain again.
And until his mother was out of the picture, I just couldn’t do it.
“Follow the plan,” I said quietly, studying him. “One day, when she’s gone, and in a way that won’t blow back on you…then we can be together. But until then…”
I left it hanging.
He nodded once.
“Good night, Boone.”
He swallowed. “Good night, Net.”
I walked up the stairs to the guest bedroom.
The only guestroom.
If I convinced Margery to move in here, I’d have to move in with Boone.
Or go to his office, but that was overstuffed and cluttered and didn’t have a bathroom anywhere close.
And with the amount I had to get up to pee in the middle of the night, I didn’t want to add any extra time to that if I didn’t have to.
There was also the room full of fishing equipment, but I could just see myself snagging my face on a hook in the middle of the night.
There were also two other bedrooms that shared a bathroom, but they were on complete opposite sides of the house and I didn’t think I could be that far away from Boone…
As I tried and failed to go to sleep in my own bed again, I considered his words.
What would be the harm in pretending for now?
Margery didn’t have much time left on this Earth.
Why not give her one of her dreams while I still could?
Though, that wasn’t why I slipped out of bed and tiptoed down to Boone’s room.
No, I went to him because there was no way in hell that I was sleeping in this house without him.
I could sneak in while he was dead asleep with him none the wiser.
At least, that was what I told myself.
I slipped into Boone’s room and then into his bed.
I pulled back the covers and slipped inside, curling up to his broad back.
And never once did I question how he scooted over to give me more room.
Or how, three hours later when I got up to use the bathroom, he shifted the covers off of me to help me get up. Or when he pulled me back in tight, how he didn’t seem all that surprised to find me in his bed.
Twelve
You complete mess.
—Boone to Nettie
Nettie
It’d been three weeks of crawling into his bed every night after he was asleep that our first doctor’s appointment came up.
“What did you tell the staff why you weren’t there today?” I wondered.
“Doctor’s appointment,” he answered stiffly, his eyes roaming around the office space like something was about to jump out and murder him if he didn’t keep his eyes moving.
I crossed my arms over my chest and wiggled lower in the seat next to him.
The last time I was in this office, it was when I was being told that I was no longer pregnant.
This office gave me hives, but literally it was the only one I was willing to go to.
“Antoinette Wheeler?”
I stood up and latched hard onto Boone’s hand like it was a lifeline, yanking it out of the pocket he’d just shoved it in to do so.