Total pages in book: 76
Estimated words: 73947 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 370(@200wpm)___ 296(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73947 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 370(@200wpm)___ 296(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
“I’m serious,” I say, even though I’m fighting a smile, too.
“I know,” Elena says. “Believe it or not, I know exactly how you feel.”
I lower my voice. “I don’t understand how I can want all of them, though. They’re so much the same, yet so different. I feel like something’s wrong with me.”
Elena’s smile disappears. “Oh, Wren, there’s nothing wrong with you.”
The certainty in her voice settles over me like a warm blanket.
Kira looks thoughtful as she strokes her child’s back. “There’s nothing wrong with wanting more than one person. Lying or hurting people is wrong, but wanting more than one person and being honest about it isn’t wrong.”
Elena leans in. “When I first realized I had feelings for Buck, Weston, and Calder, I thought I had to choose one of them, because that’s what I’d always understood relationships to be. But that wasn’t how things were happening with us.”
“What was happening?”
Her eyes get a faraway look. “They were all there for me in different ways. Buck made me feel safe and supported. Weston saw parts of me I tried to hide, and he didn’t make me feel weak for being exhausted. Calder understood my fears, and grounded me.” She pauses, a smile dancing on her lips. “I realized loving one of them didn’t lessen what I felt for the others.”
“The hardest part can be giving yourself permission to follow your heart,” Kira says.
That simple sentence seems to unlock something inside me, but I still have my doubts. “I don’t even know if they want that,” I say.
Kira arches a brow. “Well, Boone’s walked by the window at least four times since we started talking, so there’s that. As for the others, you probably know deep down, because women know these things, but if you’re not sure, you can ask them.”
“What if it changes everything?” I ask, speaking my first thought aloud.
“It will,” Elena says, “but not all change is loss.”
“Men like that don’t jump into things lightly,” Kira says. “Not when they’re brothers, or brothers-in-arms, as my men are. They’re aware of the costs of a misstep.”
Rhett’s face appears in my mind with its controlled, immovable lines. The responsibility he carries on his strong shoulders. “They’re careful,” I say.
“Careful can be good,” Kira says, “but it can also be an excuse.”
I take a sip of my freshly refilled coffee and realize I’m a grown woman with a voice, capable of asking for what I want. What if I don’t have to choose?
Kira suggests we have dessert, and in the spirit of not choosing, we each order a different kind of pie—blackberry for her, apple for Elena, and coconut cream for me—and we share.
A minute after I finish my last bite, Boone appears at our table, paper bag in hand, usual easy grin on his face.
“Ladies,” he says. “Causing trouble?”
“Helping,” Elena says.
Kira smiles at him, then down at little Felicity. “Those are often confused.”
He focuses on me. “You ready?”
When I nod and start to say my goodbyes, Elena squeezes my wrist. “Come by the school sometime before you leave town. Or my house.”
“Everyone in town knows where everyone lives,” Kira says.
“That’s unsettling.”
“It is,” Elena says cheerfully. “But it’s settling, too.”
I get to my feet, feeling more unsettled and settled myself after the conversation I just had.
Boone slides the check out of my hand and insists on paying. “Ready to go to the store?” he asks.
“Maybe another day.” I’m still replaying the lunch conversation in my head, and there’s really nothing I need at the store.
Outside, Ed Winslow is sitting on the bench, which is firmly angled toward the corner. Mae is standing in front of him, studying the position.
“Well?” Ed asks her.
She tilts her head to the right, then the left. “It could be turned a little more.”
Ed closes his eyes, and Boone laughs under his breath.
As we walk toward the truck, he stays close enough that his arm brushes mine a few times, sending sparks through me each time.
“What’s in the bag?” I ask.
“My errand.”
“That doesn’t answer my question.”
“It contains errand-related items.”
“Boone.”
He opens the passenger door for me, then hands me the bag when I’m inside. There’s a tin of tea I mentioned liking two days ago when I found an old box of plain black tea in the cabin pantry. There’s also a pack of hair ties, the good kind that don’t snag.
He gets in behind the wheel and watches my reaction. “They had your tea.”
“And the hair ties?”
“You mentioned the ones you have are losing their elastic.”
I stare at him as it takes me a moment to even remember mentioning it. It was a completely offhand comment, not a conversation.
Boone’s smile is faint now, almost cautious.
All three of the men notice too much, but Boone notices things, then turns them into offerings he lays at my feet while acting like they don’t mean anything.