Total pages in book: 131
Estimated words: 131387 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 657(@200wpm)___ 526(@250wpm)___ 438(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 131387 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 657(@200wpm)___ 526(@250wpm)___ 438(@300wpm)
I never was going back to Orlando.
I’d told her that.
But hope springs, I guessed.
“…I feel less light and fluffy that I have to tell you that I heard it through the grapevine that Bryce has seen that video, and he’s on the warpath.”
My insides shriveled up.
Bryce was my ex.
“How has Bryce seen it?”
“Did you glance at the comments?” she asked.
I didn’t want to.
“No.”
“Welp, you and Mr. Basketball are a hit. They’re calling you the Patagonia Power Couple. That account has a lot of followers, but that many likes means that video’s gone viral.”
What?
Neither of us were wearing Patagonia.
But…
Oh God.
Tonks started barking.
Oh God!
Hutch was here.
I took my phone from my ear and covered it, ordering in the dog voice Hutch taught me to use, “Tonks! Quiet!”
She let out a soft roo-roo and dashed to the door.
I put my phone back to my ear, moving to the door myself. “Hutch is here to train Tonks.”
“Okay, I want a callback, but real quick, how Bryce saw it? Well, I saw it because Marcy saw it and told me about it. Which, as you’re aware with Marcy’s big mouth, means people we know saw it. And some of those people also know Bryce. Obviously, they showed it to him. Apparently, and this is all hearsay, but we know Bryce…”
We sure did.
“…and he’s lost his shit at the idea you’re with someone else.”
I’d unlocked the door.
But at what she said, I had to hold myself very still so my head didn’t explode.
“Can I spread the word you are with someone else, missing out the friends with benefits thing?” she asked into my stony silence. “Because I’m not sure Bryce looked real close at the video. If he did, he’d see the president of the board could wipe the floor with his bony ass. Babe, that one arm lift? Lawd.”
At this juncture, the door opened, Hutch walked in, took one look at me, and although Tonks was winding up to give him her usual throaty welcome, she didn’t when he barked, “What’s going on?”
“I have to go,” I whispered into the phone.
But Mona’s back was up. “Is he mad at you?”
“No, he’s mad for me. I’ll call you later.”
I thought I heard her mutter, “Friends with benefits my ass,” before I disconnected.
Hutch watched my hand with the phone drop and then his gaze zoomed right back to mine.
“Talk to me,” he demanded.
“It’s not the Waco whackos,” I said.
“That isn’t an answer to my question,” he said.
“Okay, can I…er, give you a little history first?”
“You can give me whatever you want if it explains that look on your face.”
There it was.
This friends with bennies was so working.
“Okay, before I moved to Misted Pines, I was engaged to somebody.”
His attention flew to the phone and back to me. “Is he calling you?”
“Maybe, but I have him blocked.”
He drew in a sharp breath and urged, “Go on.”
“It was…I mean, obviously, since we were engaged, I was in love with him.”
“Obviously,” he drawled.
“The thing is, he, that is…Bryce was already married. And he had two kids. But I didn’t know any of that at the time.”
I flinched just remembering that scene in the restaurant when Tara, Bryce’s wife, and her friends confronted him.
Us.
Then I flinched again at the memory of when she noticed the ring on my finger, and at first, thought I was engaged to someone else. But then, as I was in the midst of experiencing my own heartbreak, during which I shared I was engaged to Bryce, how she reacted to that.
And I flinched yet again, remembering three days after all that went down, when I sat with Tara, we had our convo, and she showed me pictures of her two little kids (one and three years old, and both adorable, by the way), sobbing and not understanding what went wrong (Bryce), how it went wrong (Bryce), and what she was going to do next (that had no answer at the time).
Hutch crossed his arms on his chest, and the days were getting cooler and cooler, so he was wearing a brown and black plaid insulated flannel shirt over an oatmeal thermal.
I could still see his pecs pop, such were the power of his pecs.
“Obviously, I broke up with him,” I went on. “And…well, there’s a lot of other history I have going on. We, as you know, kind of touched on some of it the other night.”
“All right,” he said.
“And I just…” I shrugged and threw my hands out to my sides to unleash added annoyance. “I just got done with it, Hutch. I did a lot of research about where to go and what to do. I hocked his ring. Sold everything I owned. I’d received an inheritance I didn’t want from some person in my past, more history, long story, but I didn’t really want to touch that money, though I did”—I took in a huge breath—“and I came to Misted Pines.”