Total pages in book: 123
Estimated words: 115468 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 577(@200wpm)___ 462(@250wpm)___ 385(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 115468 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 577(@200wpm)___ 462(@250wpm)___ 385(@300wpm)
“She’s in Manhattan a few years and suddenly we’re small-town hicks,” Blakely said.
I laughed and turned my head toward Blakely. “How are you?” I asked. “Set a wedding date yet?”
There was a short pause. “I broke it off.”
“Ah, shit. I’m sorry, Blakley.” I didn’t see her very often anymore since Lexi had moved, but when I did, she always seemed happy and Lexi hadn’t mentioned anything about the breakup. “Are you okay?”
She sighed. “Yeah. I’m fine. It actually happened a few months ago.” She played with a tendril of hair that had fallen from the twist she’d somehow secured at the top of her head. “We’d been engaged for six years, Gage. Six years! At first, it made sense because we were young and he was so invested in getting his career started. He was putting in crazy hours at the company and I thought it would be hard to focus on a challenging job and a new marriage too, you know?” She paused. “But then, it just seemed like the intensity of his job never lessened, not because he didn’t settle into it, but because he liked it that way. It fed something in him. And I was getting older and he was still asking me to wait another year. Always another year. Finally, I had to face that he just wasn’t interested in marrying me, not really, and I’d already wasted enough years sitting on his back burner.”
I let out a long breath. “It sounds like you were on different pages and it was time to put yourself first.” I was glad she had. If I knew anything about men, it was that if they were really in love with a woman, they’d move heaven and earth to keep her.
Blakely nodded but didn’t turn toward me. I studied her profile in the dim glow of the outdoor lights. She was so familiar to me even though I hadn’t seen her regularly for many years. She was like family, I supposed. I’d known her in every stage of life. I’d watched her grow from a kid to an awkward pre-teen into a beautiful woman.
She stood suddenly and reached her hand out. “Walk with me?”
I grasped it and stood too. I didn’t exactly feel like taking a walk, but I didn’t exactly feel like reclining either. That restlessness stirred. Maybe movement would help.
We went out the pool gate and walked across the flawless green grass for a few minutes, strolling slowly as the lights from the house grew dimmer and the moon picked up where they left off. When the gazebo came into sight, Blakely laughed softly. “Remember when we got married here?”
I chuckled. “I was ten and you were eight. You held my favorite action figure hostage until I agreed to play wedding with you.”
“I’m always trying to get men to marry me against their will, apparently.” She shot me a wry smile, but I saw the pain flash in her eyes.
My heart gave a knock. I bumped her shoulder with mine. “I knew where you’d hidden Iron Man. I could have retrieved him anytime and thwarted your evil plot.”
She gave a surprised laugh as we stepped up into the gazebo and she took a seat on the bench. I leaned against the open doorframe and moved a tendril of honeysuckle vine out of the way. Its sweet scent filled the air, bringing with it a cascade of memories. I’d played here and later posed for prom pictures with dates I could hardly remember now. I’d kissed a few girls on this bench and gotten to second base with another. “Why didn’t you then?” Blakely asked. “Rescue Iron Man and thwart my evil plan?”
I blinked, moving my mind away from the memory of that first thrill of soft breast under my palm back to Blakely and Lexi’s constant requests for me to participate in their make-believe scenarios. “Because I liked being the hero,” I said with a smile.
A smile played at Blakely’s mouth as she looked at me from under her lashes. I stilled, feeling suddenly confused. Were we…flirting? Where had this come from? Of course I cared for Blakely. And she was sweet and pretty. But…I’d always considered her another little sister.
She ran a finger over the edge of the bench. “Do you ever think about…what we promised at Kate and Tanner’s wedding?”
I cast my mind back. That had been…what? Seven years ago when I was twenty-six? And I’d had at least a few cocktails. But it came back to me. Blakely had just broken up with someone then too. It was right before she’d started dating her—now—ex-fiancé. I was single, but happily so. And yet, despite not quite being ready to settle down, I’d been aware that others—namely my parents—were hopeful that my plans would turn in that direction sooner rather than later.