Total pages in book: 21
Estimated words: 19689 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 98(@200wpm)___ 79(@250wpm)___ 66(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 19689 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 98(@200wpm)___ 79(@250wpm)___ 66(@300wpm)
I stifled a laugh as I watched Ava’s face turn a little green.
“Can you please excuse us?” she asked. “I need to… leave.” She bolted away, cupping her hand over her mouth, and Mal mumbled an apology and chased after her.
Honestly, how could someone be so grossed out by a little cotton candy?
Ryder reached into my pocket for the little pack of wet wipes he knew I always carried. Once his and Sadie’s hands were clean, he took her back on his hip and wrapped his arm around my waist. “You okay, sweetheart?”
I glanced up to see a frown of concern on his face. He was worried about me after I’d spent the last week staying up way too late preparing a design proposal for a local restaurant franchise. Miss Susie Dupree’s Deluxe Barbeque, the official sponsor of the Lickin’, was contemplating a rebrand, and I’d been one of only a handful of interior designers asked to present. This had been kind of an honor in and of itself—enough to earn me fancy celebratory cupcakes, which had become our official Richards family tradition for celebrating good news of any kind, and a celebratory blow job, which was our unofficial Ryder-and-Colin way of celebrating more personal victories.
But, although I hadn’t flat out told Ryder yet, I wouldn’t be taking the job even if my design was chosen.
While the contract would be a coup for a relatively new company like Richards Interior Design, Miss Susie had proved to be demanding as all heck, insisting on endless last-minute changes while her bad-tempered poodle growled at me, patting her shellacked blonde hair while telling me my work wasn’t “original” enough, nickel-and-diming every line item of the proposed budget. Her late-night phone calls and emails had been enough to make my Granny Joyce sniff, “Susie’s been above her raisin’ since she married a Dupree, but if she thinks she can order my boy around, she needs to be set down a peg or two,” and to make my husband grumble, “Makes a man hope karma’s a real thing.”
For me, it had been an important reminder of a lesson I’d learned on New Year’s Eve five years ago: while I would always want to do my best and please my clients, true happiness wasn’t about career success, it was about the people I got to come home to every night—the ones who inspired and encouraged me, the ones who gave me a strong foundation and a sense of purpose, the ones who loved me and let me love them—a tattooed, power tool–wielding badass, and the cotton candy–wielding pixie who had us both wrapped around her sticky fingers.
“I’m okay, honey. I really wanted to bring Sadie to the Lickin’. We talked about starting our family traditions, and you know how Granny feels about the town festivals.”
Ryder leaned in and pressed his lips to my temple. I closed my eyes for a moment and let myself bask in his casual affection. Over the years, he’d treated me like a precious treasure, like I was the absolute best thing to ever happen to him. At every turn, he’d shown me just how important I was to him.
I was the luckiest man on earth and had been even before we’d even brought Sadie into our little family.
“Okay, but when we put Sadie-bear down for a nap, you’re going down too,” he warned.
As if that was a threat.
I laughed and wiggled my eyebrows. “Promise?”
He kissed me again and bounced Sadie on his hip.
Brooks Johnson wandered over to shake our hands, and I gave him a subtle up-and-down. I remembered Brooks well from high school, but then again I was pretty sure everyone in the Thicket knew him or knew of him. After all, it wasn’t every day that the guy known for being the high school quarterback, the mayor’s son, and the all-around town golden boy came out as gay in a very scandalous, very accidentally public way, breaking his girlfriend’s heart over a hot mic at the Lickin’ Dinner Dance before hightailing it out of town the next day and staying gone for ten full years.
Rumor had it, Ava’s heart had been broken and they hadn’t exchanged a single word since that night. In fact, if Emmaline Proud was to be believed, they’d put an entire continent between them just to avoid seeing each other. It was pretty clear from our brief meeting that Ava hadn’t forgiven Brooks… and I wasn’t sure the rest of the Thicket had either.
That meant Brooks Johnson was the Thicket pariah, whether he realized it or not.
Despite all eyes following poor Brooks, he gave us his trusty, perfect smile. “Ryder, my brother, Dunn, tells me you’ve built up a big-deal contracting business in town.”
Ryder nodded and slid his arm around my waist again after shaking his hand. “Between that and these two, I stay busy. Do you remember my husband, Colin? I think you two went to school together. And this is our daughter, Sadie.”