Total pages in book: 78
Estimated words: 74577 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 373(@200wpm)___ 298(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 74577 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 373(@200wpm)___ 298(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
I tried to put on the TV, but I couldn’t seem to focus on it.
So, yeah, I was left with my thoughts.
The ones that kept circling back to him.
I’d handled the other thing that had been weighing on me.
After some researching, I found there was no way to track my phone just from the number, so I blocked the one that had been giving me a stomachache.
With that solved, all that was left was the Atlas situation.
I’d managed pretty well with avoiding him. Though, admittedly, I was running out of excuses to be out of the house. And it was all starting to feel really silly.
I figured this one last overnight shift would let me get some perspective, then slowly start to let things go back to… normal.
Luckily, Atlas needed less actual assistance now. So there wouldn’t be a lot of situations where I would need to touch him, and therefore further complicate my feelings for him.
That was the rub, though.
Even with all the space, the interest and longing were still there.
I still wanted him.
If I were being completely honest with myself, I wanted him more than ever.
Absence and the heart growing fonder in action, I guess.
Even with the distance I’d been putting between us, he’d found ways to be good to me.
He made up the coffee pot and set it to turn on right when he knew I would wake up. He scoured the house to find the puzzle piece that had gone missing, making it impossible to finish my current puzzle. He made sure to always get me my favorites when he ordered snacks or groceries.
God, he even left me little notes with scribbles in the margins I left him, telling me about the new visitors to the bird feeder, or how a squirrel got himself into the feeder once, then lounged on his back, double fisting the bird seed until he was so fat he almost couldn’t get back out of it afterward.
“Ugh,” I grumbled, rubbing my hands against my dry, tired eyes.
I took the overnight just because it gave me a good excuse not to be in the house. Tucker would have happily covered for Ella, and was admittedly a lot better at doing these shifts than I was.
Samson was unfazed, of course. A bed was a bed, regardless of where it was located. And he’d run himself ragged all day while I drank like three pots of coffee and tried to keep moving and fidgeting, so I didn’t start to doze off.
Little by little, though, the sky outside started to grow lighter. Then Tucker’s van was pulling into the lot. For the first time ever, earlier than his shift.
“I had a feeling you would need a break,” he told me as he came in, a tattered old green backpack slung over his shoulder. It was likely full of books, notebooks, and a giant salad full of greens and sprouts that he, apparently, grew himself.
“You’re a god among men, Tuck,” I said, walking over to give him a hug. One that he immediately gave back. And I wasn’t aware just how much I needed that until I felt his arms tighten around me.
“Hey, what’s this?” he asked when a choked sound escaped me.
The tears that I’d been tamping down for a week came right to the surface as soon as I experienced a little softness.
“Alright. What’s his name? I’ll kick his ass,” he said, getting a watery laugh out of me. “Fine. I probably won’t kick his ass. But I’ll give him a lecture about being mean to girls.”
“He wasn’t mean to me,” I said, sniffling, forcing myself to pull it together.
I was just overly tired. It made it hard to keep my emotions in check.
“He better not. Or I’ll sic Ella on him,” he declared, reaching up to wipe both of my cheeks with his hands.
“Now that is a warning,” I declared, getting a big smile out of him. “Is she coming in today?”
“I told her I am covering today.”
“But you’re working tonight.”
“I don’t need a lot of sleep,” he said, shrugging it off. “Besides, she needs to be home with the little one. She doesn’t have any help,” he added, and there was an edge to his voice that had me curious if his feelings for Ella were strictly professional, or if he was maybe harboring a little crush on the single mom.
“She’s lucky to have a guy like you around,” I said, watching as his gaze slid away, a telltale sign, I felt, that I was right. “Her ex sounds like a nightmare.”
“He was. Is,” Tucker said.
“Did you know him?”
“Only from him dropping in to see her. And the occasional office party.”
Right.
That made sense.
I forgot sometimes that Tuck and Ella had been working here pretty much since the place opened. Back when Ella was a new mom who had to get a job because her husband at the time had been lying to her about being employed. Until the bank account went negative.