Total pages in book: 48
Estimated words: 47615 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 238(@200wpm)___ 190(@250wpm)___ 159(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 47615 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 238(@200wpm)___ 190(@250wpm)___ 159(@300wpm)
But me being me, and opening my mouth before I can think to stop, I ask a really stupid question.
“Why did Abby’s mom leave?” I ask Kane, noticing his expression fall as soon as I do.
“I mean,” I’m quick to add, “…Abby doesn’t ever say anything about it. But she often looks at my mom like she really misses her own or something.”
Kane goes quiet, and I chew at my lip before apologizing. “Sorry. That was a stupid thing to ask, but if you’re talking us, then I figure I have a right to know something about your past,” I explain.
Kane nods his head slowly in agreement before he says anything.
“I guess you’re right,” he sighs. “But there are no real skeletons in that closet,” he remarks dryly.
“Katie and me? We just never got along. After Abby was born, it wasn’t long before it was clear she didn’t get along with a newborn baby and me at the same time,” he shrugs.
“So…she just left?” I ask, slightly horrified we’re even having this discussion now.
“Yep. She took everything one day when I was at work, leaving little Abs with the neighbor. But what she really left behind was the best thing of all,” Kane smiles, thinking about his daughter and my best friend.
“I had to start over, but Abby made it easy. She gave me a reason to get up every day.”
I know Abby would be proud to hear him say that, but I’m more interested in how he handled being a single parent over worrying about how he felt about Abby’s mom.
I mean, that’s ancient history.
I was still a baby myself, for god’s sake.
“So you’re pretty handy with kids, huh?” I ask him, tactfully changing the subject and shooting him a knowing smile.
“It was twenty years ago, but yeah. I can hold my own,” Kane replies with confidence. “And what about you?” he asks.
The look in his eyes meaning only one thing.
And I kind of just dug this hole for myself.
I’d gladly bear a million of them if they're kids by him. But I don’t want to put it like that. Don’t wanna cheapen what I really mean.
“I’d love a family,” is all I say in reply—leaving Kane to fill in the blank in his mind.
Fill in some more of those spaces in his version of the ‘us’ that he keeps referring to. Even though we haven’t been together except for one-plus day, it sounds like a great idea to me.
I guess it’s my mom in me, the cynical part waiting for the magic to wear off or the wheel to actually fall off the whole thing between Kane and me.
But something deeper in me tells me that I’d be wrong.
That Kane really is the one. And he really does have a plan about how he wants us to be a forever thing.
But the creeping thought of my mom reminds me of a different dilemma.
How is Kane gonna swing things, so I don’t have to go work at the diner?
Otherwise, our weekend really will be ruined.
And if that was the one thing that came between Kane and me, working at the diner, I’d never forgive my mom for it.
“I know a lot of guys who have family or friends who are always looking for extra work,” Kane says, reading my thoughts without any effort.
“Unless you’re keen on working in a diner the rest of your days, I’d be glad to find just the right person to fill your slot?” he grins over at me.
Letting me take that either way I choose to.
My instinct is to protest, to think of my mom and how much she’s always counting on me.
But with it being just Kane and me now? Knowing I can have this feeling on tap 24/7.
I can’t argue with his logic.
“Damn you, Kane Gray,” I scold him playfully, nestling back into his arm as I hug it while he drives.
“Damn you for being so perfect,” I add, knowing that, like everything else, Kane will make it all work out somehow.
I don’t know exactly how, but I already know I’ll be impressed by it.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Kane
I take it slow getting us back home.
It’s a bright and warm day, just right for cruising in my vintage car, feeling like maybe we really can live in simpler times again.
Like the time the car was made, back when life just seemed…better. Easier.
But when I get to thinking about why Jen even works at the diner at all. And with her quizzing me about Abby’s mom, I’m pretty sure simpler times really are a thing of the past.
Especially when you’re about to bed your daughter’s best friend behind her back.
I hate to even think of it like that. But the bigger part of me knows that’s the only way anyone else is ever gonna see it.
And by anyone, I mean Abby.