Total pages in book: 79
Estimated words: 74298 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 371(@200wpm)___ 297(@250wpm)___ 248(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 74298 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 371(@200wpm)___ 297(@250wpm)___ 248(@300wpm)
I pulled in a deep breath, pushing my hair back with my fingers. “The weird thing is that it feels crazy not to do ‘lovey-dovey stuff’ with him now. I want him so damn badly. In all of the ways.”
Sam clutched his hands to his heart.
Red just nodded. “God damn, I have been where you’ve been,” he said.
“No shit?”
“I fell for Liam once when we were young and dumb, and then again after I’d known him for a long time too,” Red said. “He was someone I really shouldn’t have gotten involved with again, if you looked at it from the outside. But things had changed. The time was right. And now I’m happier than I knew I could be. I love him so much.”
I took a long sip of my beer and set it down on the hard oak bar top.
“I hope you know that Jack is like, obviously crazy in love with you too, Tristan,” Sam said. “I don’t think you’re going to have any problems in that department.”
I clicked my tongue. “Wouldn’t be so sure.”
Red lifted an eyebrow at me. “Sam’s crazy, but he ain’t wrong on this one.”
“Jack doesn’t believe me,” I said. “He might want to believe me. He might be trying. But to be honest, I don’t blame him. He’s been hurt in the past, and I’ve been known to fall for women fast and then end up being in brief relationships. But… he’s anything but a phase. I’d do anything for him. And I’m the one who’s a dumbass for not realizing this sooner.”
“Instead of right before you’re moving to another state?” Sam asked gently.
“And it feels too late,” I responded.
“You really are in love with him,” Red said, more an observation than a question.
I looked at Red, feeling like there were a thousand little fireworks going off inside me. “I’m more sure about it than anything I’ve ever felt,” I said. “I want him. I want him next to me. I want him to move to Colorado with me, for Chrissakes, and I feel like a monster suggesting that my best friend uproot himself from his hometown just to be with me.”
For some reason, I expected the two of them to look at me like I was crazy when I admitted it. I expected this to be the final straw, where they told me I was nuts. But instead they just nodded.
“He liked it there in Colorado, right?” Sam asked.
“He loved it,” I said.
“It sounded like he got along with all of your family,” Red added.
“He got along with every single one of their crazy asses,” I said. “Hell, I’d say he gets along with them better than I do.”
Sam shrugged one shoulder. “If you ask me, I’d say it sounds like he might want a little more nudging from you on this. If he’s having a hard time believing you, then you should just tell him point blank that you desperately want him to move there.”
I shook my head. “I couldn’t do that. I don’t want to influence his decision too much, especially when he inherited his childhood home from his father….”
“He might want you to nudge him, deep down, though,” Sam said. “And that’s not something he’d ever be able to say out loud. Just like when Fox asked about wearing pink lace panties for me one night. He’d hinted at it a few times, but he really wanted me to tell him to do it, so that he knew I’d be into it. And god fucking damn, I was into it, seeing his cock behind that lace—”
“Sam,” Red protested, holding up a hand.
“Lace panties? Really?” I asked, slightly intrigued.
“See? That’s what TMI really is,” Red said.
“Fine,” Sam said. “But the point remains. What do you have to lose, Tristan? Tell Jack what you really want. He’s your best friend in the world. You’re not going to lose him. And something tells me he wants this too.”
I swallowed hard, gripping the outside of my beer glass a little too hard. “Maybe,” I said. Doubt still clawed at my insides. Jack Damien was an independent Kansas man, and he always had been.
But what did I have to lose? I was already moving far away. If there was any time to shoot my shot, it was now.
“If you’re wrong about this, I’m going to be calling your ass on video chat every night when I’m crying and alone,” I teased Sam.
“Have at it,” he said. “But I don’t think anything like that is going to happen.”
“Sometimes the things that seem impossible are the things that change your life in the best ways,” Red said.
“Damn if that ain’t the truth,” Sam agreed.
As I drank the rest of my beer, I was pretty sure that the two of them were either going to lead me to the best or the worst decision of my life.