Total pages in book: 72
Estimated words: 67831 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 339(@200wpm)___ 271(@250wpm)___ 226(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 67831 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 339(@200wpm)___ 271(@250wpm)___ 226(@300wpm)
Explaining to our mutual friends after the breakup that no, I didn’t criticize Viv’s taste in clothing or force her to eat meat when she was desperate to stay a vegetarian, added insult to our break-up injury. I’m betting the stories she’s told her family are even worse. After all, in Vermont, there’s no one around who knows me to contradict her tales of Evil Leo the Bad Boyfriend and how he made her life a living hell.
She will have found some way to spin our breakup to make me the bad guy, maybe even the very bad guy.
Bad enough to tempt her cousin to sign up for my reality show simply to fuck with my life?
I don’t know. I hope not. Maybe Caroline kept the Vivian connection a secret because she was excited about the show and didn’t want to ruin her chances at being included in the project.
And maybe, if you open the window, the birds will fly inside and deposit themselves into my mouth, Satan pipes up from the other side of the room.
“Shut up, smartass,” I mumble.
I mean, it’s worth a try, he says, his voice plaintive now, I want to hunt them so badly, Sad Sack. The need…it haunts me.
Just like Caroline’s face has haunted me since the moment I met her.
That’s another major downside of this connection. I can’t date Vivian’s cousin. Not ever. No matter how well we get along, no matter how drawn I felt to her from the moment we met.
Even if she’s truly a friend, not a foe, that’s all we can ever be.
Friends.
But that’s fine. You don’t want to date anyone anyway, remember? Satan coos. Dating is for the young.
“I’m going to lock your catnip in my safe.”
Fine, just open the window first. I can take these birds, man. I know I can. Let me shoot my shot.
Shoot my shot…
That’s what I need to do, shoot my shot before Caroline can shoot hers.
Tossing my mostly uneaten sandwich in the trash, I text Ainsley an SOS to warn her to get a contract ready for our backup, a woman from New Hampshire she chatted with at the New England Innkeepers meet and greet.
Instantly she shoots back—Okay, but are you crazy? Caroline is great, and filming starts in two hours!
I know, I say. Hopefully we won’t need the backup, but we should have the contract ready. Just in case. Trust me, okay?
Shit, okay. Ainsley replies. But shit!
“Deep shit,” I agree aloud as I head for the door.
But if I hurry, there should be time to find out if this shit can be cleaned up before we’re all due on set.
five
. . .
Caroline
Inever lie.
Well, almost never.
I tell my mom her fudge is better than the stuff they sell at the country store and insist my dad’s rendition of “White Christmas” is every bit as good as Bing Crosby’s, but those are cozy little white lies. Fluffy lies I wrap around my loved ones to keep them safe from the cruel realities of the world.
I told myself that’s what I was doing when I lied to Chris—protecting him from worrying about my safety while I was in the city—but now that I’m wandering the rapidly-emptying expo room, preparing to confess my sins, I know better.
My stomach is in knots and guilt wraps clawed fingers around my throat.
I should have just told him the truth. He deserves the truth, and I deserve to have my boundaries honored when I say I’m fine to travel alone, even to big cities. If I’d told Chris where I was going, we might have had the chance to grow as a couple—and to share a good laugh about both of us being in the same place at the same time—but instead things are going to be…awkward.
Especially considering that I spent most of my time in that blow-up igloo lusting after another man. I’m not lusting after Leo anymore, obviously, since he’s a Very Bad Man with a dirty, wandering dick, who cheated on my cousin, but still…
Just catching sight of the igloo out of the corner of my eye as I hurry down the aisle is enough to make me blush.
Am I Very Bad Woman with a dirty, wandering vagina?
I mean, I didn’t actually do anything with Leo, but I thought about it. In depth. Maybe that’s why I’m so angry with the man, because I see the reflection of my own heinous behavior in his hurtful actions.
I’m so busy beating myself up for having impure thoughts, it doesn’t occur to me to wonder why Chris didn’t tell me that he was coming to the city to sell trees until I arrive at the makeshift tree lot at the edge of the massive room.
Where Chris is furiously making out with a glamorous woman in a sexy elf outfit…
“Bobby Christmas Williams,” I blurt out, my jaw dropping as I note that Chris’s sap-sticky hands are glued to the woman’s velvet-covered backside.