Total pages in book: 61
Estimated words: 60342 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 302(@200wpm)___ 241(@250wpm)___ 201(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 60342 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 302(@200wpm)___ 241(@250wpm)___ 201(@300wpm)
I look at him at the exact moment he looks at me. He’d be balls deep inside me if we weren’t at his parents’ kitchen table and they weren’t sitting beside us. There is no doubt.
“How are your parents, Laina?” Lonnie asks.
I clear my throat. “They’re doing well.”
“Where are they living these days?”
“Los Angeles. They moved out there two or three years ago, I think.”
Maggie slices her meatloaf. “Please tell them we asked about them.”
Lonnie chews slowly, his brows tugged together like Luke’s when he’s thinking.
I set my fork down. “I’m going to be honest with you. I very rarely talk to my parents. I haven’t been to their home in LA, and they didn’t see me for the holidays last year.”
Maggie sets her fork down, too. “Oh, honey. Why not?”
“Because they’re assholes,” Luke says, firing his father a look I can’t quite read.
“But she’s their child,” Maggie says to her son. “Are you okay, sweetheart?”
I know this must be unbelievable to Maggie and Lonnie, two people who love their children more than their own lives. They must think there’s something wrong with me not having a relationship with my parents. But it’s the truth, and I don’t want to hide it from them.
I’m tired of hiding from the things that make me uncomfortable.
Luke reaches for my hand under the table, squeezing it tightly.
“So,” Maggie says, reading the room. “How did the two of you see one another again?”
“Laina needed a place to stay away from the paparazzi, and my house was the perfect answer,” Luke says.
I smile at him. Thank you for not telling them I broke into your house without asking you first.
He winks at me.
“Well, I, for one, am glad you are here,” Lonnie says. “We’ve missed you. I know Luke has missed you. He was devastated when he came back from seeing you in Cleveland.”
Seeing me in Cleveland?
Luke’s face pales.
“I’m sorry,” I say, focusing on Lonnie. “When Luke visited me in Cleveland?”
“Does anyone need more potatoes?” Maggie asks. “Or tea? I’m getting up and can bring it back.”
No one says a word.
Lonnie stabs a chunk of meatloaf and lifts his gaze to mine. “Yeah. Right after you left that last time. Luke got a ticket to see you in Cleveland, and then you guys broke up for good.”
Luke didn’t visit me in Cleveland. What’s he talking about?
I would chalk it up to Lonnie having misunderstood a story or mixing up something that happened with one of his other children with Luke. But the guilt on Luke’s face makes it clear.
He came to see me in Cleveland?
A million questions roll through my mind, and I try to sort them while conversing with Maggie.
“Right after you left the last time. Luke got a ticket to see you in Cleveland, and then you guys broke up for good.”
That’s not what happened. That’s not close to what happened, so why would Luke tell them that?
He slides his hand from mine and places it on his lap.
I couldn’t come home, and he didn’t return my calls. That’s what happened. Unless …
Unless he did go to Cleveland.
I smile politely at Maggie as she sits with her tea, launching into a how-to on making lasagna. Where did this come from? Did I miss something? I want to tell her I don’t care how to make anything right now. I want to know why Luke is lying.
There could be a reasonable explanation for it. Maybe he told his parents he was coming to see me, and he and Gavin went partying instead. But Lonnie was so sure. And Luke won’t even look at me.
What am I missing?
“Does anyone want dessert?” Maggie asks, getting up to make her and Lonnie a cup of coffee. “Had I known you were coming, Laina, I would’ve made you a cheesecake. Do you still like those? With the chocolate on top?”
“How did you remember that?” I ask, grinning.
“You were here for years. A mother remembers.”
The good ones do, Maggie. Not mine.
“I have brownies I can heat with ice cream,” she says. “Or if you want to stay a little while, I’ll whip up some chocolate chip cookies.”
Luke finally looks at me. He shifts in his seat like he can’t sit still. This time, it’s not because he wants to devour me. This time, I think he wants to avoid me.
I’m not sure whether to be angry or nervous. It’s the worst position to be in—there’s no way to prepare. My body falls back into what it knows about situations like this and starts building a shield around my heart to protect it.
I hate it. I don’t want to feel like this with Luke. I want the open, vulnerable, honest relationship we share. I want the chocolate cake and old sheets, the cuddles in the middle of the night, the horse barn antics during the day.