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Two hours and nine minutes.
I walked into the family room, sidestepping a couple of boxes next to the base of the stairs, just as he was walking out. He stopped dead in his tracks. So did I.
When Jax’s eyes met mine, everything else around us disappeared in a great big whoosh, a sudden vacuum of sound so staggering that I could only imagine what we must have looked like. Standing on opposite ends of the room, we were unable to look anywhere else.
Would it always be like this?
Would there ever be peace in my heart when it came to this man?
After this many years, I should be immune to something as simple as a look, but Iwasn’t. I could hardly find a thread of logic in any piece of my reaction to him, and I hated that more than anything.
I broke first, yanking my gaze away from his.
“I, uh, have the first rent check,” I told him. “I stuck it on the fridge with a magnet. You never gave me the address for where to send it.”
His brow was slightly furrowed when I glanced back. “It’s a … PO Box downtown. But I’ll grab this one today.”
I managed a short nod over the thundering of my heart, turning toward the kitchen when Greer asked me a question about where I wanted my cups. Jax’s footsteps receded quickly like he couldn’t leave the room fast enough.
Running a hand over my forehead, I swallowed against a bone-dry throat and a tidal wave of frustration before answering. “Umm, that one in front of you is fine.”
Her brows furrowed. “You feel okay, Pops?”
I couldn’t answer for a minute because my thoughts felt so messy in my head, which kept clear words from forming.
Adaline came up behind me, wrapping her arm around my waist. “Do you need to rest?”
“No,” I said. “I’m just a little overwhelmed, I think.”
She smoothed her hand up and down my back. “I think they’ve got that reading chair in the spare bedroom upstairs. Maybe take ten minutes in there?”
Eyes heavy with exhaustion, I nodded.
Greer stopped me with a hand to my arm. “Side note. I didn’t know you were going for dark, sexy, and moody.”
Oh fuck, was I that obvious? I blinked, not so much as a single word able to climb past the block in my throat. “What?”
She gave me a strange look. “The color you chose in that room. I thought you were going light and airy.”
I laughed—but the sound came out like I was choking on my own spit—and my sisters shared a telling glance, like I was losing my mind.
Wasn’t I, though?
“I, uh, had a change of heart at the hardware store.”
Greer smiled. “It was a good change. Sometimes our gut leads us somewhere very unexpected.”
“No shit,” I muttered under my breath.
“What was that?” Adaline asked.
I glanced up to find them both watching me with that awful big sister sharp-eyed look.
It was knowing.
Big sisters who thought they knew things were the worst because more often than not, they were right. Which led to smug, knowing, obnoxious big sisters.
“I don’t need to rest,” I told them. “I promise.”
