12. Garrett
GARRETT
I ’ve never felt this angry before. Every part of me was screaming to march back to that bar and punch her father in the face. It had taken more restraint than I care to admit not to step between him and Paige. No matter how much I wanted to stand up for her, to shut his mouth for him before he could spew out any more hateful words, deep down I knew it was something that Paige wanted to handle on her own.
If she had asked, or even given me a look that screamed “help me,” I would have stepped in before she could say my name.
Despite all that, watching Paige stand her ground and not cower away from facing a man who had hurt her filled me with a sense of pride. Then when she reached for my hand? I still haven’t been able to process just how happy that made me.
I take in my surroundings as I open the trunk. The inn that Gwen was able to book for us was on the smaller side, which is not all that shocking given the size of the town. From the outside, it appears to be the perfect combination of modern and historic. The small parking lot is fuller than I was expecting considering there’s not much reason to stay in Jericho Springs.
“Have you ever actually stayed here?” I call out to Paige while she gathers her purse and laptop bag from the back seat.
“Yeah, Lilly and I somehow convinced her mom to let us stay here on prom night.” She shuts the back door and joins me at the trunk. “There was a rumor that spread about how Lilly and I convinced some college boys from a few towns over to come have a foursome with us. Little did they know that all we did was binge all five Twilight movies and ate our weight in gummy bears.”
“That sounds so much more fun than my prom night was.” I laugh while grabbing our bags and motion for her to lead the way.
“Well, now I need to know what you did,” she says, falling into step beside me as we start the walk across the lot.
“Prom itself wasn’t all that fun. Actually, it was kind of cliché for a dorky kid like me. My date showed up for pictures already tipsy. She continued to sneak shots with one of her friends, so by the time the actual dance came…she was trashed. I lost track of her for a few minutes and when I found her again, she was behind the bleachers, having sex with the captain of the football team.”
Paige’s nose scrunches adorably, disgust lining all her features. “Okay, for starters, that’s absolutely shitty of her. I hope her pillow is always warm. Second, there’s no way that you can convince me that you were a dorky kid.”
I laugh, reaching for the door and holding it open for her.
“Dominik and I once pooled all our money so we could dress up as Star Wars characters at Comic Con.”
“Please, please, please tell me there’s a picture of that.”
I lean in, lowering my voice so only she can hear. “Oh yeah? Have a Jedi fantasy I should know about?”
Her cheeks bloom with a beautiful pink blush and I step away to greet the older woman sitting behind the reception desk.
“Good afternoon. We’re hoping to check into our rooms.”
“Yes! Hello, welcome to the Cloud Hill Inn. My name is Ann!” She greets us with a wide grin, glancing between me and Paige. “Let’s see, what’s the reservation under?”
“Walker.”
She taps away on her screen, humming an old country song while she waits for it to load.
“Ah, yes, here we are. Lake view room with a king bed.” She reaches for the stack of new room key cards. “You’ll be in room?—”
“Wait, what?” Paige interrupts, stepping up beside me at the desk. “Lake room ? As in one single room with one single bed?”
“Well, technically, it’s one king bed.” Ann winks at me as if I’m in on some joke.
“No, that’s not right,” Paige protests. She grabs her phone and I look over as she pulls up the confirmation email Gwen sent us. “The reservation was for two rooms with two separate beds.”
I bite my tongue and let Paige handle this.
“Oh dear.” Ann looks over the details on Paige’s phone before clicking quickly on her computer. After a minute of silence, she finally looks up. “Unfortunately, we don’t have any other rooms. We’re fully booked out thanks to the spillover from the Fall Festival in the neighboring town.”
“But…we can’t…we work together,” Paige stutters, finally staring up at me with wide, frantic eyes.
I shrug, not in the least bit opposed to sharing a bed with Paige. However, if it makes her uncomfortable…
“I can sleep on the couch,” I assure her.
Paige worries her bottom lip between her teeth as she watches me, and I focus on getting us checked in and out of the lobby. I’d prefer that Ann wasn’t a wallflower during this conversation.
“We’ll figure it out. It’s not like we can make a room appear out of thin air.”
Ann apologizes profusely, offering us complimentary snacks and even discounted room service. I have to refrain from assuring her that this is perfectly fine, considering I don’t know if Paige feels the same way.
Paige doesn’t say a single word as we cross the lobby, nor does she speak when we step onto the elevator and head up to our floor. When she steps out, her nerves are practically palpable and setting off my own.
Still, I wait until we’re in the room to say anything. She stands in the middle of the simple hotel room, staring at the bed like it’s about to pop to life and snatch her up.
“Paige,” I say gently and wait until she looks at me. When her bright blue eyes meet mine, I continue, “I meant what I said downstairs. I’ll sleep on the couch.”
She visibly swallows, glancing at the furniture in question. “That seems like a back ache waiting to happen.”
“I’m not worried about that.” I shrug, stepping forward to set our bags down. “My only concern is you.”
“I just,” Paige starts before shaking her head and glancing back at the bed. “I don’t know?—”
“You don’t have to explain yourself to me. I haven’t kept my feelings or my intentions a secret, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to force anything on you. You wanting your own bed is not going to change how I feel.”
She opens her mouth to respond, but I shake my head. “How about you freshen up or change while I go run down to the convenience store. I know you planned to go catch up with some people, but we didn’t get to finish lunch, so I can grab a couple snacks.”
Paige nods slowly, pausing once she processes. “The whole reason I planned to come here was to see my dad.” Her voice is so quiet, so unlike her, that it takes every ounce of my barely there restraint not to cross over to her and scoop her up in my arms.
“Well, in that case, I’ll grab us a bottle of wine while I’m at it and we can find some old movies on TV and just relax. We’ve had a long week and can turn this into an actual night off.”
She finally laughs, the tension visibly leaving her body as she moves to where I placed her bag down. “Do either of us actually know how to do that?”
“Only one way to find out,” I tease and grab one of the room keys, then leave her to get settled.
The store takes after the town it’s in, being small enough that I can easily hear the casual conversation between the cashier and current customer even when I’m at the back perusing the wine selection. I have to force myself to take my time, not to load up the basket as quickly as possible and get back to the hotel room.
Over the past two hours, Paige went through an emotional ringer. Add in the fact that she was visibly uncomfortable from having to share a room? She deserved her space to process everything. Even if I wished she were at ease with me there, that level of trust doesn’t happen overnight. She might have opened up to me at the lake, but that could have also been a one-time thing.
I need to show her that she can let me in, and forcing my presence is not going to help.
After killing just over thirty minutes, I finally check out and head back. When I’m standing in front of the door, though, I pause. Not wanting to just burst in unannounced in case she’s changing or something, I softly rap my knuckles against the wood. Paige calls out a muted “one second” and I wait patiently.
She opens the door and my breath catches in my throat. Her hair is wet and hanging to one side of her makeup-free face. She’s changed into a matching light pink pajama set and the fresh smell of her sweet floral body wash fills the room.
“I could have sworn I saw you grab a room key,” Paige interrupts my admiration of her and steps back to let me into the room.
Clearing my throat, I follow her into the room. “I did. I just didn’t want to walk in if you were changing and still needed privacy.”
The red that stains her cheeks and neck is slowly becoming my new favorite color. She glances down at her pajamas, tugging the tiny shorts down slightly.
“Sorry, I wasn’t expecting anyone else to be around…”
“Trust me, you have nothing to apologize for,” I mumble, wondering if it would be crossing a line to order her more sets just like that even if I never get to see her in them.
Not wanting to linger like a creep, I hold up the bags in my hand before setting them on the bed.
“Why don’t you find a movie while I change.” After grabbing my black gym shorts and tee, I make quick work of changing. When I step out of the bathroom, I pause at the sight in front of me.
Paige sits criss-cross on one side of the bed farthest from the door, the snacks spread out in front of her while she flips through channels on the TV. It’s such a simple thing, Paige comfortable and ready to relax, but it makes my heart skip a beat. She could have spread out on the couch and coffee table. The view of the TV would only be slightly at an angle compared to the bed. Granted, she could still tell me to fuck off and to sit on the couch by myself.
She smiles when she notices me, motioning with the remote to the open spot beside her. “Come on. Otherwise, I’m two seconds away from picking a rom-com.”
I laugh, tossing my dress clothes on top of my bag, and join her. “Fun fact. Some of my favorite movies are actually rom-coms.”
Paige snorts. “You’re just saying that.”
I grin, loving how at ease she now seems compared to when we checked in.
“Nope. I used to watch them all the time with Liv, Dominik’s mom. No one else wanted to watch them, so she and I turned it into a weekly thing for just the two of us.”
Heaviness settles in my chest at the memory.
“Well, she’s clearly a smart woman for getting one of you to appreciate them.”
“She was the best.” I clear my throat, picking up the box of crackers to distract myself.
“Shit, wait. I’m an idiot and didn’t put two and two together,” Paige starts, dropping the remote and placing a hand on my arm. “Dominik’s mom…”
She doesn’t need to finish her sentence. It’s clear in her expression that she knows what happened.
“Yeah,” I whisper. “Both of his parents were in a car accident about six years ago.”
“And his sister last year,” she adds hesitantly and I can only nod. “So when you said that the Mikelsons’ took you in…”
“Liv filed for custody after my parents were arrested. For all intents and purposes, they were legally my guardians. They were the only family I actually knew.”
Paige lunges before I can think of anything else to say, falling into my lap as she wraps her arms around me. I hold her to me like it’s second nature.
“I knew the two of you were close, but it never clicked that you went through the same losses he did.” Her voice is muffled against my chest. I shrug, rearranging her slightly so she’s sitting sideways in my lap.
“Yeah, but it was different for?—”
“Someone else’s pain doesn’t lessen your own.”
I stare down at her, blinking at her words as they hit me deeper than I thought possible. Paige softens, reaching a tentative hand up to place on my cheek.
“You lost people you loved. Just because someone else is also hurting or has ‘been through more’ doesn’t change the fact that your heart broke too.”
“I never thought about it that way,” I admit, leaning into her gentle touch and closing my eyes. “I’ve always been focused on just the fact that Dominik lost his family, that technically speaking, mine is still alive.”
“Blood doesn’t always equal family.” Paige rests her head against my chest. “You hide so much pain behind such a shining smile. It’s like you have the sweetest and kindest heart despite everything you’ve gone through. It takes strength for you to show up like you do every day.”
Despite how raw and exposed I feel, a laugh slips free. Paige tips her head back, eyebrows pulled together in confusion.
“Did you know I named the company in honor of Liv?” I ask. She shakes her head and I continue, “She used to tell me, and anyone who would listen, that I had the sweetest heart.”
A smile splits across Paige’s lips as she makes the connection to what she just said. “If there’s one thing for certain, it’s that a heart like yours is one of a kind, Garrett.”
The damn organ in my chest skips and I clear my throat before continuing.
“Liv was always jumping in to help people. She even started a local book club just so she could use it as an excuse to send some of the new moms in the neighborhood home with food without being overbearing. When I first had the idea for SweetHeart Publishing, it was because of her.”
“That’s the sweetest thing I have ever heard.”
We stay like that for a while, Paige curled up in my lap as she listens to me tell random stories about growing up with the Mikelsons’. She only leaves my arms when my stomach rumbles and makes room so we can dive into the food.
“I don’t know how you manage to always pick out my favorite snacks.”
This time, I can feel my cheeks burning and I busy my hands by stacking a cheese square on top of a cracker.
“What’s that look for?” Paige asks.
“Um, I have a note in my phone.” When she doesn’t say anything after a few drawn-out moments, I finally cave and look up.
She’s staring at me with wide eyes, her jaw hanging comically open.
“You…what?” she whispers.
I set my cracker down and reach behind me to grab my phone. “I started a note in my phone shortly after we started working together so that I could remember what you liked or not.”
After opening the notes app on my phone, I hesitantly hand it to her. At her little gasp, I briefly wonder if I should have kept this to myself.
“Sorry if that’s weird. After our first few late nights in the office, I wanted to make sure I’d get things that you would like so just started jotting it all down.”
My phone slips from her hand, bouncing on the comforter and landing on the bag of Twizzlers. Before I can think of anything else to say, Paige is kneeling in front of me. I hold my breath as she pauses with her gaze on my lips all while my heart thunders in my chest.
And then she’s kissing me.
Her soft lips clash against mine, causing every previous thought to fly away, leaving only her. My hands itch to touch her, to memorize every inch of her that she would allow. But I don’t want to push her too far.
Paige’s hands slip from my face and slide through my hair to the back of my scalp. I don’t hold back the moan at the feeling, which seems to only encourage her to pull me impossibly closer. She moves until she’s straddling me and I finally give in to my own urges.
I wrap one arm around her waist, locking her in place in my lap while tracing my free hand up her ribs. She grinds herself against me, my cock aching to be free, and I know this won’t be enough. The need to learn everything there is to know about her, from her thoughts and dreams to her body and sounds, simmers just beneath my skin.
My thumb caresses over her ribs just below her breast, and I groan at the realization that there’s only a thin scrap of fabric between us.
Breaking away from her lips, I trail kisses along her jaw while she catches her breath.
“Garrett,” she whispers and I don’t have to see her face to know what she’s about to say.
“Let me in, Sweetheart.” I nudge her chin with my nose and her head tips back with zero resistance. Breathing in her sweet scent, I continue pleading against her neck. “Let me show you just how good we could be together.”
She sits up as much as she can with my arm wrapped around her waist. Her bottom lip is stuck between her teeth as she studies me. I reach up with my thumb, tugging her plump lip free before tracing over it.
“I know trust isn’t something you just hand out, and I will do everything and anything you ask in order to earn your trust. But for now”—I brush her hair from her face, tucking it behind her ear and reveling at the way she shivers against me—“let me start by worshiping you the way you deserve.”