Chapter 20
twenty
DREW
I’m avoiding Georgie.
She’s called and messaged numerous times in the last twenty-four hours and I’ve ignored every one of them.
I can’t wrap my head around Haynes Cohen being her tenant. Being here. In Evergreen Lake. With the child I thought would be mine.
And where the fuck is Jen?
Georgie said he’s a single dad.
Except he married my ex the day I divorced her.
What the fuck is going on?
I have no idea why he’s here and not in Chicago.
It’s over seven years since I’ve seen him. And then it was only in passing at the station. We never worked together or ran in the same circles. The only reason I know he married Jen is because my boss told me.
Warned me really. He wasn’t sure I’d take the news well. But by then I was so over the woman, I was happy she’d found someone else to fuck with.
Except now Haynes is here.
He can’t have known I live here.
My phone vibrates across the kitchen counter and I do what I’ve done every other time in the last day. Ignore it.
Pushing off the couch, I turn for the bedroom when someone bashes on my front door. I don’t have to wonder or look through the peep hole to know who it is.
She’s yelling at the top of her lungs while hammering on the door.
“Drew Westwood, you open this door right now or I’m calling the Sheriff for a wellness check!”
I can’t help the smile that kicks up my lips. She’d do it. Call my own department on me. It’s hard to remember why I’m mad at her.
Am I mad at her?
I can admit that yesterday some of my anger was aimed in her direction. Although I also have to admit it was misplaced. Because Georgie has done nothing wrong. She knows nothing of my past. I haven’t told her the nitty-gritty details. Just that I’m divorced.
Fuck!
I owe her an apology.
Scrubbing a hand down my face, I head for the door and swing it open, I windup with a fist to the gut before the woman I have no right being angry at falls into me.
“Well. Hello to you too.”
“Sorry. Shit. Sorry.” She tries to extricate herself from my hold but I can’t bring myself to let her go now she’s in my arms.
Turning, I pull her with me and bump the door closed with my shoulder. I don’t speak and she remains mute too. But her eyes say a thousand things as she stares up at me.
We stay like that for what feels like hours before she sighs. I feel that breath to the depth of my toes.
“You’re okay.”
“Yes. I am now that you’re here.”
“But you didn’t answer your phone and you were working so I thought—” She swallows thickly and shakes her head before she lowers her brow to rest against me. “You’re okay.”
“Georgie, sweetheart, if something had happened to me at work, you would know about it.”
“How? How would I know? Why would anyone tell me?”
I have to laugh. “Are you forgetting about the Evergreen Lake gossip mill? If one of my colleagues didn’t find you to let you know, the queens of gossip would have.”
“Please, don’t ever do that again. Even if you’re breaking up with me?—”
“What?” I grip her upper arms and push her away so I can look at her face. “Why the hell am I breaking up with you?”
“I. Um. Well, I let Haynes Cohen rent Granny’s house.”
“Sweetheart. You didn’t know we knew each other in my past life and you can rent your house to whoever you want.”
I’ve noticed she still refers to her place as Granny’s a lot. I wonder if it’s her way of keeping her family alive. That’s something to tackle another day.
Right now I have to tell her the reason I wanted to punch a guy in the middle of the library.
“Come sit down. I’ll explain what yesterday was about.”
She looks at me like she’s guilty of something but I ignore that and take her hand, lead her to the couch.
“It’s okay that you rented the house to him. It’s not your fault I don’t like him.”
She draws in a breath as she lowers to the cushion. “Is it him or Jen you don’t like?”
Her question has me taking a step back. “He told you?”
“He told me some things. But I want to hear from you what happened to cause you to go all Neanderthal on me. Which I might add was kinda hot but not until I was lying in bed last night replaying what happened.”
“You thought my angry outburst was hot?” This woman just keeps surprising me. I shake my head. “We’ll talk about that later. For now, do you want a drink before I start? It’s a long-ish story.”
“No. I’m good.” She pats the seat next to her.
Smiling, I lower beside her and try to work out where to start. “I married Jen two years after we met. I can’t remember proposing or why I thought I should. We lived our lives, working and planning for the future when we’d have a family. Except she kept putting that off.”
I scrub a hand over my face and blow out a breath.
“At first she wanted to wait a couple of years, then another and another until finally she admitted she didn’t know if she wanted kids. At all. It was then I really looked at us and saw lots of things I’d never taken the time to notice before. I gave her an ultimatum. We had a baby or I was walking. I figured thirty was the right age and if we waited longer it wouldn’t be a good thing.”
I have to take a breath because I don’t really want to discuss my sex life with another woman with Georgie.
“She refused to have sex with me. Which I was more than fine with. That should have been a big red flag. Anyway, one day I came home from work and she was waiting, bags packed. She told me she was filing for divorce because she was pregnant with another man’s baby.”
The strangled gasp that leaves her has me checking she’s still breathing.
“You okay?”
With a hand covering her mouth she shakes her head. “I want to say a really bad swear word right now.”
Her words are muffled by her palm but they still make me smile. “Go ahead. I’ll pretend I don’t hear you.”
“Fucking motherfucking cunt!” she screams into her hand.
I have to laugh. It’s so unlike her to swear and for her to use the worst of swear words is an indication of how much she doesn’t like what she’s heard. But then she says something that stops me in my tracks.
“If that cunt wasn’t already dead, I’d kill her!”
“You... She... What? ”
Her eyes well with tears and I can’t work out why she’s about to cry. I only know I can’t stand the thought of her doing it.
“Don’t cry. It’s okay. I’m okay. We’re okay.” Fuck! I have no idea what to say to stop her tears from falling.
“Drew.” My name is a whisper on her tongue. “She’s dead. I don’t know the details, but Haynes said she’s dead.”
I pull in a breath. “Okay.”
Her hand lands on mine. “You need to talk to him.”
“Why? If she’s dead, what’s it got to do with me?”
“He... She...” She licks her lips. “He has something to talk to you about and I think you need to listen to him. Remove your ex from the picture. Do you really have something against him? She told him you were no longer together when he met her. He didn’t even know you were her husband. She didn’t use your last name.”
“No. She never changed hers after we got married.” One of many parts of our marriage we didn’t agree on that I let slide. There were so many red flags I missed or ignored.
She looks at me with a raised brow and I think about what she said. Try to recall any interactions I had with Haynes. Nothing comes to mind. So why do I hate him the way I do? Because he got the kid I wanted?
“I don’t think it’s him I hate. The situation Jen put us both in, yes, but I guess I don’t have anything against him.” I ponder my own words. “He got the life I always wanted.”
Her gaze fills with sympathy and I brace for what I know she’s going to say. I have no idea what it is but from the look on her face alone I know it’s not going to be good.
“Tell me.”
“It’s not my story to tell.”
“But you know.”
She nods. “He told me.”
“I don’t want to hear it from him. I’d rather hear it from you.”
“I can’t. I don’t have all the answers, and you’ll have lots of questions and…I can’t. But I will come with you when you go to talk to him.”
“And it’s important.”
“So important.”
“When?”
“When do you work next?”
“I’m on in about three hours. I won’t be home until three tomorrow morning. Then I’m off until Thursday afternoon.”
“Okay, how about we have something to eat, I can see what you have here and cook, then while you’re at work I can organize meeting up with Haynes tomorrow some time.”
“If you think it needs to be done as soon as possible, then that’s what we’ll do.”
“It does.”
“And you’ll eat dinner with me before I go on shift?”
“Yes.”
“What if I’m not hungry?”
“I. Well.” She snaps her mouth shut.
“Actually, I am hungry.”
She lets out a breath and smiles.
“But not for food.”
She has to see the heat in my gaze, has to know I’m talking about eating her. Reaching out I trail a fingertip along her jaw. “I’m sorry about yesterday. And for ignoring your calls and messages.”
“I get it. I’m sure it was a shock to see Haynes.”
I nod. “It was. But I still need to apologize. I didn’t handle it well. I guess I have a lot of residual feelings about that part of my life.”
“Understandable.”
“It would be if it hadn’t happened almost a decade ago. I should have moved past the pissed off stage.”
“I think it shows how much you wanted a child, how much what you perceived as the loss of that, of not being a father, cut deeply into your heart.”
“I thought I’d lost the chance forever.” An emotion I can’t name moves over Georgie’s face, through her eyes. “What?”
“Um…”
Her eyes flick away from mine for a moment. When they return, I can see she’s made a decision and I wait, hold my breath.
“I’d have babies with you tomorrow if it were possible.”
I smile. “Tomorrow?”
“Well, it takes nine months so not tomorrow but you get what I mean,” she says with a flustered wave of her hand and my smile stretches wider.
“You know I’ve smiled more since the day I asked you out than I have in the last decade.”
“Is that a good or bad thing?”
“Good. Although I’m not sure I’m happy about everyone talking to me.” My smile slips a little. “I can’t walk ten feet down the street without someone saying hello.”
“That’s definitely not a bad thing.”
“I guess not. And even if I thought it was I’d put up with it to be with you.”
“If you’re not careful you’ll lose your Deputy Grumpy title.” She slaps a hand over her mouth. “Forget I said that!”
“Oh, no, now’s not the time to hold back. You just offered to have my babies.”
Her eyes widen.
“And I’m going to take you up on that offer. Right after you explain who Deputy Grumpy is.”
She shakes her head, her hand still covering her mouth, and I can’t resist pulling her into my arms.
“I’ll get it out of you eventually. But first, about those babies…”
Standing, I take her with me and carry her to my bedroom. Lowering her to the bed, I hover over her and just stare. She’s removed her hand; it’s now pressed against my chest, her other presses into the back of my neck where she’s wrapped her arm around me.
“I don’t know if you’re ready to hear this but I need to say it. I love you.” A small gasp slips through her lips. “I think I’ve loved you from the moment I saw you. I wasn’t in the right place then. I am now.”
“Drew.”
“No, don’t say anything. You don’t need to reciprocate. I can love you without you loving me. I’ve done it for seven years already. I can wait as long as it takes until you fall in love with me too.”
“Oh, Drew, I do love you. I started to when you asked me out, and every time we’ve been together, I fell a little more until I landed in love with you.”
“Marry me.”
Her mouth pops open but no sound comes out.
“Okay. Too soon.”
“No!” Her hands move to frame my face. “No. Not too soon, well maybe, but it feels right and in my head I was screaming yes, so…”
The grin she gives me has my own showing up. “So that’s a yes?”
“Yes. I say yes. Life is so short, we shouldn’t waste a moment because we think we have plenty of time. Some of us don’t. And I don’t want to pretend I don’t want to be married to you and having babies.”
“Do you want a big wedding?”
“No.”
“Would you be happy with a judge at the courthouse?”
“Yes.”
“Do you want a particular date?”
“No.”
“Can you say another word other than yes and no?” I ask with a grin.
“Yes.” She laughs. “How about we find out what we need to make a wedding happen and pick the first available day?”
“I can get on board with that. How long do you want to wait to start trying for a baby?”
“I’m happy to start whenever. It will probably take a while because I’ve been on birth control for so long, but I can stop taking it as of today and I’ll get a full checkup as soon as I can to be sure everything is okay.”
I can’t explain the emotions rolling through me. She’s offering me everything I ever wanted. Everything I thought had passed me by.
Lowering my head, I press my lips to hers. “I love you.”
“Love you too.”