CHAPTER EIGHT
TAYLOR
That’s something I question as one night together turns into several and the days turn into weeks and somehow, we’re still seeing each other and learning more and more about each other.
He starts taking allergy pills but we don’t want to chance things so we spend our evenings at his house, and he wasn’t being boastful when he said he could cook.
The man puts me to shame. We go to music bingo together at Matty’s bar and somehow I even convince Amelia and Mark to come along.
With both Mark and Gabe being older they get all the eighties and nineties music, but Amelia and I shut them down when it comes to recent hits and K-pop.
Gabe really gets me out of my comfort zone when he takes me fishing on his boat.
Yes, the man has a boat, and I barely have my sea legs.
Thankfully I don’t lose my breakfast or lunch, though I don’t catch anything either.
What I do end up with is a wicked sunburn that has everyone at work offering their sympathies until they hear how I got it.
Alan, the dentist I work with the most and the definitely not shy one, asks when my new boyfriend will take him out fishing. I open my mouth to argue that Gabe isn’t my boyfriend but then shut it because he certainly feels like a boyfriend.
That night after stopping by my house to feed and love on Monica, and change out of my work clothes, I pack a bag like I do most evenings and go to Gabe’s place.
His happy grin when he greets me at the door falls when he sees how red I am.
“I warned you the rays are brutal out on the ocean.”
“Yes, you did,” I say, thrusting my bag at him. Like most I hate when people rub it in that they were right.
“Have you drunk plenty of water today? Why don’t I run you a cool shower?”
He’s so stinking nice that I swear he can’t be for real sometimes.
The only time he gets snappish is when he’s fighting his nicotine urges and that gets annoying.
I tried convincing him to try the patch, but he’s determined to do this cold turkey and is afraid that reintroducing nicotine to his system will cause him to crave it even more.
I guess he has a point, but as someone who has never smoked in my life, I’m afraid I don’t have any experience with this and my own tolerance for his snappy moods isn’t that high.
And with his hovering right now I’m feeling suffocated. “Yes, I drank plenty of water and I don’t want a shower.”
“I have some after sun aloe lotion-”
“Gabe, will you stop?!” I run my hand over my face and wince at the sting of my burned skin.
“Just stop. We already know you’re Mr. Perfect,” I huff, turning and walking into the living room and flopping down on the couch and then getting pissed when my sunburned legs hate the rub of the couch’s fabric against them.
I’m a royal mess and I probably should have just stayed at home.
But then I would miss Gabe and would be mad at myself for missing him.
Gabe follows slowly behind me and stops several feet from the couch, his face a mask of misery.
Just great. I went and hurt his feelings.
“Taylor, what’s wrong?” he asks quietly.
Nothing. Everything. Ugh. “You,” I finally say.
“Us. We’re wrong for each other. You’re allergic to my cat, act like a vegetable is going to kill you.
” Okay, maybe that’s not completely true, but it annoys me how he’ll turn his nose up at all but the most basic of vegetables.
Grilled artichokes can be delicious. “I’m a morning person and you’re a night owl, you listen to freaking Yacht Rock which has to be the most boring and basic music ever, and you’re too damn nice,” I finish sourly.
“Nice? I’m too nice,” he says slowly, coming over to the couch where he towers over me.
“Yes!” I say throwing up my hands. “And for some weird reason we keep seeing each other.”
“I enjoy seeing you and I thought enjoyed my company too.”
Pursing my lips, I try to hang on to my anger that is slowly turning into sadness. “I do. But this is too easy. Our relationship shouldn’t work.”
Gabe eases his long frame onto the couch next to me. “But it is working and that’s a good thing. That’s what happens, the right relationships work like that because it’s actually not work at all.”
I shift on the couch, miserable and unable to get comfortable. I should have called out of work today, but I was too stubborn to do that. “I don’t trust it,” I say pitifully.
“Why?”
“Because that’s not how things work. We should be compatible and enjoy the same things.” I don’t add that I’m afraid he’ll get bored with me. I keep that fear to myself.
“Did you not like fishing?”
Frowning, I shake my head. “It wasn’t bad. Other than me getting burned.”
“Going to farmers markets and craft shows aren’t my thing but they’ve been something new that I enjoy because I do them with you.”
Could he make me melt any more?! I manage a shaky grin. “Music bingo was fun.”
“It was. I think we’re going to find there’s a whole plethora of things we can explore doing together that will be new to one or both of us and that we’re going to make a regular part of our life.”
“You just wanted to say plethora,” I tease. That’s another thing Gabe has introduced me to, cheesy old comedy movies.
“I did,” he admits with a grin before carefully taking my hand in his. My palm isn’t burned while the back of my hand is rather pink.
His eyes meet and hold mine. “Taylor, I know you think I’m the wrong man for you, but I think I’m your right kind of wrong.”
“That doesn’t make any sense.”
He arches his brows. “Doesn’t it? I’m older than you wanted, have a boringly secure and extremely well-paying job, listen to music that makes you roll your eyes, am looking for commitment, and love you desperately.”
My confused mind catches on the word love and happiness beats in my chest pushing the misery aside. “You love me?”
“How could I not? You think I’m all wrong for you, but I know how right you are for me.” He struggles but manages a tight smile. “What do you say? Think you could give me a chance to convince you of the error of your ways and have you fall in love with me?”
I clutch his hand harder despite the pull on my skin. “Well, with an offer like that how can I refuse to see the light and let you be my prince charming?”
“If that’s what you want, but I think I would prefer the title of boyfriend for now and maybe you could upgrade me to husband at some point?”
The hope and love shining in his dark blue eyes makes me weepy, something that doesn’t happen.
I’m not a crying sort of a person, yet I can’t deny the tears of joy brimming in my eyes and obscuring my vision.
“Yes, I’d like that,” I say, blinking rapidly.
Then, sunburn be damned, I throw myself at him.
Gabe cups my face but at my flinch he moves to cradle my head instead, carefully pressing the lightest of kisses on my lips.
“I love you,” I tell him when our lips part.
He pulls back. “You don’t need to say-”
I stop his nonsense with the press of my hand over his mouth. “I’m fully aware of what I do and don’t need, and I need you. I want you and I love you.” I smile. “You’re right, it was surprisingly easy to love a man I thought all wrong. So guess it’s time I admitted I was the one wrong.”
He laughs. “I don’t care about right or wrong as long as we’re together making this work.”
If this man is crazy enough to put up with me, how could he be any more right for me?
Smiling, I grab his face and plant a big one on him, since my lips are about the only part of my body that doesn’t hurt.