Chapter Thirty
Brian
I noticed her yellow t-shirt in the distance and was glad I had a pair of sunglasses on so no one could tell I was gawking at her as she walked along the wet sand in her pretty bare feet, both her white sneakers in her left hand.
Her ash-blonde hair looked like a halo as it caught the setting sun’s fading light.
Her nickname suited her. She was a walking ray of sunshine. And I got to spend the next ten days with her.
Alan was right—this was an opportunity not to be wasted.
Her face lit up with a smile when she noticed me sitting in the sand in front of Alan’s cottage, and she jogged toward me.
“Hey! How was your ice cream?”
“We decided not to go. I didn’t want to keep Alan from getting on the road. He was hoping to get home before the news came on.”
She plunked down next to me. “It was so nice of him to come and see you.”
“Alan’s a good dude.”
Not date-worthy good, though.
“Hopefully it’s a familial trait. Lainey and Conor deserve a good man.”
“Adam has been nothing but a standup guy. He’s freaking head-over-heels for Lainey, and he adores Conor. I’m convinced Shawn arranged for them to be together. He wouldn’t have sent someone unworthy. Adam’s going to be a good dad to that little boy.”
“That’s true. Justin said that after Conor was left alone when Lainey was kidnapped, he was inconsolable. No matter what Kristy and Justin did, the baby wouldn’t stop crying. But the second Adam held him, he immediately calmed down.”
“There’s a reason Lainey calls him the baby whisperer.”
Jade dug a seashell out of the sand and examined it as she remarked with a wistful tone, “I hope it works out for them. Lain deserves a happily ever after.”
“So do you.”
She brushed the dirt from the shell and murmured, “Don’t we all.”
I found my own shell and studied it as I asked, “You think you’ll ever have kids someday?”
“I hope so. What about you?”
“I mean, yeah. But it feels so far away that it’s hard to fathom. Kind of like, I obviously want to retire someday, but I can’t imagine it right now.”
Her laugh sounded hollow. “Well, I hope for your future children’s sake, you get around to having them before you reach retirement age.”
“Me, too. I worry I’m going to wake up someday and wonder where my life went. Getting shot has put a lot of things in perspective. I need to make some changes.”
I’d been thinking about that since I lay in the hospital bed staring at the ceiling. But saying it out loud made it real.
“Oh yeah? Like what?”
This is where I should have said something like, “Settle down,” or “Stop working all the time, so I have more time for a girlfriend.” Anything like that to let her know I was ready to get serious.
No, instead, my dumb ass said, “Oh, you know… enjoy life to the fullest. Find time to spend with my friends. Try to go fishing more.”
Fishing?
I don’t even own a fucking fishing pole!
Granted, I’d thought about taking Conor when he was older, because Shawn had loved to fish and I wanted to pass that on to his son. But I knew I’d done a shit job of conveying that’s what I was talking about.
And the only time my friends wanted to hang out anymore was to watch a game at Hannigan’s and maybe shoot a game of pool before they headed home to their wives or girlfriends. Soon they’d be having kids, and the only games we’d be hanging out to watch would be Little League.
With one hand wrapped around her ankle and her chin on her knee, she poured sand from her hand and snarked, “Wow, that’s deep Brian. It took getting shot for you to realize that?”
I wanted to be offended, but I couldn’t because I knew she was right. Not to mention, it turned me on that she called me on my bullshit.
She tossed the remaining grains of sand in her hand, stood up, dusted her butt off, and headed toward the house.
“I’ll leave you to your deep thoughts.”
It took five seconds for me to follow after her.
****
Jade
“You’re right—that was lame,” Brian said once he walked inside the screen door and sat down next to me on the navy blue couch that’d seen better days.
“I guess I’m just embarrassed because I don’t know how I’m supposed to answer that.
I had this near-death experience, and I know I should make changes in my life, but I’m not exactly sure what those changes should be. ”
“You could have just said that.”
A smile ghosted his lips. “I just did.”
I returned the smile. Our eyes locked, and for a long beat, we just stared at each other.
He really was handsome.
Those damn dimples were going to be my undoing.
I’d gone for wanting to have a fling with him, to being annoyed with myself for even considering hooking up with someone so shallow, back to wanting to continue where we’d left off at the bank.
It’d been an innocent kiss, but it’d definitely left me wanting more.
“So, I noticed there is only one bedroom…”
I kind of was hoping that’d get the conversation started.
Instead, he replied, “I know. I already scoped out the hammock. I can sleep in that since,” he hopped up and down on the seat cushion, like he was testing it out. “This couch is as lumpy as Alan said it is.”
“You’re not sleeping in a hammock, Brian. You’re recovering from surgery—getting in and out of that thing will cause way too much stress on your thigh.”
His face fell, like he was disappointed. “Oh. I hadn’t really thought about that.”
“I’ll sleep on the couch. It can’t be any worse than the couch in the nurse’s lounge that I’ve napped on.”
“You’re not sleeping out here. You did me a solid by taking time off and driving me for two days. The least I can do is offer you the bed.”
“You just had surgery Brian. I’m a nurse. It would be malpractice on my part to let you sleep anywhere but in a bed.”
He got up and poked his head through the bedroom door, then looked back at me.
“It’s only a queen bed, but, I mean, we did sleep in the same bed last night without any issues, granted it was a king. But I think we could do it again.”
Without any issues?
We almost did it while you were sleeping!
I know I would have gone through with it if he hadn’t woken up and stopped things.
I also knew that he’d been awake when I rubbed his dick while I pretended to be asleep.
So why was he lying now, saying there hadn’t been any issues?
There was only one way to find out…
“You’re right. We’re adults. Of course we could sleep in the same bed without a problem.”
Except I had every intention of causing a problem. To borrow a metaphor Brian could relate to, it was time to fish or cut bait.