Chapter Eight Derek
CHAPTER EIGHT
Derek
Halfway through my morning run with Tora, still stewing over Jasmine ruining my morning coffee, my phone rang. I didn’t bother to check the caller ID before answering.
“What’s up, little brother?” Chris’s voice greeted me.
“Not a damn thing,” I muttered, stopping to catch my breath in front of the library at the edge of the town square.
“I was calling to find out the name of that restaurant with the waterfall and the private booths. I’ve got a shorty I’m trying to impress, and I need to pull out all the stops.”
“Eternity,” I huffed impatiently. “You good?”
“Yeah, but you’re not.” He chuckled. “What’s got your undies in a twist?”
His use of the exact phrase I’d thrown at Jasmine earlier made an impact. My chest tightened, and I gritted my teeth.
“Nothing, man,” I lied. “This project is just stressing me out.”
“Work doesn’t stress you out, little brother,” Chris said knowingly. “Is there something about this specific project that has you up early in the morning punching air?” He dropped his voice. “Or someone, maybe?”
I exhaled a deep breath, leading Tora into the fenced-in area behind the library. Once I’d checked for other exit points, I shut the gate behind me and unlatched his leash. He made a beeline for the ducks congregating around a small pond, and I took a seat on a nearby bench.
“I don’t know if I can do this, Chris.”
“Do what?”
“I don’t know if I can be this close to Jasmine. Half the time, I wanna kiss her; the other half…” I trailed off, running a hand through my hair. “I don’t know. I feel like I’m going crazy.”
“Pretty women will do that to you, kid,” he said with a sigh. “Ask me how I know.”
“Nah, man.” I shook my head. “This isn’t about that.” That wasn’t entirely true.
“Then what’s it about?”
“I’m trying to reconcile the Jasmine we grew up with and this person I’m pretending to be married to for a damn job. Is this what my life has come to? Am I not better than this?”
“D, I told you going anywhere near Jasmine Morgan was a bad idea.” That wasn’t quite how I remembered it. “Then you told me you had to compete with her to keep your job. Then you told me you’re living with her and pretending to be her husband.”
“‘Living with her’ is a reach” was all I could muster in reply.
“Now you’re gonna sit there and tell me you’re shocked things got complicated? What do you want me to say? Surprise, motherf—” he added in a terrible impression of Samuel L. Jackson.
“I didn’t want you to say anything,” I interrupted before he could finish. “You called me, remember?”
“Well, punk, do you want my advice or not?” He laughed. Despite his teasing, I always wanted his advice.
“I’m gonna get it anyway.”
“It’s too late to back out now. You gave your word. It’s one of Dad’s most repeated rules.”
“And one he didn’t follow when it mattered.”
“That’s not the point.”
“Then what is the point?”
“The point is you need to figure out why you allowed yourself to get this deep with Jasmine Morgan when you could have walked away at any point.”
“You’re acting like I chose this,” I spluttered, jumping to my feet.
“Didn’t you?”
Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Tora’s attention shift away from the duck pond. He bolted toward the rear entrance of the library, and I followed his gait.
“Hey, handsome,” Jasmine greeted, crouched at the entrance with a stack of books balanced on her lap. She scratched Tora behind the ear with one hand and looked up, her eyes scanning the yard until they landed on me. Her expression shifted from soft to annoyed in an instant.
“D?” Chris’s voice buzzed in my ear. “Hey, D? You still there?”
“I gotta let you go,” I whispered, ending the call without waiting for his response.
“Don’t end your phone call on my account,” Jasmine quipped, not bothering to look at me. “I promise not to share any more of your embarrassing childhood moments.” She smirked and stood to face me.
“Whatever you said about me was overshadowed by the drunken spectacle you made of yourself that night, so I’m not worried.” The smile slid off her face, giving me a not-so-small sense of satisfaction. “And not that it’s any of your business, but that was Chris on the phone.”
“CJ?” Her eyebrows perked up. “How’s your brother?”
“I would tell you, but I don’t know if that would qualify as crossing any of the boundaries you established this morning.”
“Really?” She tilted her head, narrowing her eyes.
“Really.” I mimicked her head tilt, raising an eyebrow.
“You two are always making eyes at each other,” a female voice called from behind Jasmine. I looked up to find Kitanya, Eric’s wife, standing in the library doorway.
“Honey.” Jasmine’s demeanor switched instantly as she spun around, whipping me in the face with her hair. “You remember—”
“Kitanya, of course.” I stepped around Jasmine and extended my hand after wiping it on my shorts. “Sorry, you caught me mid-run.”
“Oh yeah.” Kitanya nodded. “It’s a hot one today.”
“Luckily for me”—I smiled, sidling up behind Jasmine—“my wife doesn’t mind a little sweat.” Wrapping my arms around her, I pressed her back into my damp T-shirt. “Do you, baby?” I leaned down and whispered in her ear.
“Oh, the sweat doesn’t bother me, sweetie,” she replied sweetly, making no move to escape my grasp. “The smell, though…” She wrinkled her nose, and I released her, trying to discreetly sniff my shirt.
“You two are adorable.” Kitanya chuckled. “I was just about to show your wife our founders’ collection.”
“What’s that?” My question earned a side-eye from Jasmine.
“A collection of documents from John William Pike, Donald Hodge, and Joseph Walker,” Kitanya explained. “Would you like to see?”
“Maybe another time,” Jasmine interjected. “I know Derek would love to finish his run and take a very long and very hot shower.” She smirked.
“Good to see you again, Derek,” Kitanya called to me before she disappeared inside.
Jasmine rounded on me, snatching her books before following Kitanya into the library.
“What’s the matter, wife?” I called to her retreating figure. “No kiss goodbye?”
“Maybe if you didn’t smell like someone boiled cabbage in a burning tire,” she shot back.
“This what a real man smells like,” I quipped. “You probably aren’t familiar.”
She held up her left hand before using it to open the door to the library. At first, I thought she was flashing her ring at me, but I quickly realized that she was using the wrong finger.
After I got back from my run with Tora and my run-in with my “wife,” I took a longer-than-usual shower, wondering if my brother was right about the direct source of my stress.
It was painfully clear—as evidenced by the half a bottle of body wash I’d just used—that Jasmine was getting under my skin.
But that was only because I was letting her, right?
Jasmine hadn’t wasted any time acclimating herself to Miller’s Cove and its residents.
She’d waltzed into town like she’d lived here her whole life, winning over the Pikes, charming the librarians, and even getting Tora to betray me with a wagging tail and adoring eyes.
Meanwhile, I was over here feeling like I knew nothing about a town I was supposed to turn into a moneymaker. I needed to step up my game.
The truth was, I wasn’t exactly excited about waking up to face the day because, mentally, I was still riding the roller coaster of my first day in Miller’s Cove with Jasmine Morgan.
Between waking up to her roasting me about my morning breath and ending the night massaging the soreness out of her feet while she screamed with laughter, something had shifted.
Something I wasn’t ready to examine too closely.
I didn’t know if it was watching her in action at the Pikes’ place, learning that I might—just might—have been wrong about her motives for this project, or seeing her curled up with my dog like they’d been besties for years.
Hell, maybe it was the way her smile in the kitchen had knocked the wind out of my chest. Whatever it was, it was messing with my head.
The worst part? Not knowing how she felt.
One minute, we were kicking it like we used to as kids, and the next, she was icing me out.
Mixed signals from women wasn’t something I was accustomed to, and it was unsettling.
I wondered if CJ was right about Jasmine being the one woman immune to my quiet, nerdy charm.
Not that I’d call myself a nerd… but still.
I wanted to talk to Jasmine, to see where her head was at and what she was feeling.
But I couldn’t even do that because I didn’t know where my head was at or what I was feeling.
Another ingredient in this mess? We were competing for the same position.
I shouldn’t have been anywhere near this woman, much less catching feelings.
I got dressed and headed out, determined to get my head back in the game and off Jasmine.
“Hey, Chief!” David greeted me as I walked into The Mill. His booming voice and easy smile were a welcome distraction.
“Hey, David,” I called back, reaching out to shake his hand. Instead, he surprised me by pulling me into a hug.
“Decided to stop by and grab some lunch,” I said, looking around the café. “But I’m wondering if I’m too late… or too early?”
“Nah, it’s Wednesday,” he replied, as if that should mean something to me.
Seeing my confusion, he elaborated. “On Wednesdays, Eleanor and some of the ladies get lunch at the tea room, then they get their hair and nails done. Sometimes they go shopping. It’s usually an all-day thing.
” He shrugged. “I suspect your lady is with them.” He chuckled, clearly amused.
“Yeah, I ran into her at the library with Kitanya earlier this morning,” I admitted.
“Yup, she’s definitely part of the crew now.”
“So you just close up shop for the whole day?” I glanced around the quiet café.
“Well, not the whole day.” He leaned over the counter to pull two bottles of beer from the cooler.
He handed one to me and popped the cap off his own.
“Eleanor and I open up in the morning for the breakfast rush. Once the crowd dies down…” He shrugged and took a swig of his beer, leaving the sentence unfinished.
“You close up?” I guessed, taking the opener he’d handed me.
“Not quite,” he replied with a sly smile.
At that moment, the bells over the door tinkled, and a booming voice called out, “Young Blood! I was hoping I’d get a chance to take your money.”
I turned to see Eric and Bubba, who I recognized from dinner the previous night, entering The Mill. They were accompanied by two other men I didn’t recognize.
“Take my money?” I raised an eyebrow at David.
“On Wednesdays, while the women are away, the men will play.” Bubba hooked an arm around my neck as David led us toward a room in the back of The Mill.
“Five-card stud,” David finished, opening the door to reveal a lavishly decorated gambling room.
It had a poker table, a large humidor full of cigars, and a fully stocked bar.
There was even a velvet painting of dogs playing poker on the wall.
The scene was so absurdly perfect, I almost laughed out loud.
“So what do you say?” David grinned. “You joining us?”
“Deal me in,” I replied, feeling the stress of the morning begin to lift as I pulled out a chair. This was exactly the kind of distraction I needed.