“I know. I appreciate the offer more than you know, but I’ll be fine.” She was already better than she’d expected to be. She didn’t need to disrupt any more lives because of her rose-colored glasses.
“Okay. If you change your mind, I’m there.”
She thought of Beckett, Jilly, and Ollie. “Thank you. I’m going tolearn to fish. And hike. I’m going to try everything and make the absolute most of each day. Then, I’m going to lie around and read, paint my nails, and swim in the cove. I’m going to ignore all of my work texts and just relax.”
“She’s seriously texting you?”
“Repeatedly. Like we didn’t have a conversation where I told her I was out of town.”
“You need another job.”
“I can’t deal with that today.”
“No. Of course. I love you, Presley. You’re the best person I know.”
“Thanks. Back at you.”
They hung up and Presley tried to get into the romance she was reading, but her mind kept wandering to all the signs she’d overlooked. Her parents had raised her to be independent mostly because they wanted their independence. She thought of calling them now. If they weren’t at work, they were together, so she’d reach both of them if she reached out. But her mom would tell her it clearly wasn’t meant to be and problems didn’t get solved by moping about them. Her dad would make agreeing noises regardless of whether there was anything to agree with.
“You’re fine. You’re always fine. This is just a small detour.” She looked around the room again.
Scooting down in the bed, she put her book aside. She turned the lamp off and lay in the darkness. Little stars twinkled on Beckett’s ceiling, and for some reason, it delighted her. Had he put them there? It was funny to think he went to sleep every night looking up at these. They weren’t real, but she made a wish anyway.
It would have surprised her to know she went to sleep with a smile on her face.
Eight
Her internal clock woke her even before the sun peeked through the slats in the blinds. She loved mornings, the start of a new day. Today, especially. Today was the start of a new road. One she hadn’t traveled before. A new Presley Ayers.
Getting out of bed, she pulled on a pair of yoga pants, brushed her hair up into a high ponytail, threw on a cute T-shirt she’d found at L.L.Bean, and slipped on some socks. The cabin was definitely warmer than her first room, but it still had that “should I get out of bed?” cold that greeted every morning.
Taking her phone off its charger, she opened the blinds quietly and looked out at the lake, glistening like it’d been covered in pixie dust. She took a picture, added a couple of filters, posted to Insta. TikTok was the popular kid in socials these days but she stayed loyal to her Instagram fans because that was where she started.
Her followers had grown slowly and organically. When a local celebrity influencer followed her and shared one of Presley’s posts in her story, she’d gained several thousand followers. She liked TikTok, utilized it, but she liked the not-having-to-perform aspect of Instagram.
Slipping out of the room, Presley stopped when she saw Beckett’s large body sprawled out on the couch. A blanket was draped partially across him, but most of it pooled on the floor where one of his sock-covered feet rested. The other was up on the arm of the couch. He still wore the Henley from the night before, but he’d changed into sweatpants or pajama bottoms. She couldn’t quite tell which.
Her fingers twitched at her side. He had the kind of hair that beggedfor a woman to run her hands through it.Not your hands. Not you.She padded lightly past the couch and into his kitchen. As quietly as possible, she set about making her charming and sexy host a thank-you breakfast.
The tension in her shoulders eased when she accidentally banged the pan against the stove and he didn’t wake up. She found vanilla, her secret ingredient, in his cupboard and wondered if Jilly put it there. Did he like to cook? God, she could just imagine him baking cookies with Ollie. He was so good with her.
By the time the French toast was sizzling on the stove, she’d loosened up enough that she wasn’t thinking about the gorgeous man sleeping on the couch. Instead, she was thinking about all of the things she was going to embrace moving forward.
Grabbing her phone from the counter, she angled herself for a perfect selfie with a pretty plate of the powdered-sugar-covered, golden-brown bread. Extending her arm as far as she could, she used the point-five option. She’d make a TikTok later in the day, but right now, she didn’t feel like talking. Right now, she just wanted to capture the moment.
She tagged the airline in the photo when she shared it to her story, thanking them. Her caption read, “On my own again. Woke up in paradise.” Smiling, she tagged the lodge and added a couple of hashtags, including #GetLost.
A sound spun her around, and she nearly squealed and dropped her phone when she realized Beckett was standing. She saved the phone, but the top piece of toast went flying, leaving a powdered-sugar trail in its wake.
She couldn’t look away from him staring at her. His gaze was bleary and he looked a little confused. His hair was mussed, one hand shoved in the locks. He blinked several times and everything inside her clenched. She pulled in a deep, slow breath. He was sexy as hell in the morning. She hadn’t thought the bulky, outdoorsy type was her jam, but wow.
“Coffee?” That one word was rough.
Putting her phone and the plate of food down, she quickly grabbed the piece of bread from the floor and tossed that one in the trash.
Grabbing a cup for the coffee, she poured some as he padded, not so lightly, over to the table and sank into a chair. “Cream?”
“Black.”
