The day drags by achingly slow. Too fucking slow. It’s a shame I actually have to get work done because all I really want to do is walk next door and see Pippa. I want to steal her—even if she’s kicking and screaming—and pull her all the way back to her house. Or she can come to my place. I just need to be near her again. I want to feel her soft, warm body sleeping next to mine. I want to run my fingers along her bare skin, further exploring every single inch of her exquisite body.
I want to hear her soft moans in her sleep when my fingers play with the waistband of her pj’s. I want to see how many orgasms I can get from her until she’s begging for a break, her body too spent to take any more.
I want to sit on the living room floor and talk about life with her. I want to know about her childhood, to hear the silly stories of the trouble she got into. She seemed to be a rebellious teenager, and I want to know every detail from every day of her life from her very first memory to the moment she met me. I’m obsessed with knowing everything there is to know about her, and I’m afraid of what that could mean for me.
I’ve never been like this with a woman. Quite frankly, I’ve never cared about women. I’ve ended up in mutually agreed-upon relationships that were based on sex alone. The expectations were clear from the very beginning. Feelings weren’t supposed to get involved at any point in time. And if I ever felt like someone wasn’t holding up their end of the bargain by not developing feelings, I’d simply leave.
Now, it’s a terrifying realization that I want to stay. I don’t want to book a flight back to New York. I don’t want to run away from Pippa, even when her eyes soften and she looks at me like I couldn’t do a single thing wrong. I’m not terrified of asking her on a date. Usually, the thought of a date would put me off. This morning, I found myself holding my breath, waiting for Pippa to answer me. I wanted her to agree to it. I want to take her out, to show her off, to have people know she’s with me. That she’s mine.
And that’s never happened to me before. I don’t know how to handle it.
One thing I do know is I’d spend every second with her if I could, and that’s unlike me. I like my personal space. I like to be alone. I spent entire days and nights alone without someone talking to me as a child. I got used to it. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve found myself having to reset my social battery, getting overstimulated by being around others. It’s not like that with her. I’d be in a better mood if she was right next to me, not an entire building away.
The thought of her used to irritate me. She used to get under my skin in a way that I wanted to put states between us. Things have changed. Quickly and dramatically, in a way that I can’t keep up with.
I think I have actual feelings for this woman.
I don’t do feelings.
But I want to do feelings if they’re for her.
Speaking of feelings, I look down at my vibrating phone, finding Beck’s caller ID on it.
“Fuck,” I mutter under my breath. He’s texted me upward of ten times since our chat yesterday, which isn’t typical of him. He’s the friend that gives me space. He doesn’t send dumb memes all day and night or send weird-ass videos he found on different apps like some of our friends.
But he’s still apparently a nosy motherfucker regardless because even though I ignored his first call, he’s calling again.
He’s going to ask about Pippa. Which means he’s going to know about my goddamn feelings for her because why else would I be in a woman’s bed in the middle of the afternoon? We used to be cut from the same cloth until he met Margo. He knows the importance of what he stumbled upon yesterday.
I angrily swipe to answer it, annoyed he’s intuitive. “What?” I spit, already wanting to hang up the call.
“Someone’s grumpy this morning. Were you up late last night with that local friend of yours?”
“Fuck off, Sinclair,” I growl, angrily clicking my computer mouse to give myself something to do.
Beck chuckles on the other line. “You knew I’d bother you until you gave me details.”
“I don’t remember prying into your love life when you were pining after Margo like a goddamn lost puppy. Even when you talked about her all the time, although she was dating your brother.”
“We don’t need to bring Carter into this. Plus, I didn’t talk about her that much.”
“You talked about her all the damn time.”
“I don’t know why the conversation got pointed in my direction, but we’re going to circle back and talk about you, my friend. Don’t think I didn’t miss the fact you said love life. Is the Camden Hunter in love?”
I grunt. I’m not in love with Pippa. I haven’t known her long enough to love her—I think. I have no prior history to know what it’d even feel like to be in love. But I do believe I’ve developed feelings for her. Weird, foreign feelings I’ve never felt before.
“No, I haven’t fallen in love,” I snap. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I’m talking about the fact that you were willingly lying on a pair of sheets that seemed to have a lower thread count than your IQ.”
“I told you, it was the rental.”
“Margo is still ignoring me for your damn project, which means I have all the time in the world right now. So I can keep asking you questions until you eventually stop dodging them, or you could just answer me now, and we don’t have to keep going back and forth.”
My finger and thumb pinch the bridge of my nose. Screw him and the fact he can read me like an open book. “Do you remember when we first all came to Sutten?”
“You mean the time I got married there? Yeah, you could say I still remember it.”
“Has anyone ever told you you’re a dick?”
Beck laughs on the other line. “Takes one to know one. Keep going. But yes, I do, in fact, remember my wedding, thank you for asking.”
“Well, remember when someone spilled beer all over me at the stupid tourist bar?”
“Yes.”
“And remember when your dessert caterer ran into me and spilled cupcakes all over me?”
“I do remember hearing about that, yes.”
“Turns out the woman in both those scenarios owns the neighboring business to mine. She owns the cafe next to the gallery.”
“And you’re seeing her? I swore I remembered Margo saying how much of an asshole you were to her.”
I swallow because I do regret how awful I was to Pippa. Looking back, I don’t know what my problem was, but I definitely wasn’t kind to her. It’s a miracle she still wants to speak to me—is allowing me to take her on a date. “Yeah, I was,” I finally answer, remembering Beck waiting on the other line.
“I’ve got to know more about how this happened.”
So for the next ten minutes, I relay everything to Beck like a couple of gossiping teenagers. He asks questions the entire time, seemingly interested in the story of me and Pippa.
At the end of it, Beck lets out a long whistle. “Damn. Never did I think I’d see the day where this happened. Your crush is cute.”
If he was here in person, I’d flip him off. I do it regardless, even though he can’t see me. I lean back in my office chair, staring up at the white ceiling. Even after filling Beck in on everything and talking about it out loud, I have no idea what to call what’s happening.
“Fuck off, man. I’m a grown adult. I don’t have a crush. I don’t know what it is, but I can’t get her out of my mind.”
“They’re called feelings, Camden. Have fun with them.”
I grunt. I don’t want to have feelings for Pippa, but I don’t not want to have feelings for her either. It’s a terrible situation. One I can’t wrap my mind around.
“I’m going to take her on our first real date tonight,” I blurt. God, I really am a little lovesick teenager. Now I’m talking about first dates at almost forty years old. This woman is too far in my head—my skin—my everything.
“Please tell me you have something romantic planned.”
“She’s planning it, actually.”
Beck lets out a disappointed sigh. “You’re making her plan the date? What the hell, man.”
“She loves this town and all the little local secrets about it. I wouldn’t know where to start here when planning a nice date. So yeah, asshole, I told her she could pick where, and she seemed very excited about it, thank you very much.”
“If you say so.” He laughs, managing to irritate me more.
“I actually don’t remember asking your opinion.”
“What a shame for you, then, because I’m still going to give it to you.”
“Not if I hang up on you.” I spin a pen in my hand, needing something to do with my hands. I’m getting anxious because the only thing I really want to do is forget about everything I need to do today and give Pippa a visit next door.
“All jokes aside, I’m happy for you. Maybe you’ve always needed someone who will talk back to you and isn’t scared of you. I hope things work out between the two of you.” He laughs again. The asshole needs to stop finding my life so comical. “I can’t quite picture you settling down in Sutten, though. Are you going to get yourself a nice pair of cowboy boots? Finally ride that bull at that damn bar?”
“Oh, fuck off. We haven’t been on a date yet. No one’s talked about moving.”
“Mhm,” he hums, clearly not believing a word I’m saying. “Anyway. Care to hear my next idea?”
Beck gives me a welcome distraction by laying out the logistics for a new idea he has. It isn’t terrible. Not like any of his ideas are really ever bad. I hate to admit it, but he’s too smart for his own good.
He manages to distract me for almost an hour before we hang up and I’m left alone with my thoughts again. My fingers twitch at my sides as I stare at my computer screen. I’m supposed to be going through the portfolio of a new talent Leo found, but I’m not in the mood. Instead, my fingers itch to get dirty. I want to get them covered in clay. To feel the weight of a carving tool in my palm. I have a few bases ready to go at my Manhattan studio, but that’s too far away. I’d never thought I’d be here long enough to need supplies.
But now, I’d do anything to have everything here to get lost in making some art. That might be the one thing that’d keep my mind from Pippa.
I’m not so lucky. But I do get a reprieve from Trisha calling me, wanting to discuss the monthly budget.
