“Of course he did,” Willow grumbled.
“Now, I know you, and I know something is up. Something happened between you two, and I wanna know what it is. And then I wanna know why I had to practically torture the information out of you.” Avery’s brows drew down. “I thought we were better friends than that.”
Well, shit. This wasn’t some information-mining mission like Willow would get from Rory. This was Avery, her best friend and biggest cheerleader, and Willow had unintentionally hurt her. Lord, a stake to the chest would’ve been less painful than knowing that. With anyone else, Willow would’ve assumed those words were simply a passive-aggressive guilt trip, but not from Avery. She said what she meant and meant what she said—it was one of Willow’s most favorite things about her. She never had to wonder or worry about where they stood. And right now, she knew. She’d hurt her best friend.
Willow slipped around her desk and went straight to Avery, wrapping her arms around her. “I’m sorry. It’s not you. Or us. I promise.”
Avery returned her hug. “So you didn’t tell Mac either?”
“Nope, and I have no doubt I’m going to pay for that tonight.”
“Well, that makes me feel a little better. But I’m still going to need to know what’s going on.”
Willow pulled away with a laugh. “Of course you do.”
“Seems only fair.”
She paced around her small office, her lip caught between her teeth. She just needed to get this over with. Like a bandage. Rip it off and deal with the sting of pain rather than the slow torture of drawing it out. “I, um—”
“Oh my God, youdidsleep with him!”
Willow spun around, her mouth agape. Was it written that plainly on her that anyone could tell? She’d worried about that when she’d given her virginity to Finn—that somehow, she’d be walking down the street and people would take one look at her and be able to tell. She hadn’t thought she’d need to worry about it at twenty-eight, though.
“Don’t crush my dreams and tell me he didn’t get better with time,” Avery said. “Is that why you’ve been avoiding him? He wasn’t able to get you off, and now you can’t face him?”
Willow choked on her spit at the same time flashes of their night together flickered through her mind. Oh, he’d definitely gotten better with time. Infinitely. “No, that’s not it.”
Avery’s eyes got wide, and a grin spread across her face. “So he gotbetter?” She fell into the chair and patted the one next to her, gesturing for Willow to sit. “Details. Now.”
Yeah, it’d probably be better if she were sitting down for this. “It’s only happened once…” Okay, that was a lie. It had only happened onenight, but there had definitely been more than just one round. Technicalities.
“Just from looking at that man, I’d place bets he can do alotduring that ‘once.’”
Willow tried not to let her memories sweep her away, but she couldn’t help it. Not when they were so fresh in her mind. Not when they’d floated through her head more times than she could count—the first time on his bed, right after when he’d taken her in the shower after caressing every inch of her, even when they’d ventured out of his bedroom for a snack and he’d bent her over the kitchen counter and taken her from behind. Drew could’ve walked in at any moment, which, apparently, had only cranked Willow’s engine a little hotter because she’d come so hard, she might’ve blacked out for a minute.
“Yeah, definitely don’t talk about this with Rory,” Avery said. “Your sex fantasies are written all over your face.”
Shit. Rory. Willow hadn’t even thought about telling her. While Mac would be pissed Willow hadn’t come straight to her and told her everything, she’d get over it soon enough. With Mac, a conversation about Willow and Finn would be relatively painless. With Rory, it’d be a second version of hell.
“I don’t think I have to worry about that. I’d rather strut down Main Street naked than discuss my love life with Rory.Especiallywhen that love life contains one of the Thomas boys.”
“I don’t know—having that conversation with her might actually be easier than talking with Finn himself.” Avery propped her feet up on the desk and leaned back in the chair. “He lookedpissedwhen he came in here. Though I don’t blame him—it was clear as day you were in here but avoiding him.”
Willow blew out a deep breath. She wasn’t looking forward to that discussion, but it’d have to happen sooner rather than later. She couldn’t keep avoiding Finn like he carried the plague. And, truth be told, she didn’t want to. But she also knew her original plan of carrying on like nothing was unusual, like she and Finn seeing each other again wouldn’t register on the radars of the people of Havenbrook, was a pipe dream.
After five years of busting her ass and doing everything exactly right, her daddy had finally,finallybestowed a compliment on her. He was already waiting for her to screw up with Finn being in town. And if she did, he’d waste no time making sure Willow knew exactly how badly she’d messed up.
She wasn’t going to go through that again. She’d had enough of it to last a lifetime.
Even days after the best sex of his life, Finn still had a spring in his step. He smiled more freely, laughed a little louder, and felt more relaxed.
Of course, that’d been before his partner in the best sex of his life treated him like he was a damn leper.
All week, he’d been trying to see Willow, but it just hadn’t worked out. He, Drew, and Nola had had too much on the docket to allow for much downtime, especially now that they were dealing with bullshit regulations that somehow hadn’t been an issue until Dick had arrived back in town. But they were jumping through the hoops, adjusting the bar top height—twice, because, apparently, the first number they’d given had been amistake—and adding more sprinkler heads for the fire suppression system—despite those being inspected and approved already—to name a few.
Busywork. All of it. It was a pain in their asses, but they’d managed to get through it all. There wasn’t a doubt in Finn’s mind Dick was doing this to try to get them to give up and leave. But what the mayor apparently hadn’t learned yet was Finn and Drewspecializedin making their way through difficult and tricky situations.
The only thing this was in the grand scheme of things was inconvenient, especially given the forward progress he’d made with Willow. If Finn had managed to find a pocket of time and slip away, she’d been unavailable, so they’d had to make do with texts and phone calls. While he hadn’t been inside her since that night at his place, that didn’t mean he hadn’t made her come again in their time apart. And, from her enthusiastic response to those instances, she was having a great time.
