“I know you are,” she said. “But there are always going to be things in our lives that will stress us. We can’t wait around hoping for the perfect time to do anything.”
He nodded his head. “Agreed. I’m sorry if I hurt you with my words earlier. You were excited and I took that away from you. No one should do that.”
“You did take it away. I wanted you to be excited with me. I didn’t think it’d cause you to get angry. I guess I thought you were past the way you thought about yourself. It looked it to me, but I wasn’t seeing clearly either. Love could have been clouding that.”
He sighed. “I should be past it and I’m getting there. I really am. Mainly because of you and your family.”
“Awww, that’s nice of you to say. But I think you’ve done most of the work on your own. I had no part in where you are in life.”
“But you have a part in me falling in love. I don’t know that I ever thought I would. I wasn’t looking for it, that much I know.”
“I have been looking for it and couldn’t find it. When I stopped looking I found you.”
“The Fierces would like to say they had a part in it.”
“You know?” she asked, her jaw dropping.
She’d thought he would have caught on two weeks ago and hadn’t. Then she lost her nerve to tell him.
He’d been so excited over Maverick’s first Christmas and everything he bought and set up, the last thing she wanted to do was take his mind off that and put it on their relationship.
“I didn’t until about thirty minutes ago.”
She frowned. “What does that mean?”
“Do your parents know about today? The house, our fight, anything?”
“No. I haven’t told them. I was going to call my mother tonight because I’m sure Elise will say something to Gabe. But I wanted to wait until I saw the land and decided myself. Why?”
“Because your parents and the four Fierces showed up for lunch.”
“And you thought I sent them there?” This wasn’t good.
“No. I didn’t. They were being too nice. If they knew about our fight, I’m sure your mother wouldn’t have come or she would have given me shit. I know you learned it all from her.”
“That’s right,” she said, nodding.
And she was going to find out from her mother exactly what happened.
Talk about horrible timing when she wanted Chance to figure out his feelings for her on his own.
“I went over to talk to them before they left and Grant made a comment about knowing we’d be perfect together just by watching us that one day.”
“They wanted to set me up and I said no.”
“Your mother said that. We didn’t talk much more about it. I promise, but you can check with her. My grandmother knows about our fight.”
“She guessed something was wrong by looking at you, didn’t she?”
For a man who thought he didn’t have anyone in his life, he had the right person at the right times.
“Yeah. That led to the verbal beating. After your parents and the Fierces left, she commented on me getting the stamp of approval from your parents.”
“And it triggered what was said at the party on Christmas Eve?”
“Yes. It made me realize they don’t know my past. They were making their judgments on who I am today.”
“Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.”
