It’s pretend,I remind myself while I hug and kiss her back.
Just pretend.
But I’ve lied enough in the past twenty-four hours. I can’t lie to myself too.
I can’t pretend it’s not my teenage dreams come true to be holding and kissing this woman, even knowing we have an expiration date.
That everything about her body molding to mine feels even more perfect than I dreamed it would.
That I don’t want to let go.
She’s beaming at me as she pulls out of the kiss. “See?” she says to her grandma. “He’s the absolute best.”
“Any fool can get a motor,” Grandma Vicki says.
I look her square in the eye. “I can replace it too.”
She stares at me like she’s trying to read the lies littering my soul.
But fuck it.
I’m pissed now.
I didn’t do a single damn thing to this woman. I can have her shop back up and running by midafternoon. And she’s being a butthead.
“I’ll call Wade,” Kimberly says. “If he—if Dane can’t fix it today, we’ll have a backup plan.”
Grandma Vicki hasn’t stopped staring at me.
I don’t stop staring back.
I don’t care how old she is. She’s being rude, and she’s putting Amanda in an awful position.
Just like my family’s done to me for my entire life.
Starting to see why it was preferable to pretend to be engaged to the enemy to telling her grandma that she doesn’t want the bakery.
Grandma Vicki apparently likes getting her way.
“Do you need a credit card for the motor?” Amanda asks.
“This one’s on me.”
“If you break my kitchen—” Grandma Vicki starts.
Kimberly leaps between us. “Thank you, Dane. Whether you can do it or not, we appreciate you trying.”
I nod to her. “Anything to help Amanda.”
I would. I’m still the sucker who’d do anything to help Amanda.
No regrets, though.
Not when she beams at me again.
I can practically hear her voice in my head.We’re making progress on my mom!
Amanda’s a whirlwind in the kitchen, tossing off her apron and grabbing her small wallet and phone from one of the drawers in the desk in a small office.
