“I mean…” I shrugged and winced. “You know I did. And they’re good together.”
“I know they are.” He smiled gently. “Talking seriously about this family thing of yours, I’ve always said this. Curses aren’t real.” I opened my mouth, but I shut it when he gave me a look. “They’re not. Curses are not real, no matter how much you might think they are,” he double-downed. “Shit happens. And I’m sorry crap happened to your grandfather and pop and uncle. But you guys, you and your brothers, shit, even your dumbass cousins, are different.”
“I don’t know, man.” I rolled my neck and stretched my legs out, trying not to stare in Elizabeth’s direction.
“Well… if you need anything, you know I’m around.”
“Thanks. You going home to Kandy?”
“You know it.” He stood and hesitated when he looked back at me. “You know you are more than capable of having a relationship of your own, right?”
“Sure.”
“I’m serious.”
“But?” I asked, unable to stop myself.
“Maybe quit with the weird stalker crap and just go talk to her?” he suggested with a wave goodbye.
“Quit with the stalker crap,” I repeated under my breath. If he only knew the shit my brother Merri was up to with Scarlett, he’d get this was nothing when it came to stalking. Even married and with a kid, my brother was obsessed with his wife. And she loved it, too. I’d seen her walking around town pretending like she had no idea he was only a couple of steps behind her.
People were weird. Love made you do all sorts of odd-ball things.
Speaking of love, I swallowed and stood the moment I watched Elizabeth do the same. I couldn’t seem to stay away from her as she got up and started to walk down the main area of Moonlit Pines.
As I followed her, I kept distance between us.
I watched her stop at the flower shop and look in the window then pick up and smell a couple of the small bouquets that were on a rack outside the shop. Liz even walked in, and for some god forsaken reason, I couldn’t stop myself from following her inside, where I pretended to be captivated by some kind of tropical plant.
My jaw clenched, and I had to stop myself from approaching or stopping her when she got way too fucking close to some cactus-like plant and let her dainty little fingers hover right over the pokers. Fuck, she was a curious little thing.
The rest of the day went much the same.
Keeping my distance, never making eye contact or approaching her. Even as I followed her back home. It was like I couldn’t help myself. After getting home from the bar that first night, I did what any sane person would do: I looked her up online.
Scoped out her social media accounts. Hers and her friends and family’s. People who had tagged her to see if I could find anything and everything. By four in the morning, I wasvoracious for every little detail. Starving for more with an insatiable hunger.
It still shocked the hell out of me just how much of an imprint of our lives we left out for the public to find. Moonlit Pines turned out to be a smaller place than I had even known. My best friend’s woman was best friends with Elizabeth’s youngest sister, an up-and-coming influencer I’d seen around town who had even shot content at the brewery.
Liz walked into her place, stopping at her door before glancing over her shoulder. My body dipped inside my truck to avoid making eye contact. She stared out and then turned. There was a hitch in her shoulders before she squared them just a moment before she opened her front door, almost like she was trying to will herself to step inside.
“What are you afraid of, beautiful girl?” I asked into the empty truck and hated that the door shut behind her. My phone buzzed on my knee. I didn’t have to look down to know it was more than likely Bash or Onyx trying to figure out where the hell I was. I was an hour late for my shift, but I couldn’t get myself to move.
“You have to,” I scolded myself. “You gotta go. You can come back.” Clearly, I’d lost my mind since I was talking to myself and planning on doing shit that would more than likely end up with me getting arrested.
Yet knowing that, knowing I’d be completely distracted at work by my sweet nurse of mercy, I left and headed to the brewery.
Knowing the entire time, I was completely and utterly fucked and in love with a woman who couldn’t even be bothered to text me.
3
elizabeth
Dear Stalker,
I see you, you know? For a stalker, you’re not really good at the whole blending-in thing. It makes me wonder if I’m your first. If I am, would it be weird to say I’m both honored and a tiny bit shocked that you, Austin Hart, out of every local male resident of our small mountain town, are following me, of all people, around like some kind of lost puppy? I don’t get it. I’m just… me.
Thanks for the succulents, by the way.
