“They’re good. Gavin’s growing up too fast and acts like more of an adult than I do.” I chuckle.
“What about you? How are you doing?”
“I’m…” Ithink about my conversation with Larkin and try to be honest with myself. “I think I’m doing okay, actually. I didn’t know what to expect with the job and moving back, but so far, it’s been pretty good.”
“It’s really nice to have you back here, Annie. I know this isn’t how you imagined things going, but we love having one of you girls back home.”
Guilt wraps around my heart. It’s not that I’ve ignored my parents, it’s just that I got hung up on what my life was supposed to look like. Then my job became endless hours of work and barely any time to see my sister and her family, let alone driving the few hours to see my parents. It’s a shitty excuse. I’m seeing that now, but it’s what I thought I had to do to get ahead.
My dad continues talking, but I’m zoned out. Comparing my life before the move to my life now is eye-opening. I never realized how much my job in Austin sucked from me. I was a shell of a person, just doing their bidding and praying it was enough to climb the ladder.
Here, it’s a slower pace of life. Although it’s been hard for me to adjust to it, I feel calmer than I have in years. My anxiety has lessened, and my self-diagnosed ADHD has been a little more manageable. I’m not drinking coffee by the gallon and feeling heart palpitations halfway through the day. I’m not pulling all-nighters and then spending my weekend sleeping because my body can’t handle them anymore, but unrealistic expectations and deadlines were the name of the game.
God, why did I put up with that shit?
Because it was what they drilled into our heads. If we didn’t comply, if we didn’t finish the next impossible task, our careers were over.
It’s such a crock of shit. Ledger told me the other day that nothing we do is life and death, so there’s no need to work ourselves to the bone. It hit home in a way I wasn’t expecting. My job in Austin wasn’t life or death; nothing we did had an immediate bearing on someone’s physical life, yet we treated it as such. No wonder the stress was at a constant high. Nowonder you see people having heart attacks at a young age in the finance field. It’s physically unsustainable. Ledger’s easy words opened my eyes to everything wrong with my last job.
Even if I don’t stay on with Bluebell Falls Landscaping, I think those words will live on in my head.
Chapter 8
Ledger
Working with Ainsley for most of the day was the ultimate test in patience. She looked so fucking sexy in those cutoff jean shorts, that every time she bent over, all I could think about was stripping them off of her.
Needless to say, I’m racing home so I can jump in the shower and take care of my raging hard-on.
I pull into my driveway and barely get the truck door closed before running into the house. I strip as I go, fully naked by the time I reach my bathroom. Turning on the water, I wait for it to warm up. I lean against the counter, gripping my base hard. The image of Ainsley’s strawberry blonde hair laid out on my bed has me harder than stone.
The shower finally starts to steam, so I rip open the door and rest my forehead on the tile as I go back to my fantasy.
I’d strip her down nice and slowly. Peel every inch of fabric off her body as she squirmed beneath my fingertips. I’d tease her for distracting me all day. Take my time circling each of her diamond-hard nipples before trailing lower. I’d put just enough pressure on her clit to get a little relief but not enough to get her off.
The hand on my cock moves faster, swirling the precum that’s dripping from my head down my length.Fuck, I bet she feels amazing.
I want to hear her whimper for me, beg me for more. I want my name on her lips as I circle her clit in the way she needs me to in order to come.I want to learn what she likes, learn what turns her on, and explore any fantasy she has.
My hips start thrusting as I squeeze a little tighter. I’m already so close, but I’m forcing myself to live in this false reality a little longer.
The need to hear her beg for my cock, to see her spread open and dripping for me, makes the pressure at the base of my spine ratchet up. I imagine lining myself up with her needy pussy and pushing in, hearing her gasp of pleasure. It’s the image that finally takes me over the edge. I come against the tiles in my shower, watching as it goes down the drain.
It’s anti-climactic. Sure, it took the edge off, but I’m not truly satiated. I want to see what she really looks like underneath me. I sag against the tile, worn out from working and keeping myself in check all day.
Dragging my tired ass out of the shower after washing up, I dry off before collapsing on my bed.
I need to figure out how to tell Ainsley who I really am. Every time I try, I panic and dig myself further into the hole I’ve created. I know the longer I wait, the worse it will be, but for the life of me, that fact doesn’t register when I’m in her vicinity.
Today was exactly what I wanted. I got to learn more about her; we worked well together and talked about everything under the sun. My crush has turned into a full-blown infatuation. Now, I just need to pull up my big-boy pants and tell her the truth.
Sunday night dinners have been a tradition in our family for as long as I can remember. When we were young, my mom would rotate whose favorite meal she cooked, and it was a day we all looked forward to every week.
I’ve upheld that tradition ever since our parents passed away.
In my senior year in college, everything changed for our family. Rina was in college by then, Lennox was in eighth grade, and Willow was a junior in high school. Our parents wanted to finally take a vacation for themselves, so Rina came home to watch the kids while our parents took their first trip in far too many years. They were going to drive to the beach and relax. They barely got an hour away before a guy T-boned them going sixty-five.
It changed the course of all our lives. I was only a couple weeks away from graduating, and although I had plans to stay in the big city, grow my business, and marry Jenna, I had to go home to take care of my family. I’ve never regretted it, and catching Jenna cheating was a blessing in disguise. I did the best I could to help Willow and Lennox finish school, but I still worry about them. Especially Lennox. He still acts like a teenager sometimes, and I worry I’ve messed him up somewhere along the way.
