“Not that much. But it’s one of those things that you can see through his shirt.”
Delaney sighed dreamily. “I love it when you can see their shirts stretched across their biceps.”
“Not to brag, but I have one of those,” Josie grinned.
Delaney smacked her arm. “Hey, some of us can only dream for now.” Then she turned back to me. “Go on.”
“Um…well, he still has warm, chocolate eyes. And his hair is shorter than it used to be.”
“Can you still run your fingers through it?”
As soon as I thought about it, shivers raced down my spine. That was not good. “Yes.”
“Oh my God,” Josie whispered. “Did you hear that hitch in her voice?”
“I definitely did. Tell us more.”
“There was no hitch.”
“There was definitely a hitch. Which means it’s really good. Now spill!”
I couldn’t do this. Every time I thought about him, accompanying thoughts that were definitely not okay filled my mind. Didn’t they know what they were doing to me?
I grabbed a dress and marched over to the rack. “Defined cheekbones, intense eyes, and a fuckable body. That’s all you’re getting!”
“No wonder you don’t want to talk about him. You’ve already got it bad,” Delaney whispered.
“Well, I just can’t ever see him again, that’s all. From now on, I’ll make sure to avoid Ryder Lawson at every turn.”
“Yeah, and that’s so easy to do in a small town,” Delaney laughed.
“I work in my shop and go home every night to a glass of wine. It can’t be that hard to ignore the man. Besides, it’s not like he’s going to give me the time of day after I yelled at him.”
“And if what the rumors say are true, he’s hiding with his tail between his legs,” Josie nodded.
“What do the rumors say?” Delaney asked, her eyes wide with curiosity. “I haven’t heard this.”
“That he was fired from his job in New York. Apparently, he’s a massive failure, and he came home because he couldn’t hack it.”
That didn’t sit right with me, for some reason. He didn’t seem like a man who had failed. Then again, I only talked to him in abar about the best nights to go on a date. It wasn’t like we had a deep and meaningful conversation.
I got back to work, refusing to stand around for another minute while images of Ryder Lawson flitted through my brain. Yes, he was good-looking, but that didn’t change the fact that he was nothing but a bully.
“Well, it doesn’t matter what happened to him or why he’s home. I won’t be seeing him again.”
“Keep telling yourself that,” Josie laughed.
Our fun was interrupted by glass shattering at the front of the store. We all screamed, ducking and covering our heads as we cowered together.
When nothing else happened, I slowly sat up, peering to the front of the store.
“What the hell was that?” Delaney whispered.
“JR,” Josie whispered into her phone. “We need you at Ellie’s store. The window just shattered.”
I could hear him yelling into the phone for her to stay where she was. That was fine with me. I didn’t really want to go check it out.
“It doesn’t look like anyone’s out there,” I whispered.
