“Micah,” I grind out. “For the love of God…”
He laughs at that and leans closer, resting his forearm along the countertop next to my plate of fruit and eggs. “I’m a retired playboy, if that makes you feel any better.”
I knew hehadto have had women in groves. The man is charm and sex all tied up in a pretty red bow that we women would love to unwrap and tangle up with.
Regardless, Magnolia Ridge is a small town with, maybe, a thousand people in it. It’s more close-knit than what I’m used to. I’m a small-town girl, but I lived outside of town. And, even then, there are more than quadruple the number of people there than here, and I didn’t know everyone’s name.
That’s not the case here.
“I need to apologize for not speaking with you for the last few days,” he states through my silence. “I was trying to get my head straightened after…my surprise visit.”
I bob my head, trying to be understanding and not a woman who caught feelings too quickly and begins having a nervous breakdown over a new female added to the mix. “No need to apologize.”
“No need to be polite,” he professes evenly. “It was an asshole thing to do.”
Was it?
I’m not sure what constitutes as rude or unacceptable when we’re not dating but holding off until after the school year. I don’t think many people have ventured down this road, and it’s all new territory for me.
“Are you okay?” I ask simply. “You looked upset.”
He clears his throat and nods. “Yeah. I just want to make it clear it won’t happen again.”
“I get needing to have some space. You don’t owe me?—”
“I do. I said I was serious about this, and I didn’t communicate. I don’t want you left in the dark. Regardless of how we’re moving right now.”
I stare at him, looking for a clue or insincerity because he can’t be real.
Not fully.
It’s like he knows everything I want to hear to make me comfortable.
“That woman,” he utters ever so softly. “Was Heath’s mother.”
Didn’t want to hear that.
Inhaling through my nose, a sliver of panic begins creeping into my veins and headspace, but it’s absurd. I’ve only known Micah for maybe three weeks, and I have no claim on him.
At all.
However, the thought of his ex striding into town leaves me uneasy and paranoid. I know how small-town romances work.
You can live happily ever after like any other romance in the world.
Or you can break up andstillhave to run into them everywhere.
The latter sounds like sheer torture at its finest. I’m not sure how I’d handle parent-teacher meetings with the two of them on the other side of my desk, in love, had already worked out whatever issues they had, like we didn’t screw in the backseat of his truck, and I…feelings, again.
“Are you okay?” I ask genuinely again, wishing I were in this moment. “That’s…got to be difficult.”
“I’m a big boy,” he replies with ease. “I just don’t want her to screw up my son, that’s all. Other than that, she was just a waste of time.”
I’m not going to lie, that makes me feel better.
But that’s the petty, mean side of me.
“Don’t say that,” I lightly scold. “She’s the mother of your child.”
