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“That’s…so weird.”
“It’s not weird if you’re into it. It was fun for a bit, but then it got old for me not being her primary partner. If it works for you, it works. That’s the whole point, isn’t it?”
I attend to my cooling coffee, another long sip. “I feel like there’s something wrong with me.”
“There’s not.”
“I feel like you should be convincing me out of this.”
Seth sighs, “Well, if Nate isn’t into it, then I’m certainly not going to keep championing it, but…I really doubt you’d be bringing this up to me if there wasn’t a voice loud in your head saying it.”
Damn Seth. He’s right. “My gut is doing something. I don’t know how to explain it.”
“That’s the thing about the gut, right? It just tells you things, and you’re forced to either believe it or turn a blind eye. Usually, I’d say the former is the correct way to go about it.”
“You’re so wise for someone so single.”
I can almost hear Seth’s eyes narrowing. “I’m hanging up now, Lotts.”
I don’t bother to convince him otherwise, thanking him as fast as I can before the call goes dead. I put my phone down, look out across the beautiful lake landscape.
My head feels like it could float away like a balloon because, for the first time in a long time, I feel like I’m doing something right.
That winding knot at the base of my skull has released, and I’ve given into what I think might be the truth.
I don’t want Laney Briggs to be mine. Not anymore.
I want her to beours. Our queen to worship. To dedicate our lives to.
All I have to do is get out of my own head.
And there is the small detail of Nate and Laney being on board with this crazy plan too.
23
NATE
Time flieswhen you’re falling for your best friend’s ex-girlfriend. And also sharing her with him.
Our final days at the cabin have been filled with a quiet dance of Mason and I exchanging Laney back and forth. After her work with me in the morning, she often goes off with Mason for a bit, then returns to give me her attention. At night, she alternates whose bed she sleeps in. When she’s not with me, I miss her. When sheiswith me, I make it count.
The three of us share all our meals. And unlike my birthday dinner or any other number of times we had to be in the same room, there isn’t a drop of awkwardness.
We laugh and talk. Do the things friends do.
I watch Laney, then watch Mason watch Laney, expecting the jealousy to burn in my chest like a thousand suns.
And it doesn’t.
It is our own little universe where the rules are different than life back in New York. None of us questions it.
We’rethriving.
Today, though, is our last day before returning to the city. There is a pall over all of us, an almost funereal feeling as we move about the cabin, trying to pack up our things.
I watch Laney as she collects her books from the coffee table in the den.
She doesn’t dare look at me on the couch where I’m resting after PT.
