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Wyatt sits up straight and reaches for me. “Come here, babygirl.”
When I shuffle toward him, he pulls me closer to stand between his legs. His bed is on a squat, simple platform, so for once, I’m a head taller than him with him sitting down. He circles his arms around my waist and pulls me into him, pressing a kiss to the hollow of my throat. I wrap my arms around his neck to hug him back, sinking into the feeling of his warm lips on my skin.
He draws back and tips my chin down to look him in the eye when he says, “Yes, at one time, I thought I did love her enough to ask her to marry me.”
I scoff at that, irrationally upset at the thought of him being previously engaged. I’m being ridiculous, and I know it. But that doesn’t stop the rising tide of strangely envious emotions.
He squeezes my waist and finishes, “But after she split, I could admit to myself that I only proposed to her because I was ready to settle down—not because I was madly in love with her.”
I frown, feeling kind of bad for Crystal, even though her leaving means I get to be here with Wyatt. He had said he never would have let me hitch if he had a girlfriend or wife, so I guess I should be thanking her.
“What happened? Why did you break up?”
Wyatt pulls me down to sit across his lap, and I lean against his shoulder. I drop an arm to run my hand up and down his chest over his shirt the way I imagine Crystal might have done at one time.
“Crystal and I moved in together after I proposed. It just made the most sense financially. She was a party girl and spent a lot of her time out at bars with her friends while I was away working. I never cared about that since I knew she liked to party before we got together, but it did rub me the wrong way that she didn’t want to stay in with me on the nights when I was home. Anyway, one day, I got back to town a few days earlier than scheduled when a delivery got canceled. There was a moving truck in the front yard, and I walked in to find Crystal packing damn near everything into boxes. I pretty much got the gist of what was happening right away. She told me she had met someone at the bar a few months before, and”—Wyatt’s face twists in pain—“she told me she was pregnant with his kid, that we were over, and she was eloping with him.”
“Holy shit,” I blurt in shock. I’m glad things didn’t work out between him and this cheating bitch named Crystal, but it’s obvious he’s still torn up about it, and my stomach clenches. “You said you weren’t in love with her, so why do you look so heartbroken right now?”
Wyatt sniffs and looks off to the side. “I had figured out she was pregnant. Small changes to her body, food cravings she was having, and things like that. I thought she was just waiting to tell me she was pregnant, that maybe she was planning some kind of surprise. I’ve always wanted kids but knew it might not happen for a guy like me. I was so excited at the thought of getting to be a dad, and so when she told me it was another man’s baby and not mine, it hurt like hell. Still does, to be honest, even four years later.”
Wyatt
I’ve never told anyone except Mama about what really happened between me and Crystal. I didn’t want to explain how Crystal didn’t just kill our relationship—she killed my future, too. There hasn’t been anyone else other than a few unsatisfying boozy hookups here and there in all this time. Not until Dolly came into the picture.
It feels so damn good holding her like this in my lap with her stroking her hand up and down my chest as I push my nose into her neck, breathing in her scent. We stay like that for a few more minutes, sitting silently as she processes everything I just told her.
“It’s getting late, and we didn’t stop to eat a real meal. How about I order in something?” Perfect timing as I hear Dolly’s stomach growl loud and clear, and she flushes slightly with embarrassment. “I’ll take that as a yes.” Chuckling, I squeeze her in my arms one more time, then pick her up and settle her on the bed next to me. “I’ll call in an order at the Chinese restaurant close by. Why don’t you get settled in and put your stuff away?” I point out the bathroom and closet doors. She only has the one duffel bag, and I’m not sure how many more clean clothes she has, so I add, “There’s also a stacked washer and dryer in the bathroom if you’d like to do any laundry.”
“Oh, good. I ran out of clean panties.” Her cheeks flush darker like she hadn’t meant to say that out loud. Her eyes widen briefly before she looks away and asks, “Do you want me to throw in any of your laundry with mine?”
I’m pulled up short. It’s just laundry, and it’ll only take two seconds to throw my clothes in the wash, but it feels good to have a woman offer to take care of something so…domestic…for me. I haven’t had that in a long, long time. The fact that it’s Dolly who is offering to do so fills me with warmth and gratitude.
“Sure, that would be great.” I hand her my travel bag and watch as she disappears into the bathroom, closing the door behind her.
Twenty minutes later, our food is delivered. Since I only have one chair in the kitchen, we opt to sit on the linoleum floor, eating in companionable silence as Dolly yawns between bites of her noodles.
“Oh man, I haven’t had Chinese food in so long. I’m stuffed full.” She groans and pushes her to-go container away from her.
I’d like to stuff you full with something else, I think.
She rubs her little belly, and once again, I envision what it would look like if it were my baby in her belly she’s rubbing. I have to look away so she doesn’t see the longing on my face and get scared off.
We’ve only known each other for three days, and I know good and well that I shouldn’t be having these kinds of thoughts about a girl who just turned eighteen, a girl who only tagged along with me because she was desperate for a ride. But knowing all that doesn’t stop me from dreaming about the kind of future we could have together.
“Come on, let’s clean up and get ready for bed,” I say, keeping my eyes on the containers as I tidy up.
Up ‘til now, we’ve started each night sleeping separately, though she’d end up crawling in next to me at some point. But since I don’t have a couch for one of us to sleep on and I left the sleeping bag in the cab, we’ll have to share the bed, and honestly, I can’t fucking wait to fall asleep next to her.
On the road, we each had separate bathrooms where we’d get ready for bed, but here, we go through our nightly routines side by side. This feels more intimate, and my imagination runs away with me again, thinking of what it would be like to do this with Dolly every night. She has her few toiletries spread out on the counter, and I like the way it looks with her things taking up my space. It feels homier, if not a little messy, when I’m so used to everything being stark and empty.
I finish up my routine before her, so I strip down, change into a clean pair of navy blue sweatpants, and sit on the bed, waiting for her. She comes out of the bathroom a few minutes later in another one of her oversized T-shirts, and I have to wonder just how many of those she was able to cram into her duffel bag.
It’s then I remember what she said about running out of clean panties. Our laundry hasn’t finished in the dryer yet, so she might be bare under her shirt. That thought makes my already half-staff cock swell and jerk, pre-cum leaking out of the tip. I try to adjust it discreetly so I don’t freak her out and make her think I’m expecting anything, no matter how much I may want it.
Dolly approaches me shyly and opens and closes her mouth a few times before she can get out what she wants to say. She stops a few steps away and holds my gaze. “Wyatt, what did you mean when you said you ‘knew it might not happen for a guy like you’ when you were talking about having kids?”
That is not what I was expecting her to say. My brows furrow in confusion. “Dolly, you have eyes. You see what I look like. I weigh more than twice what you do.” I gesture up and down over myself and lightly slap my stomach, failing this time not to let my insecurities creep in again.
