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That made me sound like an asshole and I frowned. “I like plenty of women,” I insisted but I couldn’t think of one off the top of my head, other than Olive.
Stone barked out a laugh. “None that you want to sleep with.” His satisfied, knowing smile only annoyed me.
“I don’t want to sleep with Olive, so there’s the flaw in your theory.” Liar, my mind shouted at the exact time Stone uttered something similar.
“Bullshit. You had her, sure, but you want her. You know you do and even if you don’t, I know it. I can see it all over your face, man. Just admit it, at least to yourself.” He shrugged and nodded for me to follow him to the bars on the other side of the gym. “How can you not like a woman who, instead of pouting or giving you the cold shoulder, bought you a bunch of baby crap? That you need, I might add.”
He had a point, but, “It’s complicated.”
Stone let out a low sigh and hit me with a serious look. “It’s always complicated, Liam. Whether or not kids are involved. The question you should be asking, is it worth wading through all the complicated crap to get to the good stuff on the other side?”
There was no doubt where Stone fell on that topic, but I wasn’t so sure and it had very little to do with Olive. Or the baby. “What do I have to offer her or a baby? She’s got a house and a career, hell she owns her own company. My job is dangerous and I can’t talk about it, which women hate, not to mention the fact that I’m gone for weeks, sometimes months at a time. Is that fair to either of them?” It reeked of my old man, always putting his wants and needs ahead of his responsibility as a father.
“Sorry to say man, but it’s too late for fair. The kid is coming and Olive, well she’s already here, so who are you really trying to protect?”
“A good question, one I don’t have an answer for. Yet.”
His brown brows rose in surprise and a slow smile crossed his face. “The yet means all is not hopeless and that’s a good sign. Wanna grab dinner and drinks tonight?”
Yes. “Nah, I think I’m gonna bring Olive dinner. Maybe you should go out and pick a woman to make Sophie jealous enough to realize what she stands to lose.”
Stone sighed heavily and his broad shoulders fell in resignation. “I’ll just grab something with you and head back here. There’s always work to be done, especially if this expansion is going to happen.”
“You’re still opening more gyms? What is this, some mission to get the whole world ripped like me?”
He shrugged. “What the hell else am I gonna do?”
“Get off your ass and go for the woman you want? Because I know you think it’s worth it to get through all the complicated shit to the good shit on the other side.” Throwing his words back at him felt good and Stone’s smile made me laugh.
“Smart ass. Put that advice to good use and then you can worry about me.”
“I’m a SEAL, I can do more than one thing at a time,” I told him with a cocky smile.
“Yeah, then invite me over when you put the crib together. I’ll bring beer and popcorn for the show.”
I flipped him off as I left the gym with a promise to meet up tomorrow. Tonight, I had plans.
If she didn’t take the food and turn me away.OliveThis is what I’ve been reduced to, my head stuck in the fridge and tears streaming down my cheeks, and all because I didn’t have time to go shopping and my shelves are depressingly bare. So depressing that apparently, it called for tears. Just what I needed after the day I had, a random emotional breakdown over the fact that my fridge was bare. “So, so bare.” Even the chill of the cold air on my wet hair wasn’t enough to keep me from searching every nook and cranny of my fridge in search of something, anything, to eat.
It was bad enough that I’d lost a client today because she refused to stop talking about the wedding in the first date, but on top of that I spilled a marinara covered meatball on my favorite off-white dress and I fell asleep during a break from my intro to dating conversation class.
When the bell ring, I pulled myself from the fridge with a smile, hoping that my powers of telepathy had finally picked up enough that Sophie or Eva knew I was in desperate need of food, preferably cooked and ready to eat. I opened the door and my jaw dropped. It wasn’t Eva. Or Sophie. Instead it was Liam, looking delicious and disheveled in jeans and a green t-shirt that hugged every single one of his many, many muscles. And he had food. And flowers.
