Page 70 of Broken Boundaries

I laugh. “I don’t know what to do.”

“Why do you need to do anything? We’re young. Dawson isn’t pushing you for more, is he?” I shake my head. “So keep going on dates with him. Keep kissing Brooks when he’s feeling weak. And keep little Calloway far, far away from you. Done!”

“You make it sound so easy.”

She shrugs. “We don’t need to overcomplicate anything. Just have fun.”

“Yeah. I’ll try my best.”

“And… if anything else happens with Brooks, I’d better be the first to know! I can’t believe you didn’t tell me!”

“I know, I guess I was just a little embarrassed because he kissed me and then acted like it was a huge mistake.”

She scoffs. “Yeah, that’s a dick move. But, and not to make excuses for a man, it sounds like he has a lot of conflicting feelings he’s trying to work out.”

“I know, I’m trying to be respectful of that, but then he just keeps being so nice to me.”

“Damn him and his kindness!”

We both laugh. “This is so messy.”

“Life wouldn’t be fun if it weren’t a little messy,” she tells me as she rubs my back to comfort me. “You’ll figure it out, though. You don’t need to rush.”

“Thanks for being such a good friend to me, Jazz.”

“One of my many many skills,” she teases. “But I’ve gotta get to work. They want me to finish cleaning up in here before I can head out for the day.”

I stand from the couch. “I’ll leave you to it then.”

I take my time walking back to the lodge. My brain has been running overtime recently, but maybe Jazz is right. I’ll just let everything play out and see what happens.

CHAPTER 26

Aspen

I’m off work today and spending my morning eating pancakes with Jazz at the diner in town. I don’t typically venture out for breakfast other than the pastries at the coffee shop, but she insisted that I have to try these pancakes. As it turns out, they are pretty good, and they have every flavor of syrup you could ever want.

“So, are we gonna meet up at the fair tonight?” Jazz asks through a mouthful of fluffy pancakes. She went with blueberry syrup on hers.

“Yeah, for sure. I’m meeting Dawson, too, though. Is that ok?”

“Hell yeah. The more the merrier. Owen might make an appearance as well.”

I raise my eyebrows. “Wow… a public outing together? Must be getting serious.”

“Shut up. You know I don’t do serious. But he has tonight off and mentioned that he wanted to go to the fair. I just casually suggested we could meet up. Friends and all that..”

“Yeah… right.” I smirk at her, and she rolls her eyes.

I’ve been told that the fair is a pretty big deal around here. It’s one county over but not a long drive. There are rides, games, concerts, and food. I’m pretty excited about it. It sounds like it’ll be fun.

“You think Daddy Brooks will be there?” She wriggles her eyebrows at me, and my eyes go wide.

I lean forward. “Keep your voice down.” She just laughs. “And I don’t know. He hasn’t mentioned anything to me about it.”

He’s been dropping off my dinners and leaving quickly lately, so we haven’t spent much one-on-one time together. It feels like he’s trying to avoid spending time alone with me. It sucks, but it’s probably for the best.

“Well, if you need to sneak off with him, just let me know, and I’ll keep Dawson busy.”