Page 53 of Spurred On

“Did you at least have some time together this weekend, to try to work out your differences?”

Time together? Yes.

“There’s no way we can work out our differences.”

“Don’t say that, Sidney. I know how much you like him.”

Is that what this was? “Hanna, I don’t like him.”

“Please. You can’t fool me. I see the way you look at him.”

“Sexual desire is one thing. It’s purely physical. And it’s not enough. If you don’t like a guy, it’s just not enough.”

“You don’t like him?” Why she seemed so stunned was a mystery.

“No. I don’t.”

“But he’s funny and charming and kind—”

“And he’s slept with every woman in town.”

“Not every woman.”

Sidney nodded. “You’re right. He probably didn’t seduce Matilda Wilberforce.”

Hanna barked a laugh at the suggestion. As well she should. Matilda Wilberforce was ninety if she was a day and she walked with a cane and enjoyed whacking young men on the ass with it.

“Well, Mama always said, it’s not the people we dislike, it’s the things they do.”

True. And Sidney really disliked the fact that Cody slept with everyone. “It hardly matters. There’s no way Cody and I could have anything real.” Maybe her sigh was a little too maudlin, because Hanna’s gaze locked on her face.

“You’ve loved him forever.”

“Not love.” It couldn’t be that. Love was butterflies and roses. This was worms and thorns. “Besides, I couldn’t be with a guy like that, always wondering who he was fucking today—”

“If you really feel that way, you need to forget about him.”

“I have.”

Hanna’s expression made it clear, she wasn’t buying it. It only made sense to underscore her disinterest.

“He’s not the settling-down type.”

“Well, I have to disagree,” Hanna said. “I think he is. He just needs to find the right woman.”

Yeah, and Sidney was not that woman.

“Someone who can meet him toe to toe and give him what for. Someone bold and brash and fearless.”

Sidney frowned at Hanna. She knew what her sister was trying to do. She knew she was all those things, and more, but she didn’t have the desire—or perhaps the courage—to let herself fall in love with a man who would break her heart on a daily basis. And he would. He’d proved it before.

Hanna sighed. “All I’m saying is, you deserve someone who will love you and only you. Someone who will make you happy.”

“Thank you,” Sidney said. “And so do you.”

Hanna squeezed her hand, and they sat there for a moment longer before Sidney stood and took her leave.

It was a damn shame neither of them seemed able to lasso a decent man. But by God, she was going to try.