AllFreeNovel
Share Us
When she pulls back, she’s got tears in her eyes, and I find myself choking up. “I’ve missed you, too.” Needing to change the subject, I use my thumb to point in the direction of the kitchen where Liam has gone. “He’s quite the outdoorsman these days.”
She grins. “Tell me about it.”
“How is it that your son was born an old man?” Ever since Liam could walk, he’s preferred to wear socks with his sandals and he’d rather watch documentaries than cartoons. He and my dad have a lot in common.
“He’s acting a lot more like a kid now that we live up here,” she says, looping her arm through mine. “Let’s go find Digger.”
My smile turns into a cringe. Digger and I didn’t exactly see eye-to-eye on things when I was here last year. We were both trying to protect Harper in our own way, which turned out to be completely opposite of each other. My friend has said more than once that it was like having two bulls in the same pen.
I follow Harper out the back door where Digger is firing up the grill. As soon as he sees us, he offers a genuine-looking smile as he holds his hand out. “Ethan, how was the trip?”
“Uneventful, which is exactly what I was hoping for,” I tell him. Glancing around at the forest behind the lodge, I smile. “I’m so glad to be out of LA.”
“Can I get you a beer?” he offers.
“Only if you’re having one.”
He flips open the cooler next to the grill and takes out two cans of Bud. He offers one to Harper, and then one to me before going back in for his. Harper holds up her can. “To old friends and fresh starts.”
“Here, here,” I say, as we clink the cans together.
After we all take a celebratory sip, Digger asks, “So, did you meet Julia?”
“I met her all right.”
He and Harper burst out laughing before Harper asks, “Did she accuse you of wanting to steal her sheets?”
“Among other things,” I laugh. “Why didn’t you tell me I was renting a place from an old-school gangster?”
“I told you we should have warned him,” Digger tells Harper.
She shakes her head. “It’s more fun this way.”
“So, I spend fifteen years taking care of you, and you just throw me to the wolves the first chance you get,” I say with a grin to let her know I’m kidding. “If I wake up with a horse head in bed with me, we’re gonna have words.”
She shrugs. “Hey, this is the Last Frontier. You’ve got to be tough to make it up here.”
The evening passes far too quickly as I catch Harper up on the latest Hollywood gossip and she fills me in on her and Digger’s wedding plans. By ten o’clock, I’m yawning from the long day. “I think it’s time I head home and find out why those sheets are so special.”
“I’ll let you have tomorrow to get settled, but after that, I’m going to expect you up here for regular visits. I need to get my Ethan fix before you leave me again.”
“First of all,” I tell her, “you left me and Prisha. Secondly, I’m here for six months, so we’ll have plenty of time together.”
Digger and Harper walk me around to the front of the lodge. Digger wraps an arm over Harper’s shoulder before saying, “You’d better watch out. If Harper has her way, you’ll be moving up here next. She’s hoping you’ll fall in love with a local and decide to stay.”
I roll my eyes at the notion. “Just because you’re getting married again, Harper, doesn’t mean I’ve changed my mind about the institution. Tried it once, hated how it ended.”
Tilting her face towards her fiancé, Harper says, “Ethan’s letting one bad apple spoil the bunch.”
“Hey, Paige wasn’t just a bad apple. She was poison.”
“Paige was three years ago, Ethan. And she doesn’t represent the entire female population on the planet.”
“I didn’t know you were married before,” Digger says.
I shake my head, my gut tightening. “I only got as far as the proposal. Instead of yes, she said she didn’t love me and wasn’t sure she ever had.”
“Ouch, I can see why that would put a guy off marriage,” Digger says.
