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When I went up to the house, he was there, his car in the garage.
“What’s going on?”
Jeff had a grin on his face and thanked me for coming. It didn’t seem like I had a choice on the phone. He hadn’t said that it was an emergency, but it felt like it was implied. There didn’t seem to be anything that was on fire, figuratively, and I asked him again what was going on.
“I needed to see you.”
I sighed. “I was at work, Jeff. You can’t just call me away from work in the middle of a shift.”
“The diner is not a real job.”
I gave him a dirty look and told him that this wasn’t starting out well, whatever it was he was doing. He was being cryptic on the phone and now he was criticizing my job? Really? Like I didn’t know what kind of job it was?
“I meant that you shouldn’t have to work there.”
“Well, I have to pay the bills with something, Jeff. Besides, that’s all there is in Jericho to do.”
“What if you didn’t need to pay bills anymore?”
I was confused and told him as much, making him clarify. “I mean, what if you moved in here? You wouldn’t have to pay for anything. You wouldn’t need to work there.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I mean, I guess it was the next stage of the relationship. It’s not like it was coming out of the blue or anything, I just wasn’t expecting it. Not yet anyway. “You’re asking me to move in with you?”
Jeff grinned and pulled me in close. “Yeah. I want more time with you.”
“Well, I don’t know what to say.” I really didn’t either. Could that be possible, me and him living up here together? I did love the place, loved Jeff, but would it be too much? I hesitated.
“Say yes. You are up here all the time anyway and there is no sense in pretending that you’re going to stay there. I hate your apartment. You belong here with me.”
I pressed my lips together. “Is that so?”
“Yes.”
“This is not what I expected. But you know, I will still have to work somewhere. I’m not just going to sit around here all day, waiting for you to come back,” I countered. I felt like I couldn’t just go along with it, give in so easily. I gave into Jeff a lot. It was hard not to.
“Not even with the pond here at your disposal all the time?”
I looked out the window to where he was talking about, and I smiled. “I can only stay in the water so long.”
Jeff begged to differ but didn’t do so out loud. “What if I told you that I was going to need you for something else?”
Now he had my interest, but I was pretty sure I knew what that something else was. He was always in the mood, always, and it didn’t feel like this time was any different. I wanted to ask him if he brought me up here for sex, but I played along.
“Oh yeah?” I said with a smile.
Jeff grinned back. “Yeah, I like where your mind goes, but that’s not what I was talking about.”
I pouted so that he could see that I wasn’t happy. I liked the idea that I had better. “Oh, so what’s going on then?”
“Your brother and I are going to get the Safety House going. We found an investor and I could use someone like you that could coordinate some of it for me. You know everyone here and you are so organized. I need that in my life.”
“Oh yeah? Here I was thinking that you were just trying to get in my pants.”
“No, I want your mind too. Actually, I want every last bit of you.”
He was talking about forever again and damn if I didn’t love when he got like that. I was so in love with Jeff and all I wanted to think about was forever. We’d been through a lot, came a long way, knew each other forever. I couldn’t imagine a time or place when we weren’t together, and I liked that he couldn’t either.
“And what are you going to do with me, after you have me?” I asked.
