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"Are you okay, man?"
Keaton let out a long exhale as his head dropped. "Yeah. All I’ve ever wanted was for her to be happy."
Before coming to Whisper Lake, Knox had never been rendered speechless; now it seemed to happen on a damn near daily basis. He had no words for his cousin. He’d always figured Keaton and Camilla would end up together. They’d just gotten together so young; it hadn’t been an easy road. Especially with Keaton traveling so much when he was competing.
Keaton glanced up at Knox, and his brow furrowed. "Areyouokay? You look like someone just ran over your puppy."
"Sorry. I know it’s not... I have no reason to... I just… I guess I sort of always looked at you two as the sort of relationship I wanted. You guys seemed like best friends who couldn’t keep their hands off each other. I just… I never really thought it would be over. Not for good, I mean."
Keaton nodded. "Our timing was just never right. When she wanted to get married, I wasn’t ready. By the time I was, I guess she was tired of waiting around." He held his arms out. "I did all this to show her that I could settle down, but I was too late."
"Fuck." Knox had wondered if that had been the case—that his cousin had come to Whisper Lake to show Camilla that he could stay in one place—but hearing Keaton say it out loud and that it hadn’t worked was still a shock.
"Listen, man, I’m not saying that you should ever settle down. I know that’s not something you want. But if you meet someone who makes you want that, don’t fuck it up like I did."
The door to the gym opened, and kids began filing in for their classes. As Knox watched his cousin greet his students and their parents, he couldn’t help but think about his own life. There had been so many women who wanted more commitment from him. In fact, that was the main reason his relationships ended. That or he moved or got deployed.
He’d never once regretted things ending. But he had a gut feeling that when he left Whisper Lake and left Laura, he just might experience that regret for the first time.
Which was insane since he hadn’t even kissed the woman. Or maybe that was why he felt so strongly about her. It was the buildup. Surely, nothing could live up to the fantasy that he’d built up in his mind.
He was sure that once he and Laura had sex, the obsession he’d suffered since the first time he’d seen her would lose some of its potency. Once they’d done the deed, the relentless desire for her would lessen.
That was his theory, anyway, and there was only one way to test it out.
* * *
Laura got out of the shower and immediately grabbed the lotion, spreading it on her smooth legs and arms. She’d groomed herself within an inch of her life in preparation for the evening ahead.
Tonight, Knox was coming over, and they were having sex. She’d only agreed to Knox’s proposal because she knew that she wouldn’t be able to get pregnant. She also knew that once she got pregnant and had a baby as a single mom, she’d be out of the dating game for years. Maybe even a decade or two.
So, on the ride back from the fertility clinic, she decided that she would give herself the next few months to say goodbye to her single life. This was it. Her last hoorah, or she guessed hoochi-rah.
From the first second she laid eyes on Knox Savage, her hormones had been on overdrive. The man oozed sex appeal, and she could just tell he knew exactly what he was doing in the bedroom. And clearly, they were compatible; even Felicity’s tests had shown that.
All her life, she’d dated with a purpose. Even in her first relationship, which had started when she was twelve, she’d only agreed to be Mario’s girlfriend because she could envision herself marrying him. And she had.
Once she was divorced at twenty-four, her dating had even more purpose. She’d wanted to be a mom by the time she was thirty. Which would have happened if Lucas hadn’t lied to her.
Since then, she’d been dating with a goal in sight. She didn’t waste her time on men she knew she had no future with. She was constantly weighing whether or not the man she was seeing was compatible as a life partner and future father. She was focused on the end game, and any man with whom she didn’t see a potential future did not get a second of her time, no matter how badly she wanted them. Her hormones had no say in the matter. They were constantly being outvoted by her head and heart.
Not this time. This time, her hormones were in the driver’s seat. With Knox, she was going to give into her base, animalistic desires and spend the next few months having hot, no strings, no commitments, sex.
The entire day that she’d spent with her family, she’d been wondering if she was making a big mistake. She’d never entered into a relationship being anything but totally honest. This time, her pants were on fire.
Knox thought they were having sex to make a baby. He’d even sent her paperwork denouncing any rights to the child. As badly as she wanted to have a literalHot Girl Summer, she wasn’t sure if she could go through with doing it like this.
The easiest answer would be to just come clean to him and see what he said. But Laura knew herself, and just like she knew she’d never really be able to forgive Mario, she knew that she had too much pride to admit that she’d only agreed to Knox’s offer because she wanted to have sex with him so badly.
Her mind was spinning when the phone buzzed on the counter. Part of her was hoping that it was Knox canceling, and another part of her knew she’d be devastated if that was the case. When she looked down, she saw that it was Kennedy calling on FaceTime.
"Hey!" Laura answered the call and propped her phone up on the Q-tip receptacle as a makeshift tripod.
"Are you in a towel?" Kennedy asked as trees blew behind her.
Laura could tell that she was on the walking path that ran around the lake.
"Yeah, I just got out of the shower."
