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She smiles. “Just know that you need to get your head out of your ass. Don’t take things for granted.”
“Speaking from experience?”
“Yeah. I ignored my feelings for Travis for years, and he did the same. It almost broke us.”
I study her for a long moment. My cousin and her fiancé have the number one home improvement show on cable, but not too long ago, they almost broke it off. They had both denied their feelings for each other. Until Nancy got a stalker who nearly killed her, they both refused to admit their feelings to each other.
“This isn’t the same situation.”
“Yeah, well, no, it isn’t. Every love story is different.”
I rear my head back from her. “I am not in love. That’s a silly emotion.”
Nancy throws her head back and laughs. “My God, you sound like Syd. She was in love with Grady for months, and it took her forever to admit it. Again, it was a different story than mine, but they started out hating each other. That sounds like someone I know.” She wiggles her eyebrows at me. “Sounds like the beginning of a rom-com movie. It also sounds like someone I know.”
“You have lost your mind.”
But I can’t fight the worry that tells me there is more to my attraction. Truth is, I have never been this infatuated with a woman. It feels like I have done a three-sixty because I hated her for the last week and a half. Now, I want her? Makes no sense.
“What’s going on over here?” Travis asks as he slips a hand around Nancy’s waist.
“Nothing. I’m just giving Jon crap about his crush.”
“I don’t have a crush.”
“Oh, Avery?” he asks at the exact moment.
“Yeah,” Nancy says as she looks at me over the rim of her glass. “Avery.”
A scream is lodged in my throat. I love my cousin—the only cousin I can genuinely say that about—but she knows me too well. I’m infatuated with Avery, and it’s stupid. It’s close proximity. In other words, we’re stuck together, and maybe that’s the reason.
The music stops, and I hear her laugh over the crowd. I can’t help myself. Looking over to where she was standing with Ford. The rancher is taller than I am and broader than what I remember as a stand-up guy. But just like with Josh, I now want to beat the shit out of him.
“Jon.”
I ignore my cousin as I watch Avery laughing, the way she snorts, and something moves through me. It’s not jealousy, but there is a lot of that. But it has more to do with the fact that I want to be the man who makes her laugh. I want to make her eyes sparkle.
What the actual fuck is that about?
“Jon!”
I blink and look at my cousin. “What?”
“I said your name a billion times.”
“Twice,” Travis says.
“What is going on with you?”
“Nothing.”
She looks at Travis. “Go away.”
“What?”
“I love you. Go away. Need to chat with Jon.”
He kisses her cheek. “Come find me, babe.”
