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Although, once I had a moment alone, a weird feeling would enter me and Cade would appear at the forefront of my mind. Why couldn’t I forget him?
I stared out the window, feeling a little shell-shocked, similar to a witness of a crime, but I was the victim. This sort of occurrence happened when I had nothing to distract me, no work or Jake to blur the memories and doubts lingering at the back of my mind.
When my mind wandered into unwelcomed territory, I’d rethink the choices I’d made. Choices like moving to California for college, breaking up with Cade and being with Jake. But as they say, hindsight was always twenty-twenty.
“I’m thinking about joining the mile high club.” He elbowed me. “What do you think about that?”
“Tease all you want but if I said, me too, would you make it happen?” The negative dark hole I’d been sinking into faded and the sun revealed itself from behind the clouds.
“I might, depending on how desperate you are for me.” He might? When it came to sex, Jake was always ready to please me.
“I can’t say that I’m desperate. Just thought it would be a fun adventure.”
“Fun? Do you know how many germs are in lavatories?”
“No. Is it a lot?” I was teasing my germaphobe. Jake wouldn’t drink out of my glass or let me feed him food from my fork. We’d exchanged bodily fluids and french kissed on the regular, but that apparently hadn’t mattered.
“Christ, don’t be disgusting. Is your whole family like you?” He stared at me aghast. Now I knew he had been messing with me. Sometimes I couldn’t keep up with his flip-flopping.
“They’re farmers.” I popped my shoulders, nonchalantly. He knew my folks lived in a rural town with less than three thousand residents, and they had a large organic farm. “They deal with all kinds of disgusting things.”
“That’s great.” He went back to scrolling on his phone. “Can’t wait to meet them.”
I snapped my mouth shut. It would be pointless to defend my family, my very conservative, family-oriented family. Once Jake had made his mind up about something, there was no changing it. He’d told me a million times that my parents would expect us to get married and give them grandchildren in theverynear future.
He was ridiculous. I wasn’t ready for kids. Didn’t even know if I wanted any. But Jake believed I was taking him home so he’d get the message to propose.
Please, no!
I didn’t want Jake to ask me the biggest question of my life. I hadn’t even muttered the L-word.
It was too soon.
We’donlybeen together a couple of years.
I wasn’t ready for a life-long commitment.
Plenty of women would think I was a fool for not tying Jake down. Sure, he was a wealthy thirty-five-year-old, Casanova, and every woman’s dream but his wealth never mattered to me.
After Jake’s grandfather died from a massive stroke, days before his twenty-first birthday, he inherited fifty million dollars. So began his unemotional, disconnected, dystopian life. His days were spent living without rules or a schedule. He had a privileged life most could only dream about.
Jake’s grandfather had been a successful land developer in Southern California and had built his empire over the course of forty years. Jake had told me they were both intelligent and looked nearly identical. I’d thought he had been exaggerating.He clearly admired his grandfather, which I’d found endearing. When I saw a photo of them, the similarities were startling. They could’ve been twins: tall, wavy blond hair, and fit with a golden tan that made their emerald-green eyes pop. They could’ve easily passed for GQ models. They werethatattractive.
The loss of his grandfather had rocked Jake’s world and forever changed him. His story had broken my heart the night he’d told me. He’d been three sheets to the wind, and spilled his guts. He’d told me he would never love anyone again, or get married because he didn’t want to experience the pain of loss again.
I’d understood his pain as I hadn’t gotten over the biggest loss of my life.
Jake had seemed like the right guy for me, one who wouldn’t want a long-term commitment, someone to distract me from my heartache, a short fling to occupy our time.
Funny how things had changed and we were still together two years later.
My giddiness took on a whole new level as I impatiently waited to pick up the rental car. I couldn’t wait to see my folks, hug my dad, and inspect him. When we spoke on the phone, he sounded the same. But my mom had told me his memory loss and tremors were getting worse.
At the counter, I folded my arms against my chest to keep from fidgeting. It had only been ten minutes, but it felt like we’dbeen there for hours and I didn’t want to waste a second now that I was finally home.
“What’s taking so long?” I peered behind me at the growing line. Most of the travelers appeared fine, so I wondered if they were country folk. I remembered how it had been living in a slow paced, small town and having no place to be. Judging by my impatience, I’d changed into a city girl.
“Will you relax already?” Jake muttered at my left.
