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“What?” Mom asked first while Dad kept watching like he was trying to understand some alien language. “Your job is here. Your friends. I don’t understand.”
“I was offered a job in Dallas,” I said. Despite practicing my explanation a million times, the words still sounded wooden coming out of my mouth.
“What job?” Dad demanded, brow still knit.
So I explained that Griffen Industries needed an in-house insurance expert, and Gage Griffen (the founder and a friend from Cottonwood Falls) thought of me.
“But why?” Mom asked. “Your life is here.”
My cheeks flamed, and I had to remind myself to breathe. “It’s hard to explain.”
“Is it about the money?” my dad pressed.
I shook my head. It wasn’t about money—although the bump in pay would be nice. There were other goals I hoped to reach in my life. Ones that weren’t happening here.
My breath shook, and so did my hands, so I wrung them in my lap. “I’m almost forty, and I don’t have any relationship prospects in sight. Everyone in this town is paired up, not interested, or an ex. And I want what you both have with all my heart. I want a husband, a family. I want a happily ever after. It’s just not finding me here.”
Tears pricked at my eyes. Of embarrassment. Of loss. It was hard to feel like there wasn’t something wrong with me, being passed over for love all these years.
If twenty-year-old me could see my current self—still single with no prospects in sight—she’d be devastated. And to tell the truth, current me was devastated too. I was running out of time to have a family of my own.
Mom and Dad exchanged a silent conversation, and then Dad said, “When do you start?”
“In three months.”
I had three months to pack up my entire life, say goodbye to my friends, and start all over.
Dallas, here I come.
3
HAYES
The office phone rang on my desk, but I ignored it. No business calls past six—unless it came through the emergency line. I put my feet up on my desk and started my nightly routine of scrolling through the long list of women in my phone.
What did I want tonight after the kind of day I’d had?
Kinky to distract me from the monotony?
Vanilla to comfort me from a stressful workload?
Loud to drown out all my thoughts?
Efficient to get the job done before I got too tired?
Every option was there in the list of names and numbers.
But then a new message came through on my phone, interrupting my search.
Unknown Number: Sorry I’m running late! Be there in five! – Della
My eyebrows drew together.
Hayes: How’d you get my personal number?
Della: Liv gave it to me.
“Fuck,” I muttered, making a mental note to have a chat with my sister-in-law. Della may have been Liv’s best friend, but that didn’t mean she needed special access to me too.