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“Harrison! I didn’t think you’d be home so soon. I’m sorry. I’m almost done here.”
“You’re fine. I forgot you were coming today.” I like Clarissa a lot. She has five adult children, including a daughter who Ford, Brad, and I went to high school with, and six grandkids that she is constantly showing me photos of. She’s sixty-something, slight, and capable of making every surface shine without even breaking a sweat.
I used to feel guilty as hell for having a woman twice my age cleaning my ridiculously large house but when I said something to that effect as a joke, she had turned pale and explained how much she needed this job because her husband is a diabetic and the medication is expensive. Which made me feel even worse, so I gave her a hefty raise. So now I have probably the highest paid housekeeper in the entire Low Country.
“Any weekend plans?” she asks, taking her bucket to the laundry room and dumping it.
Not a one. “Nope. You?”
“I’ve got the youngest grandkids so my Katie can work her shift at the hospital. By the way, she told me Brad’s wedding got canceled.” She comes back out of the laundry room. “That’s such a shame.”
Was it?
I picture Ivy, eager to indulge in my roadside stops, laughing at the honky-tonk while dancing with Liam. I remember her eager cries of pleasure in the bed next to me and Liam as Ford stroked her pussy to an orgasm.
I don’t think it was a shame at all that Brad let a woman as free and fully herself as Ivy go.
Holy shit.
I have feelings for Ivy, too.
Immediately, I open the refrigerator, even though I have no interest in anything inside it. I just need the flat-paneled door to hide my heated face from Clarissa.
“I don't think people should get married unless they’re very sure they want to get married,” I say to the eggs. All the contents of the fridge start to blur together, as it feels like my entire world has just shifted beneath my feet.
I don’t know what to do with this new information.
Ford would kill me if I told him. I think. Would he? Probably.
Then there’s Liam. With him it’s real. He likes me for who I am.
Fuck.
Complicated, adorable, easily ruffled William.
Who is now with Ivy, if that kiss outside the motel room was any indication.
“I don’t think that’s true at all. I threw up the morning I married Sam because I was so nervous. I thought I was makingthe biggest mistake of my life. Turns out it was the best decision I ever made.”
I close the refrigerator. “So I should marry the first person who makes me throw up?”
Clarissa laughs. “No! Just the person who makes you feel so much that it feels like your heart is in your throat every time you think about them.”
Like Liam.
“I pity whoever that person is,” I joke. “Getting stuck with me is no picnic.”
Clarissa reaches up from her barely five feet tall height and pats my cheek. “Hush. You’re a good man, Harrison, even if you don’t believe it yourself.” She steps back. “Now pick up the phone and call whoever it is that has put that look on your face. Love is risky business, but you’re up for it.”
Maybe I could be.
“Sam’s a lucky man,” I tell her.
“Damn right he is.” She gives me a grin.
That makes me laugh.
“Okay, I’m heading out.” She gives me a wave and picks up her purse off the kitchen counter. “Your phone is dinging.”