Page 4 of The Comeback Road (Leaving #2)

Lexie

Jace only let me leave for lunch because I agreed to have dinner with him.

He had pulled me into his office, telling me there was an urgent matter we had to discuss—we had six months of kisses to make up for.

Before I knew it, thirty minutes had passed, and I was officially running late to meet Magnolia for lunch.

Pulling open the door into the diner, I stumbled in, catching her sitting at a booth looking at her phone. She was probably waiting for me to text her back since I was almost twenty minutes late.

“Sorry…sorry.” I plopped down opposite her, and when I looked up, she was staring at me in surprise.

“Care to explain?” Magnolia asked.

I tilt my head to the side. “What do you mean?”

She gives me an are you freakin’ kidding me? look. “You look like you went two rounds with a farmer in the hog shed. What do you mean, what do I mean?”

“Oh, that,” I mumbled. I had hoped that I had got myself together a bit on the way over. But it was hard to hide the flush that only seemed to get more prominent when I thought of Jace and what had transpired when he pulled me into his office .

Magnolia kept her eyes on me, refusing to let it go.

I grabbed my coffee cup so I could use it as a shield while I let it all tumble out.

“Jace served his wife—well, soon-to-be ex-wife now—with divorce papers and took off his wedding ring. He alluded to the fact that he’s been looking for her for a while to serve her, and then he was all ‘ tell me no’ and I didn’t, so we made out… a bit.”

Magnolia’s mouth popped open. “ What? ”

“I know.”

Before I knew it, she was squealing in delight—which was so not like her—and bouncing up and down in her seat—which was even more not like her.

“This is so exciting! I’m so happy for you!”

I tried to smile, but it came out more like a grimace.

Magnolia was the only one who knew the depth of my feelings for Jace.

I was totally and completely in love with him.

I knew he wanted to have sex with me, maybe even date.

But he had been married, so it was a no-go for me.

Regardless of the fact that she had run off a few years before, Jace was still married, and he still wore his ring.

That had told me everything I needed to know.

But now, Jace was getting divorced, and he had taken off his ring.

“I’m nervous,” I whispered, not liking that it made me vulnerable, that it reminded me a little too much of my childhood.

“Don’t be, Lex. He adores you. Anyone with eyes can see that.”

“I know, but I’m just worried it won’t be enough.” I shrugged.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Magnolia said softly. I knew she was asking if I wanted to talk about my dad, so I adamantly shook my head. I didn’t want to talk about him, not even a little bit.

“Have you spoken to her?”

The her she was referring to was my half sister, Lacy.

She called, but I ignored them. I knew it might be selfish; she probably was a good person, but it was hard to reconcile the fact that she was only five months younger than me.

My dad had been living a secret life for years before my mom found out, and in the end, it wasn’t us he chose.

Lacy reached out first when we started college, and I ignored her just as much as I ignored my dad.

She kept trying, but I couldn’t seem to make myself have a relationship with someone who spoke highly of our father.

I think Lacy was trying to mend fences between us, but she only added a deeper wedge.

I stopped answering, and eventually, she stopped calling.

“No.”

Reading my body language and the tone of my voice, Magnolia shot me one last questioning glance and thankfully moved back to the topic of Jace, almost as if she could sense my anxiety about it.

“He’s smitten, I promise. I’ve overheard many phone calls about you between him and Sloan. He filed for divorce. He served her. He did that for you.”

But he should have done it for him.

I bit my lip, trying to let her words convince me and deciding to push my thoughts to the side.

“You’re right. We are having dinner tonight.”

She clapped her hands together. “Where are you going?”

“He asked if he could cook me dinner, that he’d like us to spend some time getting to know each other without the whole town getting involved.”

That had Magnolia bursting out laughing, “You know he’s right.”

“I know.”

“What time will you be home? You can show me all the outfits you want, and I won’t complain once, I promise .”

“Wow, you must really be happy for me,” I joked, but Magnolia reached over and grabbed my hand with hers and gave it a squeeze. “I really am,” she said. I couldn’t help but get choked up at her words.

“Thanks, babes.” I gave her hand a squeeze back.

The rest of lunch passed by with relatively easy conversation, and a little update on how the build was going.

Magnolia finally decided on calling it The Bar-k-ery and they were currently arguing over the spelling.

I wish she would have let me help her with funding, but it only seemed to set her off.

If Magnolia knew how much money I had, maybe she wouldn’t be so hesitant to accept it.

But I knew that would lead to questions I really couldn’t answer.

Once I had devoured my pancakes and we had finished a pros and cons list over the spelling, it was time for me to head back to the office. Once I pulled in, I realized I still had a few minutes left of my break and decided to call Luke back.

After thirty seconds of ringing with no answer, I hung up, once again ignoring the nagging feeling that something wasn’t quite right.