Total pages in book: 95
Estimated words: 92466 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 462(@200wpm)___ 370(@250wpm)___ 308(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92466 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 462(@200wpm)___ 370(@250wpm)___ 308(@300wpm)
Still, I warned myself to slow my roll.
“I don’t have the exact answer, Nicole, but maybe it starts with a promise to call each other once in a while. To check in.”
After a pause that felt like a lifetime, Nicole nodded. “I can do that.”
A rush of relief washed over me, and we resumed walking. At one point, we passed the house she’d always said was her dream home here in town. I didn’t say anything, but I could tell by the look on her face that she was thinking about it, too.
When we returned to Mimi’s, we found her and Fiona laughing together in the bedroom.
“You two getting along?” Nicole asked.
Fiona smiled. “I have to say, Miss Mimi here is a hoot. I think I hit the jackpot.”
“Aw, well, we’re glad you see what we see,” Nicole said.
“I can start any time if you two need to get on with your lives.”
“Like how soon?” I asked.
Fiona stood. “How about tomorrow?”
My pulse raced. “Tomorrow?”
“That would be fantastic,” Nicole answered faster than I could process this.
***
That night before bed, I called Ronan to update him on the latest situation.
“Dude! When are you coming back to L.A.?” he asked in greeting.
“Sooner than I thought.” I ran my hand through my hair. “And I’m not thrilled about it.”
“You found someone for Mimi?”
“Yeah. A local widow. She seems great. And she’s supposed to start tomorrow, which means I have to get out of here. I’ll spend at least a few days at Tina’s, then book my flight back to L.A.”
“I know it sucks leaving Nicole, but I’ll sure as hell be happy to have you home.”
“Thanks, man.” But L.A. wasn’t home. This felt like my home.
“You okay?” he asked after a moment.
“I think I had this deluded thought that if I had more time, I could somehow win her back. I could find a way to make things so great that she’d forget everything. Or maybe she’d just finally be willing to work through things we never have. It was a fantasy, though.”
“I get it, man.”
“We messed around a little in bed this morning,” I confessed.
“Whoa, what?”
“We didn’t have sex…but it surprised me that she was willing to go where we did. I can’t stop thinking about it. I can’t stop thinking about her, and I haven’t even left yet.”
“She cheated on her boyfriend?”
My blood pressure rose. “No.” I shook my head. “I didn’t tell you they broke up?”
“No! Really?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s huge.”
“It happened before she came out here. But he showed up once, and I almost fucked him up. I don’t trust that he’s out of the picture.”
“You need to call me for backup for shit like that. I thought I told you to let me know if you needed me.”
I chuckled. “I didn’t know he was coming. But getting you into trouble isn’t going to make anything easier. If two of us are out of commission, there’s most definitely no Delirious Jones.”
“There’s no Delirious Jones without any one of us.”
“That’s true, I guess.”
“Well, I’m glad you’re coming back. But I wish you’d gotten the outcome you hoped for.”
“I’m still better off than I was before I came. Nicole and I are on speaking terms at least.”
Ronan snorted. “Sounds like you’ve been doing more than speaking.”
“I wish that had changed something, but it didn’t.”
“At least she kicked Julian to the curb, though. Or is trying to. That’s a win, if you ask me. It could’ve been so much worse. She could’ve married the dude or had his kid. Then she’d be trapped with him.”
“That would’ve been a disaster.” I shuddered. I wasn’t sure how Nicole felt about having kids these days, but we’d once had a pregnancy scare of our own. Although, the only one scared had been Nicole.
CHAPTER 22
ATTICUS
PAST
I rushed back from the recording studio the moment Nicole told me she’d bought a pregnancy test. We had always used protection—with the exception of one time. Hence our current situation. She’d been meaning to go on the pill but had been reluctant to start it, fearing how her body might handle it. And we’d slipped and had sex without a condom.
We’d just moved to a one-bedroom apartment in Brooklyn to be closer to where the guys and I had been recording. Nicole had started her first official hairstyling gig, and I was waiting tables. We could barely pay the rent, so it seemed impossible to fathom how we’d afford a baby.
My beautiful girlfriend met me at the door, and I followed her back to the bedroom. “Have you checked the test yet?”
“No.” She shook her head, rubbing her arms vigorously. “I’m too scared.”
“I know.” I enveloped her in a hug. “Don’t be scared, baby. I’m here. No matter what happens, we’ll be okay. We have each other, and we’ll get through it.”
She stepped back to look at me. “This is not a good time for us to bring a child into the world. I’m only twenty-two and just getting started at the salon. And you’re finally getting some traction on the music front.”