Page 49 of Next to You

Spencer and his dad had barely dropped me off a half hour ago, and I was already moping around like my life was ending without him.

I lived in a cozy log cabin behind the Honeybrook Inn. Much like Spencer’s family cabin, I was in the forest. The difference was that mine was not in the boonies. I was only a hop, skip, and a jump away from the Inn and town and takeout coffee.

I had one bedroom, a bathroom, a kitchen, and a living room. Basically, I lived in a girly little square with a wraparound porch. Think pastels, fluffy overstuffed furniture, homemade quilts and knitted throws, my needlepoint, and books everywhere.

It was a rustic log cabin on the outside with old lady décor on the inside. Picturing Spencer in here gave me a thrill. What would it look like to have him naked in my white iron four-poster bed? I almost started drooling at the thought of his chest hair getting caught up in my lacy pink duvet cover. And those big, rough, work-calloused hands of his…

Damn.

I missed him.

I wanted to finish what we started together in that big chair at the cabin.

I didn’t want to be without him—maybe ever.

Last night, he told me all my kisses were his. My dating history taught me to take whatever a man says when I am bouncing around on his lap with a grain of salt, but Spencer was different. I believed him.

We had only been stuck in that cabin for a few days, so I knew I was being silly, overly romantic, dramatic, and full of wishful thinking. But I couldn’t find it in myself to care because our time there felt real. It was the most I’d beenmyselfwith another person in a long time, if ever.

We had a date planned, but I was sobadat dating that I was bound to screw something up. Back in the cabin, I had quit thinking about how to act and just let myself be myself. We had no choice but to let all of our usual pretenses go in order to stay sane and survive together.

I paced around my kitchen island with my thoughts racing out of control.

The quiet in my cabin pounded in my ears.

My heart constricted, and it felt like the air had somehow thinned. I couldn’t breathe.

The reality of the real world outside of our snowy little bubble was slapping me in the face hard, and I didn’t like it one bit.

I stopped at the sink and filled a glass with water, gulping it down in a few sips.

Sure, I had electricity and hot water now, but what did it matter if he wasn’t here with me?

Like an irrational fool, I darted around my house and flipped all the lights off. I built a fire and threw myself on the couch towatch it crackle and blaze as I got lost in the memories of the last few days.

I was warm, and I had all my stuff, and my fish, and my books, and TV, but I wanted to go cuddle in the dark with Spencer, damn it. I didn’t need all these distractions when I was with him.

I’d gone from my Man Ban to the All Spencer All the Time Plan as if I hadn’t spent my entire dating life getting my heart broken by mediocre men. My outlook had changed like the crack of a whip, shocking and sudden, like an awakening. I was all in with him. Now, I knew my other relationships had never worked out because I was always meant to be with Spencer. We were perfect together.

Where had my sense of self-preservation gone?

Like a dewy-eyed ingenue, I’d left it somewhere at the Cassidy family cabin. But damn, hopefully, I wouldn’t need it anymore.

I didn’t even have his number to call him. Our phones had died, and there was nowhere to write his number down. I hoped that he remembered mine because I was missing him like crazy, and I needed to hear his voice. Maybe it was a good thing I couldn’t call him since I was halfway to losing my mind over him.

Quit being pathetic.

I should shower, make something to eat, or do anything else but sit on my couch like this sad shell of a woman.

I picked up my mug from the coffee table and sipped it.

Yeah, I had coffee, but it wasn’thiscoffee. I slid it back onto my coffee table with a dramatic sigh. I was ruined for life and spoiled completely rotten because of how well he’d treated me. No other man would do.

My phone charging on the end table pinged with a message. I lurched, heaving myself up to grab it.

Alas, it was not Spencer.

Every one of my half-sisters, my mother and grandmother, had started texting me. After the first ping, the notifications went out of control. I muted them and sank back into the couch, throwing an arm across my forehead. I knew Spencer’s dad had informed them they’d be picking us up today, so they knew I was alive and home. I didn’t have to answer yet.

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