Page 36 of Untruly With You

Yes, please. Get me out of here.

Frankie jumps up and holds a hand out to me. “Let’s do it.” Clearly, I’m not the only one wanting to get away from the awkwardness.

“You guys go ahead,” Cassidy says flippantly. “I have some things I need to do.

Frankie and I don’t object. Magnolia looks like she’s about to, but Frankie pulls her by the arm, a subtle pleading behind her eyes.

As soon as we’re outside and out of Cassidy’s line of vision, Frankie grumbles, “Ugh. She’s the worst.”

“Don’t say that,” Magnolia chides. “She’ll be your sister soon.”

“Don’t remind me,” Frankie says.

Magnolia’s mouth pops open. “Francesca!”

Frankie makes a face at her mother’s use of her real name. “Ever since the engagement, Cassidy’s just been so…” She makes a guttural, groaning sound. “And you should haveseenthe way she hugged Sutton yesterday, Mom. It was like watching a Venus fly trap with one of its victims.”

I shake my head, laughing. “You can’t just blame her. IfSutton didn’t want to hug her, he shouldn’t have. He’s not a helpless little fly.”

“Around her, he might as well be,” Frankie says.

I’m shocked to hear Frankie talking like this. Even when she was mad at Wells at dinner my first night here, she played it off with a joke.

As if reading my mind, Frankie adds, “I’m just protective of Sutton. That’s all.” She sighs. “Usually Cassidy isn’t so bad.”

“Cass is on edge from the wedding prep,” Magnolia says, looping her elbow with mine. “She makes Wells happy, and that’s what matters.”

Magnolia shifts the conversation. She asks me about my family, my hobbies, my work. We talk about school, and I tell her my side of the story of meeting Sutton for the first time. She smiles when I tell her that he spent a lot of time not only with me but also with my parents.

Main Street in West River is only a half-mile long. There are exactly two crosswalks in town, one on either end of Main. We pass an old-fashioned candy store, a western-wear shop, two restaurants and one cafe, a jewelry store, and even the radio station. Frankie waves to the man working at the microphone on the other side of the window. He must be at least eighty years old. He waves back enthusiastically.

The longer we walk, the more I notice people’s eyes on me. Though West River only has two thousand residents, there are still dozens of people walking along Main Street. And every single one stares at me. I never felt like I drew any double-takes in the city, but here, it’s like I’m an animal in a zoo, being watched—sometimes with apprehension, sometimes with delight, but always unabashedly.

I whistle. “What, is there no cable in West River?”

“Not a lot happens in a town this size. I wouldn’t besurprised if you show up on the front page of the paper,” Magnolia quips, giving me a very Sutton-esque half-smile.

Frankie bumps my shoulder. “Haven’t you been listening to the radio? I’ve been giving Laine Rodriguez updates at the top of every hour.”

Sutton is still workingwhen we get back to the ranch, and both Frankie and Magnolia have some work to do, so I take advantage of the alone time by walking along a tree-hugged trail beyond the front clearing. It’s beautiful, undeniably, but it’s also too quiet. There aren’t any sounds of clogged traffic, construction, or overlapping conversations like there always are in the city. It’s eerie.

In the silence, my mind races. First, I scan the pines and ponder the question of how close a bear would have to be to me before I would see it. Pretty dang close, I think.

Then, I think about Sutton.

I think about his hug with Cassidy, realizing I would rather run into a bear than run into the two of them together again. I think about his breathing, soft and steady as he slept beside me. Mostly, I spend my time trying tonotdwell on the mental image of Sutton chopping wood, sans shirt. Because friends don’t think about friends shirtless.

When my efforts to stop thinking about Sutton prove fruitless, I pop my headphones in and pull up a playlist on my phone. In my pre-trip prep, I spent hours listening to country and folk music. Now, it’s my guilty pleasure. And John Denver’s voice cranked up to max volume is just what I need to get my mind off things.

Once the sun descends in the sky, I turn back to the house. I was careful to stay close to the tree line when hiking, just to be sure I didn’t get lost.

Inside the house, the living room is vacant, so I continue upstairs, throwing my bag on the bed. I almost take my headphones out, but worried more errant thoughts will cascade through the silence, I keep them in, deciding I’ll wait until the last second before my shower to take them off and hope the roar of the water will be distraction enough at that point.

But when I open the door to the bathroom, I collide with a solid wall on the other side. I let out a surprised yelp as I stumble back, yanking my headphones from my ears.

Sutton stands there, his post-shower towel barely clinging to his hips, his damp curls kissing his forehead. His deep eyes widen, and there's a flash of red across his cheeks.

A jumbled, “Whoops,” is the best I can croak out. My gaze involuntarily drifts over the planes of Sutton’s body and the “S” tattoo on his ribs. Water droplets cling to the definition of his torso.

---