Page 56 of Fake To Forever

Chapter Twenty-One: Man-to-Man

Christian

“Christian! Christian! Where are you?”

At the sound of Haven’s excited cry, I jump up from the couch, where I’ve been lounging and watching the news. Before I can rush out of the living room to find her, she comes racing through the door with a wide smile on her face.

“What’s going on?”

Her eyes are wide as she takes a deep winded breath. “Garretts’s coming home early. He just called to let me know.”

My stomach twists, but I force a smile. I should be excited for Garrett to be coming home. I haven’t seen him since I moved here, but instead, I’m slammed with guilt. He has no idea about Haven and me, and I can’t imagine that he’s going to be thrilled that we got engaged without talking to him first.

There’s a mix of emotions in her eyes as she nods, placing her hands on her hips as another heavy breath escapes her.

“That’s a good thing… right?”

“Yeah… of course it is. I want to arrange a dinner to celebrate him coming home,” she declares. “What do you think?”

“It’s a fantastic idea,” I tell her. “Whatever you want to do. We can have it here, or make reservations somewhere. You just decide and let me know. I’ll arrange everything.”

“Really?”

“Yes, absolutely,” I reply with a smile, trying to ease the obvious nervousness she feels. “We can do whatever you want.”

Walking towards me, she wraps her arms around me before placing her head against my chest. “Thank you… though I will admit I’m really nervous about him coming back.”

“I get that… I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little nervous as well. But we both knew it was coming sooner or later.”

“I know. I think I’m gonna head up to the hospital and tell Mom and Peter.” She grins up at me, her eyes softer than they were a minute ago. As much as I know this is bothering her, I don’t want her to worry about anything. It really should be me that tells him about all of this. He deserves to hear it from me, man-to-man. I don’t want Haven to have to worry about this on top of everything else she’s dealing with.

“All right.” I nod. “When exactly does your brother get home?”

“He’s supposed to get back Thursday night,” she explains, grimacing slightly. “So, three days.”

“Great… it’ll be so good to see him again.”

“I know, it’s just with everything going on…” she drifts off in her words, her eyes falling to the floor as she steps back. “It’s a lot.”

“Let’s not worry about that right now. Just go enjoy yourself with your mom, and we can talk about it all later.”

She nods, leaning up to kiss my cheek before grabbing her purse off the side table making her way towards the door.

As I watch her leave, I keep my smile in place until she’s completely out of sight. When I’m alone again, I release a long breath and shake my head. I need to talk to Garrett before anyone else can tell him what’s going on between me and Haven. If I can explain things to him man-to-man, maybe I can make him understand that I have every intention of taking care of Haven and won’t do anything to hurt her.

With any luck, we can work this out before he even talks to Haven… and I just pray he doesn’t try to kill me in the process.

***

Early Friday morning, I make my way to Garrett’s apartment. I realize, belatedly, that I probably should have called in case he had company, but when I arrive at his place, he opens the door, already dressed.

“Christian? What are you doing here so early?” he asks with a confused frown.

That’s a more loaded question than he realizes. I’ve been keeping an eye on his schedule so I could intercept him when he got back from the oil fields to tell him about Haven and me before he heard it from anyone else. Haven doesn’t even know I’m here. She’s still riding the high from her weekend in New York, and I don’t want to take that away from her just yet. It’s only been four days since she got back.

“I need to talk to you,” I say, stepping past him to get inside.

“Come on in,” he says furrowing his brow in obvious concern as he shuts the door. “Is everything okay?”

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