Page 45 of Cole

Having to consider the restrictions she faced to live an authentic life even with these women added just another example of the growing dissatisfaction with how she was beingforced to live her life. She wanted the type of life that Charli and Lexi had. She wanted to live a genuine life, where she didn’t have to hide parts of herself from people she really liked.

“Would you like something to drink?” Charli got to her feet and led the way into the large, sunny kitchen. “I should have asked earlier, but we got distracted by the beautiful outfit you made.”

“I don’t want to take up more of your time,” Annie said, though she would have loved to hang out with them some more.

“Oh, don’t worry about that.” Charli gave a wave of her hand. “We have nothing else on this afternoon.”

“Is Blake outside with the boys?” Lexi asked.

“Yep. He’s doing some work on the garage.” Charli put on a kettle of water. “How about Wilder? What’s he up to?”

“He’s helping Lee at the vet clinic. They were doing some work, building more cages or something.”

“Is Wilder handy like that?” Charli asked, her tone highly skeptical.

Lexi laughed. “He’s been trying his hand at it recently. It’s led to living in some messiness of late, but it makes him happy, so I put up with it.”

“I hear ya,” Charli said as Amelia walked back into the kitchen, having gone to change out of the dress. “Blake has been doing lots of projects around here.”

“He just finished our room,” Layla volunteered, as she helped her mom prep the mugs with the tea bags they’d each chosen.

“I saw it when Amelia changed into the dress,” Annie said. “It looked lovely. Very reflective of two different people.”

“We insisted,” Layla said.

“But we tried to agree on things where we could,” Amelia added.

The sisters clearly shared a closeness, and for a moment, Annie wondered if she might have been close like that if her twin sister was still around.

She didn’t think about her sister often. She was an abstract concept to Annie. But there were times when the thought of her sister popped into Annie’s mind.

“And yet you still managed to drive Dad crazy,” Charli said with a chuckle. “It’s amazing he didn’t lose all his hair while he worked to please you two.”

Annie could hear the affection Charli had for her husband clearly in the woman’s voice. It sparked a longing in her own heart to have that for herself.

She wanted to love and be loved. To have friends and a life beyond the walls of her home.

But how would it ever be possible?

“Here you go,” Amelia said, as she set a mug of tea in front of her.

“Thank you.” Annie gave her a smile that felt harder than usual to bring to the surface.

Every day now, it felt she was struggling more and more with discontent. And it was weighing her down. She didn’t want to feel like that, because she had so much in her life to be grateful for.

“How is Shiloh doing?” Lexi asked. “Is she not here today?”

“She’s doing well,” Charli said as she sat down at the table. “She’s out with Skylar and Aiden this afternoon.”

“That’s great that they’ve managed to work things out,” Lexi said.

Charli nodded. “It’s an answer to prayer. Actually, I just wanted Skylar and Aiden to get along better. Maybe become friends again. That they’ve decided to get back together as a couple came as a little bit of a surprise, but definitely a welcome one.”

Annie thought of the news that Cole had recently shared with her that he was a donor match for Shiloh. He’d been excited at the prospect of being able to help his niece, though he obviously hoped that the stem cell transplant wouldn’t be necessary.

Cole had shared quite a bit about his friendship with Aiden and his relationship with his sister, Skylar. There was no doubt that he was super close with both of them. Annie hadn’t spent much time with either of them, but when she had, she hadn’t felt like they shared much in common.

Although, realistically, there were probably very few women her age that she had much in common with.

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