Page 71 of Hooked
Tayla’s jaw dropped. “What are you doing?”
He looked at the bagel. “Eating.”
“What is wrong with you?” She grabbed the bagel from his hand and walked to the knife block. “You can’t just eat an untoasted bagel.”
“You can, actually. I was doing it.”
“Not in front of me, you heathen.”
Ox watched her cut the bagel and toss it in the toaster. “I think you do think of this place as home. I think you’re being stubborn because this isn’t how you imagined your life going. But stuff that’s unplanned can be just as amazing. Sometimes it’s more amazing. You think I ever imagined opening a bookshop with Emmie?”
“That was serendipity.”
“Yeah. And what if your meeting Jeremy is just as serendip…”
“Serendipitous.”
“That. What if this is your destiny?”
“You think my destiny is being a bookkeeper in Metlin, California?”
He leaned across the counter. “What’s wrong with being a bookkeeper in Metlin, California? A bookkeeper with great friends who are there for each other and have a lot of fun on weekends. A bookkeeper who does yoga in sequoia groves and learns how to rock climb with her boyfriend. And hosts a book club for cool teenagers who think she’s the shit. What’s wrong with that life? Other than it wouldn’t shove success up your parents’ collective asses?”
“You know what?” She popped the still-cold bagel out and put it on a paper towel. “Toast your own bagel, Ox.”
“You know I’m right. That’s why you’re pissed off right now.”
Tayla walked to her room and shut the door, taking her coffee with her.
Stupid Ox. She’d never liked him.
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Chapter Sixteen
Jeremyand his pop were talking on the front porch of his parents’ cabin.
“You leave me with them another week and I’m gonna go insane,” Pop said. “I want some damn bacon, and your mother is convinced my sodium is high.”
“To be fair, we probably all eat too much sodium, Pop.”
“I am eighty-five years old, Jeremy Augustus Allen. You think I give a damn about my sodium? I want a piece of bacon with my eggs in the morning.”
Jeremy shuffled his feet. “Mom and Dad already planned for you to visit for another week.” It was Monday night, and his mom had asked him to bring up some groceries from town. He hadn’t realized his pop was going to ambush him. He should have been clued in by the tofu his mom had included on the list. “Is the only issue the food? You and Dad are catching a ton of fish.” Jeremy had an ice chest full of bass and early trout.
Gus crossed his arms. “There’s only so much a man can fish.”
“And now you’re just talking bullshit.” He looked over Gus’s shoulder to the dim cabin. His parents were already getting ready for bed. “I’ll call Mom in the morning. Convince her that you’ve had your… score… I can’t remember what it’s supposed to be.”
“Three score and ten! It’s biblical, Jeremy.”
“Fine, fine.” Jeremy backed toward his truck. “I’ll mention the biblical reference and remind her that you’re a grown man who can pick his own food and if she wants you to keep visiting them, then she needs to let you have bacon.”
“See that you do.”
Jeremy stopped before he opened the truck. “Do you really want me to take you home?”
His grandpa had given up his license a few years back, when driving at night became too difficult. He’d been placated by the fact that he liked walking, he lived close to all the places he liked to go, and Jeremy was always willing to cart him around. At times like this, however, Jeremy was reminded how limiting it was to be without a vehicle, especially for an independent man like Gus.
