Page 128 of Townshipped
I laugh some more. “You have exactly zero filter.”
“Filters are for people who live in fear. I’ve got nothing to fear. You don’t like what I’m thinking? Eh. Sorry, mama. Cover your ears. I’m going to say it. I’m not mean. Just truthful.”
“You are that. But, seriously, he’s not going to say all those things. Not even close.”
“Okay,” Gabriela says, taking a more sedate tone and then changing her voice a little to sound masculine.
“What if he said, ‘Em, I miss you. I want us to be together. What are we going to do to bridge this distance? I don’t want to let you go.’”
When she says those words, I can almost picture Aiden saying them. Her voice was a fairly good imitation of his inflections and the gravelly richness of his tone. Tingles zip across my skin when I imagine Aiden saying those things to me.
“Well?” Gabriela asks.
“I’d go.”
“Darn straight you would. You’d go and you’d place your palm right on those fantastic, ripply abs just for me and run your hand up and down just a little so you can count them. Nothing crazy. You can do it through his shirt. I’m just saying.”
“That should totally offend me.”
“You know his abs should be sculpted and placed somewhere for public appreciation.”
“I know they definitely should not.”
“Possessive. I like it. You never ever were like this before. You wouldn’t have cared a stitch if I wanted to make an entire museum dedicated to Buck’s abs.”
“Because that would never be a thing.”
“True. Bless that man. He definitely wasn’t going to inspire a Michelangelo carving.”
We laugh together.
“So,” Gabriela asks in herI’m getting seriousvoice. “What’s keeping you here?”
I lean back on the bed pillows and stare out my window toward the end of our brick driveway running along the manicured lawn with the expanse of trees in the distance.
“I don’t know. I thought recovering my memories would make me feel whole. It doesn’t. I feel like I found myself for the first time in Ohio. The Boston Mallory isn’t the same woman as Bordeaux Em.
“Boston Mallory dated a man she didn’t love, and worked a job she was good at because it pays well. I checked all the boxes, but I was adrift. Besides our friendship, there wasn’t a thing about my life I loved.”
“I know,” Gabriela agrees. “That’s why I told you to go on your honeymoon alone in the first place. Do you want my opinion?”
“You’re asking? Like I have a choice as to whether you share your thoughts with me?”
“You’re not wrong. I’m going to tell you what you need to hear.”
Gabriela laughs like she’s tickled with herself.
Then she says, “I think you need to go back there. Arrange to stay somewhere else, so you’re not on the farm with him and the kids. You need to take this risk. How many women meet the man of their dreams and have a chance at making a forever life with him?”
43
AIDEN
The distinctive sound of Duke’s motorcycle thrums from the end of my driveway. I turn from setting up the milking stand to watch him dismount and walk toward the goat enclosure.
I just finished feeding the newborns small doses of grain, and now I’m milking the moms for my cheese production.
“Hey, farmer Aiden,” Duke says as he opens the gate.
