Page 16 of Resisting You
I was pretty damn sure Rosa wouldn’t want to stay married. Hell, she didn’t even want todateme. There was no way she would want to be my wife. “I… I need some time to think. Let me get through my sister’s wedding and I’ll get back to you.”
“You know,” she said, “just once I’d love to have a weekend off that doesn’t involve putting out your fires.”
The irony was, I wasn’t asking her to put this one out.
“Okay. I’m shutting my phone off in a few minutes for the wedding. I’ll turn it back on after the main events are over.”
“Can you be back to the city tonight?”
I swallowed, glancing around at my mother’s backyard. The wooden archway Cam had carved for Ronnie to get married beneath. The twinkling lights strung all around the deck and yard that transformed my childhood home into a romantic paradise.
I hated coming home to Maple Grove. Most trips, I did everything in my power to get the hell back to New York within twenty-four hours. But over the last two years, I’d also been making much more of an effort to reconnect with my family. Rebuild the bridges I thought had long since been burned.
“No,” I said quietly, flicking my toe against the top of the water. “I won’t be back for a few days.”
“Okay,” Kristen said, not pushing the matter. She knew my history with my family. She knew when to press me and when to back off. It was why we worked so well together… usually. When I wasn’t fucking it all up.
“Good luck officiating. Call me tonight as soon as you can. I can hold off the press for a little while, but not for long.”
“Yeah, I will. And Kristen… thank you. I’d be lost without you.”
“Believe me kid, I know.”
A sad chuckle slipped through my lips as I hung up. I tilted my face to the sun and closed my eyes, letting the warm sunshine hit my skin. Waves caused by a nearby boat lapped against the dock, splashing. In the distance, the haunting call of a loon sang its sad song, echoing across the water.
The phone started buzzing in my hands again.
“What’d you forget, Kristen?” I asked, answering the phone without looking at the screen.
“Noah Tripp,” a voice snapped in my ear and I slammed eyes closed, squeezing them shut as hard as I could. Dammit.Why didn’t I check the caller ID first?
“Hazel,” I said, greeting my best friend’s new wife. “Hey. How’s married life?”
“I could ask you the same thing.” I heard Reid in the background mumbling something and Hazel snorted. “Reid is telling me to be nice to you. Which frankly, the fact that I’mgivingyou this call, giving you this head’s up,ismy version of nice.”
“What head’s up?”
“Rosa is on her way to Maple Grove.”
Every muscle in my body knotted. I couldn’t have heard her right. “Excuse me?”
“Rosa. Is. Coming. To. Maple. Grove.” She punctuated each word in a snotty way that paralleled the way my twin sister, Callie would have spoken to me.
“Why?” My lungs felt tight… like they were too large for my chest cavity and I pressed my palm to my sternum.
“Why?” she repeated. “Are you seriously asking me why? When you left this morning and didn’t answer anyone’s calls, she hopped on the first bus to Maple Grove. She should be there any minute.”
“But… but she doesn’t even know where I am in Maple Grove.” I breathed a little easier, knowing that she didn’t have my mom’s address.
“Oh, she knows. She found your sister’s wedding invitation in the trash of your hotel room.”
I dropped my head, the breaths now coming in short, sharp waves. “Shit,” I hissed. “I have to go, Hazel.”
I hung up the phone and immediately dialed Rosa. It started ringing and my blood ran cold. Because directly behind me, I could hear her ringtone.
I hung up and slowly turned around from where I was sitting on the dock to find Rosa standing there, her hands on her hips, glaring at me.
“Well hey there,darling.” Her voice dripped with sarcasm.
