Page 6 of Lavender Lake
“How are you going to explain that,” he asked, pointing to my neck.
“I’ll tell Hadley I’m anemic.”
“It’s clearly a hickey.”
“I should’ve told you not to mark me.” I glared at him.
“You weren’t thinking coherently. What with your eyes rolling into the back of your head.”
I flushed. “You’ve got a mouth on you.”
“Want me to put it to better use?”
“Look, I don’t go around having regular one-night stands, okay?” I took a deep breath and attempted to reign in my infamous Irish temper. “But last night, I needed something to take my mind off things. You were there. You did a good job, okay? But the ego you have . . . it’s going to get you into trouble.”
“God, I hope so.” He cracked a grin, but when I didn’t smile back, it slipped. “What things?”
“Hmm?”
“What things did I take your mind off?”
I blinked. “Declan knows you’re coming, right?”
“Not exactly.”
“What?”
“I was going to surprise him. I was just going to show up.”
“So, then you don’t know,” I murmured.
“Know what?”
I looked him in the eyes. “My dad, Bowman. My dad is in the hospital. That’s why I came home three weeks before the wedding.”
“Shit. The hospital? What happened?”
I swallowed. “Kicked in the head by a horse. Hadley called me two nights ago and I got on the first plane out of New York, but then the weather in Denver . . . He had brain surgery yesterday—to relieve the pressure. He was stable as of this morning.”
But that could change. At any moment. Just like life. I hoped we were still going to have a wedding in a few weeks, not a funeral.
“Surprise,” I said with a strained smile. “Not all happy and joyful, you know?”
“Guess not.”
“It’s not too late to turn back. Get off the plane and get on another and head back to where you came from. Most people would do that.”
He didn’t reply for a long moment, and then he shrugged. “I’m not most people.”
Yeah, no kidding.
“How are you doing? I mean really. Are you hanging in there?”
I lifted my Bloody Mary in the plastic cup and took a sip. “This helps.”
“Hmm. And here I thought it was me causing you to drink. Glad to know it’s not.”
“80 percent my dad, 20 percent you.”
