Page 28 of The Billionaire's Runaway Bride

I whip through a good portion of the logs, working up a sweat to the point I take my shirt off and use it as a rag to wipe my brow. My arms and shoulders burn, revved up from the sudden and intense exercise, but it helps. Venting keeps me from wondering and entertaining my racing thoughts about the girl who’s captured my attention so thoroughly.

When Marian’s old truck pulls up and I see Lauren’s high ponytail swaying, I don’t stop. I keep chopping the wood, reveling in the mighty strokes that split the logs so quickly.

She exits, arms laden with bags of groceries.

I glance up, my chest heaving as she stares at me. After I wipe my brow with my forearm, I squint and wonder just who this woman is.

“So, are you more of a Cab-Sav or a Pinot fan?”

Her mouth drops open as she gasps, almost dropping every bag in her hands.

Chapter 11

Lauren

What? Alarms go off in my head. I can’t do anything but stand there, gawking at Caleb. Of all things he could have said…

I shake my head, wanting to jerk out of this trance of shock. If I could, I’d deny this connection.

He knows. I swallow hard, trying to fit that fact into my mind and not freak out.

He knows.

Panic flares, but I swallow again and test out more shallow breaths to keep my cool. Even if I can’t, and I do freak out after all, I want to hide it and at least pretend that I’m all right with this.

I can’t be. Fury and confusion swarm within my frantic mind, and I blink, stupefied as he doesn’t say anything else. He doesn’t even look at me. Shirtless with all his rock-hard muscles gleaming in the afternoon sun, he resumes chopping wood like he moonlights as a freaking ripped lumberjack.

I choke on whatever words that rush to the front of my mind, but I shake my head again and can’t utter a single thought.

He saves me from forcing a coherent reply, beating me to it by asking, “So, you missed your wedding, huh?”

I grit my teeth as my blood boils hotter. The nerve of this man asking that.

“Who sent you here?”

He pauses only to set another log on the cutting block and glances at me. “What?”

“Were you sent here by my parents? Or Jeremy?” I get the demands out, but I hate the way my voice shakes. My fingers tremble too, and with a hasty realization my digits are going numb from stringing too many bags on my hands, I swear under my breath and leave.

“Silly me,” I snap dryly as I hurry away. When I spotted him there, I figured he’d rush over and help carry the load in. No. Instead, he stunned me stupid with a question about my past.

Or recent present. I ran from my wedding, but I didn’t morph into a whole new person. I still am my parents’ daughter. And I had “missed” my wedding. But knowing that Caleb knows stings. It makes me vulnerable and defensive and beyond angry.

Marian isn’t in the kitchen, and it’s just as well she isn’t. I hurry to stash everything in the fridge haphazardly. She can sort it according to her “system” later. I only wanted to get the perishables out first, saving the rest for a second trip. As in, a repeat of my path and facing Caleb again.

I grind my molars and stand up as tall as I can, impatient to get it over with and get the heck away from him and his unwelcome questions.

He knows. He knows. Which means someone had to have told him. The timing is too uncanny to dismiss. He showed up right when I did, and as I hurry back to the truck, I’m convinced Caleb’s arrival here isn’t as innocent as I thought it was.

Once I stride toward the truck, he pauses chopping.

“I wasn’t sent by anyone.”

I whip around. “Tell the truth, Caleb.”

He shakes his head, glaring at me. “I want to know the truth.”

I laugh once, a bark of hot disbelief. “You want the truth?” He has no right!

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