Page 11 of Stealing Home

“In my bedroom.” I shout.

Ty walks in and looks at me with a sheepish grin. “What is with that grin?”.

“Oh, nothing. Just happy that you’ll be living next door and I’ll have a front-row seat to your life, little brother.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“Oh, you know just that Heather is giving the down low on you since Adriana asked about you.” He responds.

“Okay, and that means a front row for what?” I hedge.

“For when you fall. Heather told me how you didn’t even flinch when she asked you to pick Adriana up from the airport for her. And don’t forget you asked when she was coming too.” Ty says sheepishly and blows me a kiss.

“What are you doing here again?” Ignoring everything he said and throwing a pillow at his head instead.

“Just left the stadium and thought I’d stop by to see how picking Adriana up went.”

“It was fine. She seems like cool people.” I say, answering him.

My phone rings and I look down and see it’s my agent, our agent, Art.

“It’s Art, I have to grab it.” I tell Ty. He waves at me and mouths, see you soon.

“Hey Art, what’s going on?” answering my phone.

Art beats me to speaking about going public about the breakup with Layla. Apparently, she met someone and wants to be seen with him. We will let the world know that we broke up three months ago and took time to be on our own. I told Art that was good with me and thanked him for coordinating the statements. With that taken care of, my need for a shower takes over so I can get dressed and head back over to Ty and Heather’s for dinner.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Adriana

Cole left, and my gaze honed in on Heather. “What are you trying to do, woman?” asking Heather while squinting my eyes at her like daggers are coming out.

“What do you mean?” Heather replies, acting oblivious.

“You know exactly what I mean.” chuckling at her antics. “I think you are up to something, ma’am.”

“Okay, so here is some tea you have to keep between us. Cole and his ex-broke up a little over three months ago, but they haven’t gone public with it. Anytime Ty and I have talked about you he’s seemed quite interested. So when I had to stay home for the delivery today, he practically offered to pick you up.” Heather updates me.

I stare at Heather, absorbing the meaning of her words. That answers my question and gave me more to think about. Cole is single and wanted to pick me up?

“And hey if he realized maybe he has a crush, then you know even better.” Heather shrugs her shoulders nonchalantly. “He’s given Ty so much shit about settling down and getting married. So, we’ve been waiting for a front-row seat for him to fall.” She finishes.

“Well, he is gorgeous, and he was very sweet. But, fair warning, my ex really did a number on me.” Giving her the heads up.

“What did he do? Are we sending the boys after him?” she asks me dead serious.

Boys? She’s so put together in all other aspects of her life, but her soft spot is these two men and it makes me laugh.

“Heather, they’re men, not boys. And no, we don’t need to do that.”

I take a deep breath before diving into my relationship trauma. It’s the first time I’ve talked about Toby since sharing what happened with Dani five months ago.

“And I walked in on the jackass with not one buttwowomen, who I call the floozie twosies, the day I was laid off. I should have known he was a two-timing jackass since his name was Toby, but I guess my asshole radar wasn’t working the day I met him. Needless to say, I’m not really that excited or eager to get back on the horse, if you know what I mean.” Giving her the inside scoop that led to my being here.

“Are you fucking kidding me?! What a piece of shit! I’m so sorry, lady. It sounds like the next man needs to be an actual adult and not a man-child.” Heather tells me.

“Yeah, it’s going to take someone pretty fucking special to change my mind. And a whole lot of fucking effort, too.” Agreeing with her.

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