Page 38 of Pulling Heartstrings

“Wait,” I say, and thankfully she doesn’t make me chase after her. “I’m sorry, I didn’t?—”

“Seriously, it’s fine,” she interrupts and then waves her fingers towards my desk. “I interrupted something, and it was bad timing all around. I’ll head back to the city and get out of your hair.”

“No, don’t leave. Why don’t you stay the night? I need to talk to Bronte, but I would love for you to finally meet her.”

“Are you sure?” Nina hesitates, and I know she’s weighing the options to see if I’m serious or not. When I nod, she beams, and I know it was the right call. Nina and I had shitty parents growing up, and I’ve been her guardian for most of her life. “Great. I packed a bag just in case.”

“Okay, I’ll catch up with you later,” I tell her quickly before I bolt out of the door.

I look up and down the street, and I’m not shocked to see that Bronte is gone. I try to think about where she would go. I discard her house. That would be the obvious place, and she wouldn’t want me to find her so easily. The same goes for the diner too. She’s already eaten, and she can’t go home, so she needs a place to hide. It would have to be somewhere public and within walking distance. She would want to go somewhere familiar, but I guarantee she’s not in the mood to have conversations.

I’m grinning to myself as I turn around and take off in the direction of the library.

Once I climb the stairs and walk inside, I see a little old lady at the circulation desk stamping books. When I get up to her, she looks over the top of her glasses at me and gives me the sweetest smile.

“You must be Marcus.” I see she’s wearing a name tag with Mrs. Maggie on it. To my surprise, the little old lady looks me up and down like a piece of meat. “I can see why Bronte is running from you. What size shoe do you wear?”

“Um...” I can feel my cheeks heat as I look anywhere but in her direction.

“She told me not to tell you she was going to hide with the research textbooks on the second floor.” Mrs. Maggie pushes her glasses up her nose. “But I’ve never been good at keeping secrets.”

“You don’t say?” I try to smother my grin, and it’s almost impossible.

“If you ask me, that girl could use a few pushes against the stacks, if you know what I mean.”

My eyes widen in shock at the sweet little old lady.

“Oh, don’t make that face. I was young once.” She looks me up and down again. “My late Andrew wore a size thirteen.” She winks at me and then points to the stairs behind her. “At the top, take a left. She’ll be all the way in the back.”

“Um, thank you, I think.”

“Anytime, handsome,” Mrs. Maggie says. “Oh, and don’t worry. We don’t have cameras back there. I’ve been trying for years to get some installed, but it’s never in the budget.”

“I thought you said you were young once?” I tease.

She lets out a quick laugh. “Oh sweetie, it’s not to stop people from fooling around back there. It’s so I could watch the show.”

My mouth falls open before I shake my head and back away from the desk. Mrs. Maggie doesn’t say anything else and goes back to stamping books.

As I race up the stairs, I can’t help but think that Mrs. Maggie might be the coolest old lady I’ve ever met.

Chapter Seven

BRONTE

I pace back and forth between the bookshelves. This corner of the library with the research textbooks has always been my little hideaway. When I was in high school, I’d come here after school and read through them.

It wasn’t hard for me to easily lose myself in the information I craved. There’s a website where people search for case law, and when they find it, they upload the legal documents. I would spend hours sifting through these books, hoping to find the answer. I always wanted to be among the first to respond because it felt like a game I could win.

It was better than going home to an empty house. My father was always on the road working and even more so when I got older. At least when I was in the library, people were around. It was quiet but not too quiet.

Right now, I have no desire to scour through old textbooks. Even if I opened one, I don’t think I would be able to take anything in. I’m so distracted that I know I'd read the same page over and over again. It’s because all my thoughts revolve around Marcus. Who was the attractive woman in his office? And how the heck was he able to touch me like he knew every curve of my body?

When I worked for him before, I never missed how women would watch him. Women that were way more in his league than me. I even harbored a slight romantic interest in him prior to his awareness of my existence, but back then, my interest was primarily focused on his skills and talent in the courtroom.

I learned about him through reading case law. In fact, the first time I saw his name was right here. The experience of meeting him in person was overwhelming. I had already built him up so much in my mind that I never thought reality could top that. I was oh so wrong.

The second I saw him, my whole body lit up in a way it never had before. I was so terrified that I built walls to keep him at a distance. Marcus bulldozed right through them each time. A part of me had truly enjoyed that. Here I am hating being alone, and he was always trying to get close, but I was running.

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