Page 84 of 7 Days and 7 Nights

“So I guess I’ll take a call while we all let that little bombshell sink in. Let’s see...” She noticed JoBeth’s name on the monitor and put her on the air.

“Hi Dr. O.” JoBeth sounded almost as uncertain as Olivia felt. “I kind of hate to interrupt.”

“No problem,” Olivia replied. “I just, uh, needed to clear the air.”Too bad she’d used a sledgehammer to do it. “Tell me what’s happening.”

"Well, I’m still trying to decide what to do,” JoBeth said. “I mean, both you and Matt said that if I wanted to get married and Dawg didn’t, that I should move on.”

“He said that?”

“Yep.” JoBeth sounded far too resigned for a woman contemplating marriage. Olivia could still remember settling for James when all she’d wanted was Matt. Today, of all days, she didn’t want to see JoBeth make the same mistake.

“You know, JoBeth, when you peel everything else away, there’s really only one thing that matters: Which is more important to you, being married or who you share your life with? When you know the answer to that, you’ll know what to do.”

“I was hoping for something a little more specific.”

“I know,” said Olivia. “But I think I’ve already given you more answers than I should have. It’s time to start trusting your gut.”

Of course, it was her gut that had prompted her to make such an outrageously public confession, and all she had to show for it was a hollow feeling in the pit of her stomach and a dim ache in the region of her heart. The potential for even greater humiliation loomed on the horizon.

At the signal from Diane, Olivia ended the call and waited out the scheduled commercial break.

She knew that if Matt hadn’t been tuned in when she signed on, someone must have clued him in by now, but although lots of callers were waiting, not a single one of them was Matt. She thought about the baggage he carried with him, about the loss and pain he’d buried so deeply, and wished he’d let her help him through it. More than anything, she wanted him to be free to love her back in a way she could accept.

Coming out of the break, Olivia considered how she would have counseled a caller in her predicament. She’d told JoBeth and countless others to pursue their dreams and go after what they wanted.

It was her misfortune to want Matt Ransom, but want him she did—all of him, on a permanent basis, and in every possible way. It was time to start scaling a few walls and long past time to start practicing what she preached.

In a healthy relationship, both parties shared their thoughts and feelings. Expectations were to be... expected. She was entitled to know how Matt felt about her.

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Her heart hammered in her chest.

“As I mentioned earlier, I, uh, seem to be in love with Matt Ransom.” She paused. “And I think the time has come to find out how Matt feels about me.”

Her hands shook, but it was too late to turn back now. “If you’re out there, Matt, you need to pick up a phone and give me a call. And you need to be ready to share.”

Olivia did another scan of waiting callers, but Matt’s name still wasn’t among them. Her mouth was dry, and she felt strangely light-headed, but in her heart, she knew she owed it to both of them to be clear about what she wanted.

Taking a deep breath, she issued a final challenge. “Come on, Matt. Pick up the phone and give me a call. Let’s see if you have what it takes to leave Never Land behind.”

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Matt considered calling Olivia for all of five seconds. He’d been in the shower when she signed on, toweling off when she first uttered the L-word, and breaking out in a cold sweat by the time she challenged him to call.

Tucking a towel around his hips, he wiped steam off the bathroom mirror and caught a glimpse of his face. Grooves of panic sliced across his forehead, and his eyes were those of a cornered animal. His usual expression of detached amusement was nowhere to be found. Olivia had turned the tables on him so neatly, he had no idea what he felt or how to respond.

Matt covered his cheeks with shaving cream and jerked the razor downward, nicking an ear in the process. He couldn’t imagine what Olivia was thinking, but if she expected him to call and “share” his innermost feelings on demand, she was living in a fantasy world screwier than the one she’d accused him of inhabiting.

He’d call her when he was good and ready and had some earthly idea of what to say. And not a moment before.

In the meantime, he’d put some miles between them. He was way overdue for a trip home to Chicago. This was an excellent opportunity to catch up with his mother and sister and spend some quality time with his nephews. The station could go find some other trained monkey to fill in for him. After the shit they’d pulled, he didn’t owe them squat.

Matt added clean clothes to the duffel bag still sitting on his bedroom floor and called the station, refusing to talk to anyone but T.J. Then he backed the car out of the garage and headed toward I-75, where he pointed the nose of the Porsche north and applied his foot firmly to the accelerator.

He spent the next 422 miles trying to fathom the turn his life had taken. He still couldn’t believe Crankower and T.J. had pulled off such a sordid little scheme, any more than he could come to terms with the whole mess between himself and Olivia. Once again she’d managed to scale walls he’d spent years erecting, and once again she wanted to drag him to a place he’d sworn he’d never go.

She’d made him talk about Adam, forced him to share feelings he’d kept locked away for a lifetime, and no matter how hard he tried, she refused to let him slide back to his comfort zone. Olivia Moore expected more of him than any woman ever had, and it annoyed the hell out of him that some perverse part of him wanted to give it to her.

He stopped for the night at a Holiday Inn just north of Louisville and was registered by a smiling, pink-cheeked college student who seemed younger than he’d ever been. She actually blushed when she asked him if he was traveling on his own, and he told himself it was only fatigue that stopped him from inviting her to join him for dinner.

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