Page 98 of Bargain with the Bachelor
Or if that wasn’t a possibility, I’d find a little one-bedroom apartment somewhere in town.
If my photographs continued to sell—or the trust fund thing panned out—perhaps I’d do as Cinda had done and buy a small cottage in town.
Or not. It didn’t really matter. The luxury of the place I went home to at night meant nothing compared towhomI shared my life with on a daily basis.
And I knew exactly who I wanted that to be.
Hunter thought he was scaring me away by telling me how much he needed me. He couldn’t have been more wrong.
Iwantedto be needed by him. I wantedhim—and whatever baggage might come along with the deal.
It would likely take some work to convince him of that, but I’d gotten used to hard work.
And Hunter was worth it.
There was only one problem. He was in Eastport Bay, and I was in Manhattan.
Stepping around my desk, I headed for my office door and then down the hallway to the director’s office.
I knocked and, at my boss’s invitation, stepped inside.
“Hi. Could we talk for a minute? I have some news.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Favorite Season
Hunter
I stared out the window of the Cliffhouse’s small dining room at the sun setting behind the Eastport Bay Bridge.
The food had been phenomenal as usual, and now that it was spring, the view of the lush green lawn and the deep blue ocean beyond it truly couldn’t be beat.
But I was ready to leave. This was the first time I’d been here since Kristal had left town, and I was considering never coming back again. This place was now inextricably tied to memories of her—and I was better off avoiding those.
Right, like that’s even possible.
The entire city was one big parade of Kristal-memories. Maybe I’d buy a penthouse apartment in Providence like Reid had done and just leave Eastport Bay behind completely.
Speaking to her on the phone three weeks ago had reopened wounds that had barely even begun to heal. Now I walked around nearly anemic from the internal emotional bleeding.
In my peripheral vision, I saw someone approaching, most likely my waiter—Kristal’s old fanboy Robbie—returning with my credit card.
But instead of the sullen male voice I’d expected, I heard a woman say, “No six-thousand-dollar bottle of wine this evening? You’re not getting cheap on me now, are you?”
I sucked in a sharp lungful of air as Kristal slid into the chair across from me.
“Hi,” she said with a mischievous smile.
Somehow managing to choke on nothing but air, I coughed a couple of times and finally responded with a gravelly, “Kristal. What a surprise.”
She smiled and nodded to my empty dinner plate. “How was it? Let me guess, you got the… brisket burger.”
“Yes. It was… good... good.”
My brain unfroze and began to wrap itself around the fact that Kristal was actuallyhere, in person, talking to me and not a hallucination conjured by the sheer force of my need for her.
Why wasn’t she in New York? What was she doing in Eastport Bay? Belatedly, I realized what was going on.
