Page 28 of I Choose You
Claire
I stood in Wyatt’s room—my new room, temporarily—and took it all in. Reid came in behind me and placed my suitcase on the floor.
“Thanks,” I said cheerfully. “You didn’t have to go there to pack it up yourself. I would have done it. You’ve done more than enough already.”
“That would involve you going there, which you are not doing.” Reid walked past me and opened the bedroom window. It was cold outside, but the fresh air was needed to get the stagnant air circulating.
It was clear that Wyatt didn’t spend a lot of time here. He must have packed up some clothes and toiletries, but some of his more summery clothes were still in the drawers. That was fine. One, because it was his house, and he could leave whatever he wanted here. He was doing me a huge favor by allowing me to stay here on such short notice. And two, I only had the one suitcase of clothes with me. I had been living out of it all this time, not daring to put my clothes in the Cove’s End dressers, so it didn’t bother me to have to workaround Wyatt’s clothes.
Reid left to grab the other suitcase from his truck, the one with shoes and makeup and toiletries of my own. It was strange to think that for my entire life, I had lived a totally different lifestyle. One of excess and possessions. I always thought I was pretty responsible with my money, but after spending months with nothing more than my two suitcases, I realized that I had far too much back at home and that I really didn’t need it.
I made my way around the house. It was a two-bedroom, one-bath cottage. Wyatt’s room was small but clean. The bed had been made, including fresh sheets. It looked like the spare bedroom was a little smaller and used as a multipurpose space with a desk and some workout equipment. The bathroom was next to the spare room, another small room but clean and well maintained.
There were neighbors pretty close on both sides, but the kitchen looked out to the open backyard. Suddenly, the air in the room changed, like an electrical current was circling the perimeter. I looked over my shoulder to see Reid standing on the opposite side of the island, his arms crossed over his chest, watching me.
“Thank you. Again. You really didn’t have to do this, but I appreciate it all the same.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
The silence felt heavy. I didn’t know what was wrong with my head today, but it felt like it was trying to make something more out of Reid’s every gesture, every word. Reid was just being nice. Sure, that in itself was still a little weird since, until three days ago, he was mostly Mr. Grumpy-Pants, but that didn’t mean anything other than he was a decent guy.
“Listen, I know you don’t want me to go back to the motel, but I really do need to get my car. I have to get to the police station soon to give my statement. That will be the last time I go there though, I pinky swear it.” I smiled at him, holding my pinky finger out to him. Reid had somehow got me out of giving my statement last night, but I wouldn’t be able to get away from it again today.
“Don’t worry about it.”
I resisted rolling my eyes, just barely. “So you keep saying.” It wasn’t a second later that I heard a car pull up in the driveway. I went to the living room window and peeked out through the curtains. Sure enough, there was my car. Wyatt got out of my car and hopped into the SUV that was parked along the curb out front, Wes behind the wheel.
I glanced back at Reid, but he raised his brow, a small smirk trying to break free. My phone rang where I’d left it on the kitchen island. Reid glanced at it like it was an annoyance. I hurried over to it, ready to answer it.
Will.
I silenced the call, pocketing my phone. He was still calling me occasionally, even though I never answered. He had to know that it was over between us. What was he trying to hold on to?
“Alright, well… do you need anything else?”
“Anything more than a house to stay at?” I asked incredulously. “No. I think this should just about do it.” My phone started ringing again.Seriously?I took it out of my pocket to silence the ringer, expecting to see Will’s name again. This time, it was my mother. “Hold on one sec, I just have to take this real fast,” I told him.
“Hi, Mom,” I answered brightly. My brain was still processingeverything from yesterday, last night, and this morning, but I didn’t want my mother to know any of that. I buried my emotions as deeply as I could and walked the line between cheerful and manic like a master. If I sounded too upbeat, she might recognize that it was fake. But if I didn’t sound positive enough, she would know something was wrong, and there would be no stopping her from endless lectures and pressure to go back home.
It seemed to work. Either that or she simply wasn’t paying attention because she jumped right into the conversation without asking me anything about myself, even a quick “how are you?” or “how’s the project?”
“What time will you be back on Wednesday?”
“I’m not going to be there Wednesday, remember? I’m going to come in on Thursday, probably around 5:00 p.m. I’ll take a half day and start driving back around noon.” We had gone over this already. Multiple times. But she wanted me to be home on Wednesday, therefore, in her mind, this conversation never happened. Not until it went the way she wanted it to go.
“Thursday is too late, darling. You’ll be here Wednesday so I can make sure you look your best. This is particularly important to your father, you know that. You can’t show up in wrinkled clothes from your drive. The press is going to be all over this wedding. You need to be at your best.”
“I’ll try to get in earlier on Thursday, but I really can’t be back on Wednesday. I’m working.”
“Well,” she sighed. “Send me a picture of your dresses so Will can make sure he coordinates appropriately. We don’t want it to look like you two haven’t been communicating.”
“Mom,” I said, trying to get her attention.
“And use proper lighting, please. That’s very important.”
“Mom, Will and I haven’t been communicating. I am not coordinating my outfits with him. I don’t even have my dresses with me. They’ll be waiting for me to pick up at the boutique shop. Besides, I’m bringing a date with me.”
“What?” Her audible gasp was a bit over-the-top, in my opinion.
