Page 92 of When We Were Us
“Oh, and here I was thinking the vomit was the icebreaker.”
“Itwaspretty forceful.”
She lets out another laugh and snorts. Clapping her hand over her mouth, her eyes go wide, and her expression is mortified. It’s ridiculously cute.
“First, the vomiting, and now, the snorting. The complete package,” I say with a laugh.
“You’re hilarious.” She swipes a hand towel off the countertop, chucks it at my face, and shakes her head, catching my eye from the corner of hers.
“Seriously, though. I am sorry about that. It was not my finest moment,” she says with a small shake of her head.
“What wasn’t?”
“The puking.” She tilts her head and bites her bottom lip. Her smile is shy and sexy as hell.
“I don’t know, it was pretty impressive,” I joke. “You really got some distance there a couple of times.”
She makes a face, her head dropping back with a groan, and she laughs lightly.
Chuckling, I shift my weight, crossing an ankle over the other as I stand there against the counter. “It’s fine, Wren. Seriously.”
“Finn told me what you did.” She ducks her head, grimacing. She looks embarrassed.
I blink at her, confusion creasing my brow. “What?”
She gives a little roll of her eyes. “Holding my hair. You didn’t have to. So, thank you.”
I lift a shoulder. The decision to do it hadn’t been a conscious one. “You’re welcome,” I say, quietly.
“And thank you for bringing dinner. It’s very sweet,” she says and turns to the stove, grabbing a pot to reheat the soup.
I huff out an amused breath.
“What?” She quirks a brow at me over her shoulder.
“My brothers would shit an actual ton of bricks hearing you call me sweet.”
Her answering laugh and smile have warmth spreading through my chest like wildfire. And God, I want to kiss her.
“Are you hungry?” The look she gives me is innocent, but the words manage to go right to my groin.
Yes. I’m starving. But not for chicken and rice soup.
I nod, push off the counter, and cross to her, taking the soup out of her hand and setting it aside. I take her by the shoulders and steer her to the table. “Sit. You’re the one not feeling well.”
“I feel ok. I can reheat it.”
I turn back to her, picking up the soup, and raise an eyebrow—a silent command to sit and let me take care of her.
She grins and then rolls her lips together, running two fingers across them like she’s zipping them shut, and then gives a twist of her wrist like she’s locking it. It’s the cutest gesture and her grin makes me chuckle. We’ve been tiptoeing around one another for so long that the simple act of teasing with her floods my body with satisfaction.
Turning back to the stove, I pour the lukewarm soup into the pot that Wren got out and set it on the burner to heat. I’ve always been a helper, a doer. I’ve never been comfortable sitting on my hands, especially when there is a job to be done. Been that way since I was a kid. Working with my hands has always grounded me, and this little act of reheating dinner for her is not only physically calming but also giving me time to breathe—to think.
Being who I am—or rather, who I became out of sheer self-preservation after she left—I never wanted to let myself explore these feelings again. I’d been a complete mess for months after she left. It felt suffocating, like my lungs couldn’t fully inflate without her. I used to drive for hours down endless backroads, thinking about her, and wishing I’d been enough for her. Thatwehad been enough. She was everything I had ever dreamed of, and she was gone. It was excruciating.
So, I put everything I had into working the ranch alongside Pop, feelings be damned. There is no better balm for a crippled heart than a long day on the ranch, pushing your body to its limits, and then falling into bed every night, knowing you worked your ass off and couldn’t have been more productive if you tried.
But it was a lonely existence. I got really good at ignoring my feelings, shoving them down in an attempt to move on, and exchanging them for a life of nothing but work. Putting every ounce of myself into something that, while productive and lucrative, can’t keep me warm at night. It can’t fulfill me past a hard day’s work and a nice living. Standing here now, I am realizing just how lonely my life was before I saw her again.
