Page 70 of Sugar
“I’m just saying, Liv and I are still in thathave to spend every waking moment togetherphase and we aren’t even married.”
“Layla and I are still in that too,” Wells agrees. “Not sure it ever goes away.”
“Yeah.” I nod, smiling my sincerestI’m going to fuck you upsmile. “Ava and I know what that’s like. Except in our version, it’s more of a legal requirement than a desire thing.”
Wells barks out a laugh. “Sure didn’t look like alegal requirementlast night.”
“Should have seen it coming,” Rhett adds, shaking his head.
“Seenwhatcoming?”
“You falling for your crazy-ex-girlfriend-turned-fraudulent-wife all over again.”
“She’snotcrazy,” I argue, downright irritated at their continued use of that word. Rhett and Wells look at me with growing amusement, which does nothing to help. “And I’m not falling for her.”
Can’t fall for someone you never stopped being in love with, my sore ego unhelpfully adds.
“You start in the second barn yet?” I ask, grumbling.
“No,” Wells responds.
“Perfect.” I grab a rake, shovel, and wheelbarrow and take it all with me. “You know where I’ll be.”
My irritation only grows as the day goes on. I shouldn’t have told her about Maverick, shouldn’t have let her in so far with something that could easily destroy us both. I told myself I was going to keep a firm distance for my own sanity, and then I go and fuck it up her first night she’s here.
It becomes near impossible not to think about the way she dragged her hands across my back to soothe my terror, how she held my face and looked at me with those startling blue eyes. I think about the curve of her bare knee, the waterfall of hair cascading across flushed skin.
I spend hours mucking and raking and feeding and brushing and still don’t chase a single thought of her away. Her face burns behind my retinas, and every time I blink against the bright rays, she’s there, smiling at me like I mean something to her.
By the time I get back to the cabin, the late afternoon sun is leaning heavy toward the west, throwing the first traces of golden light across the porch. Ava’s pulled out a kitchen chair and propped it against the house, where she now sits cross-legged in one of my old high school hoodies—one shedidn’tsteal from me ten years ago, which means she found it in the back of my closet.
Her hair is damp from a recent shower, her face clean of makeup. I don’t even make it to the stairs before the past snares me and I see her the way I once did. As the girl she once was.
So full of sunlight, of beauty that still knocks the wind out of me.
She used to bring me to my knees with nothing but a look. If she realizes the power she has over me, if she learns how easyit’d be to give her every part of me all over again, would she take it?
She clears her throat, observing me with a guarded curiosity. “What?” she asks.
I shake my head, focusing on the ground between us. “How was your day?” I ask.
“Fine,” she says, her expression neutral, giving nothing away. “How was yours?”
“Fine,” I echo. “Did you get what you needed from your dad’s?”
“Nice and easy, just like I said.”
I notice the open beer she’s holding in her hand, and frown. “What’s that?” I ask, nodding to it.
Ava smirks. “A beer.”
I bite the inside of my cheek to keep from grinning—the fucking brat.
She must notice because she starts fighting her own smile. Holding the bottle up, she says, “It’s for you.”
“For me? Why?”
She shrugs. “Figured you could use it.”
