Oh, Fudge (Hot Cakes #5) - Erin Nicholas Page 0,33

asked.

Mitch knew his friend was rubbing his head.

Ellie blew out an exasperated breath. “I’m tellin’ you that you boys are bein’ nitpicky dumbasses.”

“Dumbasses?” Chase repeated. “To want to prove something is true?”

“Good lord,” Ellie muttered. “Do you need a research paper to tell you something is working if you can see it and feel it with your own eyes and heart?” she asked.

“If millions of people use condoms and there are fewer women gettin’ knocked up, then you know that the condoms are working, right? If people start wearin’ seat belts and more people walk away from car crashes, you know the seat belts are working. If you burn your hand and put a salve on it and it feels better the next day, then it worked to make your hand feel better. And if you find a woman who makes you think about turning your whole life upside down to be with her, then you’re falling in love with her.” Ellie’s voice softened. “Nothing changes a life more than love does.”

“I…” Chase trailed off. “Yeah. I guess you’re right.”

Ellie scoffed. “Of course I’m right. I’m old. I know a lot of shit by now.”

There was a pause and the sound of shuffling on the other end of the phone.

“Well, there you go,” Chase finally said to Mitch.

“She’s gone?” he guessed.

“Dropped her knowledge and then went to harass someone else,” Chase said. “You feel better?”

“I don’t know how we got from salves to me moving to Iowa, but, yeah, I guess I do.”

“So I need to pack your stuff and haul it up to Iowa?” Owen asked.

“Maybe,” Mitch said, feeling a warmth in his chest. “I need to talk to Paige.”

“Okay, good luck,” Owen told him. “But, in all seriousness, Ellie has a point. When you find the girl that makes you feel different. Different from the other girls but also like you’re a different person, better than you were before, then she’s worth a U-Haul and a change-of-address form at the post office.”

Mitch felt his smile spreading. “Yeah. You’ve got a point.”

He and Paige hadn’t been together enough for him to be different, but he thought maybe he could be.

“I’m jealous,” Chase said. “Bailey and I can’t really do the change-of-address-U-Haul thing. I mean, she could move to DC, I suppose, but she’s happiest down here on the bayou, and I’m only in DC for a couple of years before I’ll hopefully be heading back down here anyway.”

Mitch grinned. His friend had already decided he wanted to be back closer to Autre. “You think you can do the long-distance thing?” he asked.

Chase paused, and again Mitch imagined he had located Bailey across the room. “Yeah,” he said, his voice softer. “Fuck, yeah. We’ll get together as much as we can, and the future together is worth however hard it is now.”

“And with the way you two are when you’re together, it’s probably safer if the two of you are mostly together on Zoom or FaceTime,” Mitch teased.

Just the other night, they’d disappeared down to the docks for some alone time and come back dripping wet because they’d fallen into the bayou. Bailey was definitely accident prone and she took Chase right down with her.

Chase chuckled. “Good thing I’m going to medical school, huh?”

Mitch laughed. “For sure.”

“Okay, so go tell your girl that you’re going to need to buy some warmer clothes, and I’m going to go try not to get my nose broken under the mistletoe.”

Laughing, they disconnected. Mitch got out of the car and looked up at the light shining in the window of Paige’s apartment over the yoga studio.

Here went nothing.

7

Man, she was in so much trouble.

She wanted him to stick around. A lot.

The words had just hung in the air between them after she’d said them and then he’d winked at her and left before she could emphasize, “for the next couple of days.”

Not that she’d rushed to say that.

It wasn’t like she thought there was a chance he might stay more than that.

He lived in Louisiana. He worked in Louisiana. His entire family—which was, evidently, quite large—was in Louisiana.

Plus she did not want him to stay. Not like stay stay. She was the one who got itchy when a guy wanted to go out two days in a row. Of course, around here, two dates two days in a row meant they were going to discuss honeymoon destinations.

So, no, she did not want Mitch to stay any longer. The story about him and Tori would