Take the Chance (Top Shelf Romance #9) - Brittainy Cherry Page 0,48

until the roasted chicken was cold.

Time passed quickly. She’d been standing in the sunroom on her cell phone for hours now. Her eyes were glued to the rain cascading down from the sky as she moved her lips, speaking to whoever was on the other end of the line.

I wandered past the room every now and then, watching her move her hands to express herself, watching the tears fall from her eyes. They fell heavily, like the rain. After a while, she hung up and lowered herself to the floor, sat with her legs crossed, and stared out the window.

When Talon was down, I stepped into the sunroom to check on her.

“Are you all right?” I asked, concerned about how someone as bright as Lucy could appear so dark that afternoon. It was almost as if she blended into the gray clouds herself.

“How much do I owe you?” she asked, not turning my way.

“Owe me?”

She turned around, sniffling, and allowed the tears to keep falling down her cheeks. “You bet me that my relationship would be over in a month tops, and you win. So, how much do I owe you? You win.”

“Lucille…” I started, but she shook her head.

“He, um, he said New York is the place for artists. He said it’s the place for him to grow his craft, and there are opportunities there that he wouldn’t have in the Midwest.” She sniffled some more and wiped her nose on her sleeve. “He said his friend offered him a couch in his apartment, so he’s going to stay there for a while. Then he said a long-distance relationship wasn’t something he was really interested in having, so my stupid heart tightened, thinking he was inviting me out there to be with him. I know what you’re thinking, too.” She giggled nervously then shrugged and shook her head. “Silly, immature, naïve Lucille, believing love would be enough, thinking she was worthy of being someone’s forever.”

“That’s…not what I was thinking.”

“So, how much?” she asked, standing up. “How much do I owe you? I have some money in my purse. Let me go grab it.”

“Lucille, stop.”

She walked in my direction and put on a fake smile. “No, it’s fine. A bet is a bet and you won, so let me go get the money.”

“You don’t owe me anything.”

“You’re good at reading people, you know. That’s probably what makes you a fantastic author. You can look at someone for five minutes and know their entire story. It’s a gift really. You saw Richard for a moment and knew he’d end up breaking me. So what’s my story, huh? I hate spoilers, but I’d love to know. What’s going to happen to me?” she asked, her body shaking as the tears kept rolling down her cheeks. “Am I always going to be the girl who feels too much and ends up alone? Because, I…I…” Her words became a blurred mess as her emotions began to overpower her. She covered her face with her hands and broke down right in the middle of the sunroom.

I didn’t know what to do.

I wasn’t made for these kinds of moments.

I wasn’t one to give comfort.

That was true, but when her knees started to tremble and her legs began to look as if they were going to collapse, I did the only thing I could think to do.

I wrapped her in my arms, giving her something to hold on to, giving her something to hold her up before gravity forced her down to the solid ground. She wrapped her fingers in my shirt and cried into me, soaking my shoulder as my hands rested against her back.

She didn’t let go, and I figured I shouldn’t ask her to pull her emotions together.

It was all right that she and I handled things in a different fashion. She wore her heart on her sleeve, and I kept my heart wrapped in steel chains deep within my soul.

Without thought, I held her closer as her body continued to shake. The woman who felt everything leaned in closer to the man who felt nothing at all.

For a split second in time, I felt a little of her pain while she encountered my coldness, and neither one of us seemed to mind.

“You can’t go home,” I told her, glancing at my watch, seeing that it was almost midnight. “It’s pouring rain, and you rode your bike to my house.”

“It’s fine. I’ll be okay,” she told me, trying to grab her jacket from the