Page 65 of Hard to Get

“It’s irrational,” Finn says. “Sorry. It’s nothing against your dog.”

“No, that’s okay, I know that. You should have told me.”

He gives me a look.

Right. Even stupid fears about little things are hard to open up about.

“Okay.” I drag my gaze from man to man. “From now on, we’re going to talk about this shit. We’ll never get better if we don’t.”

“Fuck,” Cammy mutters.

I lift an eyebrow at him.

“Yeah,” he agrees. “Sure.”

17

STELLA

I’m waiting for Jayden to show up and I’m weirdly excited. Did I miss him the last week?

I guess I did. Sort of.

That’s… I don’t know. Is it bad? I can’t fall for this guy.

I am not going to be my mother.

I think back to when I met Cole. After my parents’ divorce, I didn’t start dating again until university. Cole was interested in me right away, flirting, paying attention to me. He pursued me. And I loved it.

It was heady, being the focus of someone’s attention like that. After being abandoned by both my parents, basically, this was a high for me. It felt exciting and fun and affirming. It felt good to be loved. I wanted to be with him all the time. I craved his attention.

It took a while for me to see the problems with that. The day I realized I was turning into my mother scared the hell out of me.

I’m happy with my life now. A fling is fine. I can have a fling with Jayden. No strings, no commitments. He’s young! Twenty-five. He’s not ready to settle down! I was reminded of that when I told him about Cole and he said, “Whoa. That’s a relationship.” It’s a good thing he’s young because he’s not going to get serious either.

When he asked me out Friday, it was so tempting to ditch my other plans. But the truth was, I’d had a stressful week and I’d been truly looking forward to a ten-step skin care routine, a full-body exfoliation, and watching TV in bed.

My doorbell rings. Betty loses her mind barking—she always does that—and scrabbles across the hardwood floor to the door.

I open the door to him and smile.

Damn, he looks good.

And that smile—boyish, warm, the dimples—I might melt a little inside.

“Hi,” he says.

“Hi. Come in.”

Frank is with him and has already entered, heading straight for Betty. I glance at them greeting each other, then back at Jayden. He steps into the foyer and hands me… flowers.

My heart softens even more as I gaze at the arrangement of white cymbidium orchids in an elegant black box. “Oh…” I breathe out. “Thank you. They’re beautiful.” I take them. “You can hang your jacket in the closet.”

I take the flowers to the kitchen. When I look over at him, he’s crouched down to greet Betty, rubbing her head and ears. “Hey, pretty girl. I haven’t seen you for a while.”

She gazes at him adoringly.

Me too, Betty. Me too.