Page 29 of Holiday Heir

Jagger

March

Three months is long enough to convince most men they imagined the whole thing. But it hasn't done a damn thing for me except prove I've got a memory like a bear trap. And that's torture.

I cringe every time someone at the bar orders ranch water. Then I replay the sound Lainey made right before she laughed, a little intake of breath like she was surprised she found something funny. And don't get me started on vanilla.

Any woman wearing it, I run from. The bakery I used to visit almost daily, I avoid at all costs, unable to not pick up the tiniest scent of it. And when the cold air blows and somehow vanilla's mixed in it, my dick goes so hard it hurts.

Lainey left a stain on my life. She ruined me for small talk in exactly one night, and then she disappeared. It's like she knew how to take the spring out of my step. If I didn't know better, I'd say she'd never been real in the first place.

But I know she existed.

I've told myself every version of getting over it there is.

She was passing through.

It was one night.

She's just another piece of ass.

All it does is make me feel worse because I know those are all lies.

Dad thinks I've become more responsible. Mason knows I've gone soft. Sebastian and Alexander don't comment because they're into their wives and their own lives. Nobody's figured out that the reason I'm not tearing through this county's supply of women anymore isn't maturity. It's that not one of them is her, and I've apparently decided that's the only thing worth wanting anymore.

I bring the tractor around the last turn of the south pasture where the new fence line is holding steady and the old one used to sag. I cut the engine then curse myself. The quiet out here used to be the good kind. Now it's too quiet, which always leads me to wonder where Lainey's at and what she's doing. So I turn the tractor back on and drive to the main house.

Alexander's truck sits parked by the barn. Phoebe leans against the tailgate in one of her California outfits, all thin cardigan and no coat, her ring catching the light every time she moves her hand. She waves at me like we're old friends, which I guess we are now, several months into her living out here and planning the next big Cartwright wedding.

"You look terrible," she informs me, cheerful as usual, like she enjoys delivering bad news wrapped in a smile.

"Thank you. I try."

"I'm serious, Jagger. You've got a face like a man who hasn't slept right." She tilts her head, studying me the way she studies swatches of lace, like she's deciding whether I need fixing. "Alexander says you've turned into a hermit."

"Alexander needs to mind his own business."

She smiles bigger. "I'll let him know. But this is me minding it. Minding your face, specifically, since it's going to be in the pictures." She grins, and I have to give her credit. She's better at needling me than most people who've had thirty years of practice at it.