Not the Rebound Guy by Abby Knox (popular books of all time .txt) 📗

after my high school sweetheart up and left me at the altar. And I don’t think either of us regretted that decision.”

“Of course you didn’t. But granddad had been secretly pining for you since junior high.”

“I’m just saying, keep an open mind. And don’t take too long to make decisions.”

I slide my laptop into my bag and pull out my planner. “How long until Garrett’s house is finished?”

“Late June or thereabouts,” she says.

“So, he’ll be moved off the porch by the time I head back to New York.”

“Probably, yes.”

I click my favorite pen and mark the last weekend in June in my planner and write the word “Sex.” Because I have to have something to look forward to if I don’t currently have a place to have the sex. And I’m not the kind of girl who does it in public. Not even on vacation.

“What are you writing?”

“Nothing. I just want to get Garrett a housewarming gift when he moves back in, and I don’t want to forget.”

“I’ll bet you do.”

“Grams!”

“Oh, calm your undies. And please, take the boy out tonight.”

I jut my chin out. “Well, the joke’s on you because he already asked me out for tonight.”

Grams claps her hands in glee.

“I feel bad leaving you alone for the second night in a row when I just came back to town. What are you going to do?”

She wags her head at me. “It’s Friday, honey! Book club at the senior center. They have a bus now, for senior-center sanctioned activities.”

I stand to leave. “Well, I’m still sweaty from all that work this morning. I’m gonna head up to the house and take a shower if I’m going out tonight.”

“You do that. Shave your legs, too!”

“Grams!”

Inside the house, I bump right into a sight I was not prepared for.

“Whoa. Sorry.” I don’t know where to look. I did see Garrett’s man nipples just hours early in broad daylight, but this is ridiculous.

Standing there in the bathroom with the door open is Garrett, wearing nothing but a thin white towel wrapped around his waist. Grams’ pink floral monogram sits right over the bulge.

“Oh my god, I’m sorry,” I say, backing out.

“It’s okay!” Garrett exclaims as I make a beeline for my room and close the door.

I hear his footsteps on the other side as I catch my breath. “Hey, Eliza?”

I bite my lip. “Yeah?”

“Your Grams tell you to take me out to the drive-in tonight?”

I laugh. “Yeah. Did she tell you to ask me out tonight?”

He returns the laugh, and I feel flooded with relief. “Yeah. Wonder why she keeps trying to get rid of us?”

I tease, “Who knows, maybe she has her own gentleman caller.”

“She should!”

I wag my head. “Yeah, but I’d rather not think about that. She’s eighty years old.”

He pauses, and I think I hear something brush the door like he’s resting his hand there as he speaks. “Timing is irrelevant when it comes to finding happiness.”

“Nice idea,” I say, pressing my hand against the wood.

“If you just want to go as friends, I’m okay with that.”

I blow out a breath. “That would be nice. To just go with a friend. No pressure.”

“Absolutely. I would not want to pressure you, Eliza.”

“Because you know I’m still processing my breakup.”

“The breakup with the guy who won’t go downstairs. Got it. You definitely should not jump into anything after such a life-changing thing.”

I bite back the moan at the thought of what Garrett’s soft lips could do to me—if he eats pussy half as good as he kisses, he could ruin me for anyone else—and then slide my hand across the wood. “I’m gonna go have a shower before our…date. I mean, before our group hang of two.”

His voice drops low, and it vibrates through the door, through my hand, and lands between my legs. “I’ll get out of your way.”

Chapter Eight

Garrett

Needing to check in on the brood boxes one more time before our date—or whatever this is that Eliza and I are doing tonight—I take a moment to ponder what just happened.

Why did I just promise her a friend hangout, when that’s not at all what I want?

The egg-laying season is coming along nicely in the brood comb, and I find myself stupidly jealous of how simple it is for some creatures. The queen bees lay the eggs and fend off rival queens. Drones’ singular job is to mate with the queens. The workers take care of everything else: gathering the food, caring for eggs, and protecting the nest. It’s all straightforward, and nobody is up in their heads about it.

My ringtone startles me as I carefully close the brood box. I answer it and move on to check on the surplus honey in the supers.

“What’s up, Wyatt?”

“Just calling to see what my baby brother is up to on a wild night in Piper’s Grove,” Wyatt says.

This is odd. “You never call just to chit-chat. What’s going on?”

Just as I’m peeking into the superstructure to see if I have enough honey to harvest, Wyatt drops the bomb. “Erin’s pregnant. She’s having a baby in November.”

And yet another example of a creature whose life turned out to be simple and straightforward. Wyatt and Erin met in grad school. They married quickly and never looked back. Wyatt had never had a serious girlfriend up until he met her, and he knew immediately she was the one.

“How did you know?” I ask him, gingerly sliding the super back in place.

Wyatt clears his throat. “Well, it’s kind of personal, but if you must know, Erin started complaining that her boobs were sore—“

“No, Wyatt,” I interrupt, shaking my head, trying to clear any thought of my sister-in-law’s breasts from my mind. “I meant, how did you know Erin was the one when you met?”

There’s a pause, and I wait it out while I check on the rest of the frames. “I don’t know if I can explain it. Have you ever sat next to someone at random, and suddenly you felt like you were