“Thanks,” King mutters and slips out of the truck. Literally. One second he’s climbing out, and the next he disappears with a grunt and a thud.
Gasping, I hurry around to find him sprawled in the dirt, a look of irritation on his face. “You okay?”
“Peachy.”
It takes almost five minutes to get him from the truck to the master bedroom because he’s moving so slowly, and I can only hold so much of his weight without feeling like I might collapse beneath him. I don’t even get a chance to look around because I’m so focused on holding him up. I am more than glad when he slumps face first onto the bed, fully clothed, and kicks off his shoes.
“Thanks,” he mumbles into the mattress.
“Do you need anything?”
He simply hums.
Thinking I should get him some water, I head back down the hallway and to the kitchen at the back of the house. As soon as I get a good look, I freeze in my tracks. Light streams in through the large windows, illuminating the most luxurious kitchen I’ve seen outside of a TV set. It’s bigger than I would have expected, with granite countertops and stainless steel appliances amidst gorgeous mahogany cabinets. A massive island sits in the center, begging to be spread with pastry dough and cookie sheets.
“And here I was thinking you didn’t care about the kitchen,” I murmur as I run my hand along the island.
It takes a moment to locate some glasses, and my search yields some interesting information. While the kitchen looks ideal, very little of it gets used. Many of the dishes still have stickers on them, and most of the small appliances are in their boxes. It’s like King has been building the perfect kitchen without any plans to actually use it.
I fill a glass with filtered water from the fridge, which is nearly empty, and peek a glance at the freezer, which is full to the brim of pre-packaged meals. That better fits my vision of King’s adult life, though it doesn’t explain the well-prepped kitchen.
With more questions than I had a moment ago, I return to King’s bedroom and set the glass of water on his bedside table. He’s already snoring softly, clearly exhausted from his gastrically disastrous afternoon. “I guess I’ll hang out here until you wake up,” I say. And then I take in the room.
Like the kitchen, the master bedroom has been expertly furnished and decorated. It has a masculine feel to it, full of dark woods and navy blues, and it feels very much like King. The man version of him, anyway. He looks at home in this place, and I can’t help but wonder what his life has been like since I left.
He never had big plans for himself, content to keep doing the things he’s been doing his whole life, and some of that still seems to be true. He’s still at the surf shop. He still lives in Willow Cove, where he’s lived his whole life. But he has clearly grown up and matured into adulthood. What else do I really know about him? Not much.
And yet I proposed to the man. Someone I can’t say that I know anymore. Crazier still, he agreed.
I’m pretty sure this is a bad idea, but it’s the only idea I’ve got.
Chapter Five
Georgie
I’m elbow-deep in biscuit dough when King emerges wearing nothing but a pair of gym shorts and a confused expression. He takes in the messy kitchen, eyebrows pulling low, and then leans his shoulder against the wall at the edge of the kitchen. “Please,” he growls, “make yourself at home.”
I huff, hating the way my body tenses up at his rough tone. I shouldn’t be afraid of this man, but he’s as much a stranger as he was when we met at twelve years old. And he’s a stranger who doesn’t like me. I don’t like being disliked any more than I like people telling me what to do. “Well, I would have asked for permission, but you were passed out.”
I’m doing my best not to stare at him, but it’s incredibly difficult. I saw him shirtless at the bakery, but only for a second or two. Now he’s all on display, shoulders and abs dotted with droplets of water. He must have showered before coming to find me, and seeing him wet like this has memories of King on the ocean surfacing in my mind.
That was always my favorite time to see him, right after he’d been out on the waves. He always looked so happy and worry-free, and his hair tends to take on a mind of its own when it gets wet. It’s not curly, not like mine, but it has a fun wave to it that fits his personality so well.
I clear my throat and start cutting biscuits with a glass cup. I already have a tray in the oven, and this is way more than the two of us could ever eat, but I bake when I’m stressed. In the kitchen, I can control the outcome instead of bracing myself for what might happen. Ever since Lane’s unexpected breakup speech, I can’t stop feeling like something bad is right behind me.
“How are you feeling?” I ask, trying to distract myself.
He moves closer, something I feel as much as I see out of the corner of my eye. The man has a presence. “Better. What are you making?”
“Can you call yourself a Southern boy if you don’t recognize biscuits and gravy?” I look up and jump when I realize he’s just on the other side of the island from me. It was hard enough not to stare at him when he was on the other side of the room. “I, uh, thought it might be nice to have some comfort food, if you’re up to it.”
In response, his stomach growls loudly and seems to break some of the tension between us. He relaxes, arms falling to his sides and giving me an up close view of his broad chest. “Thank you,” he says slowly. “I don’t know if I would have made it home on my own.”
“Food poisoning?”
“Probably.”
“What did you eat?”
We both glance at the garbage can, which is full of frozen meal packages.
He runs a hand through his hair, giving it some more life as the damp locks fall back into place. “Sorry about, uh…” He glances down at his bare torso. “I put in a load of laundry, but until it’s done…”
“I’m not complaining.” My words register as soon as they’re out of my mouth, and I blush. Hard. “I didn’t mean that how it sounded.”
“It sounded like you were admiring me.” There’s only a hint of humor in his tone, which is less than I would have expected from him. He was always so carefree when we were young, and though I’ve seen pieces of the old King popping up here and there, he’s so different from how I remember him. It’s like life has weighed him down. “So…”
The first batch of biscuits is probably ready to come out of the oven, but my eyes lock on his forearms as he rests his hands on the counter. Surfing doesn’t take a lot of forearm work, so I have to wonder where all this muscle is coming from. “So?” I repeat and then force myself to focus on the food. I don’t want to serve King burned biscuits just because he’s well-formed.
Thankfully, the biscuits are perfectly golden as I pull them out of the oven. I’m pretty sure I still need to convince him that getting married is a great idea, and plying him with food is always a good way to go.
Marriage really is the best way for us both to win. He gets someone to revive his uncle’s legacy and help him keep Bill’s memory alive, and I get my own place to make it how I want. Without the weird legal issue of the bakery having to stay with family, it would be such a simple trade.
When King says nothing, I grit my teeth and take a slow breath to work up the courage to ask him if he was serious when he agreed to my proposal. “Were you—”
“I don’t like the idea of marrying you,” he says. Nice and blunt.
