Page 81 of The Bitterroot Inn (Jamison Valley 5)
If I fucked this up, if I lost her? My heart would never recover. So my timing had to be just right. I couldn’t tell her everything too soon. Not until I knew she loved me and might be willing to move forward. I couldn’t tell her everything too late. If I waited longer than absolutely necessary, she’d never get over the secrets.
Really, I should have fessed up years ago. But it was too late now so here I was, hoping that Maisy wouldn’t ask me to leave once she learned the truth. When she learned about Nell.
Fucking Nell.
I dug my phone out of my pocket and hit her number. She’d called me all morning but I’d ignored her. She didn’t have anything original to say, just more threatening texts and voicemail messages.
What happens next is your fault.
These conversations were always some variation of the same. Idle threats.
But this time around, I was calling her bluff. If she hadn’t retaliated by now, I doubted that she would. I just hoped one day soon she’d get bored and move on to torturing someone else.
“It’s about time you returned my call,” she snapped after the first ring.
“What do you want, Nell? Your message said something about my stuff?”
“Yes. I found some of your old things today. I need to know where I should ship them.”
“Donate them to charity. Throw them in the trash. I don’t give a fuck. I told you already, I don’t want any of it.”
“Nothing? You want nothing?”
“That’s right. Nothing.” I had everything I already needed. I had clothes. I had my camera. I had my parents’ wedding picture. I had the one picture of my dad and me fishing two summers before he died. I wish I had found Mom’s wedding ring, but since it was lost, whatever else Nell had found in my old stuff, she could have.
“I can’t believe this. I can’t believe you!” she shouted.
“Believe it.” I ended the call and kept driving.
She was pissing me off, but I wouldn’t let it wreck my day. By the time I pulled into the hospital, I’d brushed off Nell?
??s call and was ready to get my day over with so I could go to Coby’s game.
“Someone had a nice lunch.” Gigi greeted me as I walked by the counter in the emergency room.
I smiled. “Not too bad.” Pretty fucking delicious, actually.
“Considering she just texted me and said you two have worked things out, I’m guessing that smug grin has to do with my best friend.”
“It does.”
She smiled. “Good. She needs a good guy like you.”
Gigi and I had seen one another in passing this week but hadn’t had a chance to discuss my relationship with Maisy. I’d been waiting for Gigi to comment, so I watched her for a moment, waiting, but she just stood there smiling.
“That’s it?” I asked. “No interrogation? No threats about making her happy?”
She shook her head. “Not from me, but don’t you worry. You’ll get plenty of that from her brothers. If you hurt her, Beau and Michael will skin you alive. And I know for a fact that Beau could hide your dead body in a place no one would ever find it.”
“Right.” Message received. “I can’t promise I won’t screw up, but what I feel for Maisy is real. I’m doing everything with her feelings in mind and whatever I can to make her happy.”
“See that you do.” She slid an iPad over the counter. “I’ve input a few new patient notes for your afternoon rounds.”
“Thank you.” I took the iPad and walked toward the stairs, but before my feet hit the first step, I paused and turned back to Gigi. “She hasn’t healed.”
Gigi shook her head. “No, she’s buried it all. She lets that motel run her life, and she focuses all of her energy on the Bitterroot and Coby. She puts on a smile. She tells everyone she’s happy. But no, she hasn’t healed. She doesn’t even know what she’s missing.”
“I’ll help her heal,” I promised.
