Page 37 of First Bride to Fall
Misty and Charlotte would be okay. Besides that, neither of them were children any longer. Everybody here was a grown-up, and all three of them had agreed about the anti-Aidan plan. Nobody had been forced into anything. It was just like their mom had said—they’d each made a free choice. And Nell’s choice had been to enact Operation First Bride, which was right on track.
For all she knew, Charlotte and Misty were already in a race to find husbands for themselves. Misty probably had guys lining up around the block, and Charlotte had plenty of exes to choose from. The one in the toughest predicament was obviously her. Which was why she had to work twice as hard to win.
Or,not lose, and have to marry the son of her dad’s late archenemy.
She opened Grant’s text app, and the first thing that popped up was the photo she’d sent him of the two of them together by the waterfall. She left that one alone for him to look at later, and she created a group text to Charlotte and Misty. Nell’s number ended in zero, Charlotte’s in one, and Misty’s in two.
Hi, it’s Nell. Phone died. Texting from Grant’s. Will catch you up when I get home!
Misty sent an emoji thumbs-up a few seconds later.
After a lag, Charlotte did, too.
She was glad for the acknowledgment of her message, and also glad that neither of her sisters had tried to respond with any sort of annoying or nosy correspondence that could have embarrassed her in front of Grant. It was his phone, after all.
That task done, she became curious about the other numbers on his recently texted list.
It wasn’t like she had to look too hard to learn who he’d been communicating with. The trail of messages was right there in his history, pretty much in plain view.
Okay. Wait.
She had to scroll down a tiny bit.
And then a little more.
Her heart gave a happy leap.
Ooh, fun! There’s my number again!
It was from when he’d texted her the location for today’s hike.
He’d texted the other hikers, too.
Pretty much all of his texts were work-related.
A few were order confirmations from food delivery services. Others had to do with shipping acknowledgments regarding supplies he’d bought for his camp store.
It was really kind of a boring list. She wasn’t sure what she’d expected to find. He’d told her he wasn’t dating anybody, so it wasn’t like she was going to discover some secret girlfriend. Not unless she went way back, and that would be really intrusive. Not to mention creepy. She couldn’t do that.
She was tempted.
But, no.
Nell closed the app, and then there was another one staring her in the face.
Grant’s photo album.
It kind of taunted her. That tiny colorful button.
It was probably all work stuff like he had on his Instagram.
Mostly landscapes with almost no people.
Boring. Boring. Boring.
He obviously had nothing on his phone he was ashamed of. He hadn’t thought twice about letting her use it. So.
She stole a peek at the bathroom door and could hear the shower running.
