Accidental Knight: A Marriage Mistake Romance(14)

None except, I do.

I will.

I promised.

Keeping one hand over the top of the stack, I point to the signature line on the first paper. “This one’s for the phone company. I know, who has a landline anymore, but you know Jonah...” After she signs it, I flip just the bottom half of the page. “Here’s the gas company next.”

My pulse increases as I flip to the next page, then another.

Several are completely unnecessary, simply needed so there are too many for her to want to read.

I hold my breath as she keeps signing and I keep flipping. I don’t let my lungs work till the very last page has her curly little name attached.

Thank Fuck.

She sets down the pen and wipes a hand across her cheek when it’s done.

Noticing the moisture there, my stomach drops.

It’s hard for me. For her, it’s worse.

Honestly, I half expected a spoiled brat, a chick so pampered she’d want to bolt after an hour or two here in the boonies.

Jonah always insisted his Bella wasn’t like that, but having been here for four years and knowing without a doubt that she’d never visited Jonah in person, I wasn’t convinced he was right.

I’m still not completely convinced.

Hell, even now, a part of me wants to tell her I’ll move back to the cabin, but that would put her out of eyesight, and I can’t have it.

She’s my cover, the single precious thing I have to protect. No different than my sharp shooting days in the Army, never taking my eyes off my cover or the targets after them.

I scoop the stack of papers up, giving them a good whack against the table to make them even.

“Beautiful. The hard part’s over now. There’s plenty of food in the cupboards, so help yourself to anything,” I say. “Your room’s still upstairs, hasn’t changed a bit.”

She blinks several times, as if trying to hold off the tears welling in the bottom of her eyes. “Thanks.”

Pushing away from the table, she stands. “If you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll just go unpack and...” Drawing in a deep breath, she pinches her lips together as a few tears escape her eyes.

Shaking her head, I see she’s hit her limit. She turns and scurries out of the room without another word.

Hello, guilt. I’ve had that shit as my shadow for several years now, and a new, heavy bout strikes as I hear her smothered sobs.

Shit.

I don’t know why I ever thought we could do this with minimal damage.

Make no mistake: this will get ugly. Has to.

Carrying the papers to the back porch, I pack up my shooting gear, and then bring everything up to my bedroom. The room directly across the hall from hers, all the distance I’m afraid I’ll get from Bella Reed over the next six months.

“Dammit, Jonah,” I mutter under my breath. “I hope you’re satisfied, wherever you are.”





3





Trust the Adventure (Bella)





The stairs, the hallway, my bedroom are nothing but a flipping blur.

I squeeze my eyes shut and lean against the door I’ve just closed. It doesn’t help the tears, which come in angry waves.

I can’t stop picturing Grandpa’s name.

Jonah Reed.

It was there, typed in bold letters across the top of the first sheet of paper I’d signed. I’m just glad Mr. Grump-alicious – the name Sheridan gave eludes me at the moment – didn’t ask me to read every page.

I’d have never made it to the last one.

It’s all too permanent, and suddenly, all too real.

Gramps is gone.

Gone.

His face, his voice, his humor, his everything.

The tears burn hotter, and I have nothing left, no strength to fight back anymore.

So I give in, slinking down the door, gracelessly onto the floor. My forehead bangs my knees, and I hug my shins, making myself into the tightest, smallest ball I can as the pain fully engulfs me.

“Oh, Gramps.”

Two words. Too many memories.

Me, tiny, perched with him on Edison’s saddle. The hot summer sun burning down as we rode over the hills, the scent of Gramps’ leather jacket and that hint of pine cologne he always wore.

Me again, trudging downstairs when I was eleven or twelve, just as he hung up the phone. “Forget it, Molly. She’s fine. Long as she’s with me, she’s happy,” I’d heard him snap, the sour look on his face twisting into a grin like nothing could ever be wrong the second he laid eyes on me.

Me, times three, throwing his arms around me in that totally Gramps way the last time we left his place together before heading to the airport.

I’d just turned eighteen and became fair game for a new kind of teasing. Gramps, wondering when I’d walk through his door one day with a serious boyfriend, and then a wedding, and then great grandkids.

And now...now he’d never get that chance.

And with my life cratered like it is, I’m damned afraid I won’t either.

I’m on the floor for what seems like forever when a noise in the hallway causes me to lift my head. The room is still a blur, but my tears have run dry. My eyes are just hot, burning beads instead.

It hurts to blink. It hurts to breathe. It just hurts. Period.

Something I tell myself I’d better get used to. The hurt. It’s not going away anytime soon.