Crazy (The Gibson Boys #4)(6)

I climb off the bar. Taking my hat off, I run my fingers through my blond hair. That was a warning not to press, and I want to respect her request, but I also want to make sure she understands why I was pressing.

“Do you need anything, Navie?”

Her eyes fly to mine as she sets the napkins on the bar. “Why did you ask me that?”

“I don’t know. Seems like a fair thing to ask a friend.”

“Yes. I’m fine. Thanks for asking, friend.” She smiles before looking down at the napkins. “The world needs more men like you.”

“Convince Molly of that.”

She looks up and laughs. “I’m never gonna understand your infatuation with her. Never.”

“And I’m never gonna understand why you’d even breathe the same air as Logan.” I signal goodbye and head to the door. “Add my drink to my tab. And that twenty for the gas unless you accidentally forget. That’s cool too.”

“Goodbye, Peck.”

I keep my head down to avoid the sun as I step back outside. I can completely understand why Dylan called me a jackass now. She thinks I’m Logan. Navie and Logan? Makes me sick. That’s not even being lonely. That’s being … stupid.

A grin splits my cheeks as I imagine the look on Dylan’s face when she realizes her mistake. A chuckle rumbles past my lips as I consider the reaction of that little spitfire when that happens because it will. Linton is too small of a town for it not to.

Trudging along the sidewalk, my mind goes to the text I got from Nana earlier about coming over for dinner. I told her I’d be by, partly because I love fried chicken and partly because I can’t tell her no.

But as I climb in my car, I do some quick math. I can be at Nana’s in ten minutes, and she’s expecting me in about twenty. I start to take off when I see Navie’s car tucked in behind Crave.

“I’ve been late before,” I grumble and head the opposite way of Nana’s.





Three





Dylan



“That hurts.”

I wince. My little toe that’s silently screaming for assistance is swollen. It’s a shade of red like it’s been slapped … or taken a sucker punch from the corner of my suitcase, which is what actually happened.

“Darn thing,” I groan. Hobbling over to the sofa, I collapse against a pile of pillows. There’s one covered in pink sequins, and another that’s a soft, bright yellow that looks like it’s been crocheted. Next to that is my personal favorite—a blue, almost water-like design that evokes serenity.

Usually. My throbbing toe kind of supersedes the Zen.

Navie’s apartment is small but cute as a button. There’s an abstract painting of what I think is a farm over the couch, and a lime green and gray rug that stretches across the living room. A diffuser sits on the little round table in the area that’s probably pitched as a dining room slash breakfast nook.

I hold my toe and work it back and forth. The pain burns at first and slowly subsides as I tend to it. Sinking back into the pillows, I fill my lungs with oxygen. They inflate … effortlessly, which is a surprise.

There has been a tightness in my chest for as long as I can remember.

Stress, the doctor said. What in your life is stressing you this much, Ms. Snow?

Oh, I don’t know. Maybe that it’s falling apart.

I sat on the examination table—an appointment I only made because Navie made me swear I would go—and looked at him blankly. Wouldn’t it be an easier question to answer if he asked me what isn’t causing me stress?

Surely, this was normal. That’s what I kept telling Navie. Doesn’t everyone walk around with pain in their shoulders and their chest squeezed so tight that they can barely breathe at least twice a week? Aren’t panic attacks normal when your boyfriend leaves you for his ex-fiancée and your mother basically makes you earn her love?

Apparently not. And this whole breathing easy thing is everything they said it would be. It’s definitely something I could get used to.

Closing my eyes, I feel the muscles in my body give in. The tightness that’s become second nature starts to relax when my phone rings.

“Crap,” I say, eyeing the contents of my suitcase strewn around the room.

I hop up and dig through the clothes that will get me through until the moving truck delivers the rest of my stuff. Finally, under a tee shirt with a pair of lips painted on the front, I spy the phone.

“Hey,” I say, testing my weight on my toe.

“You doing okay?” Navie asks.

“Yup. It’s been a very eventful afternoon.”

She sighs. “That worries me.”

Laughing, I retake my spot on the couch. “Don’t be worried. It’s fine. My toe isn’t broken, and Logan was effectively put in his place.”

“What did you do, Dylan?”

I twirl a strand of hair around my finger and smile. “I might have gotten bored, and I might have just happened to see a sign for Dave’s Farm Stand or whatever it is. And then maybe I wanted to see if he had any produce—”

“You did not.”

“Or I remembered that you said Logan worked out there sometimes and helped Dave, whoever he is, work on trucks and farm … shit. So I took a look.” I shrug. “I can’t help it that fate decided Logan and I should meet. He was just standing there, so-to-speak, when I arrived.”