Audrey wasn’t my problem.
Except that was a big-ass lie.
She was very much my problem.
A sense of hard resolve poured through me. It was time I stopped lying to myself. That wasn’t getting me anywhere.
I turned toward Audrey’s house, not quite sure what I was going to do. I didn’t have a plan. I just knew I needed to see her.
Now.
CHAPTER 19
Audrey
“Icing on the cake, Max.”
I paced around the kitchen, opening and closing cupboards and taking things out of the fridge. I didn’t know what I was doing but I couldn’t seem to slow down long enough to figure it out.
Max watched and I wasn’t sure if he looked concerned or just confused.
“Of course there’s someone else. Why wouldn’t there be? You’d think he would have told me he had a girlfriend.” I got a jar of pickles out of the fridge. No idea why. “Although maybe she’s not his girlfriend. Maybe there are a lot of someone elses. She could be one of many.”
I put the pickles back.
“He probably has a bunch of girls. That could be why he didn’t kiss me last night. He thinks of me as a friend and he doesn’t sleep with his friends, just girls like that.” I gestured vaguely toward the house next door. “I don’t know what that means. She’s probably fine. And he probably doesn’t even think of me as a friend. I’m just the weirdo next door.”
I’d been very stern with myself today. I was not going to think about Josiah Haven. Nothing had happened between us, and my little crush had been silly. Totally misplaced. I didn’t like him at all. I’d been inadvertently hypnotized by the power of his surly brow furrow.
He was completely wrong for me.
It didn’t matter that he’d helped me give a squirrel a funeral or that he’d found Max when he’d gone missing and helped me wash him off. And the whole thing with Colin at the bar? He’d probably do that for anybody. It didn’t make me special, and it certainly hadn’t turned my interest into a full-blown crush.
“Who wants a guy like him anyway?” I got out a pan. “He doesn’t like anyone. Who needs that kind of negativity in their life?”
Max cocked his head to the side.
I rolled my eyes, like he’d called me out on a lie. “I know he’s not that bad. He’s just very serious and yes, I realize I actually like that about him. Come on, Max, I’m trying to make this situation okay. Help a girl out, here.”
He wagged his tail.
“I know you like him too.” I stomped my foot. “No, not too. I don’t like him. That’s what I’m trying to say. I can think he’s mysterious and interesting and oh my gosh, so gorgeous, but that doesn’t mean I like him. Because obviously he doesn’t like me.”
My phone rang, startling me. I sighed as I dug through my purse to find it. It was probably my mother.
Exactly what I needed right now.
I pulled out my phone and it didn’t hit me that it wasn’t my mom’s number until I’d already swiped to answer. It said restricted.
“Hello, this is Audrey.”
Nothing.
“Hello?”
Max watched me curiously.
I sighed. It was probably one of those robo-caller things and it hadn’t clicked over to the telemarketer who was about to try to sell me something stupid. It was the third or fourth time I’d gotten a call like that in the last week.
So annoying.
“Sorry, no thanks.”
There was sound, almost like a click, but no voice. I looked at my phone and the call had disconnected.
I put the phone down and looked at the counter. For some reason, I’d pulled out a package of frozen chicken, a box of spaghetti noodles, a frying pan, a can of vegetable soup, and a spatula.
“What am I even doing?”
Max didn’t have an answer any more than I did. With a deep breath to calm down, I started putting things away. I didn’t feel much like cooking, but I was hungry, so I got out a few things that actually made sense together and started throwing together a meal.
While my dinner cooked, I fed Max. Like usual, he inhaled his food, then happily trotted into the living room to curl up on the couch.
I’d stopped ranting but I couldn’t stop thinking about seeing Josiah with that girl. It had felt like a punch to the stomach. I couldn’t decide what was worse, the way he’d walked out so abruptly last night or seeing a woman practically pressed against him, touching his face.
I couldn’t be mad. I didn’t have any claim on him. But it still made my stomach hurt.