Not the Rebound Guy by Abby Knox (best classic romance novels txt) 📕

it’s the water of the shower, not my eyes leaking hot tears, and get on with my bedtime routine.

Chapter Twelve

Garrett

This time, I wait until I know she’s asleep—I can hear Eliza’s gentle snoring —before I start quietly plucking out a new song on my guitar.

In the morning, I wake up early even though I’ve only had about three hours of sleep and walk over to tend to all my critters.

When I finish with that, I take a walk to pick up some flowers from the supermarket while I think things over.

The truth is, there’s not much to think over. I’ve fallen for this woman. I might even use the “L” word. I’m certainly going to get my heart broken when she goes back to New York, and I can do nothing to prevent that.

If she wanted me to come to New York to be with her, I would finish the job on my house in a heartbeat. Sell everything, even the goats, and follow her anywhere. But only if she wanted me to. I’ve known her less than two days; I know I shouldn’t be thinking like this.

That’s the thing about shoulds. They’re everywhere, and they don’t mean a damn thing.

I’m supposed to be the chill one. Not the plan-for-all-contingencies one. But this thing between us has made me run headlong into spontaneity and come out the other end ready to plan my whole future around this woman.

When I arrive back at Grams’ house, I can hear the two ladies talking over coffee through the open windows. Inside, I give the white tulips to Grams and the pink ones to Eliza. She smiles at me, takes both bouquets, trims the ends, and places them together in a wide-mouth jam jar.

“Perfect centerpiece. Thank you,” Eliza says, her cheeks blooming red as she sips from her mug.

Apart from coffee, the kitchen is full of the aroma of strawberries cooking on the stove and bacon and fresh biscuits.

“Breakfast is in the oven; help yourself,” Grams says. “After you pour in the sugar and stir the berries for me.” She nods to the big bowl next to the stove.

I pour the massive bowl of sugar into the bubbling pot of smashed strawberries and listen while Grams tells me how long to stir. “I never thought about it, but everyone should have you be the official jam stirrer. You don’t tire out as easily as most people.”

Eliza chokes on her coffee behind me, and I keep my eyes trained on the bubbling pot.

This time, it’s my cheeks that feel like they might burst into flames.

“True, very true,” Eliza sputters.

The two of us try to keep it together as we spend the rest of our Saturday morning canning jam and jellies under the authoritarian watch of Grams.

By the time we break for lunch, we’ve done about seven or eight batches of eight jars each.

“We’re cutting it close,” Eliza says, looking over her planner, leaning against the farmhouse sink.

Grams has ambled outside to the other garden to “get some sunshine,” leaving Eliza and me alone in the kitchen.

Eliza is so cute in her borrowed apron covered in strawberry syrup. With the way she pores over her planner, I’m almost coming around to the idea of buying one for myself. She looks up with a bright smile. “But we’re gonna make it.”

“We?”

She smiles. “We’re a team, right? You and me and Grams.”

“Sure are.”

It’s then that I notice her cleavage has a blot of strawberry jam on it.

I lean over the table, invading her space. “Hey. How did that get there?”

She glances down and says, “Oh. Dammit. The shelf strikes again.”

“Let me get that for you,” I say.

Eliza stammers. “Oh. Um. Grams is just outside,” she points out, but doesn’t seem committed to this reason for us not to fool around.

“She’s in the back 40, fussing over her crop,” I say. “She won’t be back for a while. The goats will give plenty warning.” I cover the spot with my mouth and lick the sweet, sticky jam. “Mmm.” I suck a little bit of skin into my mouth, but not enough to give her a hickey.

“Garrett, you are playing with fire right now.”

“I think I like the sound of that,” I say, kissing across her breasts. Her thin, soft cotton tee-shirt is stretched tight. I want to get rid of that apron and bend her over the kitchen table.

I want to tell her how she’s ruined me. Wrecked me. I was a nice, polite guy before we met on Thursday, but now all I can think about is getting rid of all of these clothes and putting my finger in her ass. Watching her tits bounce while she rides my dick. Watching her lips wrap around my cock.

I think there’s a chance she might continue to protest, but then I see her scrape jam out of what’s left in the pot with the rubber scraper.

She holds it out to me. “Hungry?”

I lean forward, but she pulls the utensil away, teasing me.

Growling, I grab hold of her. She laughs and accidentally drips more of it onto her chest.

“Oops,” she says, in an exaggerated fashion.

“Aren’t we supposed to be cleaning up?” I ask.

She smiles. “So, help me clean up.”

I repeat the same move as before, yet some of it has dripped down, deep into her cleavage, inside of her bra. With a growl, I tear her apron off over her head and yank down the front of her vee-neck tee shirt, stretching out her neckline. My face dives in between those ripe melons, devouring all the jam until she’s clean, and then I keep going.

Until I feel something hot and sticky dripping down the side of my neck.

“Oops. You got something on your shirt. Better take that off.”

She pulls at the neckline of my tee shirt and plants her mouth against my skin, licking off the hot jam, building the bonfire of desire that grows in my belly.

“Baby, you keep fucking around with that jam; I’m going to get crazy.”

Her