Irresistible Bachelors: Books 1-5 by Landish, Lauren (bts books to read TXT) 📕

folks who just don’t fit in live. Unfortunately for this couple, their house is right on the edge of ‘the tracks’, as we call it. On the edge, and looking around at the other houses, not in a good way either.

It’s a shame too, because looking at the house itself, it’d be a place I’d love to live and start a family when the time’s right. There’s even a fireplace, and to me, nothing is more romantic than cuddling up in front of a real fire on a winter’s night. But no amount of renovation to the house will make up for the decidedly unsafe street it resides on.

Hurrying back to my car, because Mama didn’t raise no fool, I’m off to property two. Pulling up out front, I feel a little tingle of excitement. The house has got hidden appeal, as it’s almost completely covered by a huge shaggy tree in the front that drapes down to meet the overgrown weeds standing as tall as I am. And while I’m on the shorter side, that’s for a woman, not for a weed!

I get out of my car, checking my notes on my tablet before I try and fight my way through the jungle that is the yard. The house is in a good-ish neighborhood. It was just caught up in a court battle for years. An old man died, and his two sons fought over the family home. Finally, the probate court said fuck it, and the property’s up for sale.

I walk up to the house, trying my best to keep to the cracked walkway. It’s a shame, really. The two sons could have gotten a lot higher value for this place if they’d just agreed to split the sale or to just have one of them sell it. Fuck, flip a coin. Don’t let a house get like this! Thank God for jeans that make my ass look good and light hiking boots.

My initial excitement fades as I get inside. While the pictures that the website displayed showed the good side, they certainly hid the bad. All of the plumbing fixtures are corroded. The whole place will have to be repiped, and I bet from looking at the outlets, it’ll have to be rewired too. I didn’t think anyone even had outlets like that in their houses anymore.

As I make my way upstairs, I’m tallying a list of projects for the house, and even before I get to the spare bedroom that has no ceiling because a leaky roof collapsed inward, I realize it’s not a money-making option. There’s light damage that can be replaced and repaired economically, and then there are total renovations that cost more than they’re worth. This house is definitely part of the second group. Damn it. Zero for two today. Off to the third on the list . . . and it’s nearly an hour out of town, just over the county line.

I get on the Interstate and start to cruise. As I do, I realize that I’m not that far from the town where I lived as a little kid. I didn’t always live near the big city. In fact, for the first ten years of my life, I was a country girl. I spent my summers swimming in the river, riding my bike like a crazy person, and camping in the backyard of what was the best house ever. Two stories, it was an old farmhouse that my parents had bought and renovated before I was born. While the farm itself wasn’t ours, we still had a full acre to ourselves, a big garage, and a playset that gave me some of the best memories I could imagine. I haven’t stopped by since moving back to work with Oliver. The memories are a little too painful to think about. Still, I’m pulled toward checking it out.

On a whim, I decide to get off the highway and head over to my old place. I haven’t been back here in over fifteen years, not since my mom got a new job and we had to move, but the turns are familiar to me. The street curves. A few of the houses have changed, but I can still identify some of them.

When I see 614 Douglas, I’m slow driving, just sort of intending to do a drive-by of the old home. I’m certainly not intending to spend much more time than that. I have to get out to this third property for Oliver before the afternoon wears on any longer. But as I see the property, I hit my brakes, stunned. The house looks just like it did before, with the wide front and almost Alpine-steep roof that’s broken up by two jutting outcroppings. I’ve always thought they looked like eyes over the long porch that wraps around the whole front. The railing is just like it always was, a sort of off-white that made me think the house was a smiling face.

But what causes me to smack my brakes isn’t the house, but the sign out front. I blink, rubbing my eyes, but when I open them, it’s still there, just like it was before.

For Sale by Owner.

Holy shit. My childhood home’s for sale.Cassie

I stare at the house from the curb, my brain swept away on a flood of memories, some good, some bad. Here, twenty feet away from me, is the oak tree that Mama didn’t want me playing in, but I still did every chance I got since the trunk was split. She said it was because of storm damage when she was pregnant with me, but whatever the reason, thick branches started not that far off the ground, and to a little girl who loved to climb, it looked like a ladder to the sky. I scrambled up that ladder so often I knew every twist, nook, and cranny in the branches. At least, I thought I did until I was eight and slipped and fell. I’m lucky I