Can’t Hurry Love by Nadine Millard (primary phonics books .txt) 📕

“Anyway, there was an older couple there, I’m assuming her parents, who eventually managed to drag her ass into a car, and that was it. She was gone.”

“Wow,” Beth said, because she didn’t really know what to say.

“I felt really sorry for him,” Paige said sadly. “He looked terrible. I mean, hot as all get out, obviously, but terrible.”

“Yeah, but — but that doesn’t change anything does it?” Beth asked hesitantly. “I mean… he still lied.”

Brooke and Paige shared another look while Beth flopped into the chair across from them.

“We can’t tell you what to do, Beth,” Paige said gently. “But—“

“But what?”

“—but we all make mistakes, and from the little I saw, and what you’ve said, I can kind of understand him taking his time getting into something new and dragging all of that up.”

Paige was a bleeding heart though, Beth told herself. She was just as soft and mushy as Beth herself.

She didn’t want to be foolish. Her heart had steered her wrong for a year with that man. She couldn’t trust it.

Brooke would bawl her out and get her head on straight. She turned to the beautiful brunette who never, ever took crap and hardly every believed men when they claimed innocence.

“What do you think?” Beth asked, half afraid of the answer.

Brooke narrowed one eye. “You love him, huh?” she asked.

“So much,” Beth said tearfully. “But I don’t want to get hurt. And I know I’m too romantic, I know I look for fairy tales when real life doesn’t work that way. I don’t want to be an idiot.”

Brooke nodded.

“So?” Beth asked when her friend still hadn’t given her the kick-up-the-butt she clearly needed.

Brooke sighed and got to her feet, holding out a hand to Beth. “So,” she said with a tiny smile. “I think we need to get you ready for tonight.”

“I’m not going tonight,” Beth said mutinously.

“This festival was to find love, right?” Brooke asked.

Beth nodded miserably, feeling even stupider.

A speed-dating festival! What had she been thinking? People didn’t fall in love that quickly.

You can’t hurry love, Josh had warned her, even though she had fallen in love that quickly, to her detriment, as it turned out. So, he’d been right.

“Then go get it, Beth,” Brooke said.

“You don’t think I’m a fool?”

“Oh, I do.” Brooke grinned. “It just so happens he’s a fool too, so you’re perfectly matched.”

Beth stared at her most unforgiving friend before slowly, an answering grin spread across her face. Squealing, she threw her arms around Brooke then Paige before running toward her room.

She had a happily ever after to go get.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Beth walked into the community center feeling more nervous than she’d felt in high school before they’d announced Prom Queen. There was a lot more at stake tonight than a plastic crown and a sash. But she’d been pronounced Queen that night, and she fully intended to get her prize tonight, too.

She ran a hand self-consciously over the dress. The red suited her bright hair, and the matching lipstick made her eyes look bluer. But it was a little lower cut than what she was used to, which was why she’d never worn it before tonight.

But Brooke had taken one look at it and announced that nothing else would do for the occasion, and since Beth was a little scared of Brooke, she did as she was told.

As she looked around the room, she saw Gerald’s eyes widen as he waved at her. She waved back then turned her back in case she’d given him the wrong idea.

Her eyes fell on John the actuary, and she was delighted to see him dancing with Elsie Caine, looking adorably loved up. Looked like their brunch the other day had gone well.

She spotted Zoe and Beck, but they were in the midst of a full on make-out session that she didn’t particularly want to get in the middle of.

All of her brothers were with yet more girls, and Beth could only roll her eyes at their antics.

Brooke excused herself and walked to the bar where Damon Wakefield made a beeline for her. And was quickly batted away.

“I don’t think he’s here,” Beth whispered to Paige who gave her hand a supportive squeeze.

“Ladies, you’re looking gorgeous this evening.”

Beth turned as Mason Decker smiled down at them both, though Beth could see he was only really watching Paige.

Paige stiffened beside her. “I’m just going to check on the band,” she said rigidly before hurrying away.

“Still her favourite person in Rocky Valley.” Mason grinned, but it was tinged with frustration.

“Maybe if you weren’t destroying the thing she loved the most, you’d get a warmer reception,” Beth pointed out a little icily.

Mason had never done anything to her, but he was bothering Paige, so sides needed to be taken.

“I’m not destroying anything,” he answered. “I’ll keep the integrity of the building, which she’d know if she listened to me.”

“You don’t get it, do you?” Beth asked, exasperated. “It’s not just the building, Mason. That library is important to Paige. And she will never forgive you if you ruin it. Never,” she emphasised, just in case her hunch about Mason and Paige was correct.

He stared across the room at her for a minute before cursing under his breath. “I need a drink,” he muttered, stomping off toward the bar.

And then she was alone. She clasped her hands self-consciously, wondering if Josh was going to be a no-show. Had he changed his mind? Decided that she’d ignored him for too long?

It hadn’t been that long, she told herself a little defensively. And he’d kept her waiting a year, so she was perfectly entitled to—

The band suddenly stopped playing halfway through a song.

Beth frowned up in confusion, hoping something wasn’t wrong with the sound system. Paige didn’t need anything going wrong tonight, not after all her hard work. She was getting ready to rush over to her friend to see what was going on, when music sounded not from the band, but still through their speakers. She recognised