So Much More (Made for Love #3) Read Free Page B

never do.” She walks out without a backwards glance.
    I stare at the abandoned key that sits between Daphne and me and will the blood that’s rushing through my veins to stay cold—cold—ice cold. I try and convince myself that I’m doing the right thing. Staying away, keeping my distance, protecting myself—it’s the right thing. I try to ignore the questions that are crawling out of the dark crevice I shoved them into months ago; I try to squash that irritating need to know why ; I try to bury that little part of me that has her name written all over it.
    “Brandon? Brandon!”
    My eyes flick up to meet Daphne’s.
    “Don’t. It’s not worth it. She’s not worth it. Don’t touch that key.”
    You’re my best friend. You won’t say no. You never do .
    As I reach for the key, I convince myself that I won’t use it. I tell myself that when I drop by the hotel tonight, it’ll only be to return a lost key. I persuade myself into thinking it’s the responsible thing to do.
    I lie .
    “I should probably get back to work,” I murmur as I stand. The look Daphne gives me makes me feel like shit. Her eyes are filled with sympathy and compassion that I don’t deserve.
    “Call me later if you want, okay?”
    “Yeah. Thanks.”

S UMMER 2016. BEST. PITY party. Ever.
    Two days after Beck and Addie’s wedding, I was in Georgia. That Tuesday, over a pizza and a significant amount of liquid courage, I came clean to Jack and Claire about everything. Micah. Luke. The Red Coat Incident. It was almost as humiliating to confess as it had been to live it in the first place. I had only ever told one other person before—Harper.
    Add her to the list of people/things I’ll miss seeing everyday.
    Anyway, once the Davis’ knew the truth, they took pity on me. I didn’t deserve it, but I didn’t have the strength to turn it down. Somehow, my two week vacation turned into a two month extended leave. For the first month, they did their best to try and get me out. I met a lot of their friends and saw a lot of their beautiful state. After a few weeks, I decided that if I was going to stay, I needed a little work. There was a coffee shop around the corner from where they lived and I picked up a few hours every week. It made me feel like less of a mooch.
    When Jack and Claire were busy living their normal, functional lives, working their legitimate, college-education-required day jobs, I’d stay holed up in my room. Reading. My Kindle has seen more action than a two dollar hooker this summer. Far more than me, that’s for sure. I’m not ashamed to say that I fed my new smut addiction with a fiery frenzy. All it took was one random find and I was hooked. J.Daniels introduced me to a man named Reese Carroll and that Sweet Addiction ignited an insatiable desire to lose myself in other people’s love stories. I must have read close to forty books while I was away.
    Yeah—that one click addiction people talk about? It’s for real .
    While some might call my indulgence unhealthy, I call it bliss. It helps my aching heart. For as long as I am lost in someone else’s story, I can pretend she is me and I am her and the hero in the story loves me. Wants me. Needs me . The truth is, in the land of romance novels is the only place that can be my reality.
    Claire tried to convince me to stay in Georgia. She told me I was welcome under their roof until I found a place of my own, but I knew I had to come back. Come home. I may have run away from my job like a pathetic little lap dog with my tail between my legs, but I couldn’t abandon the rest of my life. A captain goes down with his ship, right? Well, my port-of-call was in Colorado, so I made arrangements to return in the middle of August.
    I was sure of only two things—two non-negotiables that I clung to with every bit of strength I managed to scrounge up. One: I was not going back to Westminster. I didn’t want to risk running into any of my old students at the grocery store or