Page 21 of Lumberjack Bride
She huffs in annoyance. “You have a job,” she says.
“I’m on two weeks leave for our honeymoon.”
“You have Pearl.” She steps forward. “Who’s going to take care of her?”
I shrug. “Bobby can do that.”
“Pearl hates Bobby.”
“And she loves you,” I say. “Did you think about that? Sure, she’s a dog, but she’s our dog, Hazel. She’s family and she adores you and she won’t understand this.”
Hazel’s shoulders slip an inch. “That’s not fair.”
“You’re right. It’s not. But I don’t care. Emotional appeal is the only thing that gets through to you. Logic doesn’t work. I could easily point out how many people you’d be inconveniencing and disappointing by canceling our wedding at the last minute but the only thing that’ll really twist the knife is the idea of Pearl’s little, whimpering eyes filling with sadness as I tell her she’s never going to see you again—”
“Stop that!” she shouts.
“I don’t know, Pearl,” I say. “Hazel just didn’t want you anymore.”
Her jaw drops. “Don’t tell her that!”
“I promised her you were coming home. Two more nights, I told her. Two more nights and she’d have you back. We’d be one big, happy family again.”
She looks down.
“But you know,” I continue. “She’s a dog. She’ll get over it. But I won’t. I don’t know how to live a life without you in it anymore, Hazel. Without you challenging me and comforting me and driving me fucking crazy every day. I don’t want to give that up. I don’t want to go back to the way things were before. Work, home. Work, home. I won’t give up what I have now and that’s why I’m going to stand here until I rot. You think I won’t last on your lawn for as long as you did on mine? Challenge accepted.”
“Shut up, Romeo!”
A voice cries out from somewhere down the street.
Hazel snorts but quickly lays a hand over her mouth to hide it. Her hidden smile sparks a bit of warmth in my chest and for a moment, I think she feels the same.
“And I forgive you,” I say.
Her smile drops. “You forgive me?”
“Yeah.”
“For what?”
“For...” I pause, “making me drive all the way out here for no reason, maybe?”
She clears her throat and shifts a few steps back. “Goodnight, Leo,” she mutters.
I jut forward. “Wait, Haze. You—” The door slams behind her. “Damned woman.”
I should have just shut up when I had her smiling. I’ll have to remember that. You’d think I’d know that by now but the deep, overwhelming urge to taste my own foot won out once more.
My phone rings in my pocket. I reach for it, somehow a little hopeful that it’s Hazel, but it’s just Bobby.
I swipe it on. “Hey,” I answer.
“Any luck?” he asks.
“Honestly not sure yet.”
“Well, hang in there. You won her back before. You can do it again.”