Two Family Home by Sarah Title Read Free Book Online Page A

he’d invite her in. She could be patient. She could wait, and she could accept that it might never happen.
    She could!
    That’s why she was shouting at herself! Because it was totally true, and not at all because she needed convincing!
    Whatever. At least she had a cute apartment, and she was getting to try her hand at gardening. As long as Walker didn’t mind. She should go into the garage and ask him. No, stop, she told herself. You’re just being nosy. Just stalk him on the internet like a normal person. Besides, the lease said she had access to the garden, which to her meant she could tear the whole thing up if she wanted to.
    She did not. When she wasn’t researching her landlord for her own peace of mind (she told herself), she’d been all over the internet looking for gardening tips. The Willow Springs Public Library had a great list of online resources that gave her hope that she wouldn’t have to start the garden from scratch. In fact, that was a bad idea. She even downloaded a free gardening app that Gladys turned her on to. Since she was going to leave Walker alone, she stood there with her phone out, trying to identify various green things poking out of the dirt. According to her research, some of it might be salvageable. With her starting kind of late in the season, she wanted to save all that she could.
    She practically jumped up and down with glee. Late in the season. She’d never had a season to be late in before!
    It was not too late for tomatoes. Zucchini would be fine, eggplant maybe. She couldn’t tell if she had melon or pumpkin, which was embarrassing, but fortunately no one was there to see her squat down and try to figure it out.
    She wished she could talk to the man who’d planted the garden. She imagined he’d have some good advice for her. But more than that, the garden was clearly a labor of love. Beneath the weeds—she was pretty sure those were weeds—she could see neat rows laid out inside a border of wildflowers. She wanted to show him that, just because he’d moved away, a part of him remained in Willow Springs. Maybe, once she got it whipped into shape, she could invite him over. Make him some apparently terrible iced tea. Or maybe Walker was still in touch with him, and he could keep the guy updated. Or she could ask Walker to invite him over and the three of them could have lunch. And, if Walker spoke actual words to her, it might be more fun than a root canal. That would be an amazing step forward in their relationship.
    Not that they had a relationship.
    A girl could dream.
    And this girl maybe did dream. About an angry man in boxers.
    Oh, Lord, those boxers.
    She shook her head. No. No no no no no. She was on a Fresh Path to Independence, not a Do-Dumb-Stuff-with-Your-Landlord-Even-If-It-Looks-Super-Fun Path. And taming that angry bear who lived next door would definitely be trouble. She didn’t want trouble. She didn’t want to reform a bad boy. That stuff was not for her. If the bad boy wanted to change, he’d change. A person can only be who he is. That’s how she’d ended up getting anxiety hives when her last boyfriend talked about marriage. She was not a homebody. She was not a stay-local kind of gal, and she’d been living her whole life as if she were.
    She had enough trouble trying to figure her own stuff out; she didn’t need to try to figure out someone else’s.
    No matter how tempting it was.
    No amount of head-shaking could convince her that she did not want to see what those flexing muscles looked like up close. Fortunately, he was clearly a jerk.
    But what a hot jerk.
    A hot jerk with a secret.
    Not only was he a jerk, but he was clearly disgusted by her. Which was not really fair. He hadn’t exactly seen her at her best. She looked down at her worn cotton shorts. Definitely not her best. And the last time he saw her, she was wearing different old shorts and being bested by blue