Obsession Falls (The Haven Brothers #1)

I’m not worried about him. I don’t care who she dates or who she fucks. She can fuck half the town if she wants to.

It just makes me hate her all the more.

CHAPTER25

Audrey

A few weekswent by and three things didn’t happen. One, Lou didn’t put up much resistance to my ideas for the newspaper. I wanted to focus not only on local news, but on the locals themselves. Feature them, in all their quirky, Tilikum glory. So we came up with Hometown Spotlight, a weekly piece that would focus on the people of Tilikum.

I thought it was a pretty good idea, if I did say so myself. Hopefully the readership would like it.

Two, I didn’t get a reply to the job I’d applied for in Seattle. Boo.

And three, no one wrote anything in animal blood on my door, or performed any other creepy acts of vandalism. That was a yay.

The biggest yay? Josiah Haven.

We’d stopped discussing whether or not he was going to sleep at my place. He just did. It wasn’t like he was moving in. Not exactly. But a toothbrush and a few other things did appear in my bathroom and instead of taking everything home each day, a few clothing items made their way onto the chair in my bedroom.

Josiah’s presence in my life eased the sting of not getting a reply from the Seattle job. Despite how great it had sounded, it was also hours away, and it wasn’t a remote position. When I’d applied, starting a relationship here in Tilikum hadn’t even been on my radar.

But now? Things were changing. Fast.

That didn’t stop me from my usual Saturday morning routine of checking online job listings and noting the ones that might be worth pursuing. But my heart wasn’t in it. I took a sip of my coffee as I sat at the kitchen table and scrolled through the postings.

Could I fathom staying in Tilikum for good? Was I crazy for worrying about it? Just because Josiah and I had taken things to the next level didn’t mean it was going to work out in the long run. I’d been swept up in the beginning stages of a relationship before. The newness, the excitement, the constant butterflies. None of those things meant we’d go the distance.

I’d been disappointed before. As much as I didn’t want to experience that again—didn’t want to jump into something that didn’t have forever potential—I couldn’t put that kind of pressure on Josiah.

So, Josiah, do you think the amazing sex means you might want to marry me at some point?

Yeah, no.

I took another sip of coffee and kept scrolling. Although Max had woken me up early, I’d managed to get up without waking Josiah. He hadn’t emerged yet and Max had gone right back to sleep on his doggie bed after going outside. Silly dog.

Thinking about jobs and the future and Tilikum and Josiah, I had to ponder the big question. What did I want?

Did I want to go the distance with Josiah? If he told me he thought we had a future together, what would I do? How would I feel about that? Could I be satisfied with a life here?

Big questions and I didn’t know the answers. I really liked Josiah. Maybe too much, considering things between us had only heated up recently. I loved being with him, sleeping next to him—and with him. He made me feel safe and protected.

But his whole life was here. His business was literally rooted to the ground of Tilikum. I very much doubted he’d relocate if I got a job somewhere else. And I didn’t blame him. This was where he belonged. I couldn’t ask him to do that.

As for me? I didn’t know where I belonged. Maybe I never had.

I heard the bedroom door open and my heart did a little flip. Just the anticipation of seeing him gave me a rush of endorphins. As if I hadn’t been tangled in the sheets with him all night.

He walked into the kitchen in nothing but pajama pants, with messy hair and still blinking away sleep. He was so sexy, with that hairy chest and lumberjack beard, I wanted to eat him.

“Morning.” His sleepy voice was ridiculously sexy. So rough and growly. He leaned over and kissed my head.

“Morning.” I closed my laptop and resisted the urge to jump up and climb him like a tree. “There’s coffee if you want some.”

“Thanks.”

Max came over to get his obligatory morning pets. Josiah gave him a few scratches. That seemed to satisfy Max and he went back to his spot.

I took him in as he poured his coffee. The hard lines of his body. The muscle built on hard work. His rough hands that could be both possessive and surprisingly gentle. He was a marvel. So sturdy and stoic, yet with a softness on the inside that he rarely let anyone see.