Like He Never Left

chapter 24

Colt's POV

"We only have a week left," Brooke whines, bouncing onto the bed next to me. "Let's do something fun!"

"Maybe a little later, but I've got work to do." The keys on my laptop clack away as I revise a contract.

"C'mon, Colt." She pokes my side, and I exhale my irritation.

Brooke has been a vacuum of my attention since the party a few days ago, hardly letting me stray five feet away from her and jumping into any conversation I find myself in, even ones over the phone with my father or even Tommy, where she'll demand he be put on speakerphone so that she can talk to him too. June and SueEllen even asked her to go shopping with them a couple of days ago, and she didn't accept until she was positive that I was going to stay in all day and work.

The only word I can think of to describe it is clingy. I tried to talk to her about it after we got back to the bed and breakfast that night of the party because that's when it started, but she insisted that she didn't know what I was talking about, and I stopped trying to push her when I realized she wouldn't say anything without an argument. And every time I tried to bring it up with her since, she passes it off and gets offended that I would call her "such nonsense." 

"You've been working for two hours already," she persists, pointing to the analog clock hanging on the wall across from us which reads ten in the morning. Little does she actually know that I've been working since five this morning. Her other hand squeezes my bicep, and I'm all for physical contact, trust me, especially with my fiancee, but I need a break.

I bring my legs up from being stretched out in front of me to cross them, forcing Brooke to back off a tiny bit. Her grip loosens around me, and I feel like I can breathe again.

"I know it's not exactly favorable, but I really have to get this done. You know that. I've already put it off long enough as it is, and Baker is starting to get up my ass about it." And he really has been. My boss has been calling me first thing in the morning for the last couple of days wondering when I was going to start getting on these cases. 

"I know," she sighs, "But I brought us down here so that you could show me your home town, not sit on the bed all day with your dorky glasses and draw up contracts and do legal stuff."

I push my "dorky" glasses further up my nose. "Yes, and I'm doing that, but please, Brooke. You bought the tickets without giving me any warning or the time to take off work. I'm sorry, but I have to work today. Why don't you call June and see what she's doing? You two really seemed to hit it off the other day," I suggest.

I squint at the screen. What the hell is a title abstract doing here? This is a misdemeanor case. Jesus Christ, I've already spent an hour more than I should have on this. My ass is grass if I don't get this in to—

"Because I want to stay with you," she answers simply, and I glance over to see her shrugging her shoulders.

"You're acting like a child," I say in an amused tone, but I feel like I'm actually scolding a child. "You want to go out, I have work to do. Go out with June."

"No."

I'm about to respond to her when the ringing of my phone cuts me off, but I have no plans of answering it until we resolve this.

"Are you going to answer it?" Brooke snarks, and I make no effort to hold back an eye roll. 

I answer my phone without checking the caller ID.

"Hello?"

"Geez, grumpy. Who pissed in your Fruit Loops?" Tommy answers. 

I sigh and rest the back of my head against the headboard with a thump.