Fools (Licking Thicket 3) - Page 18
“How is it, Dunn Johnson, that you know me so well in some ways and so little in others? You know I don’t eat spicy food. You know I’m going home to eat a truly worrisome amount of sweets from the freezer—”
“The one in the garage labeled ‘Bacteria Samples’ that’s actually full of baked goods. Genius.”
I pressed my lips together. Vienna had never cottoned on to my stash, but naturally Dunn knew. Dunn knew everything… except the most important things.
“—but you don’t know the first thing about what I want in a man? If you tried on purpose to find me terrible candidates, you couldn’t have done worse. Why the heck are you so obsessed with this?”
“I just…” He looked guilty, then embarrassed. “I told you back in November. I said, ‘I can’t be happy when Tucker’s not happy.’” He shrugged. “That’s the long and short of it. I want you and me to have what Mal and Brooks have… with Ava and Paul.”
I nearly whimpered. So close to what I wanted him to say and yet so far.
“You want me a-and Gordon… to be besties with you… and Jenn.”
He frowned. “Well, no. I mean, Jesus, not Gordon. Unless you wanted to give it a second chance?”
I sighed, suddenly overwhelmingly tired. “I need a break, Dunn. This isn’t working.”
“Yeah?” He nodded. “Okay, no, I can respect that. Even NFL players get a bye week. So we’ll take next week off, we’ll come back the following week, and we’ll hit it hard. I have, like… a dozen more candidates, and I find new ones all the ti—”
“No, Dunn. Not a break from dating, a break from this. From you.” I shook my head up at the cloud-covered moon. “God, maybe a break from the Thicket entirely, I don’t know.”
Maybe I’d go and visit my parents for the weekend. Or head someplace where the breeze was a little less chilly. Something.
“But, Tuck—”
His pleading voice almost killed me, but it occurred to me right then and there what the missing piece was, the thing that kept me hanging on Friday after horrible Friday: these setups were a connection between me and Dunn. A way of knowing I was always at the forefront of his brain, even when he was at the mechanic or the feed store. A way of knowing I had his attention and focus, since that was the most of him I could have.
“But nothing,” I said softly. “If you care about me, Dunn Johnson, leave me be.”
4
Dunn
17-Across: Not aware of or not concerned about what is happening around one (9 letters)
“Next time I won’t be so quick to trust a woman,” I promised her, raking out the mucky straw that had accumulated near the open barn door. “Which, honestly, is a life lesson someone ought to put on a cross-stitch sampler and hang somewhere.”
Bernadette regarded me with interest. She was always such a good listener.
“And, alright, maybe Brooks had a point about digging a little deeper into what makes a good match. I can do that. There’s a ton of stuff about Tucker Wright I can use to narrow it down to the absolute perfect pick. And since he’s going to fight me tooth and nail on this, I need to make sure the next guy is the one, you know? I don’t mind telling you, he scared the bejeebers out of me the other day, talking about taking a break from the Thicket. Wouldn’t be home without Tucker here.”
Bernadette made a snuffling noise of agreement and wandered over to nose the pile of debris I’d collected. I hadn’t checked it for anything dangerous, so I didn’t want her picking through it.
“Get out of there,” I snapped. “Nothing good for you in there.”
She turned to me with hurt-filled eyes, and I cursed as my phone began to ring. “Damn it, Bernie. I didn’t mean to lose my temper. C’mere.” I squatted down and waited for her to lumber over before scratching her jaw and scritching her ears. “Good girl. Daddy loves you. Who’s the best girl?”
I held the phone up to my face in time to hear my mother’s voice. “You’d better not be talking to that pig.”
I shot Bernie a look of apology and mouthed, “Sorry,” before turning and walking away so she couldn’t hear my mother’s hateful words.
“Hey, Mama.”
“I need your help with something. Can you come over?”
“Yeah, sure. What’s going on?”
“After Tucker fixed the shutter for us, I realized I wanted to put some on the shed out back to be all matchy. Tucker can’t do it this weekend because of his date, so I thought I’d see if you could come by and hang them for me. You know I don’t like to ask your dad to do anything strenuous on account of making his stents pop out.”
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