I drag my hand through my hair in frustration.
“But you just said that you’re already busy.”
“I am. Very busy.”
“Then I don’t see why I can’t just take over this project and get it underway.”
She looks like she wants to scream.
“Because I don’t want you to do that, Wolfe. Besides, why would you want to start this now? Your garage just burned down, and you have to rebuild there. You’re also still rebuilding classic cars in the other garage down the road. We’re both stupidly busy right now, and the thought of adding another thing on top of it gives me freaking hives.”
“I can do it.”
“Do you hate this house so much?” she demands. “I know it’s not new and super fancy, but it’s nice, and it’s plenty big enough.”
“It’s not that,” I insist. “I like it just fine.”
“We don’t even always have to stay here every night,” she continues. “If you want to stay down at the fancy barndominium, I’m down for that. It’s a cool space, and we should use it.”
“That’s not the point. I just want to get the other house started. I want to move forward with it.”
“Well, I’m not ready.”
We stare at each other, both angry and frustrated, and I shake my head.
“I’m going to take a walk and clear my head,” I say, turning for the door. “Before I say something that I can’t take back.”
“Good idea,” she fumes. I close the door behind me, headed straight for the path down the cliff to the beach below.
“Fucking stubborn woman,” I mutter, making my way down the rocks. It looks like the tide is going out, which is good.
I need a nice, long walk.
I love her more than anything. I want to give her everything. I just want to move forward with our lives together. To build something wonderful with her. Something that’s not just mine or hers but...
Ours.
I want that house so badly, pieces of each of us together in one space, in a home we build together. I want to make a family with her there.
I want it more than anything I’ve ever wanted before.
It’s not just a matter of marrying her. I want it all. And I’m anxious to get started as soon as possible.
Why doesn’t she see it that way?
Just as I’m almost to the sand below, the headache hits.
“Fuck.”
It’s like I’m immediately in a dark hole. I can’t even hear the water or see anything at all.
I drop to a rock and sit, hoping that this one will subside after just a few minutes.
But pain spears through me, stealing my breath, and then there’s nothing at all.
Chapter Twenty
Luna
“Why is he so insistent?” I shake my head and pace the kitchen. “He told me he could be patient, but here he is, pushing. Because he goes from zero to sixty in one-point-six seconds, and I just knew he wouldn’t be able to go slow on this. I just knew it.”
I smell Rose and try to ignore her. I’m not in the mood to have a conversation with a ghost.
“I think he doesn’t like this house because it’s not fancy enough.”
I walk into the living room and look around.
The house is nice. It’s the biggest home attached to a lighthouse on the west coast, with almost three thousand square feet of living space, and I have plenty of guest rooms and just…space.
“Sure, it’s a hundred years old, but it’s not awful. It’s certainly adequate to live in for a couple more years while I get the business going, and he finishes rebuilding the garage, and then we can build something else.”
I think I sound perfectly reasonable. So why won’t he just listen and take what I say at face value?
“What woman wants a house to be built without any input from her?” I ask, getting even more worked up. “For God’s sake, I need to choose all of the things, and I’m already choosing a lot of things, and it makes my head pound.”
Rose slams a door.
“I know, you don’t want me to leave the damn lighthouse, but it’s not like I’m going far, Rose. It’s a hundred yards south, that’s all. I’m sure you can still look in on us over there when you’re not busy haunting whoever has rented out this place. You’ll be a busy ghost.”
I blow out a breath, but Rose slams another door.
“Great, now you’re throwing a fit. There’s only enough room for one woman to lose her shit at a time here. And that woman is me today. Sorry, not sorry.”
Suddenly, a wind blows through the room, and the window facing the gazebo flies up. I can only gape at what I’m seeing.
“Oh, God. You’re not just freaking out with me, are you?”
Another door slams, and I run out of the house toward the cliffs and look over the side.