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.Then her eyes looked past Jordan toward a framed picture sitting on a narrow table near the front entrance.She was a fair distance away from it, but she instantly spotted something familiar about the two people in the picture, which was obviously of a mother and child.Brielle realized she knew the face; it belonged to the woman with the lovely blonde hair she had met at the bakery when she stopped to ask for directions.“Who’s that?” she asked to get Jordan’s attention.Her question made him follow her gaze to the picture, and he rubbed his chin with one hand.“Do you know her?” Jordan asked, although he didn’t know how she would have.“Well, no, not really,” Brielle said, shaking her head, “but I did meet the woman at a shop when I was asking for directions.It’s obvious though that either you or your roommate knows her, so who is she?” Her eyes were wide as she waited for details, and she slipped her slender fingers through her black hair, smoothing out the knots casually.Jordan sighed heavily, and Brielle took it as him knowing who she was.“As you can probably see just by driving through town, Yellow Valley doesn’t have a big population, so you know almost everyone in town.Cassie and I grew up together.We went to the same school,” Jordan detailed.There was more.She could see it in his eyes Jordan wasn’t finished.Brielle knew that much.She only wanted him to open up to her.She wanted him, and to mean more to him than just someone he hooked up with when he was feeling horny.If he still had feelings for Cassie—it was obvious she had meant something to him in his past—then she ought to know about it before she put her heart in the firing line for heartbreak she always hoped she would never feel.“Cassie and I were a couple in high school.We dated for several years until after graduation when we decided to go our separate ways.I haven’t had an opportunity to come home since I left, so when I came home this time, I discovered I’m a father.Cassie and I share a son together.”Wow! Brielle certainly wasn’t expecting to be told the guy she was kind of seeing was suddenly a father.What could she make of this news? She wasn’t ready to take on the role of a stepmother.“You’re a dad?” she practically screeched.She hadn’t meant to say it like that, but it just came out.She was very surprised, to say the least.Jordan gulped and nodded his head.“I am,” he said while scratching the back of his head.“I know I never expected to find out I’m a dad, but now that I’ve had the opportunity to get to know my son, I can’t imagine not being in his life.”“Why are you telling me this?” she asked.“You asked me if I knew her.Well, that’s how I know her.She was my first love.”“Do you still love her?”Jordan couldn’t answer that question, when he wasn’t even sure of the answer himself, even though he was sure part of him already knew.So he responded as best as he could.“I guess there will be a part of me that will always love Cassie.She was my first real relationship, and because of the child we share together, she and I will forever be in each other’s lives.I’m going to be a part of my child’s life.”“I guess why I’m really asking is because I want to be a part of your life too.And I want to know where I stand with you.Do you see me in your life too?”Brielle desperately needed to know she meant something to Jordan as much as he meant to her.Could she ever be meaningful to Jordan like Cassie obviously was?“You are a part of my life.”He wasn’t getting what she meant.“No, you don’t understand,” Brielle said, shaking her head as she took his hand in hers, and to her, they simply fit together like they were meant to be, but did Jordan feel the same way? “I like you.A lot.I guess I want us to be more than acquaintances who happen to hook up every so often.I want to go out on an actual date with you.”She watched as Jordan quickly looked away from her, taking in a deep breath before turning back to her.“Well, I guess we can go out on a date.I’m just not sure I can handle anything else right now.At the moment, my life is hectic enough as it is.I’m not really looking for a relationship.”“Okay,” Brielle agreed, despite her response obviously being a lie.Even though it wasn’t the answer Brielle was really hoping for, she knew she shouldn’t push the matter any further.And she certainly wasn’t going to question meeting his son at the risk of pushing Jordan away permanently.For now, she would be happy to simply go out on a date with the guy she was seeing.Five days had passed since Cassie’s impromptu fling with Jordan, and despite knowing she shouldn’t be harboring clandestine feelings for her ex-boyfriend—obvious reason being he was already involved with someone else—she couldn’t seem to get the thought of him out of her head.She still envisioned the two of them together in her kitchen, and the way his touch sent shivers throughout her entire body like he was electrified.She knew she couldn’t keep thinking about Jordan this way anymore, because despite what happened between the two of them, they would not be getting back together.That was made seamlessly clear the second Cassie realized he was seeing someone from Miami [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]