This was probably an act of pity couched vaguely in kindness.

I didn’t care.

I’d maybe make twenty or thirty dollars.

Another tank of gas.

And I’d take that too.

“I’ll get on them tonight,” I told her, matching some of Brooklyn’s socks.

“Right then. But before I let you go, with Christmas around the corner, and this going on now for months, it’s high time we had a chat about what you’re gonna be doing about Toby.”

I stopped matching socks.

There it was.

Deanna was open and out there and totally did not beat around the bush.

Hell.

“You know that storm is gonna blow, baby girl,” she told me confusingly. “Might as well have it blow soon, before the holidays, so we can all have a good one without that hanging over our heads.”

Now I was staring at my son’s socks not seeing them.

The storm was gonna blow?

What storm?

“What are you talking about?” I asked.

“You two just gotta get together. Johnny won’t like it, but he’ll deal. And if it doesn’t work out, we’re all adults, including you and Toby, we’ll all deal.”

Now I was holding on to the edge of the dryer and staring at my son’s socks, not seeing them.

“What are you talking about?” I repeated in a whisper.

Deanna was quiet a second before she replied, “What do you mean, what am I talking about?”

“I mean, what are you talking about?” I reiterated with some significant stress on the significant words.

Deanna was quiet for a lot longer than a second before she queried, “You know he’s into you, right?”

No, he was not.

That was what I knew.

“He’s just a good guy,” I replied. “Both the Gamble men are good guys.”

“You’re right about that,” Deanna agreed. “Though one is a good guy who’s gonna marry Izzy and one’s a good guy who’s into you.”

“Deanna, he’s not,” I disagreed.

“Addie, he is. Haven’t you noticed?”

“I’ve noticed I’ve been adopted as like . . . a member of the family.”

“A member of the family whose pants Toby Gamble wants to get his hands down.”

Oh my God.

I wished.

No, no, no.

I could not wish that.

Shit!

“That’s just not true.”

“I don’t believe I’m hearing this,” she said quietly.

“His brother is marrying my sister,” I pointed out.

“Yeah, and I get that might give both of you pause before starting something. But you’re good people, he’s good people, and—”

I cut her off. “I see you think differently, Deanna, but that wall is up. Toby put it up. Honestly, when I met him, outside that meeting being exceedingly humiliating, I was absolutely not in a place I was gonna take up with another guy, that other guy being the mess that might come of him being my sister’s boyfriend’s brother or not. But since then, it’s been friends only. Little sister stuff. Hang. Have a laugh. Do family things together. Get the hell gone the minute anyone else isn’t around.”

“Yeah, that’s because he wants to get his hands down your pants and he’s not real big on what Johnny would think if he did, so he’s removing himself from the temptation.”

Oh my God.

I wished.

But for once, Deanna had something wrong.

It was actually a shock. She was a wise woman, intuitive, observant.

But this one she had not read right.

“No,” I retorted. “Because I overheard him talking to his friend Bryce on the phone, and when Bryce mentioned me, he’d said yes, he thought I was hot. He’d then shared he was never gonna go there, not just because I was Johnny’s woman’s sister but because I was baggage. He avoided baggage, especially since he was probably not going to hang around Matlock. He then went on to say he liked me. I was awesome. And did Bryce want Toby to fix me up with him. Bryce apparently was feeling him out because about half an hour later, Toby asked if I was in for him fixing me up with his buddy Bryce.”

This had happened.

And now, with it out, unable to keep it firm where it should be in the back of my head, I had to think about it.

Think about how earth-shattering that had been.

Think about how I’d been right that first time I met Toby. The first time I’d seen that top-to-toe perfection. That thick black hair slicked back from a widow’s peak. His long black beard. His tall, lean body with its broad shoulders and narrow hips and loose-limbed grace. The compassion in his crow-black eyes as he stared down at me after I’d endured yet another blow from the man I’d foolishly selected to be my husband.

The blow that everyone got to watch land and crush me.

Including Toby.

But now it was out, I had to think about how I knew a man who looked like that, who could share such feeling just with his gaze, who could talk so gently with that low, rich voice, would never be for someone like me.

Sweet, shy, cute Izzy—she scored Johnny Gamble.

Wild child Addie—I scored a jackass like Perry.

It did not help in the coming weeks I’d learn Tobias Gamble was the sharp edge to Johnathon Gamble’s enduring anvil.

And damn, but that was totally my thing.

Yes, in those weeks I’d learned Toby wore his faded jeans loose on his hips, his tees were kickass and clung tight to his shoulders and pecs and slack at his flat abs and trim waist, and that rocked.

I’d further learned when he worked on cars at the garage he half-owned, he played hardcore metal and he did it loud.

I’d also learned he had wanderlust. He’d taken his forestry degree and put it to work as a logger and a park ranger and he had his pilot’s license.

I’d learned he laughed easy.

I’d learned how he looked at Dave with complete respect, Johnny with open affection, and Margot with unhidden adoration. How he teased Iz like he’d known her for years and folded her into their family without a pause.

And last, I’d learned he had a singular talent of putting up with me because I was part of the Izzy Package, and from what Deanna was saying, clearly hiding he was doing it.

Though he really dug my kid.

So that was something.

“He called you baggage?” Deanna asked incredulously.

“He didn’t use that word, but he did tell Bryce I had heavy shit I was dealing with,” I told her.

“That’s a lot different than calling you baggage, Addie.”

“Well, Bryce obviously asked him if he was going there and he’d said I had heavy shit, and while I was sorting it out, I didn’t need to get hooked up with a wanderer who might not stick around. I needed something steady, so he wasn’t interested.”

“And again, that’s a lot different than saying you were baggage and he avoided baggage,” Deanna kept to her theme.

“Maybe to a woman who’s been married for years to the love of her life, Deanna, but out here in the world of the single woman . . . no, the single mom, what he said translated means he’s not interested . . . at all.”

“I’m not sure—” she began.

“Do you think a Gamble man wouldn’t go for what he wanted no matter what?” I asked.