“I guess I’ve never given hot springs and yoga a lot of thought,” Mitch said. “But I’ll take your word for it.”

She shrugged. “I actually hope I can just work for someone else. That would be easier. No roots.”

“You’re against roots?”

“I’ve got so many roots right now that I can barely pick my feet up.” She sighed. “I’d like to be rootless for a while.”

“For a year.”

She tipped her head. He was hung up on that it seemed. “At least,” she added.

“Right.” He seemed to be thinking that over.

Paige frowned. “Told you that it sounded selfish.”

“It doesn’t,” he denied. “You have… a lot here.”

“I do.”

He shifted, sitting up a little straighter. “So it’s not marriage you’re against. Just the importance your family has put on it.”

She frowned, wondering why he cared so much how she felt about marriage. She swore to God, if he proposed to her, she’d throw him out in the snow. Without Max’s coat.

Maybe without his pants.

“It’s the idea that I’m weird or failing if I don’t have the marriage and family and mortgage thing.”

“So that’s what you want to get away from. Their expectations and pressures.”

“Yes.”

He sat forward. “Come to Louisiana.”

Her heart flipped in her chest. “What?”

He’d better not be proposing. Though asking her to come to Louisiana was not just a movie date.

“For the wedding. Josh and Tori’s,” he added.

She breathed out. But she couldn’t deny there was a tiny twinge of disappointment. “Oh. Yeah, I could—”

“Then stay.”

She felt her mouth drop open.

“Shake it up. Tell your family you’re going to do your own thing. In Louisiana. They won’t have a front row for your life there. They won’t even know what you’re doing, so they can’t judge it.”

That was crazy.

And it sounded nice.

“Just move to Louisiana?”

“Yep. I can give you a place to live. Free by the way.” He gave her a little wink. “And a job. You can save up money there just as easy as you can here. Maybe easier. No rent. No paying business overhead.”

She also sat forward. “I’m guessing the place to live would be with you?”

“In my house,” he said with a nod. “But it’s got four bedrooms. There’s another guy living there too. Works for our family business. He’s our veterinarian.”

Her own bedroom. But in his house. Uh-huh. “What’s the job?”

“Otter yoga.”

Her eyebrows rose. “Um… what?”

He chuckled. “I mean, you can do more than that. But there are no yoga studios in Autre.”

“Hmm…” She quirked an eyebrow. “Otters?”

He grinned. “We have otters. A whole family of them. We’ve decided to start an otter encounter as a part of the Boys of the Bayou business. People can come and interact with the otters, feed them, play with them. Seems like a girl who is used to doing yoga with cats, could figure something out with otters too.”

That sounded fun, actually. Otters were adorable.

“We have alligators too. Turtles. Lizards.”

“Yoga with alligators?”

“Maybe the babies?”

She laughed.

“And we’re getting a llama. Tori is taking one back with us. Maybe two. Knowing Tori, actually, probably three.”

“From Drew and Dallas Ryan?”

“Yep.”

“They’re alpacas, actually.”

“Right. Alpacas.”

Alpaca yoga. Otter yoga. Seeing Mitch every day. Hmmm…

“My family would assume that we’d run off and, of course, gotten married,” she said.

“And when we don’t, that will really make them wonder,” Mitch said. “They’ll just have to guess about what the hell is going on.” He leaned closer. “Admit it, that could be kind of fun.”

It could be.

A chance to have a relationship without any outside influences? To spend time with a guy and actually see what could happen without anyone else’s hopes getting up? A chance to really date someone without worrying about breaking her mom’s heart if it didn’t work out?

“You promise you’re not going to propose?” she asked.

“I think I can resist.” He gave her a half grin.

That wasn’t an I promise, but she smiled back.

“Living with you and some other guy isn’t really aloneness,” she pointed out.

“No.” He nodded. “There’s not a lot of space or alone time in my life, I’ll admit.”

Yeah, see that was a red flag. She didn’t want to trade one crazy big family for another.

“But you’re still saving up for the Year of Aloneness, right?” he asked.

“Right.” She was probably six months away, honestly. She wanted to have enough to pay rent for at least part of the year in Colorado without worrying about her job situation.

“So come do that in Autre. Away from the proposals that keep happening up here.” He actually frowned slightly at that.

She grinned. Was he jealous? She hated herself for liking that idea.

“You worried they might wear me down and I’ll finally say yes to one just to shut everyone up?”

His frowned deepened. “Let’s just say I don’t hate the idea of you being away from all the marriage-minded guys that seem to populate this little town.”

Paige laughed lightly. “That should be a huge reason not to come to Louisiana, you know.”

He reached out and snagged her wrist, tugging her up the bed.

She went. Willingly.

He rolled her under him and kissed her long and deep. When he lifted his head, he said, “Come to Louisiana and be my friend with benefits for a few months.”

“That’s it? That’s all you want?”

“I want you to have what you want,” he said, his eyes sincere.

A little bit of her resolve melted. She actually felt it turn to liquid and slip away.

“And I do want men to stop proposing to you,” he added. “Louisiana seems like a good place for you to land temporarily.”

She smiled and ran a hand up the side of his face. “You’re very tempting.”

He pressed his cock against her hip and she felt her body heat instantly. “I promise the benefits will be nice.”

“Your other roommate is a heavy sleeper?” she teased.

“He can get his ass out if he doesn’t like it,” Mitch said gruffly, dragging his jaw along hers.

She shivered and arched closer.

A place to land temporarily. A little adventure. A chance to save up the money she needed but be out from under the magnifying glass of Appleby. Well, her family in particular. The whole town seemed to think that marriage and family were the ultimate goals, but her family was particularly obsessed.

Her Year of Aloneness was still the plan, but she couldn’t afford to do it yet, and the idea of spending another six months here did give her a little ugh feeling.