“It used to be mostly guys, right?” I asked.
“Well yeah. Until you got here, it was all guys. Nora stayed here for a while, but then she built her cabin and moved out because she got sick of all the guys.”
“How many of you were here?”
Grant lifted a hand, counting on his fingers. “Well, there was me, Gabriel, Elias, Tucker, and Diego, so there were five of us.”
“But there aren't five bedrooms,” I pointed out.
“Yeah. Tucker and Diego shared the biggest bedroom for a while.”
“Really?” Cat asked.
“Yeah, didn't you notice there used to be two twin beds? We turned it into a pool room when only three of us were left,” he explained.
Cat snickered. “Such a guy house. No wonder Nora wanted to move out.”
“It was totally a guy house,” Grant replied with a shrug.
“Let’s invite all the girls out soon,” I offered.
She squealed. “I'm in. I'll make appetizers.”
“Perfect,” I replied.
Grant grinned between us. “I guess that'll be one of my nights out then.”
“You're always out,” Cat said sharply.
“Why do you care?” he countered.
“I don't,” Cat retorted.
Cat tossed a throw pillow in his direction. They quieted and settled on a comedy show while I continued to tap away on my laptop, adjusting some things on the website I was working on for another business in downtown Diamond Creek. When I had decided to come up here on a whim, I'd honestly thought most of my business would be online clients from a distance. While that did keep me busy, I had lots of local business. People here definitely wanted to support local businesses, and I benefited from that.
Hours later, I was alone in the living room. Grant and Cat had gone to bed. I tended to be a night owl. I also had a tendency to be an early riser. In short, I didn't sleep well. I had been fighting off a sense of restlessness all day. It had been an innocent enough conversation earlier, but Daphne and Cammi had gotten under my skin with their heartwarming teasing about falling in love. I didn’t want to care. I also didn’t want to be crushing on Grant because that was freaking annoying. With a sigh, I tapped the save button and powered down my laptop before closing it.
I stood to walk into the kitchen to get something. Abruptly, my breath became short, and my heartbeat felt funny. It felt as if the beats were out of order and skipping between too fast and too slow. Moments later, I was gasping for air and found myself on the floor beside the couch. I didn’t have a clear idea of how I ended up there.
“Harley?” Grant's voice reached me from the base of the stairs.
I looked over, my thoughts were muddled and fuzzy. “Yeah?”
He crossed the room swiftly in long strides, kneeling beside me. “What the hell happened? You fell.”
I didn’t normally sit down in the middle of the floor like this, but I wanted to argue the point. The next thing I knew, he was checking my pulse, and I was trying not to get pissed off.
“I feel fine,” I insisted.
“Did you faint? Have you eaten today? Your pulse feels okay.”
“It's fine. I'm fine.” I was sort of lying because internally, I was freaking right the hell out.
“I think we should get you up on the couch for a few minutes.”
“Oh my God. You do not need to monitor me,” I said.
Grant didn’t care how I felt. “Deal with it.”