To Say I Love You Read Online Free PDF

lock up before we went up to bed. While Will took a shower, I unpacked his few things and added his dirty clothes to my laundry pile, then set the fans on to cool the room down.
    When he emerged from the bathroom, a towel riding low on his hips and his skin still softly steaming, I had to swallow hard. As we’d both gotten older, he’d broadened out some, and I had known for a while I probably had an unhealthy infatuation with his back and shoulders. There were still droplets of water clinging to the dark hairs on his chest, and the whole picture made the breath catch in my throat.
    “What?” he said, rubbing his hair dry with another, smaller towel.
    “Nothing.” I turned away, feeling my face heat from being caught.
    When we finally crawled into bed together, I rolled onto my side and let him press close behind me. Will skimmed a hand from my ribs down to my knee, then back up, coming to rest on my stomach. I leaned back into him, feeling the reassuring bulk of his chest against my back, smiling to myself when he rested his lips on my neck.
    I knew we needed to be together, alone together, and this was all I was likely to get for a while longer. Knowing things were changing, though, was enough to keep me going. Having him with me was enough. For now.

Chapter 4

     
    T HE NEXT day, Will and I took my dad to see the new house and get his opinion on fixing it up. Out of everyone I knew, I wanted his ideas first.
    “Oh. This is the old Miller place,” he said as Will pulled to a stop in front of the yellow house. “You went to school with one of those kids, Jess.”
    “Really? Who?”
    “I don’t remember the names. There were three or four of them. Redheaded kids, all of them.”
    I shrugged.
    “They moved out of town, oh, about ten years ago now. This place went up for sale and it’s changed hands a few times now. It’ll take some work, but there’s no reason why we can’t make it nice. Especially if you’re willing to put the work in, Jesse.”
    “Yessir,” I said.
    Since Will was starting his new location-independent job with a three-day stint at the Atlanta office, meeting all his new colleagues and learning his way around the building, my dad and I had a chance to get a head start on the house. It sucked that Will had only got back on the weekend and was going away again for a few days, and it would keep sucking until we got settled into something more regular.
    Still, we decided on our priorities, and the first day was spent mostly ripping out old carpets and stripping wallpaper from the walls. Needless to say, the AC was cranked up fairly early in the day.
    My dad seemed to be happier while ordering me about, and I bitched and moaned appropriately as we hauled stuff out of the house and into the back of his pickup, ready to go to the dump. The floors under the carpets weren’t in a great condition, and I was worried about having to replace floorboards.
    “There’s nothing rotting there,” Dad said as we surveyed the living space at the beginning of day two. “It’s just not looking great. You wanna put carpet down again?”
    “No. Wooden floors, I think.”
    “That’ll cost you more.”
    “I know,” I said, bracing my hands on my hips as we looked around. The room seemed bigger already, what with the crappy furniture, nasty wallpaper, and bad carpet all gone. I wanted wood floors and light-colored walls.
    “You sure you can afford all this? I can help y’all out if you need it, Jess. You just gotta say.”
    I didn’t talk money with my dad that often. He knew we were doing okay, since he asked a couple of times a year. It wasn’t something we needed to talk about. I knew he helped Jennifer with her school fees, so he wanted us to know he could do the same for Will and me.
    “We’re good, Dad. Thanks.”
    “All right. I know you’re not working at the moment….”
    I smiled. “I promise. We’ve got some savings, and Will just got a promotion at work.”
    “Really?”
    “Yeah.