Love on the Ledge Read Online Free Page A

walk.”
    Hayden taps his toolbelt. I forgot he’s working and didn’t just appear to brighten my day because I keep thinking about him.
    “I have the measurements, Dad.”
    “Then get to it. Stop bothering the young lady.”
    “He’s not bothering me,” I say.
    The old man furrows his brow and turns around as if I didn’t say anything. “Get back to work. You’ve got a lot of free labor to do.”
    Hayden follows after his dad, but not before he winks at me and digs the end of his pencil into his chest one more time.
    I roll my eyes and pretend he doesn’t make my insides flutter like petals in a sweet breeze. He doesn’t take his gaze off me as we walk parallel to each other across the lawn. So to hide from the blazing sun, the sear of his blue eyes, and the gossiping tongues of my family, I do the one thing I’ve wanted to do since I woke up—I dive headfirst into the pool, clothes and all.

Chapter 4
    I hold a white lily up to my mother’s nose. “I like this one.”
    “Too funeral,” my mom says, batting it away. We’re picking out flowers for the wedding, and my mom insisted on coming along.
    “Didn’t you hear?” I tell her. “That’s what my generation calls getting married. Sorry Pepe.”
    “You don’t have to tell me, nena .” He faux pushes me away. “I’m the last person I thought would ever get hitched.”
    “Because all your ex-boyfriends could populate Texas?”
    He sucks his teeth, and my mom doesn’t look amused.
    “Don’t encourage her,” my mom says.
    Pepe isn’t a typical uncle. Most of my uncles are middle-aged with mustaches and bellies that show how many beers they’ve had over the years. Pepe is fit from his days as a celebrity trainer. He’s middle-aged but doesn’t act like it. He’s more like a brother than anything else. Hence, I’m his maid of honor.
    “And don’t talk like that, Sky,” my mom says, followed by an exasperated sigh. “It’ll happen for you. I got married late—twenty-three.”
    It’s hard to think that at my age my mother already had a husband and a child on the way. That life is so far away from my plans, yet here it is being shoved in my face while I plan someone else’s happily-ever-after.
    Pepe’s hip starts to flash. His phone is programmed to do that when it rings, which is seizure-inducing. “It’s Paris,” he says excitedly, then puts his hand over the phone and adds, “The country .”
    He’s not usually so boastful, but the family deserves it after the way they treated him growing up.
    My mom shakes her head, and I can see her clutch her purse tightly, the way she does when she wants to make the sign of the cross over her body and say a prayer. But she doesn’t. Instead, she takes all of that pent-up family guilt and turns it over to me. I’m such a winner.
    “We’ve been trying to pick wedding flowers for hours. It’s not your wedding, and they both said they like the sunflowers,” I say.
    “Sunflowers don’t say wedding by the beach. It says wedding on a farm.”
    “Ma, no it doesn’t. And also, the ceremony is at their house, not on the beach. Just trust me, okay?”
    “Why are you in such a hurry?”
    I have a flashback of my mother standing in my way at the door to our old apartment, back when she had two jobs and always looked tired. Back before Pepe told her he’d take care of her the way she did for him when he was little. I’d be going to the library and she’d pitch a fit. River never had that issue. Then again, maybe if her parents had paid more attention, River wouldn’t have gotten into so much trouble over the years.
    My mom didn’t need to tell me to stay away from boys. I got that all on my own from watching the tears my mom shed every day over my father’s infidelities. Still, she didn’t let a day pass without insinuating that I was doing everything except studying. Back then, the worst thing that could have happened to me was getting pregnant. Why has that changed only ten years