“So what do nice guys text?” he asked.
“They ask to sit by me at lunch,” Sierra said. “Or to ride our bikes up to the waterfall. That kind of stuff.”
“Sit by you at lunch.” He narrowed his eyes at her. “And who have you been sitting by?”
“Mikel,” she said with a smile. “And Dad, he’s nice too.”
Cal couldn’t respond, because Hailey came down the hall in her dress, and Sierra started shrieking. Amie made the two girls pose in front of the window so the natural light fell onto their faces. She told them how wonderful they were, and kept tucking stray strands of hair back where they belonged.
She said, “Now, listen, ladies. If any of these boys—”
“Mom,” Hailey said, darting a glance at Cal.
“Oh, I want to hear this,” he said. “Go on.”
“You’re fourteen years old,” Amie said. “Too young for sex. Don’t go off alone with your date. You may think he’s a nice guy, but he’s still a hormonal, fourteen-year-old boy.”
Cal was in awe of how Amie could lecture, and he wished he’d taken a video of her.
“Stay together,” she said. “Watch out for each other. You have a phone. Use it if you need to. We will come get you, no matter what, no matter where, no questions asked. Okay?” She looked at Hailey and then Sierra, who both nodded.
Amie looked at Cal. “Any last words? The boys will be here any second.”
“What she said,” Cal said, and Sierra giggled. “And I will be the bad guy,” he said. “If you don’t want to do something and don’t know how to say no, call or text me, and I’ll say no.”
“Oh, good one,” Amie said with a smile. “What’s our safe word tonight?”
The girls looked at each other, and Cal looked at Amy. “I just usually ask Sierra—is this something you want to do? And she can say yes or no.”
“That works,” Amie said as the doorbell rang. “Oh, they’re here. I get as many pictures as I want. No arguing.” She gathered both girls into a hug. “You’re going to have so much fun.”
Cal marveled at how easily Amie interacted with and seemed to relate to Sierra and Hailey. And he was totally stealing the idea of telling his daughter what he wanted and that she couldn’t argue.
“I get to answer the door,” he said, hurrying to step in front of Sierra. “And you can’t get mad at me for asking a couple of questions.”
“Dad,” she said, but she didn’t try to stop him. He walked over to the door and opened it to find two young men standing on his doorstep. A big SUV sat in his driveway, with a man behind the wheel and a woman in the passenger seat. The Palau’s. Cal raised his hand to wave to them, and then looked at the teenagers on his porch.
“Gentlemen,” he said. “What are your plans for tonight?”
“Uh, dinner,” Mikel said, his eyes wide and full of anxiety. “And then we’re going to the school.”
“What time will my daughter be home?” he asked.
“Midnight.”
“Your parents are driving the whole night?”
“Dad,” Sierra hissed behind him, and Mikel nodded.
“You don’t drink, do you?”
“Dad,” Sierra said louder now.
“No, sir,” Mikel said.
“What about you?” Cal looked at the other boy, whom he didn’t know.
“No, sir.”
“Our daughters will be safe with you?”
“Yes, sir,” they said together.
“All right.” He stepped back. “You better come in. Mrs. Fixdale wants a lot of pictures.” The two boys stepped past him and into his home, and Cal tried not to enjoy his fatherly role quite so much.
Amie did take a lot of pictures, and then they sent Hailey and Sierra out the door with their dates.
Cal leaned against the counter and sighed, and Amie collapsed into a chair at his kitchen table. “That was terrible,” he said.
“And it’s only the beginning,” Amie said.
They both started laughing, and she said, “I’ll send you some of these,” as she scrolled through her phone.
“That would be great,” he said. “Do you want some coffee?” He didn’t normally drink coffee in the evenings, and he was certainly already keyed up from the events that had just happened. But he knew his adrenaline would crash, and he had to stay up until midnight tonight to make sure everything with Sierra was okay.
“Yes, coffee would be lovely,” Amie said, smiling at him.
Cal turned to start making the brew when his doorbell rang again. He glanced at Amie, but of course, she didn’t know who it was. They moved toward the door together, and she said, “Watch, one of those boys is freaking out. I knew fourteen was too young for the prom.”
Cal chuckled and opened the door, expecting a lanky teenage boy.
He got Lisa. His gorgeous, blonde-haired goddess—Lisa.
Sucking in a breath, he tried to speak at the same time, and the result was a squeak.
“Hey,” she said, and then her eyes moved to Amie. “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know….” She tucked her hair behind her ear and looked back at Cal, clear accusations in her eyes. “Did I miss Sierra? I wanted to wish her luck tonight.”
“The girls just left,” Amie said. “Cal was just putting on coffee.”
“Oh, was he?” Lisa glared at him now. “That’s funny, because Cal doesn’t drink coffee in the evenings.” She folded her arms, obviously waiting for him to say something.
Problem was, he had no idea what to say.
Chapter Seventeen
Lisa could not believe the man in front of her. She had not pegged him for a cheater. At all. Of course, she also hadn’t expected his “slower” to mean “I’m going to completely disappear and only text you when you text me first.”
So she was learning all kinds of things about the man.
“I should go,” Amie said. “Call me if you hear anything from the girls.” She slipped out of the house and past Lisa as if Lisa were made of smoke.
“Who was that?” she asked as a car started up behind her.
“Amie,” he said. “Hailey’s mom.” He stepped back, fear still in his eyes. “Do you want coffee?”
“No,” she said, confusion starting to creep through her anger. “Are you seeing her?”
“Of course not. She’s married with three kids.”
“And that matters how?” Lisa asked. “People have affairs all the time.”
“Oh, wow,” Cal said, settling his weight on his back foot. “Do you really think I’d do that?”
“Did you really think I was fake when your daughter called me that?” Lisa hadn’t come here to fight with him. She’d come to give Sierra a big hug, and she’d been hoping she could crash with Cal on the couch for a few hours. Talk to him. Find out if ten days apart was slow enough. She’d pulled into his driveway dying to kiss him.
Now she just wanted to run away.
Cal shook his head, but Lisa didn’t know if it was in disbelief or if he was saying no. The anger deflated from her, physically making her shoulders slump.
“Look, I’m sorry,” she said. “That caught me off-guard.” She turned and took a few steps. “I just wanted to see Sierra.”
“Wait,” he said, but she’d already started down the steps. Her wedged shoes didn’t allow her to stop once she got going downhill, so she didn’t stop until she reached the sidewalk.
She turned back to him, but he said nothing. “I hope she has fun, Cal. Call me when you’re really ready to be dating again.” The words may have come out a little sharp, but she couldn’t really tell right now. She hurried to her car and got behind the wheel.
For some reason, being locked in the car offered some measure of safety, though she could still see Cal standing at the top of his porch through her window. She flipped the car in reverse and got out of his driveway. Down the road.
Relief spread through her, helping her muscles release. Her fingers still gripped the steering wheel too t
ightly, and she didn’t make the turn she needed to in order to get back to her house.
She drove around the island, unsure of her final destination, only that she didn’t want to go home alone.
She found herself at Riley’s house, though that wasn’t much better than her own place. But Cal won’t be able to show up, she thought, and she actually liked the layer of protection between her and him at Riley’s.
After flipping on all the lights in the house and making sure she was locked in and alone, Lisa did brew some coffee. Her thoughts rotated, never landing on any one thread.
When she finally got the courage to look at her phone, she’d missed a call from Cal and had five text messages from him as well.
I have never thought you were fake, he’d said.
I’ll tell Sierra you stopped by.
Amie and I have never seen each other. I would never participate in a relationship like that.
So you won’t answer your phone.
Did we just break up?
Lisa just stared at the words as the scent of coffee filled the house. Then she set the phone face-down on the counter and poured herself a cup, hoping Riley had left sugar in the house. She used to know where it was, and when she opened the cupboard next to the stove, she found the cute little bowl with plenty of sugar in it.
No cream, but at least Lisa didn’t have to drink her coffee black and bitter.
She didn’t want to break up with Cal, but she feared he wanted a much different relationship than she did. She’d be lying if she said she hadn’t been hoping to talk to him about that tonight too.
Her stomach growled, and Lisa knew drinking coffee while she was hungry would leave her with an unpleasant buzz. She picked up her phone again, ignoring the texts this time, and navigating to the food delivery app. Once she had some excellent Thai food on its way to Riley’s house, she finally took her first sip of coffee.
She sat on the back porch in the skirt she’d worn to work that day, and she watched the sun sink into the ocean. The minutes seemed to slip away as easily as breathing, and then drag.
Her food arrived, and she ate her way through noodles and chicken and soup before feeling like herself again.
Only then did she face her phone. Cal would be awake until Sierra came home from the prom, so she could call him. Tell him…what, exactly?
She dialed his number anyway, because she’d gone to his house to see him and talk. They could at least do one of those things.
“Lisa,” he said, panicked and relieved at the same time.
Lisa didn’t know what to say. The first thing that came to her mind also came out of her mouth. “Yes, I think we should break up.”
Silence met her ears, and she waited for Cal to say something.
“All right,” he said in that sexy voice of his.
“That’s it?” Sure, they’d only been dating for a few weeks, but she’d really liked him. And she’d thought he liked her. A hot knife sliced right down the middle of her body, separating her left half from her right. She took quick gulps of air, wondering how she’d gotten to this point again.
“I’m not a cheater.”
“I know that,” she said.
He sighed, a very audible form of his frustration. “But you did say something that I think is right.” He cleared his throat, and she imagined what his face would look like as anxious as he was. Adorable. Handsome. Vulnerable. All things Lisa loved in a man.
“I don’t think I’m quite ready to date again.”
Lisa started nodding, though she didn’t have anyone to see her. “Yeah, I figured when you said we needed to slow down after only three weeks of seeing each other a few times.”
Cal didn’t say anything, so she didn’t know what he was thinking or feeling. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I thought I was ready.”
“Like I said, call me when you are.” Lisa didn’t really hear what he said after that, and when he said, “Thanks, Lisa,” she pressed her eyes closed so she wouldn’t have tear tracks on her face.
The call ended, and Lisa wanted to throw her phone through the nearest window. Before she could, the device buzzed, and she couldn’t help looking down at it.
Clean up party, ten a.m. Charlotte had texted. Starting with brunch at my place. Bring your SOs.
Smiley faces and thumbs up emojis started flying in, and Lisa put her head in her hands and cried.
Brunch with her significant other. What would that be like?
She cried because she feared she’d never have a significant other that lasted more than a month or two. She cried because she’d go alone and pretend to be happy for everyone while she was dying a slow death inside. She cried because she missed Cal fiercely.
And she cried because now she had to start all over again. Twenty-six dates until she found someone who might be able to stand being with her for longer than a few weeks.
Lisa left her phone in her office, knowing full-well that she’d have a zillion messages by the time she got back to it. She didn’t care.
Brunch started at ten, and that meant everyone wouldn’t get to Your Tidal Forever until at least noon. Lisa walked in at nine-thirty, wearing the same clothes she’d been wearing to the wedding yesterday afternoon.
She changed into a pair of shorts and a T-shirt—emergency clothing she kept in her office—and got to work undressing the trellises, winding up the tealights, and putting everything in its correctly labeled box.
The work was easy and slow and methodical. Exactly what she needed for the morning after a break-up. She didn’t want to see anyone, as then they’d realize her puffy eyes meant she’d spent a long time crying last night.
And she was simply too old to cry over a relationship that had barely lasted a month.
She did miss Cal though, and he had been different than the other men she’d dated. She was just getting Sierra to open up to her, and regret lanced through her because she hadn’t been able to see the teen in her prom dress, all made up and ready for the dance.
At noon, Lisa collected her clothes and phone from her office and slipped outside. She made it out of the parking lot without seeing anyone from the company, and she drove through a burger joint so she’d have something to eat.
When she finally pulled into her own driveway, she was ready to be home.
Her afternoon in sweats, with a pint of ice cream and a chick flick, vanished before her eyes when she saw a figure rise from one of the chairs she kept on her front porch. A moment later, Sierra leaned over the railing.
Lisa’s pulse went from zero to sixty in less than a single breath. The teenager didn’t smile or seem all that thrilled to see Lisa, but she also wasn’t flying down the steps in a panic. Lisa got out of the car and called, “Hey. What are you doing here? How was the prom?”
That got Sierra to smile, and she ducked her head. So the prom had been great.
“It was fun,” Sierra said, the same type of answer Lisa used to give her mom when she didn’t want to expound on the details. “My dad said you came by and just missed me.”
“Yeah,” Lisa said, arriving on the porch too. “I tried to get away from the wedding as fast as I could. We were cleaning up this morning.” She gestured to the chairs, and they sat down. “You haven’t been here long, have you?”
“Only an hour or so.”
Lisa looked at Sierra, not wanting to beat around the bush with her. “An hour? What’s going on?”
“My dad is in a bad way,” she said.
“Excuse me?” Lisa asked. She smiled at Sierra. “I’m old. Translate for me.”
“He’s miserable,” she said, giggling. “Not that that’s funny.” She shook her head and sobered. “He was banging pans around this morning, and he burnt the coffee, and then he took the whole coffeemaker out to the trashcan and declared he was giving up the stuff.”
“But coffee in his love language,” Lisa said.
“Yeah, that’s how I knew something was wrong,” Sierra said. “And he is not nice when
he’s not caffeinated, let me tell you.”
Lisa managed a quick smile. “We broke up.”
“I heard.” Sierra tucked her hair behind her ear. “Why?”
Once again, Lisa wanted to be truthful with the girl. “Honestly?”
“Yeah, I don’t need things sugar-coated.”
“He’s not ready,” Lisa said. “He’ll always love your mother, I get that. But he is just not ready for another real, serious, loving relationship right now.” The words stung even as she said them, because they were true.
“He wants to be,” Sierra said.
“There’s a difference between wanting something and actually being able to do it,” Lisa said gently. She drew in a deep breath. “Now, do you have any pictures from last night? I want to see your hair and your makeup and the whole ensemble.”
Sierra just watched her for a minute, finally smiling.
“What?” Lisa asked.
“I think you actually do want to see the pictures.”
“Of course I do,” Lisa said, sitting back in her chair.
“I was wrong about you, Lisa,” Sierra said. “You aren’t fake, and you’re actually really nice.”
Every muscle tightened and then relaxed. “Thank you.”
“Maybe my dad wasn’t the only one not ready for him to move on,” Sierra said. “I’m sorry I wasn’t that nice to you.”
Affection for this young woman touched Lisa’s heart, and she reached over and gripped Sierra’s hand. “It’s okay. All is forgiven.”
Sierra gave another smile tinged with sadness and swiped on her phone. “Okay, so Hailey’s mom took these. I think we look pretty good.” She handed the phone to Lisa, who stared at the beauty in front of her.
“Oh, Sierra,” she sighed. “These are more than pretty good. You’re beautiful.” She cast a quick look at her. “I wish I had made it on time.”
“Next time,” Sierra said, and Lisa actually believed the teen wanted her to be involved next time she had a big dance to attend.
“Yeah,” Lisa said, knowing it would never happen. “Next time.”
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