Staying For Good (A Most Likely To Novel Book 2)

by Catherine Bybee

  She nodded. “How are things with you and Mylo?”

  “Working. He wasn’t ready to be a dad, but he’s trying.”

  “Does he watch Blaze when you work?” The question was leading, but it didn’t seem Zanya was going to offer the answers Zoe wanted without provocation.

  “Once in a while. His roommates complain.”

  Zoe cringed. “Then he should get his own place, don’t you think?”

  Zanya stared and said nothing for a good minute. “Let me guess, Mom complained about watching Blaze.”

  The last thing Zoe wanted was to cause strife between her sister and mother.

  “It can’t be easy on her, Zanya.”

  “It’s not easy on me either.”

  Not the point!

  Instead of saying what she was thinking, Zoe wrapped an arm around her sister. “I know it’s not. I just worry.”

  Zanya offered an insincere smile and captured a glass of sparkling wine as one of the servers walked by. Instead of taking one for herself, Zoe made a point of drinking sparkling water instead. Driving Miss Gina’s vintage van to drop off guests was looking like a high probability as the night wore on.

  The stress on Zoe’s face didn’t ease until after Zanya had excused herself when Blaze started to fuss.

  Luke was aware of nearly every move Zoe made throughout the night, from taking the keys away from Tim, to disappearing into the kitchen only to return with a parade of food behind her, to toasting the future bride and groom with only a sip of champagne. She wasn’t drinking, wasn’t eating a lot, and was playing hostess as if the inn belonged to her and everyone was her personal guest.

  He tried to offer his help but found her distracting smile and assurance that she had it all handled warding him off.

  Slowly the guests at the inn said their good nights and made their way upstairs, and the ones who lived in town found sober rides back home.

  Jo had taken a van full of guests home with a promise to return to retrieve her squad car.

  Miss Gina took one look at the remaining mess in the parlor and tossed both hands in the air. “Tomorrow is soon enough to clean up this mess,” she announced. “I’m going to bed.”

  “You’re a saint.” Zoe kissed Miss Gina’s cheek good night before she walked out the door.

  Mel filled a serving tray with empty glasses and headed toward the kitchen while Zoe followed behind with a tray full of dirty plates.

  Luke and Wyatt sat down in the empty room.

  “What a whirlwind.” Wyatt kicked his feet up on the coffee table and rested his head on the sofa.

  “I think it went well,” Luke said. “No family drama, no one puked on the carpet.”

  Wyatt laughed. “Your bar is really low, my friend.”

  “I have yet to attend a wedding without both.”

  “Apparently engagement parties don’t have the same effect on people.”

  Zoe and Mel walked in side by side.

  Wyatt scooted over on the sofa and patted the space beside him. “You heard Miss Gina . . . tomorrow is soon enough.”

  Mel didn’t argue and hit the couch with a heavy sigh.

  Zoe, however, continued to put glasses on a tray.

  “You’ve done enough, Zoe. Don’t make me feel guilty for sitting,” Mel said.

  “I’ll just put these in the dishwasher.”

  Luke lifted himself off his ass and walked behind Zoe. He took the empty glass in her hand away, set it down, and pulled her away from the mess.

  She started to protest and noticed everyone watching her.

  Much as Luke wanted to pull her into his lap, he directed her to a chair beside his and pushed her shoulders until she was sitting. “There, much better.”

  “The food was amazing,” Mel told Zoe.

  “It’s what I do best.”

  Luke could argue that, but didn’t. He watched Zoe tuck a finger into the back strap of her left shoe and kick it off. After the right one followed, she slowly rubbed her instep. Without a second thought, he reached down, encouraged her to lean back, and lifted her feet onto his lap.

  The woman had beautiful feet.

  The first press of his thumb against her instep had her moaning and closing her eyes. “You’re hired.”

  “We’re going to have to figure something else out other than you cooking for the wedding. I don’t want you working that hard on our day.”

  Zoe popped one eye open. “You want someone else to cook?”

  “I want you to enjoy the day. Besides, you’ll be wearing a bridesmaid’s dress, not an apron.”

  Luke found a tiny knot in the arch of her foot.

  Zoe nearly groaned. “I can bring in my team . . . oh, God do that again.”

  Luke did it again.

  “You have a team?” Wyatt asked.

  “I can round up the right people to prepare what you want. We’ll have to figure the menu out early enough so I can get the right people.” Zoe spoke with her eyes closed and her toes wiggling.

  Luke softened his touch and rubbed each toe before moving to her other foot.

  “Everyone was asking about a wedding date tonight.”

  “I’m leaving that up to you,” Wyatt told Mel.

  “Why me?”

  “Because every man in the room tonight told me to let you decide on date, time, place, flowers, food . . . everything. Saves arguing and aggravation.”

  “Don’t you want to plan it together?” Mel asked.

  Luke met Wyatt’s gaze.

  “I’ll plan the bachelor party,” Wyatt told her.

  Mel frowned.

  “That’s my job,” Luke chimed in.

  Wyatt pointed in his direction. “Right. Then I’ll just show up wearing the required attire, put a ring on your finger, and kiss you for the camera.”

  Mel wasn’t smiling.

  Even Zoe stopped moaning long enough to open her eyes and catch the tension.

  “What kind of flowers do you want?” Mel asked.

  “Anything but plastic.”

  “Wedding cake?”

  “Chocolate.”

  “Boring!” It was Zoe’s turn to add her opinion.

  “We can have more than one layer,” Mel said.

  “Or a groom’s cake,” Zoe added.

  “Should the invitations be modern or traditional?”

  “I don’t care.”

  Luke didn’t either.

  “What about a wedding date? Don’t you want to figure that out together?”

  Wyatt leaned over and kissed his future bride. “I don’t care. I want you to be happy . . . so if it takes you six months to plan the wedding, great. Three, even better. We’re in this together forever, so do what you have to do.”

  That had Mel smiling and leaning in for a kiss.

  Luke looked away and found Zoe watching them with a tiny smile.

  When they finished kissing, Mel said, “We should talk about budget.”

  Wyatt reached over to where his jacket lay over the back of the sofa and into the inside pocket. He removed a dozen envelopes and handed them to Mel.

  “What’s this?”

  “A little help from our friends.”

  “Seriously?” Mel ripped into the first envelope and pulled out several crisp hundred-dollar bills. “Who is this from?”

  “My parents, your dad . . . Great Aunt Minnie.”

  “I don’t have a Great Aunt Minnie.”

  Wyatt laughed. “Me either. Who cares? People wanna help. Let them.”

  Zoe lifted a hand in the air. “I agree with Wyatt on this one.”

  “Add this up and let’s figure out what else we need.”

  “The bachelor party is on me.” Luke made sure his donation was in advance and evident.

  “Bachelorette party is on me.” Zoe had leaned her head back again and was enjoying her foot massage.

  “Drinks at R&B’s is good enough,” Mel said.

  Zoe and Luke both laughed.

  She opened her eyes
, glanced at the happy couple, then looked at Luke. “I’m thinking Vegas.”

  “I like the way you think,” Luke told her.

  Chapter Nine

  Wyatt and Mel had retired to her room and Jo had dropped off Miss Gina’s van before leaving with her squad car and the promise to drop by the next day.

  Zoe refused to go to bed with dirty dishes in the sink or crumbs on tables that ants could find by morning.

  Luke was removing a few empties from the back patio and turning off the lights.

  “You don’t have to help.”

  “Just say thank you.”

  Zoe smiled. “Thank you.”

  He tugged a plastic bag out from under the kitchen sink and filled the can. “You really can’t leave it until the morning, can you?”

  With her hands full of soapy water, she said, “Call it a byproduct of growing up in Casa de Trailer.”

  It was her quirk that she didn’t expect anyone else to understand.

  Luke finished with the trash can and rolled up his sleeves.

  Instead of putting the clean dishes on a drying rack, she handed them to Luke. He dried them and searched the kitchen until he found the right places to put things.

  “I noticed your mom didn’t come.”

  “I noticed, too. Probably for the best.” The last thing she wanted was the stress of her mom acting put out. It was always something with her. Zoe wasn’t paying enough attention, someone looked at her sideways and whispered. Not to mention she’d always been jealous of Zoe and Miss Gina’s relationship. “Zanya tells me Zane’s been keeping a job, helping out.”

  “That’s what I hear. I hope it lasts.”

  “Me, too.” Her baby brother had had more run-ins with the law than Jo had before she decided to carry a badge.

  “What about your sister?”

  Zoe groaned. “I can’t place a finger on her. She seemed like she had it together before Blaze was born. Now . . . I’m not sure what she’s thinking.”

  “My guess is she’s just surviving.”

  “Crappy way to live.”

  “Life’s choices, babe. We’ve talked about this.”

  They had . . . since she was a teenager. If there was one thing Zoe had on her side, it was the ability to watch the people around her and decide which path not to take.

  “I can’t help but feel like I could be helping more.”

  It took a minute for Luke to respond. “And how would you help?”

  “Send more money . . . send Zanya back to school . . . I don’t know, help.” Zanya had skirted through high school and dropped out six months before graduation.

  “Has Zanya told you she wants to go back to school?”

  “No.”

  “So handing over what you work hard for would do what?” Luke asked.

  Zoe watched him put two glasses into a crate Miss Gina had ordered for the party. “Nothing but get her by.”

  “She has to want it.”

  From the first open conversation she’d had with Luke, he’d always told her the same thing. The people in her life, from her mother to her father to her siblings, everyone made their own choices. Even when life tossed you curveballs, you had the choice to push away from the base to hit the ball or let it fly by without trying.

  “Do you think Zane wants it? That he’s figuring out how to get out of that damn trailer?”

  Silence had Zoe glancing Luke’s way.

  He stood with his hand swiping a glass dry with a kitchen towel, his hair falling in his eyes, those same sharp eyes on her . . . “I think you were both raised in the same home, and he sees how life can be. You’ve shown both your siblings that, Zoe. It’s up to them to make life work out for the better.”

  “Maybe they don’t know how.”

  Luke stepped up beside her, turned off the running water, and took her hands in his. “I know you, Zoe. You’ve told them both you’re there if they need you, right?”

  She nodded.

  “You’ve told them you’d help out.”

  Her head bobbed again.

  “You’ve probably even given money without them putting out their hands.”

  “Every Christmas.”

  “It’s up to them, now. Their lives . . . the paths they need to follow in order to survive on their own.”

  Zoe lowered her head and closed her eyes. She saw her baby brother and sister the day their mom had come home from the courthouse after their father was sentenced. The fear in their eyes had matched the joy in Zoe’s. As much as they didn’t like getting hit, there was an uncertainty that came with the lack of beatings that only survivors living in an abusive situation understood.

  Zoe got it . . . but she never looked back. She’d vowed to help her mom out as much as she had to in order to keep them in their broken-down trailer.

  “You’re their sister, Zoe. Not their mom.”

  “I’ve always felt like I was both,” she whispered.

  Luke lifted one hand to her chin.

  When she opened her eyes, she found understanding and support.

  “I hate to see you hurting.”

  It did hurt, more than she cared to admit. “I wish it didn’t.”

  Luke stroked the side of her jaw with the pad of his thumb. “It hurts because you care. If you didn’t care, you wouldn’t be Zoe. Just don’t let it consume you.”

  “You’re right.”

  He winked and let a cocky smile crack his lips. “I’m always right.”

  “Humble . . .”

  “Bite your tongue.”

  She bit her lip instead. The touch of his hand on her jaw distracted her, his understanding made her want to fold into his arms and stay perfectly still for hours.

  “I should probably go,” he whispered.

  No! She scrambled to find the words to make him stay. “What if you don’t?”

  He stepped closer so the heat from his body radiated to hers. “Then I’m taking you to bed.”

  Yes! A much better idea.

  “And in the morning I’ll leave early enough to escape the questions until we’re ready to answer them.”

  Zoe wasn’t sure she knew the answers herself. “I’m leaving on Monday.”

  “I know.”

  “Do we act like nothing happened?” The thought cut through her.

  Luke’s finger traced her bottom lip, his eyes kept shifting from her eyes to his hand. “No. I’m going to call you, and you’re going to take my calls.”

  “I am?”

  “You are. Then we’ll see each other.”

  The image of her crashing into his arms in the rain like some black-and-white movie came from nowhere.

  “We’ll take it one day at a time.”

  He released her other hand and placed both on her face.

  “What if it doesn’t work, Luke?”

  He pressed his body against hers, the kitchen counter keeping her from moving away. “We’ll deal with that if it happens. Right now, I think we should try.”

  Zoe rested a hand on his hip, the other gripping the side of the counter. “We never had to try very hard.”

  “No.” He lowered his lips until she felt his breath mix with hers. “We didn’t.”

  His featherlight kiss reminded her of their very first. She’d been so scared, worried that Luke Miller might actually be playing her. How could someone so good-looking want anything to do with a girl from the wrong side of town? But he’d kissed her with such gentle lips, she was the one who pushed in for more. Like now, when he moved away with barely a taste and she reached for him.

  She felt him smile under her lips, and she nibbled until he gave her more.

  Her heart kicked in her chest, jolting every nerve ending awake. She felt his fingers push into her hair, tilting her head to take a long drink.

  Luke’s tongue danced alongside hers, the tune familiar but different. They’d both grown up, taken lessons from others in the decade they’d spent apart. This was somehow better. Maybe because they’d denied any d
esire for so long. Maybe because there was a risk in touching now that hadn’t been there when they were kids.

  As kids they didn’t think about tomorrow.

  They’d been careful, always. Condoms, birth control pills . . . Zoe never took chances. Her heart had taken time to become involved, probably because of her trust issues. She knew now, without any real thought, that her heart was at greater risk than when she was a teen.

  She pushed thoughts of broken hearts from her head and let herself feel.

  Luke was holding her, keeping her from melting into a pool of lava on the kitchen floor. Kissing him was a full body experience. His knee pressed between her legs, his hands stroked the length of her back only to rest in her hair to change the position of her lips.

  He was firm, everywhere. And larger than he was in his teenage years. His shoulders, which stretched against his shirt, were full in her hands.

  Luke pulled his lips from hers. “You feel amazing.”

  She nodded her agreement, couldn’t find the words needed.

  His lips found hers again until she forgot to breathe.

  “We should . . .” He pulled away. “Go upstairs . . .”

  Zoe smiled and allowed him to lead her out of the room.

  They took the back stairs to the second floor, and she rounded the hall to the third. Luke knew his way around the inn but didn’t know which room she was in, so she led the way.

  She thought of this as the blue room, even though the only blue in the room was the duvet cover on the bed. Much like all the rooms in the inn, this one had a spray of fresh flowers that adorned one of the side tables, fragrant sachets that scented the air with lavender, and a private bathroom so the only time the guest needed to leave the room was to eat. Most of all, it was away from the other guests, which Zoe liked when she was staying at Miss Gina’s.

  “Ah, the white room,” Luke said when they walked through the door.

  “It’s blue.”

  Luke closed the door behind him, turned on the light. “Everything in here is white.”

  Zoe pointed to the bed. “Blue.”

  Luke offered half a smile. “The tiny blue flowers on the bed make it the blue room?”

  “The soap in the bathroom is blue, too.”

  “You’re adorable.”

  Zoe did a full circle. “The candle is blue.”

  “It is . . . and a single blue candle in a white room makes the whole room blue.”