by Lisa Plumley
“You?” Carol looked baffled. “But you couldn’t have known—”
“Yes, I could have. I’m the only one who could have known.” Natasha shook her head. “Don’t you see? I know Damon better than anyone. I should have realized from the start what he was up to. I should have kept myself from falling for it!”
I should have kept myself from falling for him.
“You couldn’t have,” Carol insisted, coming forward again with a consoling look. “You’re being too hard on yourself.”
“And you’re being a pod person. Look at you!” Natasha cast a chary glance at Carol’s outstretched arms. She stepped back. “Are you threatening to hug me again? Have you been possessed?”
“You are always too hard on yourself!” her former mother-in-law said. “When you and Paul broke up, all those years ago—”
“No. Please don’t bring Pacey into this.”
Carol looked confused. Too late, Natasha realized that she’d adopted Damon’s habit of referring to her ex-husband as Pacey—probably because he seemed less and less relevant to her life as time went on. Paradoxically, it occurred to her, Damon had begun calling her ex Paul at some point—maybe because, once they’d gotten together, Damon hadn’t needed to distance himself from her (supposedly intact) marriage anymore.
“I mean,” she said more clearly, “please don’t bring Paul into this. He doesn’t have anything to do with me and Damon.”
“Actually, he has everything to do with you and Damon,” Carol countered. “I was there, remember? I was there when your marriage broke up. I saw how my son reacted. I saw how you reacted, too. Or more accurately, how you didn’t react.”
Determined to do exactly the same thing right now, Natasha crossed her arms. “I should get going. Traffic is—”
“Going to have to wait awhile,” Carol interrupted. “Because I just realized it’s about time I called your attention to a few things—like the fact that Damon Torrance had more to do with your marriage falling apart than you think.”
“My marriage fell apart because your son cheated on me in his artist’s studio with his ‘muse’ of the moment,” Natasha reminded her, “who turned out to be a far better fit for him, by the way, than I ever was. And now I really have to leave.”
Natasha turned. But Carol grabbed her shoulder, stopping her. This time, she wasn’t doling out hugs, either. Uh-oh.
“Just tell me,” Carol urged softly. “Was there anything going on between you and Damon then? When you first started working together? There were all those late nights. All those ‘brainstorming’ weekends. All that out-of-town travel—”
“No!” Aghast, Natasha stared at her. “We were launching Torrance Chocolates’ boutiques and cafés all over the country. The expansion was difficult. Damon worked himself to the bone. I did, too.”
Carol gave her a sharp-eyed look. “And you never once gave in to the temptation to turn that work into something more?”
Natasha couldn’t believe Carol was seriously asking her this.
“I was married! For at least part of the time, Damon was married, too. Remember?” At the mostly forgotten memory of Giada Bandini, Natasha frowned. “Damon and I never crossed that line.” She gave a rueful laugh. “For all I know, Damon never wanted to cross that line. Not with me. Not then, at least.”
“Right. Okay. I guess you knew that. And Damon knew that.” Carol shook her head. “But did Paul know that? Did he?”
“If he didn’t, he should have asked. He should have talked to me. I was right here.” Instantly irate, Natasha frowned. “And if you’re trying to blame me for my marriage ending—”
“I’m not trying to blame anyone,” Carol said. “I’m simply telling you what I know is true: All that time, Paul thought you and Damon were having a fling. He was convinced of it. He told me so. He thought he’d already lost you. All he could see was that you were part of a world he never could belong in, and—”
“I was doing it for him. For us!” Natasha cried. “I was doing it so he could create. Both of us couldn’t be feckless artists. It wouldn’t have been practical.”
“—and that you were slipping away from him. So yes,” Carol admitted, “Paul strayed. When he did, you reacted in exactly this way. You ignored the heartbreak and got back to work.”
“Well, I couldn’t exactly crumple,” Natasha protested in her own defense, unsure what Carol was getting at. She didn’t like thinking about those gray days when her marriage had broken up. She’d put them behind her already. She’d locked the door and thrown away the key. “I had to take care of Milo.”
“It went beyond taking care of Milo,” Carol insisted. “It went beyond just trying to cope! You had other options. You could have gotten counseling. You could have talked to Paul. You could have given it another try instead of instantly giving up.”
Natasha goggled at her. “I thought you wanted me to be with Damon. Now you’re suggesting I should have stuck with Pacey?”
“No, with Paul.” Again, there was that befuddled look. In a milder tone, Carol added, “What I’m suggesting is that maybe you should react differently this time. Last time, you put it all behind you immediately and pretended everything was okay. But it wasn’t okay then, and it can’t be okay now.” Her former mother-in-law shook her head. “I saw you and Damon together. I saw the way he looked at you—the way you looked at him! Losing that has got to be a tremendous blow for you both. You were—”
“We weren’t enough,” Natasha interrupted with painful finality. “If I’m ever going to get the kind of job that will let me get past that, I really have to leave now.”
Then, before Carol could stop her or hug her or otherwise cause her to lose her composure again, Natasha grabbed her car keys and headed away.
To her surprise, she made it all the way to her car, got herself strapped into her seat belt, and put both hands on the wheel at ten o’clock and two o’clock … and then she crumpled.
Then she gave in to all the heartache and loss she’d been feeling since last night. Then she considered what Carol had said … and wondered if some of it was true. And then, before Natasha could get too bogged down in pointless if onlys and meaningless what ifs, she turned the ignition key and got on with her life.
There was simply no way she could do anything else.
Not now, not later … and, knowing her luck, probably not ever.
Chapter 25
Five days later
Torrance Chocolates headquarters
La Jolla, California
In retrospect, the thing that struck Damon the most was that all he’d needed to get started was a teensy nudge from someone who believed in him. All he’d needed to start working on his prototype allergen-free candy bars were a few simple words.
You must have some ideas tucked up in that famous brain of yours, Sloane had told him after their night-together-that-wasn’t. Then, to put the icing on the cake … It’ll happen.
Damon hoped it would happen. With every passing day, he was becoming more and more hopeful that he’d succeed this time.
Because, ironically, what Damon couldn’t do for himself, a near stranger had done for him. Sloane had gotten him started, with no untoward pressure and no unmet expectations looming over him. Now, days after he’d first set foot in the previously unexplored and terrifyingly intimidating territory of the Torrance Chocolates development lab, Damon had yet another array of samples for his panel of volunteer taste testers to try.
“All right,” Damon told them as he set down a tray filled with bite-size mockups, each carefully portioned in a fluted paper cup and numbered according to its designated batch, “you all know what to do by now. I don’t want any sugarcoating. I want honest opinions. If the sample you try is bad, tell me. If it needs more of something or less of something, tell me.” He paused, then delivered the panel—composed of longtime Torrance Chocolates employees and one rogue UPS delivery person—a smile. “Of course, if it’s fantastic, I want you to tell me that,
too.”
One of the assembly line packagers raised her hand. “Are all of these allergen-free samples? Because I’m new to this, and I heard that’s what you’re testing.” She made a repulsed face. “I’m so not down with gluten-free this and sugar-free that and stuff made with weird chemicals. I like normal food. I’m only here because I forgot to pack a lunch, and I’m starving.”
The assembled group tittered. Damon nodded.
“I like normal food, too. That’s exactly what this is,” he told her. “Some of these samples are allergen-free chocolates. Others aren’t. It’s a blind taste test. It’s important to me that this new candy-bar line stacks up against anything else out there. There’s no point creating something new if it can’t compete and doesn’t enhance the existing product lineup.”
“I think I got one of the allergen-free samples.” Another tester, from the HR department, peered dubiously at the sample she’d chosen from the tray. “Can I have another one instead?”
“No. Just go ahead with the one you have, please.”
The woman sighed. She took a hesitant, mouse-size nibble.
Damon watched patiently. He shouldn’t have felt defeated by the panel members’ obvious—and enduring—skepticism, but he did.
This was only the latest of several tests he’d conducted over the past few days. Even though Damon kept hoping and expecting it might be different, it never was. Everyone greeted his painstakingly developed new product samples with wary uncertainty. Everyone expected the chocolates to taste …
“Medicinal,” the UPS employee chimed in. He frowned as he chewed his chocolate. “Mine tastes medicinal. Ugh.”
There was a general murmuring of agreement while everyone else bit and chewed and sniffed and frowned. Even the simple one hundred percent dark chocolate bar wasn’t receiving high scores, Damon noticed. Oddly enough, his most difficult challenge—a bar filled with nondairy, coconut milk-based caramel and egg white-free nougat, studded with crispy, chocolate-enrobed, gluten-free French feuilletine and covered in semisweet chocolate—appeared to be leading the pack. Its scores trended even higher than the leading commercial chocolates he’d employed as a baseline.
Frowning, Damon watched as the testers poured themselves palate-cleansing glasses of water from the table’s pitchers. Still chattering about the drawbacks of their samples—or bragging that they’d luckily gotten “regular” chocolates—they wiped their chocolaty fingers and filled in their scorecards.
Why am I even doing this? Damon wondered. He’d gotten by just fine all these years without trying to create something in the chocolate lab. This was his father’s territory. Jimmy made concocting delicious new truffles and interesting new chocolate drinks seem like child’s play. In fact, when he’d been a child, Damon remembered in that moment, he had played in the lab.
He’d enjoyed it, too. He’d forgotten that. But now …
You’re no good at sticking by yourself when the going gets tough, Damon suddenly remembered Natasha telling him on that fateful night when she’d left him at the party. I won’t stand by and let you hide away from the life you’re meant to live.
Unfortunately, just then, the life he was meant to live seemed to include lots of negative feedback and disappointing results. At the thought of them, Damon just wanted to quit.
But the memory of Natasha’s final words to him simply wouldn’t let him. He had to keep going. Because maybe things hadn’t worked out with Natasha … but the way Damon figured it, he still had some unfinished business to take care of at the Jennings household. He still had to create a scrumptious, allergen-free candy bar for Milo. He still had to win. For Milo.
With the memory of that Dr. Seuss-loving, piggyback-riding, video-game-playing munchkin in the forefront of his mind, Damon rallied.
He surveyed the grimacing, extra-critical test panel members, then put his palms together in a determined gesture.
“Thanks for your feedback, everyone. It’ll be very useful when I get back to tempering the next batch.” As the testers scraped back their chairs and prepared to leave, Damon glanced at the clock. “I’ll have more samples ready by the close of business today. Everyone who wants to be part of the next phase of Torrance Chocolates, meet me back here at five o’ clock.”
Pointedly, no one looked at him. But one of the marketing interns stopped by on her way out. She touched Damon’s arm.
“It’s admirable of you to try this, boss,” she said. “But it’s been … well, I’ve lost track of how many batches we’ve tested by now. You might just have to admit it: Maybe you’re just a successful, rich, incredibly handsome networking genius who isn’t very good at the creative side of things. We all have our niches to fill. Maybe yours isn’t going to be filled here.”
Her glance took in the chocolate lab, then centered on the testing table at the midpoint of it. On it were the samples tray—now holding only a few tipped-over, forlorn-looking empty paper cups—and the pile of negative handwritten ratings sheets.
“Face it,” the intern said. “You’re working really hard for not much return. You should probably just call it a day.”
Near the Pacific Ocean
San Diego, California
It wasn’t easy chasing a toddler who was determined to give the seagulls a run for their money, Natasha learned as she dropped the plastic shovel she’d been using to build a sandcastle with Manny and took off after little Isobel instead.
Those pudgy wee legs could really move. Determinedly, Natasha raced after the giggling little girl, joined her in a delighted game of Let’s Wave at the Seagulls, then picked her up and carried her back to their picnic blanket and sun umbrella.
“Whew! And I thought keeping track of one child was hard!” Natasha told Amy as she plopped on to the blanket beside her pregnant friend. Together, they watched Manny and Isobel return to patting the damp beach sand into a lumpy fortress. Mostly, their creation involved piles of sand and a gigantic moat, which Manny gleefully filled by plunging a bucket into the surf. “How in the world are you going to manage with three children, all under the age of five?”
“Oh, I’ll get by okay,” Amy assured her, shielding her eyes from the sun as she studied her children. “It’s not just me, all by myself, you know. It’s Jason, too. He’ll be there.”
“Well, you can’t count on him,” Natasha countered automatically. “I mean, he might be working late or auditing someone or fighting crime or improving his golf game or—” She floundered, running out of options. “Or, um, he could be—”
“Running off with his secret mistress? Launching a scheme to take over the world?” Laughing, Amy shook her head. “They’re all equally ridiculous, and no, he won’t. Jason is a keeper. I keep telling you, not all men are like Paul.” Amy looked away. Casually, she said, “For instance, Damon isn’t like Paul. He’s—”
“He’s not on the menu of subjects to talk about, remember? Besides,” Natasha pointed out justifiably, “Damon hasn’t always been your favorite person in the world.”
“I know.” Amy sighed. She looked back at Natasha. “But you can’t just pretend nothing ever happened between you two!”
“Sure, I can.” Natasha struck a goofy, ultra-aloof pose. “See? I’m doing it right now.”
“Very funny. My point is, now that the initial shock has worn off, maybe you two can talk reasonably. It can’t hurt.”
“That’s what you think. It can still hurt. Believe me, I know.” Every day it hurt, and it didn’t look as if things would improve anytime soon. Every time Natasha picked up a book to read to Milo, every time she walked the familiar path to Milo’s school, every time she looked at a tail-wagging Finn or walked in her front door … Damon was there. Except he wasn’t. In his place was a big, empty hole, and Natasha had no way to fill it again. “Anyway,” she said, “I’m too busy to talk to Damon. This is the first break I’ve had from interviewing all week.”
“And you’re spending it with us.” Happily, Amy smiled at her. She cradled he
r expanding belly, absentmindedly stroking it. “How’s the job hunting going, anyway? Made any decisions?”
Natasha shook her head. “It’s been weird, actually. All the job offers I’ve had are terrific. They really are. They’re all lucrative and plenty tempting. But none of them would give me the same autonomy and freedom I had as Damon’s assistant.”
“Really? But I thought the demands of working at Torrance Chocolates were what kept you from doing your artwork?”
“Yeah. I thought so, too. But now it looks as though that situation would be even worse elsewhere.” Contemplatively, Natasha watched the waves breaking on the beach. She swept her hair from her face, shivering at the sea breeze. “I’m starting to think maybe it wasn’t my job at all. Maybe it was me.”
“Well, you could always pursue artwork full-time,” Amy ventured, pulling Isobel closer to spray her little arms and legs with a fresh dose of sunscreen. She kissed her head, then set her free and started in on Manny. “You gave up art so quickly after you met Paul. You never really had a chance.”
“I know. The thing is … maybe it’s never been what I really wanted to do. Maybe Paul was just my excuse for quitting.” Natasha hugged her legs to her chest, then rested her chin on her knees. “It was a big relief to switch majors and ditch the weekly critiques I used to get from my fine arts professors.”
“Hmmm. Better for the ego that way, that’s for sure.”
“Exactly!” Natasha laughed. “No fear of failure. If you don’t try, you can’t lose.” Which sounded a lot like Damon, it occurred to her. Except he’d tried too hard in Las Vegas.
With Damon, everything tended to be all or nothing.
“So what do you want to do now? Keep job hunting?”
“Maybe.” Natasha shrugged. “I might have to. With my luck, all those companies I’ve met with will withdraw their offers.”
“Right. You’re so unlucky that all the companies that have been pursuing you for weeks now will give up on you just when you decide to say yes.” Amy’s caring, unexpectedly exasperated gaze met hers. “I really wish you wouldn’t do that.”