“Listen, I really don’t have time to talk about this,” Clayton huffed out. “So what if Livia is the person I was waiting on?” Why did he just admit that?
Caleb nodded his head as he put another fry in his mouth and gave his brother a half grin.
“I swear if I get one slick word from you about Livia or about women in general, I’ll take the other half of that burger and smash it in your face.”
Caleb’s smile went wider. “As if you’d really do that right here in Doreen’s and ruin your perfect reputation. No way, for a do-gooder like you.”
Clayton could feel the steam rising in his body, and he was sure he was about to start sweating through his T-shirt. He took a couple of final, determined bites of his burger and then downed his full glass of water. “Doesn’t matter anyway. So what if she didn’t join me for lunch? I was only trying to be nice to her with an invitation. You know, make her feel welcome back in town once again.”
Caleb laughed full out, then took a long swig of his milkshake before speaking again. “Yeah, I bet you want to make her feel welcome, all right. You want to make her feel welcome from her head right down to her pretty little toes.”
Clayton felt his fists clench into tight balls. “I’m warning you. You’re taking this way too far.”
“Then stop making it so darned easy,” Caleb said. “It’s just too much fun pushing your buttons. I mean, you’ve got them all out and exposed like flashing Whac-A-Moles. Cut me a break, I’m enjoying seeing you show some emotion for a change. It’s better than watching bad reality TV. I should go over there and give Olivia a right proper thank you. Maybe offer her a round of drinks at the bar on me tonight for her and her sister.”
“Don’t you dare. The last thing I want is Livia tangling with the likes of you.”
Caleb put on a face as if he was somehow put out. “Why? Are you afraid if she hangs out with me she may learn some secrets about the real you?”
Clayton felt his brows pull tight. “You talk like I have secrets.”
Caleb let out a slow breath and shook his head. “If you don’t think you have any secrets, then I suspect they are buried deeper than I thought. Maybe it’s best she didn’t join you for lunch. I don’t think you’re ready to handle Miss Gale just yet.”
“What are you talking about? Maybe you’ve been up in the mountains way too long. And I don’t have any secrets I’m keeping from Livia or myself. I was meeting her to just be nice. Nothing deeper than that. The past is the past and what’s done is done.”
Caleb shrugged and his voice lowered as his expression grew more serious. “The past may be the past, but what was done didn’t have to be. Like I said, it’s nice to see you getting all riled up like this; it’s been way too long. And it’s good to see a little spark in your eyes again. I only see it now when you smile at Hope or talk about her. I know I’ve never seen any joy or passion when you talk about Celeste.”
Clayton frowned deeper. “Man, I don’t know what you are talking about. None of this has anything to do with Livia.”
“Doesn’t it? And that’s why you keep calling her by the name only you called her back then.”
Clayton was taken aback. He shook his head. “Nah, man. That’s just old habit. I wanted to meet with her, sure. To talk to her maybe about some things that have happened in the past, maybe to make amends, I don’t know. But any sort of feelings I may have, um, had, that thing is long gone and long in the past. I’m sure any feelings she may have had for me are long over too. She’s made that perfectly clear. Besides, she’s here only for a short while and I’m a father, single father of a daughter who needs me to focus on her and my responsibilities to her.”
“You may be single, but you are not dead. And you’re single for a reason,” Caleb said.
“Yeah, I’m single because I couldn’t figure out away to make it work with my ex. And she decided I wasn’t worth the work anymore.”
Caleb shook his head. “Listen, you did everything too fast, too young and too impulsively. And believe me”—he looked down at his prosthetic hand and back up at Clayton—“we’ve both made those kinds of mistakes. I would do anything in my power to change my part in my own and in your impulsive decisions.”
“Don’t think like that,” Clayton protested. “You lost a limb out there. It was me who made the decision to enlist after you had your accident.”
“But I should have stopped you. I should have found my voice and spoken up.”
Clayton didn’t think he could hear this, and he didn’t want his brother putting any more on himself. “You couldn’t have stopped me back then, even if you’d tried.” He let out a sigh. “I know it was reckless, and maybe a part of me was running from—” He thought for a moment, and the image of a sweet, young Livia came to his mind. She was looking at him as if he had the power to give her the world, and all he felt in that moment was powerless. He looked at his brother again. “—Everything. It was reckless getting drunk and hooking up with Celeste and then marrying her. But none of that is on you. You left enough out on the battlefield, you can’t be responsible for me and my stupidity too.”
Caleb nodded. “I get that. Well, at least part of me does. The rest of it I’ll have to work out on my therapist’s couch later. But you have to figure out a way to move on too. You were young, impulsive, and so was your ex. But neither of you are young and impulsive now. Now she’s older and selfish. And you’re older and being a martyr, and neither of you are doing your daughter any good. Now is the time for you to heal yourself and find some happiness.”
“Fine, I hear you, but I still don’t get what this has to do with Livia.”
Caleb shook his head. He took another swig of his shake before looking back at Clayton. “Don’t you? You know as well as I that nothing happens without a reason. She may be here just for a short while, but don’t let whatever short moments they are go to waste without you bringing some sort of peace and closure to the left-open relationship that started all those years ago. Besides, maybe Celeste walked out of your life because you were kind of a jerk and a little bit of a stick-in-the-mud and most likely a pain.”
“Thanks,” Clayton said. “You’re doing my ego tons of good.”
“Or maybe,” Caleb continued, “she walked out of your life because she knew that if she stayed, she’d only be a placeholder for a woman who you’ve been telling yourself you were not in love with for the past twelve years.”
Clayton could do nothing more than look at his brother in stunned silence. What had brought this man off the mountain in the warm light of a late afternoon to come down here and ruin his lunch like this?
Clayton looked down as his cell went off with an alert for a 911. Part of him was suddenly grateful for the reprieve. That was until he answered and found out that once again he was headed to a fire call at Goode ’N Sweet.
Chapter 14
Clayton took one look at Olivia Gale in the arms of Braxton Lewis and declared that indeed this was an emergency. Though not the type he was expecting.
Sure, his heart was racing a bit when he saw that the 911 he’d gotten was for yet another incident at Goode ’N Sweet, but when he’d made it to the back of the shop where all the action was and saw Lewis with his arms around Olivia, his Livia, all thoughts of any fire danger went right out of his head. There had better be a professional purpose or the younger man was going to pay. The guy had one arm around Liv’s shoulder and the other one closely grasped about her waist while Livia was leaning back and looking up at him with a slightly stunned, or maybe it was admiring, expression—crud, he didn’t know—while silky smooth Braxton Lewis was looking down on her with too cool a grin.
“You mind letting her go and focusing on the situation at hand?” The words came out of Clayton’s mouth before he could stop them, and worse, they came out way more clipped then they should have.
Clayton watched as both Livia and Lewis swiveled their heads his way, and their expressions went from confused to clearly something
else. Livia’s slipped into annoyance, and Lewis’s, well, his was something that Clayton hoped wouldn’t be a problem later on. It was a combination of both amusement and embarrassment. No matter, Clayton’s words clearly worked, because Lewis carefully removed his hand from around Livia’s waist, though he didn’t remove his other arm from around her shoulder as he looked down at her and asked, “Are you sure you’re all right? I wouldn’t want you putting any undue pressure on that ankle until it gets checked out.”
It was Clayton’s turn to look confused. Wait, was she hurt? Had he gone and read the situation wrong? See, this was why he kept himself free of any entanglements, not that Livia was an entanglement. She was far from one, but this was why he kept himself nonat-tached, in his mind and his heart. It was better to stay focused on business, his family, and his daughter. That way he didn’t go around making dumb assumptions like the one he’d just made.
Clayton took a step forward, still peeved over his emotion-fueled misstep, and he hated to admit it, a part of him was pissed that Livia had needed help and he wasn’t the first on the scene there to give it to her. Instead he was stuck over at Doreen’s having a nonsensical conversation with Caleb. He paused as the irrationality of his thinking hit him and shame crept up his neck in the form of unwelcome heat. He needed to deflect. Clayton quickly scanned the situation and was relieved when he didn’t see evidence of a serious fire. No flames, no dark smoke. But there was still the smell of smoke in the air and light-colored remnants indicating that a fire had been recently put out in the Dumpster.
“Are you hurt? What happened here?” Clayton asked.
Livia gave a slight push away and out of Lewis’s hold, and Clayton was embarrassed over how much he appreciated seeing her move out of the other man’s embrace. She looked at him. “I’m fine, though just as klutzy as normal, it would seem. I took a bit of a stumble over one of the parking stalls when I rushed back in after noticing we had a fire in the Dumpster.”
Clayton glanced back over at the Dumpster again. Yes, it was contained, but he got an uneasy feeling in his stomach. So, two fires now at Goode ’N Sweet? This was getting weird. There hadn’t been any incidents at the bakery for all his life, so why two so close together? He knew this needed further investigation. But he stared closely at Livia. “Are you really okay? Lewis here is right. If you tripped, you really should get checked out just to make sure that you don’t have a sprain or anything worse. You came down here to help out your aunt. You wouldn’t want to end up being the patient, now, would you?” He looked at Lewis. “Please take her to Avery for a once-over.”
Livia sighed. “That really is not necessary.” She glanced over toward the bakeshop’s back door opening, where her sister, aunt, and their cousin Brent were milling about. Clayton frowned. He guessed Brent must have been in the area and heard the ruckus. He looked around. There were more than enough people from local businesses looking on. That’s how it was around here. Not much happened, so when there was any sort of action, everyone came out.
As per her usual, Miss Joyce was looking annoyed at the intrusion on her day, while Brent looked as if he were trying to reason with her and not getting too far. Meanwhile he caught the fact that Livia’s sister’s attention seemed torn between her aunt and a few of the rookie firefighters huddled on the far side of the lot with a couple of Sugar Lake officers who had rode by to see what the excitement was all about.
“I really need to just get back to work and get my aunt calmed down. She’s not happy about this at all. And it looks like I need to save Brent. He can be a bit much at times.”
That brought Clayton’s antennas up. “Is he being a bother? Can I help?”
Livia shook her head. “No, he’s fine. He was in town on business and noticed the commotion so stopped in to check on us. I’m sure it’s fine. He’s harmless.”
Clayton gave the scene another glance before turning back to Livia. “What happened?”
She shrugged. “Drea threw out the trash about an hour ago, and then just a little while ago we started to smell smoke. Of course, the first thing we thought was that the ovens were going faulty again, but no, everything was fine. Thank goodness I thought to go and look outside.” She let out a sigh and brushed back some wayward curls that had fallen into her face. For a brief second Clayton’s breath caught over how beautiful she looked doing that small gesture, her eyes fluttering and her lips puffing out in frustration. Focus, man, you’re supposed to be working here.
“And tell me what happened when you came out. Did you see anyone else out here?” he asked, trying to get himself back on track and back to work.
She gave him a frown. “No. There was nobody here. Why would there be? When I came out I was shocked though to see the beginnings of a fire inside the Dumpster. My heart nearly stopped dead cold. I don’t know what could have caused the fire.” She paused and looked pensive, her front teeth worrying at her bottom lip. “I didn’t see anyone, but maybe someone threw a cigarette in the Dumpster? I don’t know. I don’t think it could’ve been anything that we put in there. There wasn’t anything strange or combustible in the trash. And it’s not overly stuffed, well, not too much. I know trash is not due to be picked up until tomorrow, so there are quite a number of things in there that could catch. Do you think the heat could have done this? It’s strange and kind of shocking.”
Clayton’s brow knit as he considered what she was saying. “Well, you’re right it’s both. There has never been anything like this, as far as I know, happening in Dumpsters around here. If it is someone just being careless and throwing a cigarette into the Dumpster, then I’m furious about it. And if it’s something else we need to investigate and find out. It could have possibly been a combination of some sort of improper handling of ingredients mixing together, but that’s a stretch.”
Livia looked at him with confusion in her eyes, and he could tell she was thinking it over. “I’m not sure about that. I mean, it probably is a stretch. I know Drea was doing some cleaning earlier, but I’m pretty sure she put whatever was recyclable in the recycling bins and not in the Dumpster. I’ll ask her though, just to be sure.”
Clayton looked over at Alexandrea and Miss Joyce again, then he shook his head. “You just go and get checked out for now and get the all clear. I’ll look around in the Dumpster to see if we can get to the bottom of things. I’m sure it’s all probably just an innocent mistake. Don’t worry too much over it, and tell your aunt not to either. We will inspect everything and make sure all is up to code. You guys just get back to doing what you do best, keeping the town happy and in a sweet mood.”
Livia looked up at him, then narrowed her eyes. “Is that supposed to somehow be funny?” she asked. “Because if so, you’ve got a long way to go before you get even halfway there.”
Clayton gave her a deadpan look. “Maybe I’d be a little wittier if I had enjoyed my lunch and had better company.”
He wasn’t supposed to say that, was he?
He watched as her mocha cheeks bloomed with color. “I would say I’m sorry about that, but it wasn’t as if I didn’t tell you I wouldn’t be coming.” She gave him a deadpan stare of her own. “At least I afforded you that courtesy.”
“Wow. Knockout punch in the first,” Clayton said. “You’ve got a deadly right hook there, Livia,” Clayton said as he gave a grin. “Finally. At least now I finally get one real answer out of you. It may have taken three conversations, a lunch stand-up, and a Dumpster fire. But finally, you’re starting to get real.”
Livia shook her head and let out a low breath. “And you’ve got a sneaky left.” She threw up her hands. “You know what? I don’t know what you’re talking about, Clayton Morris. I’ve been nothing but real and honest with you. I was real back then, and I’m real now. And I’m not here to have lunch or play games with you. I’m here to help out my aunt with the bakeshop and be on my way. Nothing more and nothing less. Now, I have to go. You were saying something about me getting my ankle checked out.”
And with that Livia walked away just as proud and as beautiful as the woman he’d always known her to be.
* * *
“Well, at least this time it wasn’t the ovens, so your pie didn’t get ruined. As a matter of fact, both of these are delicious. Let’s hear it for small miracles,” Aunt Joyce said.
They were back home and trying to semi-relax after the fire at the shop that day. Liv was trying to get Aunt Joyce to put her feet up, but as usual she was kicking up a fuss. “Just let me do what I do. Really, I am feeling fine.”
“Come on, Aunt Joyce, sit back and relax,” Drea said. “It’s been a long day for all of us. With the fire and everything, I think it’s taken a toll. All this excitement. And if it hasn’t, still do us a favor and humor us and just put your feet up for a while. Come on, we can watch The Bachelorette and see who gets booted off next.”
Aunt Joyce gave a reluctant nod. “Okay, if you say so. I did call you all here to help me out, so I guess I might as well accept it.” She looked over at Liv, who was clearing the dishes and tidying up the kitchen. She waved her fork in Liv’s direction. “Why don’t you leave those for now, Livy, and sit and join us. Your pie is delicious, and so are those sweet little blackberry pocket thingies you made up. We need to come up with a name for those and sell them in the shop.” At Liv’s astonished expression, she grinned wide. “Don’t look so shocked, girly. I know how to give a compliment when it’s due. You’ve got something good there. Besides, I think I can take some of the credit for your talent. I’m glad to see you are paying attention. If you’re still here for the fair, I think we should enter a few of your pieces in the pie competition along with mine. Might as well hit them with all we’ve got.”
As Good as the First Time Page 18