by Laurel Greer
Thinking like that got you into this mess.
“You’re forgetting to commentate,” her sister chided, elbowing her again.
“Right. Sorry.” Rubbing her smarting ribs, she focused on the Wild Life Adventures’ rock climbing demo in front of her and held the microphone to her lips. “Tavish is getting set to challenge my brother, here. Let’s see if he remembers how to do this, ladies and gentlemen...”
Was there really a best time to get life-changing news? Probably not. But this weekend counted as the worst. Tonight she was hosting Mackenzie’s bachelorette party, and then tomorrow was the rehearsal, and Saturday, the wedding—
Her gut wobbled and she wiped her sweaty forehead. Unclenching her jaw, she fixed her attention on the crowd. “Holy smokes, everyone! Tavish just bested Andrew’s time by a full three seconds. Guess he’s managed to do some climbing in between all that picture-taking.”
The audience of heat-wearied parents and children wearing star-spangled face paint seemed to like her soft jabs in the direction of their favorite famous son. Tavish might not love Sutter Creek, but Sutter Creek loved him. And given her job today was to entertain with the hope of selling more adventure packages, she’d use his reputation unapologetically.
The sun, out in full glory for the Fourth of July, beat down on the applauding crowd overflowing the grassy square at the center of town. Even after spending more than half her life in the ranching-and tourism-based town, she still loved how the historic Old West buildings blended so well with the newer shale-and-cedar architecture popular in ski towns. Homey and outdoorsy, it felt established. Close-knit. Small. Perfect for raising a child.
For raising a child alone? She gripped the microphone tighter. Sweat beaded along her hairline and made her polo shirt stick to her shoulder blades. But her internal thermostat issues were less a result of the sun and more the fault of the man who’d just raced Andrew to the top of the thirty-five-foot climbing wall. And damn it, she’d happily take the distraction. “If you’ll fix your attention on Tavish—” How could anyone not? His ass. Good Lord... “—at the top of the wall, the guy who just showed my brother how things are done.” She smirked pointedly at the crowd and garnered a laugh. “You’ll see he’s ready to rappel down.”
She explained the technique to the crowd, barely able to focus on her words. The flex-and-spring of Tavish’s leg muscles drew all her attention. That, and the fact she was currently growing an embryo he knew nothing about. Gah. Maybe waiting a few days to tell him wasn’t so bad. It only seemed right that one of them spend the wedding weekend free of thoughts of onesies and coparenting...
The crowd applauded again as Tavish landed on the ground, took a bow.
Show off. She ignored his second bow in her direction.
Saliva built up in her throat, made her cheeks tingle, and she shoved the microphone at Cadie. Spinning, she clung to the edge of the table and heaved in a breath, willing herself not to lose her breakfast in public.
“Uh—” Cadie sputtered. “At WiLA, we offer classes from beginner to advanced, for kids and adults...” She continued on with the closing spiel and gave thanks to both the rock-climbing and mountain-biking demonstrators. Lauren owed her sister. Cadie didn’t like public speaking.
A minute of slow breathing settled her body.
“What the heck was that?” Dangling the microphone in Lauren’s direction, Cadie ran a hand absently over the downy hair on her son’s head. Ben’s cherubic face was smooshed sideways and his little mouth hung open in his can’t-get-more-peaceful-than-this infant way.
That’s going to be me soon. Oh, wow.
Straightening, she sent Cadie an apologetic smile. “I guess the heat’s getting to me.”
Climbing gear clinked, drawing her attention away from her sister. The smile slid from her face as she got sucked in by Tavish lifting his helmet from his head, sweat curling the strands at his nape. He tipped his head back with a laugh at something Andrew said.
She loved seeing him laugh. And damn it, he’d do anything but when she dropped the “dad” bomb on him. So wait until after the weekend. He’ll be happier that way.
“Lauren!” Cadie squeezed her shoulder and followed her line of sight.
“Sorry, what?”
A dark brow curved up in suspicion. “I was saying you should go home. Take a nap before the party tonight.”
“I’ll be fine.” She yawned. Okay, maybe a nap wasn’t a bad idea. Her life was supposed to have calmed down this year. The chaos of last summer, from Cadie moving back to town after her husband’s funeral to Grammy and Grandpa’s car accident to Lauren’s wedding-slash-divorce, had been enough for a decade. Now that she’d gotten her family more settled, this holiday should have been different. But one little word—stay—and she was tangled up in Tavish all over again. Would he want to be an involved parent? Or would he take off the same way he had on their marriage?
“You know, if something’s on your mind, I’m here to listen,” her sister offered.
“Sure. If something comes up, I’ll be sure to pull out our sleeping bags and we can stay awake all night giggling about boys.”
“I hope we’re beyond the crying jags over failed proms and all that. Speaking of guys, though...” Cadie glanced briefly at Tavish, who was packing away climbing ropes. “Have you and Tavish picked up where you left off in high school?”
“Why would you ask that?” Lauren blurted.
“Well, you looked like you were tempted to strip his clothes off while he was climbing.”
Her mouth went dry. Oh, damn. So much for covering her reaction to him. “In case you didn’t notice, he’s kind of ripped. But no, there’s nothing going on between us.” Her chest clenched. Yet another addition to her stack of lies about Tavish. The guilt grew exponentially every time. But the dishonesty was necessary: Lauren wanted to help her sister heal from her losses, not pile on to Cadie’s burdens.
“You guys were good together back in the day.”
“Holding on to a high school love is the pinnacle of irrationality.”
“You could do with some irrationality.” Blue eyes widened on a spot over Lauren’s shoulder. “Oh, hey, Tavish.”
Wary curiosity crossed his face as he set a stack of plastic tubs down in the back corner of the tent. “What’s that about high school loves?”
Oh, crap. He’d heard them. At least in part. “Cadie’s is over there.” Lauren threw out the excuse, pointing to the raised wooden sidewalk that lined the stores on the south end of the square. “Remember Brad Gillis? She broke his heart when she went to college and met Sa—”
Her sister’s eyes dampened, no doubt from the reference to her husband.
Lauren mouthed a quick Sorry.
“We were champion heartbreakers after high school, eh, Lauren?” Cadie wrapped her arms around Ben, who was still sleeping securely in his baby carrier. She made a big show of greeting a family perusing the pamphlets at the information table.
Acid singed the back of Lauren’s throat. She wanted to slough off the accusation, to assert that she hadn’t broken Tavish’s heart when she dumped him during her freshman year of college, but the careful mask he wore made her wonder otherwise. Her chest tightened. Swallowing her nausea and her protest, she grabbed a bottle of water from a cooler with a shaky hand and sat on a folding chair.
Tavish tracked her movements with a studied eye. Worry tweaked his already uneasy expression. His strong hand landed between her shoulder blades as he crouched on his toes next to her chair. “You okay, sweetheart?”
“Um, did you not see Cadie when I mentioned Sam? Not my finest moment.”
“She’s not going to fall apart because you brought up her husband.” His calm, low tone only made her insides hollow out more. He took her wrist and notched two fingertips against her pulse. “Drink that water. Gotta watch for heat exhaustion in this weat
her.”
She snatched her arm away from his grasp. “I’m a fricking doctor, Tavish. I know how to avoid heat-related illness.” She didn’t, however, know how to tell him the truth. And for the sake of the wedding, she wasn’t going to breathe the word “baby” until she figured it out.
Chapter Five
Tavish took a swig from his bottle of local wheat beer as he watched women flock to Drew’s Search and Rescue buddies on the crowded dance floor.
Built in the basement of the Sutter Creek Hotel, the Loose Moose had to be the only establishment owned by the Dawsons’ company that didn’t pride itself on five-star, swanky service. It earned its fifteen-year Best Bar in Sutter Creek title by serving up cheap drinks, free pool and a loud mix of country and rock music. Nothing about its decor, especially not the moth-eaten, one-eyed moose head mounted over the archway to the washrooms, deserved reward. But it had an air so familiar it remained one of the only parts of Sutter Creek that Tavish missed when he was away. And given the girls were planning some sort of classy affair for Mackenzie’s bachelorette party, the bar served as a guaranteed escape from Lauren.
At the festival this morning, she’d made it exceedingly clear she wanted nothing to do with him. And he wasn’t going to force things, not when the attention should be on Mackenzie and Drew. Until the wedding couple departed for their honeymoon, he’d make sure none of the tension between him and Lauren spilled out from behind closed doors.
“You not going to take advantage of your proverbial second-to-last night of freedom?” He nudged his friend and pointed at the debauchery on the dance floor.
Drew rubbed his hand under the collar of his striped dress shirt. “Uh, no.”
“Good. I’d flatten you if you so much as looked at a woman aside from my sister,” he said cheerfully. “But you passed the test.”
“Lucky me.”
“Yes, you are. Don’t forget that.”
“Don’t plan to.”
He clinked the neck of his bottle against Drew’s gin and tonic. What Drew had with Mackenzie was nowhere near the kind of relationship Tavish was capable of having. Neither he nor Lauren had been able to compromise enough to make their marriage work, screwing over any chance they’d had to stay together. And if that was love, it wasn’t worth it. Wasn’t much different from his father chasing rodeo fame and forgetting he had a family at home. How his father’s wanderer gene had skipped his sister, he didn’t know. But she was like their small-town-loving mom all the way. Not so, him. Which was a damn boon for nurturing a career that had him exploring the world’s nooks and crannies, but not so much for maintaining a relationship with a woman only interested in one particular hidey-hole.
A flurry of movement from the doorway caught Tavish’s eye. His sister shimmied into the bar, decked out in a crown and an abomination of an ’80s prom dress. That shade of bubble-gum pink was like a nuclear weapon against her auburn hair. A flood of glitter-decked women followed in her wake.
“What are they doing here?”
“Who?” Drew swiveled to look. A grin split his lips. “Looks like I can dance, after all.” It didn’t take him more than a second to shoot off in Mackenzie’s direction and only about ten more to get her onto the dance floor.
Leaving Tavish with nothing to do but stare at his ex-wife. Lauren’s outfit was the opposite of abominable. Dark jeans sucked tight to her toned thighs. Fastened high on her neck, a sheaf of cotton candy-colored fabric hugged her hourglass figure from her breasts to her hipbones. And then she turned.
Backless.
Un-goddamn-believable. How was he going to keep his eyes to himself when Lauren’s sweet skin was exposed and begging to be stared at?
He shifted, trying to adjust to the sudden discomfort in his jeans. He’d have to face Lauren from the front tonight. Not that looking at her face and curves from that angle turned him on any less.
The women scanned the room, must have figured out there were no empty tables because they zeroed in on him in his vacated booth and sauntered over, Lauren and Cadie in the lead.
“Can we toss our stuff here?” Cadie asked, rustling for something in her purse and perching on a chair.
“By all means.” He motioned to the empty booth seating and the handful of chairs he’d appropriated hours ago. Most of the women dropped their things on the vinyl bench and traipsed away to join the gyrating mass in the sunken dance floor.
Twisting her hands, Lauren glanced around as if to decide where to sit.
Jesus, no need for that. If she didn’t get a hold on how awkward she got around him, the entire bar, not just their siblings, was going to start wondering what their problem was. He grabbed the wooden back of the one closest to him and pulled it out from the table. “Here. Sit.”
“I—Fine.” Clutching a shoulder-wrap thing in her hands, she settled on the edge of the chair.
A delicious waft of pineapple upside-down cake—perfume? Body cream?—hit his nose and he almost groaned as his groin twitched again. “Defeats the purpose of a bachelor party to bring the bride.”
“Hard to say no to said bride when she starts pouting,” Lauren retorted. Way too many emotions were written on her face for him to decipher. Annoyance for sure. Heartache, maybe. And a sliver of fear. His gut clenched on that last one. Didn’t sit right, Lauren being scared.
“Up for a game of pool?” He tried to smile his way into her good graces.
Lauren peered at Tavish, declining with a shake of her head.
“How about a drink, then?”
“I’m the DD,” she said in a rush, then seemed to check herself. “But if you’re insisting, I’ll have a sparkling water.”
If she was going to make him work for her company, he’d play along. “Nah, I’ll get you something nicer.”
“Fine.” Though her flat lips said otherwise.
“You want something, Cadie?”
“Just a beer, please.”
“Light lager, right?”
A smile brightened Cadie’s light blue eyes. “Yeah. Good memory.”
Lauren’s cheeks stretched in surprise. Did she not think Tavish was decent enough to remember basic facts about his friends? Ouch. He missed her faith in him, no matter how ill-deserved it had been.
And for the sake of tomorrow’s rehearsal and the dinner to follow, he needed to talk her out of her jitters. “You know, I was supposed to get another drink for Drew, and I’m not going to be able to carry all that. Could you give me a hand, Laur?” Shooting her an innocent look, he cocked his head.
She opened her mouth as if to protest but rose and followed him without complaint. Careful to touch only the paltry strip of her blouse at her lower back, he guided her toward the mirror-backed bar curving against the rear corner of the room like the hip and shoulder of a guitar. No small feat. The place was packed for the holiday. A large crowd of scantily clad college girls clustered up to the bar, taking their chances on the infamous Wheel-of-Shot-Fortune. The skirts were short. The laughs were tipsy. The smiles screamed “available.” He wanted none of it.
Ouch. I’m getting old.
Or, despite the impossibilities, he still wanted the woman weaving through the crowd at his side.
They lined up behind a cluster of people. Lauren nudged his hand with hers, forcing him to drop it from her back.
“It’s crowded, Pixie, and you’re not exactly tall. I don’t want some drunken fool to elbow you in the head or something.”
She rolled her eyes. “Exactly. It’s crowded. Full of people I have to live around on a daily basis. So it’s better I watch for flying elbows myself.”
Not the hill to die on. “Whatever suits. But you could do with dialing down the tension. Given it’s crowded with, as you said, people you have to live around.”
Her petite frame deflated.
“Tell me what you want from me this weeken
d.” Never mind that he knew what she really wanted from him. And it was something he’d never be able to give.
She grimaced. “Sleeping together last month—well, it didn’t exactly turn out how I expected.”
“Closure was a pipe dream?”
The dim, recessed lights overhead shone in her damp eyes. Damn. “You could say that.”
“So, like I said, tell me what you want.”
“I want to not have this conversation in the middle of a packed, scuzzy bar, Tavish.”
Fine. If waiting would make her less anxious, he’d extend her that courtesy. “No insulting the Moose, now. Pretty sure it adds to your family’s bottom line more than the ski hill does.”
A genuine smile, the first he’d seen on her face all day, spread across her lips. “You’re probably right. Meet me for a paddle around the lake tomorrow morning. Nine, at the East Moosehorn boat ramp?”
“Done.”
They managed to hold on to the bit of levity while collecting their drinks and returning to the table. But the minute they rejoined Cadie, she tensed up again.
He sighed. Her own worst enemy, his ex-wife.
She reached for her drink and popped the cherry between plump, glossy lips.
Visions of those lips wrapped around him made him hard as the goddamn table leg.
Hell. Maybe he should bow out politely, join the crowd on the dance floor. Better than being in the vicinity of Lauren’s pouty mouth. Better than wanting to kiss that pout away. “I should go give Drew his drink.”
Cadie caught his forearm. “He’s too busy feeling up Mackenzie to hold a drink. Stay. Chat. I’ll get the next round.”
Having spent their teens staring at each other, communicating without words, Tavish figured Lauren would correctly interpret the I-can’t-exactly-say-no-to-your-sister look he tossed her way.
She nodded and pursed her lips around the straw of her cocktail.