Holding on to Chaos: A Small Town Love Story (Blue Moon Book 5)

by Lucy Score

  She laughed. “Are you running out already?”

  “God no. I’ve got enough to keep us going to our twentieth anniversary at least.”

  “And people think I have an active imagination,” Eva snickered. “I hope you know that everything we do is fair game for fiction.”

  “I wouldn’t want your sheriff hero falling flat in the moves department. How is the book coming?”

  He felt rather than saw the shrug.

  “I’m having a little trouble focusing since… the break-in,” she admitted.

  Donovan lifted himself up on an elbow. “Baby, maybe you should give yourself more than forty-eight hours to process.”

  “I haven’t even gone back in there yet. Not since I walked through with Layla,” she confessed. She yawned. Her body was spent, and her brain was ready for bed. Everything had her feeling exhausted lately. She needed to get back into a routine, get her head back in the game.

  “You don’t have to. Not until you’re ready.”

  “It’s embarrassing. I’ve known since before kindergarten what kind of a person my mother was, and yet I’m surprised that she’s found a new way to hurt me. It’s pathetic. I’m letting her ruin yet another home for me.”

  “Well, sooner or later you’ll be ballsy enough to stop letting her ruin anything for you,” he said.

  Eva poked him in the chest. “I know exactly what you’re doing.”

  He grinned. “You mean enjoying my post-orgasmic bliss?” he asked innocently.

  “You’re getting me riled up to prove you—and me—wrong.”

  “Now, why would I go and do a thing like that?”

  “Because whining and feeling sorry for myself gets me nowhere. And it’s about damn time I take back what’s mine.”

  “You better keep it down. If the B.C. hears you talking like that, they’ll be picketing Ellery’s wedding tomorrow.”

  Eva laughed. “Once the wedding is over, I can be cured of all my hang-ups and baggage. And this planetary nonsense will be all over.”

  He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “Maybe then I can take you out on a date?”

  She smiled, happiness pooling in her chest. “I’d like that.”

  He kissed her softly, lips warm and gentle against hers.

  Eva pulled back. “Mmm, I can’t believe I finally get a date with Sheriff Sexy.”

  “It’s about damn time.”

  “Hey. Do you want to hear another secret?” she asked. She laughed when he flinched. “It’s not mine,” she promised. “Emma’s pregnant. Sounds like it’s going to be a pretty big surprise since they were just starting to talk about kids.”

  “When are we going to start talking about them?” he teased.

  Eva snorted. “How about we discuss that sometime after our first date?”

  His phone rang from the depths of his discarded pants. “Shit. It’s dispatch. Hang on a second. Cardona,” he answered.

  He tensed. “Uh, you know what. I’m real close to there. Why don’t you let me check it out first before you call the fire department?”

  Donovan jumped up and made a grab for his pants.

  “No, I don’t think the neighbor needs to break down the front door. I’m thirty seconds away. I’ll check it out and call it in if there’s a situation.”

  Donovan hung up and grabbed Eva’s dress.

  “We gotta get dressed real fast. Someone just reported a fire hazard at Gia’s yoga studio.”

  “We’re in Gia’s yoga studio.” Eva reminded him.

  He pointed at the flickering electric candles. “Neighbors apparently keep an eye on the place, and someone saw candlelight in an empty building. Got someone waiting outside to break down the door and save the day.”

  Eva yelped and grabbed the dress. She put it on and did a frantic search for her discarded underwear.

  “Well, well, well. I guess you owe me an apology, Beckett.”

  Gia stood in the doorway, arms crossed looking smug. Donovan yanked his pants up over his hips.

  Beckett peeked in and grinned. The swelling around his eye had gone down, but the shiner was still prominent.

  “This isn’t what it looks like,” Eva began. “Donovan was showing me some yoga moves.”

  “Really? Naked ones? Because it looks like you two broke in here to have sex. Also, your dress is on backwards.”

  Eva looked down and the dress tag tickled her chin. “Crap.”

  “I hope you were at least going to disinfect that mat,” Gia said, pointing with her foot at the mat they’d just sweated all over.

  “I’ll run it through a car wash,” Donovan offered. “Oh, hey. Look at that. I’m getting a call. I should take care of this.”

  “Don’t you dare fake a dispatch call,” Eva yelped.

  “Sorry, babe. Duty calls. Hello?” he said into the phone.

  “You didn’t even push Answer,” Eva yelled after him.

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  To: Eva Merill

  CC: Beautification Committee

  From: Bruce Oakleigh

  Subject: Lazy Parrot positive affirmations

  Dear Eva,

  President Bruce Oakleigh here. As part of your rigorous counseling to slay your personal demons, we will be providing you with daily positive affirmations to help guide you toward enlightenment. Please read the affirmation aloud several times a day to really feel the message.

  Yours in Successful Matching,

  Bruce Oakleigh, President

  Beautification Committee

  P.S. Amethyst and I would like to apologize for our behavior during last night’s counseling session. As it turns out, we were both incorrect. We’ve been married thirty-five years.

  P.P.S. Eva, please reach out to us to reschedule your counseling session ASAP.

  P.P.P.S. Eva, we strongly recommend that you suspend sexual relations during Operation Lazy Parrot.

  --------

  Wilson: Your positive affirmation of the day. Whenever you feel angry, say bubbles.

  --------

  Eva stared at the front door of her little cottage. She’d felt nauseous this morning, waking up to face what needed to be done. Her stomach had churned at the thought of facing what was within. This house had become the place she’d felt the most at home besides the kitchen of her father’s restaurant. And someone had tried to take that from her. Agnes knew how to strike where it hurt the most. But Eva wasn’t going to let the woman take one more home from her.

  Regardless of whether Agnes was ever caught, her things found, Eva was done with her.

  Beckett had already seen to replacing the glass, but inside she could still see the chaos.

  “Cleanup crew reporting for duty.”

  Gia and Emma, in varying degrees of morning chipperness stood behind her, brooms and trash bags at the ready.

  “Thank you, guys, for doing this,” Eva said, doling out the coffees she’d picked up from Overly Caffeinated.

  “Hey! Where are our coffees?”

  Summer and Joey sauntered into the backyard. Summer was lugging a carpet steamer while Joey manhandled a drink carrier of what looked like tomato juices.

  “Let’s get this cleaning party started, bitches,” Joey announced. “Julia whipped up some of her famous Bloody Mary mixers, and I’ve got vodka in my bag.”

  “You guys don’t have to do this,” Eva said, feeling insanely lucky and just a little embarrassed that she hadn’t thought to ask them. “I mean, my sisters do because it’s required by biology. But you two really don’t have to spend your Halloween morning cleaning up someone else’s mess.”

  Joey snorted. “That’s not what Summer said.”

  Summer threw an elbow into Joey’s ribs. “What Joey means to say is that we’re happy that we can help out.”

  “Who’s taking care of the magazine? The horses?” Eva asked.

  “Minions,” Joey shot back. “Now, if you’re done
with your ‘woe-is-me internal monologue’ moment can we go inside and start pouring this vodka?”

  They did just that. Until Summer’s eagle eye saw Emma passing up the vodka.

  “What’s this?” Summer demanded, pointing at Emma’s straight tomato juice.

  “What’s what?” Emma asked innocently.

  “Holy shit, you’re pregnant!” Joey dropped her broom, flipped a barstool upright, and plopped down on it.

  “I am neither confirming nor denying until I tell the father of the hypothetical baby,” Emma snapped back with a steely-eyed glare. “So, you better keep that trap shut!”

  Joey held up her hands in surrender. “My lips are sealed, but you better make sure no one outside this room catches wind. It’ll be another special edition of The Weekly Monthly Moon.”

  “Are you serious, right now? You’re going to have a baby?” Summer’s high-pitched squeal threatened to rupture ear drums within a one-block radius.

  “Geez! Keep it down,” Emma said, looking furtively over her shoulder. “I’m going to surprise Niko and not by having my stepsister-in-law shriek it all over town.”

  “This calls for more booze,” Gia said, opening Eva’s cabinets.

  “Nice try. Our mother took it all,” Eva pointed out.

  Gia rolled her eyes and whipped out her phone. “I’ve got it covered.”

  “The first lady of Blue Moon is having booze delivered,” Joey snickered.

  “Have you decided how to do it?” Gia demanded, dumping a dust pan of broken glass into the trash bag and snagging her Bloody Mary.

  “Well, you know I like to have a plan.”

  Eva snorted. Emma was nothing if not ruthlessly organized.

  “Anyway,” Emma said, shooting her a dirty look. “I’m having Niko’s parents come in from the city for the Halloween Carnival. They’re staying at Phoebe and Franklin’s so Niko doesn’t spot them around town.”

  “And then, what? Yell ‘surprise, we made a baby’?” Summer asked.

  Emma gave her a dry look. “No! I’ve got a plan. A real one.”

  “I don’t know, Em. I mean, he bought you a house and rescued a puppy to propose to you. I hope you’re kicking it up a notch,” Eva warned her.

  Gia snapped her fingers. “Are you telling him with your Halloween costume?”

  “Like what? Go as a whale, which is what I’ll be next summer?” Emma asked, a soft, dreamy look belying her words.

  “Don’t be an ass. Pregnancy is beautiful. Even if you’re gigantic,” Summer interjected.

  “I’m just nervous. I don’t want to have a conversation about it until I tell Niko. Do you think he’ll be happy?”

  Eva grinned at her sister. “Niko is going to freak out in the best possible way. Family has gotten a lot more important to him since he met you.”

  “It’s still a big surprise,” Emma breathed.

  “How about you?” Gia asked. “How do you feel?”

  Emma took a breath and stared at the ceiling. “So. Fucking. Excited,” she grinned. “I have to get all the f words out now before I have the baby.”

  Eva hugged her sister. “I’m going to be an aunt again!”

  Gia elbowed her way in. “I’m going to be an aunt for the first time!”

  Summer joined in. “Our family is growing!”

  Eva poked her head up out of the mob. “Get in here, Joey.”

  Joey rolled her eyes. “I don’t know why you guys have to hug about every damn thing.”

  --------

  Beckett arrived a few minutes later with a pitcher of Long Island iced tea.

  “What happened to your eye?” Summer asked, tut tutting over Beckett’s bruise.

  “Why don’t you ask Eva how she got caught breaking and entering to have sex with her boyfriend last night?” Beckett grinned.

  “We had a key! Technically it was only trespassing!”

  Joey made a grab for the pitcher and high-fived Eva on her way past. “Nice job on the creative sexing.”

  “I said I was sorry,” Eva reminded Beckett. “We just got… carried away.”

  Gia swooped in and pressed a kiss to Beckett’s mouth. “Thank you for the Beckett Bartended Booze,” she said.

  He kissed her back. “I’m going to take Lydia to go pick up Aurora from Sanjay’s birthday party.”

  “You’re the best husband in the universe,” Gia sighed, snuggling against his chest. “I’ve officially forgiven you for thinking I left a lit candle blazing away in my studio.”

  Beckett met Eva’s gaze over her sister’s head, and he winked. It was exactly the kind of thing Gia would do if Beckett hadn’t given her battery-operated candles.

  The cleanup continued amongst snippets of conversation. Baby names, gossip gleaned from Book Club, and stories about the kids were punctuated by the scrape of broken glass and the rustle of trash bags. The day was sunny enough, warm enough, that Eva opened the windows. The fresh October breeze did its part in sweeping out the bad energy.

  It was looking normal again. Sure, there were some new gouges in the hardwood floor, and some things weren’t salvageable—like her cracked-in-half mermaid sugar bowl. But overall, Eva felt like she was taking her home back. At least Agnes hadn’t gotten into the dishwasher where an entire load of clean dishes waited.

  Eva picked up a coffee mug and tucked it into place in the cabinet. The shiny white pack on the shelf caught her attention. Her birth control pills.

  It took a full five seconds for her to register the fact that they were in the cabinet and not in her purse. Meaning she hadn’t taken one since before the break-in. Shit.

  Her stomach did a slow, scary loop-de-loop when she opened the pack. Running the calculations she stopped breathing. She wouldn’t have missed this many pills just since the break-in. She’d fucked up at least twice earlier in the month.

  Eva snapped the pack shut and closed her eyes. She hadn’t taken them with her the night of her first B.C. meeting. The night she and Donovan had made love for the first time. But they’d used a condom. But they hadn’t when he’d snuck into her house the night of the Apple Butter Boil. Eva paced the tiny kitchen, nibbling on her thumb nail.

  This couldn’t be happening. She could not be pregnant to a man she’d been dating for less than a month. Oh, my God. There was a possibility that there was a Baby Cardona inside her at this exact second, and she’d just had a Bloody Mary.

  She doubled over and tried desperately to find the oxygen that had gone missing from the room. She needed to buy a pregnancy test. And just how in the hell was she supposed to do that in Blue Moon without the entire town hearing about it before she’d even peed on the stick?

  “You okay?” Summer asked, bustling back into the kitchen, a laundry basket full of unrolled toilet paper in hand.

  Eva straightened quickly and cracked the back of her head off the open cabinet door.

  “Ouch!” She grabbed at the back of her head.

  Summer dropped the laundry basket and hurried forward. “That looked like it hurt.”

  “I’m fine!” Eva said, with more panic than necessary. “Everything is fine. Are you hungry? I’m hungry. Maybe I’ll run out and get us some lunch since you guys have been so great helping me…” she gestured helplessly around the mostly spotless first floor.

  “About damn time,” Joey yelled from upstairs.

  “I’ll get pizza. Or subs. Or pizza and subs,” Eva chattered on, wishing she could shut herself up.

  “I want chicken fingers,” Joey yelled down.

  “Let’s get something from Dad’s restaurant. He’ll probably sneak some dessert in with the order,” Gia called from upstairs.

  “Why don’t I go pick it up?” Summer suggested, staring at Eva like she was crazy. “That way if you have, oh, say a concussion, you don’t go wandering around downtown all alone.”

  “No! I mean, no. I don’t mind picking up food. It’s no problem. I’d be happy to. Othe
rwise one of you yahoos would try to pay for it, and it’s my treat and—”

  The knock at the door saved her from herself.

  Summer answered it, and Eva glanced back down at the pack of pills in her hand. She was overreacting. There was no way—

  Donovan stepped across the threshold carrying pizza boxes balancing a slim wrapped gift box.

  In a panic, Eva tossed the pill packet over her shoulder. It landed with a clatter in the sink.

  Donovan’s gaze met hers from across the room.

  “Sheriff Sexy,” Eva said in a voice two octaves too high.

  “She hit her head on a cabinet door,” Summer explained.

  “It seems to happen a lot here,” he said, winking at Eva. “I’m running delivery. Bobby heard you were handling cleanup today and wanted to aid your effort.”

  “Did she also send a present?” Joey asked as she and Gia tromped downstairs.

  Emma poked her head in from the sunroom. “I smell Peace of Pizza!”

  “Present is for Eva from me,” Donovan said, handing over the shiny silver box. “It’s just a little something I thought you could use,” he said quietly to Eva.

  Despite the hysterical tremors wracking her fingers, Eva pasted a smile on her face. “Aren’t you just the sweetest…” Boyfriend? Unsuspecting baby daddy? She’d just leave it at sweetest.

  She shimmied off the lid and brushed back the tissue paper.

  “Donovan,” she gasped. A brand-new laptop, two models newer than the one that had been stolen, was nestled inside the box. She’d been saving up for one, knowing that hers wasn’t long for this world. It had purple flower decals on the laptop skin.

  “Whoa,” Joey said, snooping over her shoulder. “Cardona wins the gift giving category.”

  “This is the most thoughtful…” Words were failing Eva.

  “I’m going to get your old one back,” he promised. “But I wanted you to have something that no one else touched.”

  She dashed around the island and threw her arms around his waist. “Thank you,” she whispered against his chest.