by Soraya Lane
Serena arched an eyebrow. “He’s super hot, right?”
“Yeah. He is.”
“So . . . you do want to go there?”
Bella shook her head, as much to convince herself as Serena. “No way. He’s firmly out of bounds, and besides we’ve never really gotten along. I bet he’s slept with way too many women to count, and he’s so damn cocky. Seriously, the man thinks he’s God’s gift to women. I’ve seen the way he flirts. Besides, haven’t you listened to all the times I’ve moaned about him?”
“So go on this date on Friday. Give him a chance.”
“You’re not going to let me say no, are you? Who is he?”
Serena rose. “I have to get back to work. But you’re going on this date, Bella. He’s going to pick you up.”
“You gave him my address!” Bella shrieked, silencing the entire office. She blushed and took her last, long gulp of coffee.
“Yeah, I did,” Serena said with a smirk. “And by the way, he’s your cute barista, the one you always flirt with. I was chatting to him the other day, mentioned you, and he said he’s been wanting to ask you out for ages. I just played Cupid, and it’s only a drink. I know you’re going to say that it’s too soon, but I think you should do it.”
If her day could have gotten any worse, it just had. “Please tell me you’re kidding,” she gasped.
“No. Sorry.” She shrugged. “Worst-case scenario, you have to find a new coffee shop.”
“But he makes great coffee!” Bella groaned.
“So let him make you great coffee after you have great sex with him,” Serena whispered. “Just give yourself permission to have fun every now and again. Not every man is going to break your heart, okay? And you need a break from the boys sometimes; otherwise, you’ll go crazy.”
Serena was starting to sound like Noah. “Fine, I’ll do it. But seriously, you can’t do this to me again.”
“Scouts honor,” Serena said, holding her fingers up in some sort of weird sign. Bella sighed.
She shrugged. “Just do it. Go out with him, flirt, have fun, and then tell me how wonderful I was for setting you up in the first place. Okay? Otherwise, I’ll give your phone number to all the other hotties I have lined up for you from the website.”
“Fine,” Bella grumbled, “but give my number out to any of those guys, and I’ll kill you.”
Serena waved, and Bella was left with a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach and still with a pile of things that had to be opened and dealt with. She had samples waiting to take to clients, bills to pay, new fabrics to consider and give her recommendation on—and all she wanted was to curl up in a ball and sleep. Or read a book, go for a pedicure. Anything except deal with the real world and the fact that she was going to be collected in a few nights’ time for a date with the cute barista that she’d thought she’d been harmlessly flirting with all these months.
And Noah. She was going to have to look Noah in the eye and tell him she was going on a date. She’d expected she’d be the one having to deal with him going out and bringing women home, not the other way around—not for a second. So why was she so worried about telling a man she had no romantic feelings for that she was going on a date?
Bella ripped open the first parcel just as Kate walked back into the office. She needed to stop thinking about the man she now shared a house with and focus on work. Just because he’d looked insanely good without a shirt on did not mean she needed to change the way she felt about him. He was still the one who’d disrupted everything the moment he’d arrived.
He was still Noah who’d slept with one of her sister’s bridesmaid. Noah who was way too much fun when it was time to be serious. Noah who always teased her for being too uptight.
“Need any help?”
Bella stood up, needing to get out of the office. “Could you open all these, send any unsolicited samples back, put the bills in a pile for me to pay, and sort everything else out for me? I’m going to call in on a few clients, make sure I haven’t lost them since I’ve been out of touch for so long.”
Kate nodded. “There are lots of cards personally addressed to you, too.”
Bella didn’t need to deal with anything else relating to her sister’s death, had opened enough sympathy cards to last her a lifetime. “Thanks. Would you mind opening them for me? Write a quick note back to each one, thanking them for their thoughts, so I don’t have to? Then jot down a list of everyone who’s been in touch so I can thank them personally when I’m ready.”
Kate’s smile was sweet, and Bella hoped she hadn’t been too dismissive before, when she’d first arrived. “No problem.”
Bella hurried back to the car, needing the fresh air. She had to keep herself busy and stop thinking about Noah, the cute barista guy, and the fact that she was so behind on work that she was in danger of losing the clients she’d spent years accumulating.
Noah was exhausted. Six hours of being a solo parent, and he was in awe of anyone who had to deal with kids day in, day out. He dodged past Cooper to grab the phone, pressing it to his ear and spinning around to make sure the boys weren’t about to kill each other. They’d been good, but he was pretty sure they were starting to get tired, and he was seriously regretting his decision of not making them go to school when they’d begged to stay home. Maybe it’s time to admit that Bella might be right about her whole routine gig.
“Hello.”
“Gosh, you sound like Gray.”
He stopped, smiling as he listened. “Hi, Christina.” He recognized Bella’s mom’s voice immediately.
“How are you getting on? The boys okay?”
Noah glanced at them and grinned. “Yeah, when they’re not shoving each other and arguing. And driving me around the bend.” He hadn’t expected child care to be so . . . draining. Exhausting. Overwhelming.
“They didn’t go to school today?”
“Unfortunately not.”
“Bella made that same mistake early on. Think she learned her lesson real fast.”
So she’d been talking from experience when she’d told him not to give in and let them stay home. Maybe he should’ve listened.
“How are the two of you getting on? It must be hard on you being back and thrown straight into suburbia. And I know Bella’s worked so hard to get the boys into a routine that works for them, to help them feel a sense of normalcy despite everything.”
“Yeah, you can say that again, about being home.” He cleared his throat. “That came out all wrong—sorry.”
“My husband was the same. Always desperate to get home to us, but found it impossible to settle in straightaway. I could always see his struggle.”
Noah grunted. He wasn’t sure what to say. On the one hand, he’d always craved stability, the idea of a home life, but it also terrified him, especially when the guys he trusted with his life every day had become his family. Not to mention the fact that he was feeling like a jerk for throwing his weight around when it was dawning on him big time how hard it must have been for Bella jumping straight into parenting when he’d gone back to work and left her to go it alone for the toughest couple of months.
“Well, it’s nice not to dive for cover every time I hear a bang, but I’m not gonna lie and say being back is any kind of easy,” he joked.
“Is my daughter there? I wanted to give you two some space, but I’m dying to see those kids. I miss them like crazy.”
“I’ll bet you do,” Noah replied. “Bella’s actually at work still. Went into the office first thing, and I haven’t seen her again yet.”
“Oh, well that’s good. She needs to get back into a routine, balance the boys with work—otherwise, she’ll go stir-crazy. We’ve all been thinking it but not sure how to say it. She’s been so tired and overwhelmed that it seemed best just to let her figure things out and ask for help when she needed it.”
Noah jumped to grab a wayward ball, his arm shooting out to grasp it, and shook his head at the boys. Bella’s mom had given him a serving w
ithout even knowing it, just letting him in on that little bit on how her daughter had been coping, or trying to cope.
“I’ll get her to call you. I’m about to start on dinner—you know, trying to impress her.”
“Good luck,” Christina said. “Goodness knows you’ll need it with that one.”
“I know what you mean,” he said with a laugh. It wasn’t a secret that the two of them had never exactly gotten on, so he was sure there would be a whole lot of people laughing about the fact that they’d been lumped together.
“Just be patient with her. She’s actually a lot of fun, more like Lila than you probably realize.”
He smiled. He hadn’t seen it yet, but something told him not to doubt her mom’s words.
“If she’s anything like Lila, then your husband might have to get out his shotgun, Christina. Gray always swore that he had the best girl in the world, so I’d have to take my chance on her sister,” he teased.
“She was a great girl, my Lila,” Christina said with a big sigh.
“Lila was one hell of a girl, no doubt about it.”
The ball he’d only just retrieved and thrown back made a loud smash as it went straight through the window. Shit.
“And that’s my cue to hang up,” he said.
Christina said good-bye, and he put the phone down, folding his arms across his chest as he stared down at the boys. They were silent, hadn’t made so much as a peep since the smash. There was glass all over the carpet, but the puppy-dog expressions facing him made it impossible to be angry. Lucky for them he still remembered what it was like to be a kid.
“Does Bella ever let you play ball inside?” he asked.
Cooper and Will both shook their heads. “Nope,” Will said.
“She gonna kill us?” Noah asked.
“Yep,” Will said, still dressed in his Transformer’s suit, but with the sleeves and legs pushed up. He’d gotten hot earlier but refused to take it off, so Noah had done his best to turn it into a summer version.
“Then how about I take the blame. No need for you guys to get in trouble. But next time, no throwing like you’re pitching at a Giant’s game, okay?”
Noah headed for the laundry, getting everything he needed to clean the glass up. He was feeling like a Stepford wife, only there was no way he could keep it up very long.
“Did you ever help your mom cook?” he asked as he scooped up the mess.
“Nah,” Will said. “Just baking, like biscuits and cakes.”
“Want to help me make dinner anyway?” He had no idea how he was going to keep an eye on them and cook, but if they helped him it seemed like a win–win.
“Cool. What’re we making?” Will’s eyes were bright, his expression so much lighter than it had been earlier. When the excitement of his arrival had worn off, Noah had seen glimpses of the boy’s pain, even in the way he played with his brother and stared off into the distance. “I love making all sorts of stuff,” Will continued.
“You used to make stuff with your dad, right?” Noah asked.
Will nodded. “Yeah, but mostly with Granddad. We do model planes and stuff. I kinda help, and he does the hard bits.”
“Sounds cool,” Noah said, hoping Will wouldn’t ask him to help build a model. He could teach the boy to shoot a gun or hoops—even throw a ball—but he was crap at making things.
“I’ll show you one day,” Will said.
“Sure thing. Now give me five, then I’ll check out what we have.” Bella had always been organized, so he was betting the fridge would be full.
He finished cleaning up, made a mental note to vacuum later once the kids were in bed, and headed into the kitchen, with the boys following a step behind him. He opened the fridge and looked in the pantry, checking off a few ingredients. Cooking wasn’t exactly something he was amazing at, but he knew how to throw a meal together when he had to.
Bingo. Pizza bases. “You guys like pizza?”
“Yeah!” they both agreed enthusiastically.
“Pizza it is, then. Will, grab that stool and stand on it,” he said. “Little man, you can sit on the counter next to me.”
He got the boys set up, pulled out all the ingredients he needed, and turned on the oven. The kids might be hard work, but they were also one hell of a lot of fun.
“Bella’s gonna freak,” Cooper said. “She doesn’t like mess.”
Noah laughed. “You let me deal with Bella. She doesn’t scare me.”
Both boys laughed—until a soft voice made them all stop dead.
“Who’s not scared of me?”
Cooper and Will burst out laughing as Noah dropped the knife he’d been holding and held his hands up in the air. “Guilty as charged.”
She dropped her bag and walked over, coming around to drop a kiss into Cooper’s hair and leaning to press one to Will’s cheek. Noah smiled when her long hair brushed his arm, the gentle scent of her perfume wafting up to him.
“Why didn’t you kiss Noah?” Will asked innocently and with his cute little lisp.
“Because I’ve been naughty,” Noah said, winking at Bella as she shot him a grateful look. “I’ll be expecting one next time if I’m good.”
“Looks like you guys are making dinner?” she said, completely ignoring him.
Noah watched as she stepped back around and sat down at one of the stools. She looked beat. He swatted Cooper’s hand away from the cheese when he tried to steal it, halfheartedly attempting to stop him.
“You okay?”
“Just tired.”
He checked that Will wasn’t too close to the edge and turned around to get a couple of beers from the fridge. Noah popped the tops and slid one over to her.
“Oh, thanks.” She smiled, hesitantly, but he was pleased her lips turned up instead of down or into that awful straight line she set them in when she was mad. He’d seen that way too many times yesterday.
“I don’t usually drink beer.”
“It’s cold, and you deserve one.” Noah took a long pull of his. “Tell me all about your day.”
She looked embarrassed, a strange look passing over her face as she stared at the bottle he’d passed her. “Work was crazy, but my clients all seem to understand my absence. Well, all but one.” Bella took a sip, sighing when she put the bottle back down. “That one I told to go to hell.”
“I’m impressed.” He dragged his eyes from her, not wanting to look at her any longer. For a woman he’d vowed never to touch with a forty-foot pole, she was sure stirring up his admiration a lot. Although it was hard not to admire her; she had long hair that curled just on the ends and eyes so warm when she fixed them on the children, the look transferring to him sometimes and making him feel like everything was actually going to work out. And her lips . . . damn, he definitely needed to stop staring at those soft, pillowy, full lips of hers. Hell, her entire mouth was sexy as sin. “What did you say to her?”
She shook her head. “I don’t even want to go there. But I had coffee with a friend and . . .”
Her voice trailed off, and he watched as she took another sip of beer.
“What?” he asked, waiting for her to finish her sentence.
“Please tell me the boys went to school,” she said, her tone sharper.
He watched as she looked around, like it was dawning on her that there were no school lunch boxes waiting to be washed on the counter, and then there was the mess in the living room, the general chaos.
Noah decided to just ’fess up. “No. They wanted to stay home. Will wouldn’t get out of his costume, and Cooper begged me to watch a DVD and—”
“Noah!” she hissed, slamming her beer bottle down and glaring at him. “You can’t do this. How can you think this is okay?”
He had a mind to tell her that he’d do whatever the hell he wanted, only he knew that she was right. “I get it,” he said. “I won’t do it again unless there’s a good reason.”
“I’ve worked so hard to—” She suddenly stopped talking, and he c
ringed when she looked past him. “What happened to the window?”
“Entirely my fault,” he said, not about to land the boys in trouble. “In hindsight, playing ball inside probably wasn’t the best idea.”
“You think?”
Bella looked like she was about to explode. “The glazier is coming in the morning—it’s fine. The boys had a nap on the sofa, and I got rid of all the glass and—”
“You let them have a nap!” Bella threw her hands up in the air, and Noah found himself cringing again. “They’ll never go to sleep tonight.”
He decided not to admit to anything else and just to keep his mouth shut about what they’d been doing.
“Noah, I left you here today thinking it’d make you realize—”
“I learned my lesson. I get it. Enough said.”
Bella looked exasperated, but she didn’t say anything, just folded her arms over her chest.
Noah held up a hand before she could explode again. “You don’t need to explain yourself, but Bella, you’ve had months to figure this all out. I’ve gone from being the fun uncle to having to figure out how to be that as well as set some ground rules. Give me some time.”
“Are you going to stop being Mr. Cool and work with me as a team?” she asked.
Noah conceded, “Yes.”
He watched as her mouth opened, then shut. Eventually, she just nodded. “Okay. Truce. But don’t go overriding me again. Or telling me what to do. Or not listening.”
“Deal,” he said, holding out his hand.
Bella hesitated, then reached for it, her palm fitting snug against his. “Deal.”
Noah shook her hand and then let go to retrieve the pizzas. “Dinner’s ready! Who’s hungry?”
Spiderman ran into the kitchen, and Noah laughed when he realized that in the meantime Cooper had pulled on a Batman costume with a muscle chest on it. There was something about those kids that put a smile on his face, no matter how hard he tried to resist.
CHAPTER SIX
Bella flopped down onto the sofa, kicking off her ballet flats and shutting her eyes. She had no idea how she managed to get through every day, even with Noah helping. Between work and school and pre-K and dinners and bath time . . . . She sighed just thinking about the past week. She could hardly believe Noah had been with them since Monday.