by Elise Faber
And she was drawn to that kettle like a beacon.
She padded across the room, saw that it was inscribed with words, but when she bent close to read them, they were the absolute last thing she expected to see there.
Which was incongruous, she knew, because how could she possibly know what was engraved on that silver metal? She’d never been in this house, never met this man, never—
Real men drink tea.
That was it.
So was it a joke between him and his wife or girlfriend? Because clearly, the man wasn’t single. She hadn’t needed to be in this home for longer than two minutes to recognize that—and yes, she knew that was a slightly sexist statement or at least thought, because she was implying only women decorated homes. But it wasn’t that at all. She knew plenty of men back in Hollywood who could design the hell out of their houses—and do it a hell of a lot nicer than she could. It was just . . . there was something about a woman’s touch that made a home feel . . . cozier, she supposed.
Like a family was apt to hop out at any moment.
Or maybe that was just what she’d always hoped to find.
Wishful thinking when her own family had been—
“Thank you for helping him,” Shan said.
Sophie jumped and spun around, heart pounding like she’d intruded on something she shouldn’t have because . . . well, she supposed she had intruded. On this man’s house. On his life.
“It’s just lucky I didn’t hit him,” she murmured.
Shan sighed and nodded. “He is lucky,” she said. “He just doesn’t know it.”
“What do you mean?”
“He—” A shake of her head. “I shouldn’t say anything.”
“It’s okay,” Soph told her. “You don’t have to tell me anything.” She took a step to the door. “But I probably should head out, wouldn’t want his wife or girlfriend to find a strange person in their house.”
Shan made a strangled noise.
“What is it?” she asked.
The curvy brunette winced. “I know I shouldn’t be telling you this, especially since I hate everything to do with gossip.” She bit her lip. “But Stoneybrook is a small town, and this is common knowledge, and I would hate for you to stumble upon something or say something—”
“Say what?” Sophie asked.
“Rob is widowed. Has been for a couple of years now.”
Sophie’s heart froze. “Oh shit,” she whispered. He was young, in the full bloom of life, and to lose someone at that point in their marriage must have been brutal. “That—I—how?” she whispered.
“Car accident,” Shan said.
“Shit.”
“Yeah,” Shannon agreed. “And today is his birthday. And the anniversary of her death.”
She’d known the first, thanks to his proclamation. The second, well . . . “Shit.”
“Yeah.”
Sophie sighed. “Poor guy must have really loved her.”
Shan nodded, her vibrant blue eyes bright. “They were inseparable from kindergarten. He used to tell me he remembered the day Carmella walked into the classroom with purple overalls, a tiny Patriots jersey, and mischief in her eyes, and he knew then that he was going to spend the rest of his life with her.”
Eyes stinging, Soph swallowed several times before she could answer. “That’s lovely.”
“It really is.”
“And sad.”
“That, too.”
Silence.
Long enough that Soph started getting an itchy feeling in her spine, one telling her that she had way overstepped and should go. No. Like she should really go. Like right this instant.
Like ten minutes ago.
Like before she’d come into this house and intruded on his pain.
“I should go,” she blurted.
Shannon nodded. “I’m sure you’re tired after your flight.”
Soph began inching toward the door, that itchy feeling growing when her eyes alighted on all the female touches, on the remnants of what once must have been a very lovely life.
“Yes, I am.”
Then she ran.
Three
Miserable: Just the Way He Liked It
Rob
He woke up naked and unhappy.
Naked because he’d woken up halfway through the cold shower Finn had tossed him into, suddenly sober enough to curse and wriggle his way out of his wet clothes, but not sober enough to manage more than a quick cleanup, followed by stumbling to his bed.
Unhappy because the light pouring through the window was a jagged dagger jabbing through his eyes and stabbing repeatedly at his brain.
Fun times.
Groaning, he rolled over and squinted at the clock, seeing it was nearly noon.
Fucking hell, he was late for work.
Four fucking hours late for work.
Yanking at the still-damp towel he’d wrapped around his waist during his stumbling trek to bed, he managed to extract himself and sit up after copious amounts of cursing and wrestling.
Okay, more cursing than wrestling.
Either way, at the end of it, he was sitting up, his head throbbing, and his eyes alighting on the tablets of ibuprofen, the cup of water, and the note, his name written on the front in a sleek feminine script.
And that was when he remembered the woman.
Not just Finn.
But a woman in high, high heels and a tight, purple skirt. Skin turned silver in the moonlight, shapely thighs, an ass that had been in love with all that snug fabric. Or maybe he’d been in love with it.
Either that, or he’d enjoyed the cursing. Because she had a mouth on her like a soldier, and . . .
He frowned, rubbing his temple.
Then remembered some more.
“Fuck,” he groaned, the image of the car screeching to a halt inches from him, the door opening, the goddess emerging, and then him.
His vision going blurry.
His stomach churning.
And him puking on himself.
Then . . . blackness, the world fading away until that cold shower, until Finn had hauled him into a semi-sober state. Which meant that his friend had either stumbled upon him in that street, in the puddle of vomit, or the mystery woman somehow knew Finn and had called him for help.
Because she was a mystery woman.
He knew everyone in this small town, and everyone knew him, knew his story, knew why he’d ended up such a fucking mess the night before.
But not her.
She hadn’t looked at him with pity. Nope, she’d glared at him, fury etched into the lines of her face, making her dark eyes spark in the moonlight. What he wouldn’t give to see them in the sunlight, to discern their true color—deep brown or light or maybe hazel or a dark green or blue.
They would be beautiful; he knew that in his gut.
Just as he somehow knew that the cursing she’d unleashed on him was merely a teaser, that she had a whole repertoire at her disposal, and she wouldn’t be afraid to use it.
How?
He couldn’t begin to explain it except to say that it was a feeling laced right into the very fabric of his being.
And that was enough nonsense before he even made it fully out of bed.
He reached for the note and unfolded it, disappointment flowing through him.
Rob,
I called in sick for you. The Fosters say their job will hold until tomorrow.
-Shan
Happy.
He knew he should be happy that Shannon was a good enough friend to have called the couple whose home he was remodeling, to have explained why he hadn’t shown—though hopefully she’d not given them the he’s-drunk-out-of-his-mind-and-an-absolute-mess excuse. Though they probably knew anyway. Just as the whole town would know why he hadn’t been able to cope yesterday, why they’d all looked at him with pity.
His birthday.
The anniversary of his wife’s death.
And now, he was thirty.
&nb
sp; He and Carmella had planned on being in the Caribbean with warm surf beneath their toes, rather than the cold beachfront they’d grown up with. But now, she was in the ground and he was alone, and he was too much of a fucking mess to even think about moving on.
Plus, even when he’d tried going on a few dates when the loneliness got to be too much, they hadn’t gone well. He was barely human these days and certainly a long way from being charming. And funny story, women usually preferred when the man they were seeing wasn’t still hung up on someone from his past.
They also preferred for said man to not drunkenly wander into the street, nearly get themselves run over, and they certainly preferred their man to not puke on their own shoes after said events.
But he’d still hoped that the note had been from her.
Ridiculous, he knew.
But he’d made it a fucking skill, his ability to hope for things to be different, to wish they could change, to think and dream about all the ways his life might be different if he’d not lost Carmella.
You can’t live with your head in the clouds, my love.
He knew that. God, how Rob knew that.
And yet, it was so fucking difficult to live without her. He didn’t have big dreams. He never had. A family, a house of their own, a quiet life, and Carmella. The girl he’d fallen for when he’d been all of six years old.
She’d been a whirlwind, a bundle of energy, outgoing and courageous and constantly pulling him out of his shell.
But now I’m gone.
Sighing, he stared at the picture on his nightstand, the distressed white wooden frame holding the photo of them on their wedding day.
She’d worn a lilac dress, had roses braided into her hair.
And he’d . . . fallen even more in love with her, until his heart beat only for her, until she been in the marrow of his bones.
But now, I’m gone, she repeated.
“Yes,” he murmured, picking up the pills and swallowing them before chugging down the glass of water. “Yes, you are,” he said, setting the cup down and moving into the bathroom that was practically a shrine to her. But of course it was—even without her products still on the counter, stowed in the shower, the cabinets, the drawers, each exactly where she’d left them—because he’d designed it for her.
Had found the hand-painted tile during their honeymoon and had paid an arm and a leg to have it shipped back to Stoneybrook.
Then had cursed his way through laying the hexagonal-shaped pieces, in mimicking the beautiful patterns they’d seen in the buildings of Morocco.
Memories, he knew, stroking a finger over the handle of her hairbrush.
In every inch of this house.
Comfort. It was supposed to be comfortable, that protective blanket he tugged around himself, but it wasn’t feeling nearly as cozy. No, instead, it was starting to feel stifling, constrictive, and—
Guilt.
Because he shouldn’t feel that way about his wife.
He should love and cherish the memories, not—
Make a fucking shrine to me, my love.
Rob sighed and sank down on the edge of the tub. “Yes, that,” he whispered, knowing full well he was talking to an apparition in his mind. “But what the fuck am I supposed to do?” he muttered, head in his hands. “How do I make plans and live a life when we had ours all planned out together?”
Carmella didn’t have an answer to that.
Which meant, neither did he.
Later that night, he found himself on his front porch, a cup of tea in his hand and knowing that he needed to bite the bullet and either call Finn and Shannon to thank them for helping his sorry ass, or he needed to go see them and thank them in person.
They lived on the beach.
So he knew it would need to be a phone call.
“Weak, Hansen,” he muttered, knowing that was true.
But he still pulled out his cell and called Finn anyway. Somehow, it wasn’t strange to be on a first-name basis with the mega movie star, maybe because he’d met Finn through their mutual friend Pepper. Pepper O’Brien came from Hollywood royalty, but she was about as far from L.A. as they came. He’d actually gone on his first date after Carmella with the sweet, klutzy redhead, and while they’d not even gotten through their first round of drinks before Rob had been ousted by Pepper’s now-husband, Derek, they had become friends.
And gotten closer when she’d stayed in town.
Then over the summer, she’d introduced him to Finn (he’d already known Shannon because . . . small town), but Rob had really enjoyed spending time with the couple and Shan’s energic daughter, Rylie.
He’d become the fourth wheel, even occasionally letting himself be coaxed into beach time with Rylie, who truly was an unstoppable force, and could get him to move past the painful memory of his late wife to go build sandcastles with her on very rare occasions. It was always easier with the tiny first-grader, her unrelenting energy reminding him of Carmella—and certainly her mischief-making skills would have equaled, and perhaps topped, his wife’s numerous troublemaking abilities.
The phone rang and went to voicemail, and Rob cursed, knowing he should do things the Stoneybrook way, with a six-pack of beer—none for him, since clearly, he couldn’t hold his IPAs any longer without Carmella’s influence. That should be paired with a march over to Finn’s house and proper groveling on the front porch. They would invite him in for dinner, Shannon would regale him with stories of her class while Finn cooked, and then Rylie would coax him into building another sandcastle.
This was the way of things.
Rather, this was the way things should be.
But he didn’t wanna.
Cue whining voice here.
Rob didn’t want to go over to Finn and Shannon’s house, didn’t want to be coaxed into happiness by the joy in their little family. He didn’t want to enjoy Rylie and all her exuberance, nor the way Shan and Finn so obviously loved each other.
He wanted to be miserable.
He’d perfected the art of being miserable, had it down to a science, especially once he added in a pinch of self-loathing and a dash of punishment, just for good measure.
But as he sat there and watched the sun set and the stars grow brighter, he had to wonder what was so good about it.
Nothing.
“I know,” he whispered to Carmella, to that voice in his head. There wasn’t anything good about it, nothing healthy or respectable or noble. He was miserable, and it was bleeding over into his family and friends’ lives.
“You know what?”
The voice had his gaze jerking up, thankfully now lukewarm tea sloshing over the rim of the mug and coating the outside of his hand. Then he nearly dropped the mug altogether.
Because it was her.
The mystery woman.
Four
Wrapping Paper and Baton Twirling
Soph
She probably shouldn’t be here.
She certainly shouldn’t be intruding on the poor man’s quiet thoughts, making him slosh tea over his hand and down his pant leg.
She definitely shouldn’t have stayed up into the wee hours of the night feeling bad for Rob.
But she had.
So she had tested the ten-minute theory of Finn’s and had found him correct.
It had taken her all of seven minutes and thirty-six seconds to drive from her rental on the beach back over to Rob’s house.
Just a drive-by, she’d assured herself, just out of blatant curiosity to test Finn’s assertion, not because she wanted to catch a glimpse of Rob when he was sober. Certainly not so she could apologize for cursing him out on what had been a tough day—no matter that it had been done mechanically, fear driving every sharp word. Because she could have killed him, and then relief had mixed in and—
Kablooey.
She’d exploded.
And for a person in her position, that was dangerous. If it got out that she was verbally assaulting strangers she’d almost hit wit
h her car . . .
Well, she didn’t want to be branded that way.
Even if she was that way.
Either way, she owed the man an apology.
The last realization was what had propelled her from her car when she’d driven by and had seen him sitting on his front porch.
Now she could add almost squashing him, disturbing his quiet, and interrupting his private thoughts to her list of transgressions.
Though transgressions were the last thing on her mind when he stared at her.
His eyes, but lord, they were beautiful.
Tiger’s eyes. They reminded her of those glimmering, swirling brown and amber and gold stones, their colors churning together in a pool to form the most unique combination of shades she’d ever seen.
They were striking, gleaming out at her.
But they also held a deep well of pain, and she remembered abruptly, almost jarringly, what had propelled her out of her car.
His wife.
His late wife.
And this grieving man.
She opened her mouth to apologize, to give her sympathies, but then those gemstone eyes hardened, and her words got stuck in her throat.
“I—”
“Don’t apologize,” he said, setting the mug down with a plunk.
“Wh-what?” she asked, stupidly she knew. But how had the man known she was going to apologize?
Probably because you nearly ran him over with your car, dumbass.
Well, there was that.
Her lips parted, that apology still on the tip of her tongue, but then she saw the knowing expression in those gorgeous eyes, the slight smirk on the edges of his mouth. The man thought he knew her.
That he knew her.
She wasn’t easy to read—her childhood had disabused her of that notion, early and often. Hell, she’d gotten into acting because she was so damned good at hiding what was deep inside—whether it be painful parallels between her character and her upbringing or a co-star who’d decided it was a good idea to have fish for lunch before a kissing scene. Soph was a fucking professional at obscuring her real emotions, and it was part of what made her so damned successful—she could easily project what the director asked for, what the script deemed necessary without letting ego or pesky feelings get in the way.