“Don’t get me started.” Raymond glared down at Bobsy, who, perhaps feeling the weight of his human father’s displeasure, looked up at him and yapped with bright innocence. “He stopped walking earlier because he doesn’t like the feeling of the snow on his little tootsies. So I swung by Open Sky to get him the boots. Which were not cheap, by the way. Now the foolish dog isn’t walking because he doesn’t like the feel of the boots.”
“Ah.” Sean stifled a laugh, a task made more difficult by the fact that he caught Bobsy’s clever black eyes and could have sworn the dog grinned at him with banked triumph over the success of his ingenious plot to get Raymond to carry him all winter. “I see.”
“I’ve been meaning to call you,” Raymond told him, hitching Bobsy more firmly under his arm. “Are you ready to move out of the Harpers’ carriage house and into your own place? I’ve got some great little houses coming available after the first of the year.”
“Not just yet,” Sean said, trying not to frown at this additional reminder of his dire financial state. “I’d need to get a job first.”
“Well, I’m here whenever you need me. You gents have a lovely holiday up at the lodge. You’ll see Bobsy up there, so make sure he stays out of trouble and doesn’t eat too much junk. James and Miranda are watching him for us while Fisher and I take the kids to Florida.”
“Will do,” Sean and Daniel said.
“Take care. Merry Christmas!”
Raymond walked off with the dog, Bobsy shooting them a backward glance as they went, just as Isaiah left the restaurant and saw them. The resident Harper family genius and eccentric, as evidenced by his surly attitude, glasses, giant Afro and omnipresent skull T-shirt beneath his motorcycle jacket, Isaiah wasted no time in hurrying down the sidewalk toward them.
“Got here as soon as we could,” Daniel told his brother, his anxious gaze sweeping the restaurant. “I was down in the city meeting with the distributor. Sean tagged along for an interview at a restaurant down there. What did we miss? How bad is it?”
“The kitchen’s gutted,” Isaiah said. “They’re trying to decide whether they want to rebuild or not.”
Rebuild?
Sean thought of Nigel and Ada’s advancing age. They’d both hit the age when they should rightfully be cooling their heels by some Florida pool, piña coladas in hand. Plus, it wasn’t like business at the restaurant, which could charitably be called slow on a good night, justified the time and expense. As for the place’s cranky, lazy and unimaginative chef and the tired recipes he’d been cranking out of the formerly decrepit and now destroyed kitchen? Please.
And here Sean was, an experienced, talented and ambitious young executive chef wannabe working his ass off to find a gig in a restaurant. What he wouldn’t have done to improve a place like this if given half the chance!
And now the Harpers might rebuild just so they could continue that pointless grind into the indefinite future? What the fuck?
Sean knew that the fire wasn’t about him or his troubles, but he couldn’t stop his brain from throwing him an impromptu pity party.
“Why not let it go?” he said, unable to keep all of his morose mood out of his voice. “What would be the point?”
Isaiah took a closer look at Sean, eyes narrowing, then turned to Daniel.
“What’s his deal?” Isaiah said, jerking a thumb in Sean’s direction. “Who’s taking the first couple hours of his suicide watch?”
This was just the opening Sean needed to catalogue his grievances with life.
“I can’t find a job. I feel like I’ve interviewed at every restaurant in Manhattan. People are acting like I’m radioactive. And I can’t keep sponging off your folks, living in their carriage house forever.”
“Why not?” Daniel asked, looking genuinely bewildered. “They love having you. You’re my father’s new favorite son. Why not stick around and give them something to live for, other than the possibility of new grandchildren?”
“Even if I do that, what am I going to do for spending money?” Sean thought of his rapidly dwindling savings account and of his debit card, which would probably cross its arms, dig in its heels and refuse to dispense any money at all in the next month or so. “Use my good looks and charm?”
Daniel snorted. “At the rate you’re going? You won’t have any of either one of those left pretty soon. And why don’t you tell Isaiah what your real problem is, Romeo?”
Fuck. There it was, all his personal business about to hit the Journey’s End grapevine if Daniel here started blabbing.
“We don’t need to get into all that,” Sean said hastily.
“Too late, man,” Isaiah told him sympathetically. “Daniel’s got the biggest mouth in the family. No secret is safe with him.”
“You got that right,” Daniel said with conspiratorial glee while Sean considered the relative merits of skipping town before morning and building a new life under an assumed name. “Check it out. Your boy here met someone. Only she doesn’t want anything to do with him. Now he’s walking around like a kicked puppy. Which is what he called me when I was trying to work things out with Zoya. So I like to remind him that karma came for his ass on that one. I never thought anything could be worse than listening to another rendition of his whiny tale about the woman he liked back in Cincinnati who wound up marrying his brother Mike, but this is worse. This is way worse.”
“Keep talking,” Sean told Daniel, refraining from lunging for his throat only with great difficulty. “I’ll be happy to fill Isaiah in on a few more details about how the whole Zoya thing messed with your head.”
Daniel shrugged smugly. On account of the fact that he was a newly engaged man who happily spent every night with his fiancée’s thighs up on his shoulders. “Be my guest. The thing with Zoya screwed me up for a long time. But we got it together and I’m straight now. You, on the other hand, are still screwed.”
“Fuck you,” Sean told Daniel. Childish, but heartfelt.
Daniel only chuckled.
But Isaiah, much to Sean’s surprise, looked concerned about Sean’s plight.
“What’s the problem?” Isaiah asked him.
Sean irritably decided he’d better spit it out so they could get their fill of making fun of him, after which they could hopefully all get on with their lives.
“I met someone. Thought we had a connection, but she ghosted me. Hard to miss the message there. End of story. Let’s move on—”
“Sean!” shouted a tiny but excited voice accompanied by running footsteps. “Hi, Sean!”
Sean glanced around in surprise, his mood clearing like magic. Only one person in the world possessed that voice, and she was the sweetest little angel in the world.
Edward’s precocious and precious toddler daughter, also known as Daniel and Isaiah’s niece.
“Ella?” Sean said.
They all turned in time to see a laughing and book-carrying Ella race down the sidewalk as fast as her short legs and purple boots would carry her. She ran straight to Sean, as he’d known she would. They’d developed quite the soft spot for each other ever since they’d first met at James’s wedding back in October. Ella seemed to have a crush on him, judging from the starry-eyed looks she always shot his way, and goodness knew he loved pretty ladies of all ages. He had the wild thought that he wasn’t sure he ever wanted to meet Ella’s mother; God only knew what powers of charm and persuasion she must have to produce a daughter like this.
Grinning, he bent, scooped Ella up and balanced her on his hip.
She grinned back, her eyes bright and her chipmunk cheeks flushed. Even her Minnie Mouse Afro puffs seemed to perk like a playful dog’s ears. Sean felt a wild rush of pleasure that made him vaguely long for his own little kid while also wondering how her father Edward must feel every time she smiled at him and gave him a dose of these eyes.
“Hey!” Sean kissed her cheek and earned a round of giggles. “How’s your ear? Still broken?”
She’d had an ear infection when
he ran into her a few weeks ago at Java Nectar. Which, come to think of it, was the same day he’d glimpsed Amber for the first time.
“It’s fixed!” Ella said.
“Nice,” Sean said, holding up a hand. “High-five.”
Ella smacked his palm, then showed him her book. “It’s the Ginch, Sean!”
“The Grinch?”
“The Ginch!” She shuddered. “I don’t like the Ginch. He’s scary.”
“He is a little scary,” Sean conceded, stifling a laugh.
Ella brightened and thrust the book at him. “You read it to me!”
But a miracle happened before Sean could answer.
Amber rounded the corner and appeared right in front of him—for one arrested second, Sean actually felt as though his obsessive desire to see her again had conjured her out of thin air—her hurried footsteps clicking on the sidewalk.
Sean’s jaw dropped. His face flamed. His heart stopped dead, refusing to believe it.
“Ella, if you don’t stop running off when I’m holding your hand—” Amber began, but then she caught sight of Sean and froze, her eyes widening.
Their gazes locked, rocking Sean to his core as it hit him:
Amber wasn’t gone forever. And if he somehow played his misbegotten cards right and didn’t blow it, he might have another chance with her. The knowledge rocketed his heart straight into cardiac arrest territory.
“Oh, my God,” Amber cried. “What are you doing with my daughter?”
“It’s Sean, Mommy!” Ella said brightly from her perch in Sean’s arms.
“I see that,” Amber said, still sounding shaky, her attention irrevocably centered on Sean.
That was when Sean lost his head a little. He and good fortune didn’t have a long history together, which meant that Amber’s sudden reappearance was too good to be true.
Time to verify.
“Is it you?” he asked Amber, stepping closer to make sure his eyes weren’t playing tricks. But no, she had the same knit hat, jacket and jeans that she’d worn the first time he saw her. The same flowing black hair and perfect skin. The same bright eyes that seemed to glow when she looked at him.
Honest to God, those eyes didn’t seem to send mixed messages at all.
Unless she was an Oscar-caliber actress, Amber was as glad to see him as he was to see her.
Or maybe, and this was far more likely, Sean was just a bigger fool than he’d ever feared.
The restaurant door opened behind them just then.
Edward Harper, Daniel and Isaiah’s brother, emerged with some cat in a carrier. “Isaiah. Meant to ask whether you wanted me to spay or neuter the cat once we get it…”
That was when the world rushed back in, knocking Sean out of his arrested moment with Amber while also slapping him in the face with a huge dose of reality. Especially when lengthening shadows crossed Edward’s face as he surveyed the scene.
Suddenly everything made sense as Sean stood there in utter disbelief, feeling like a fool as domino after domino fell into place.
Edward had a baby mama whom he’d unceremoniously dropped a few months ago.
Amber had been unceremoniously dropped by some jackass a few months ago.
Amber had gained weight in the last couple of years, she’d said. Which roughly added up to the time it would take to be pregnant and produce a kid who was now a toddler.
Sean currently held a toddler in his arms.
And, last but not least, Amber had a diaper bag slung over her shoulder.
With that realization, the last domino fell into place.
Fuck.
Evidently it also fell into place for Edward. Sean’s friend and a member of the family that had embraced him as one of their own.
Edward.
Whose eyes narrowed as he zeroed in on Sean and then, finally, Amber.
“What’s going on?” Edward asked.
Daniel sprang into action, proving his worth as Sean’s best friend by stepping into the awkwardness and helping him out. “You know what? Why don’t I take Ella inside? We can find Grandma Ada.”
“Yay!” Ella said, leaning her way into Daniel’s arms.
Daniel raised his brows at Sean as he took Ella, a discreet look that screamed Good luck; you’re going to need it this time, genius.
Sean nodded. Clapped him on the back in thanks and watched him go. Wondered what the hell to do now.
“Yeah, I’m taking off too,” Isaiah said, brows raised slightly above center as he displayed a sensitivity that Sean would not have thought him capable of as he waved good-bye and headed off down the sidewalk.
Leaving Edward, Sean and Amber alone in a mushrooming awkwardness.
“What’s going on?” Edward asked Amber again.
“Nothing,” she said, shooting Sean a veiled warning look. “I was just surprised to see, ah, Sean holding Ella. I didn’t know they knew each other.”
“I didn’t know you and Sean knew each other,” Edward said quietly, his assessing gaze swinging between the two of them and returning to Amber. “Sean and I are pretty friendly. Is there, ah, anything I should know?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said coolly, avoiding Edward’s gaze as she made a production out of zipping the diaper bag and handing it to him.
Something about Amber’s denial rubbed Sean the wrong way. Maybe because the Harper family had been so kind and welcoming to him and he didn’t want to mislead any of them, even by omission. Maybe because he hated seeing Amber relegate their spectacular interlude together to something that caused her this kind of exaggerated befuddlement. Maybe because he wanted to demonstrate decisive boldness (Amber had been decisive and bold when she quit her job; couldn’t he also embody those traits?) and actually go after something he wanted for once in his life.
Probably because a sudden possessive streak demanded that he lob his little bombshell between these two former lovers and see how it landed.
And it wasn’t that he’d recovered from his hurt and anger over the whole ghosting treatment. Not at all. It was just that he couldn’t quite contain his wild flare of hope that this thing between him and Amber wasn’t over yet. Maybe, if he squinted really hard at it, he could envision something developing between the two of them. Exactly what sort of thing it could possibly be was a diagnosis he’d have to make another day, when he had much more information. His only job for right now? Not to blow it by being dishonest or letting his pride stop him from stepping onto the playing field. Because if there was one thing he knew way down in the deepest part of his gut, it was this:
A shot with Amber? It was worth a good hard try.
“Actually, there is something you should know,” he told Edward, focusing on his friend’s face rather than on the unmistakable horror dawning across her face. “About me and Amber.”
Chapter Eight
Amber’s emotions spun out of control, mimicking the action in a pinball machine as they pinged between excitement at running into Sean again, dismay at doing so in front of Edward, of all people, surprise at seeing Sean on such close terms with the Harpers and with Ella and creeping dread at what Sean might say next.
Her strongest feeling?
Overwhelming relief. At seeing Sean again after he’d been almost every obsessive thought in her silly head for the last few weeks. Relief that he actually lived there in small-town Journey’s End, which put him nearby and therefore so much more accessible than anyone ever seemed in NYC. Relief at crossing paths with him again without having to initiate the agonies of calling and/or texting him and pretending she hadn’t ghosted him when they both knew damn well that she had.
No doubt he was hurt and angry. She couldn’t blame him. Anyone would be.
Had she meant to ghost him? Not exactly. Had she meant to catch her breath after the intensity of their interlude together in her apartment? Yes. Had she meant to get settled in her new apartment in Journey’s End first? Yes. Had she then meant to text him in the first week or so a
fter their night together or, failing that, to answer one of his several texts or calls? Yes. Had she instead let her fears and insecurities get the best of her, thereby spending the last few weeks missing him and wanting to see him again while also perfecting her turtle-in-her-shell routine?
Hell, yes.
She wasn’t proud. She was woman enough to admit that. She’d handled things badly. She’d let days turn into weeks without giving him the courtesy of any sort of a response. She owed him an abject apology.
But… Say she apologized to Sean. What then? Did they resume the wild sex on the nights when Ella stayed with her father? Amber wasn’t one for casual sex. Never had been, her one night with Sean being the notable exception.
Did they try to forge a relationship?
Her inner voice stifled a snort. As if men were lined up around the block, hands raised, to date single mothers trying to navigate the complicated waters of modern families these days. Hell, she couldn’t even get her baby’s daddy to stick around. Why? Because she wasn’t good enough. She wasn’t good enough for Victoria’s Secret or somebody’s fashion week or even to keep modeling. She clearly hadn’t been good enough for Edward to want to marry her. Why would she suddenly be good enough for Sean? What would make her think that some great new man would want anything to do with a single mom and a child with whom he shared no blood ties?
Well, she knew what. She was insane. Quietly and discreetly insane, but still insane. Only an insane woman leapt into bed with a man mere hours after meeting him, then entertained the thought, no matter how ridiculous, that something other than more sex could come from it.
Which was why she had wanted to keep this whole thing on the down low, especially from Edward. What she did between the sheets these days was none of his business. Plus, Journey’s End had a grapevine that rivaled the old party lines back in the early days of the telephone, when everyone could hear everyone else’s conversation. She didn’t need that complication within a month of moving to town.
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