by Stacey Lynn
“What’d she say?”
“She didn’t rip the card up or throw it at me and said she’d consider it.”
“So I should back off?”
“When have you ever done that?” I teased, but he didn’t so much as chuckle.
His attention was gone, turned to the picture I knew he was staring at without checking. It sat on the kitchen island for him to see every day. “What do you think Melissa would want me to do?”
Goddamn him. I took a large swig of my drink, burning my throat to wash away the emotion. “I don’t know about what she’d want you to do, but I think she’d want to give Lilly a hug.”
“She was a hugger.”
“Annoyingly so.” I missed them so much.
It was just too damn bad she was gone and she left us with the task of her mission.
Fucking sisters were a pain in the ass.
9
Hudson
The date I promised Brandon with Harper was a bust from the outset. Harper was attractive, something I noticed as soon as I helped her out of her Uber ride. Auburn hair that bounced on her shoulders and glistening light blue eyes. She was the exact kind of woman I’d normally be interested in.
Intelligent with a serene personality, I forced myself to try to enjoy the drink we ordered at the Italian restaurant that had a casual bar area with little background noise and fewer distractions. That had been my first error.
Fifteen minutes into the date, our conversation was already forced through pleasantries and mostly spent talking about Jenna and Brandon’s upcoming wedding.
It was that moment, halfway through our first glasses of wine, I realized what a complete asshole I was being. I had an obsession, an unhealthy one all due to a feisty blonde with more attitude and spice than anyone I’d met in a long time. I couldn’t kick her out of my head.
I also had no motivation to do the kicking.
“Listen, Harper…”
“Oh no.” She laughed awkwardly and took a sip of her wine. “I haven’t even bored you yet with my talk of work but that doesn’t sound good.”
I cringed. I was taught to respect women. Always. Hell, I was raised to respect people—man or woman, boy or girl, race or sexual or gender orientation. “It’s not you, I swear.”
She set down her glass of wine, eyes narrowing on me. Slowly her soft features hardened into a more cunning expression. “Brandon and Jenna said you aren’t seeing anyone.”
“I’m not.”
“But you’re interested in someone.”
I brushed my thumb up and down the length of the stem of my wine glass. There was no way to describe what was happening to me. “It’s complicated. And I’m really sorry. I hoped tonight would go different.”
“Me too.” She slid off her chair and grabbed her jacket. She had it on before I could assist her. “I’ll call an Uber.”
She took off out of the restaurant, and I slapped down more money than necessary for the two wines. At least I’d make our server happy tonight with the ridiculously high tip, but I was more concerned with Harper outside. Alone. At night. And clearly pissed off from the way she’d so quickly fled. Not that I could blame her.
I hurried to find her and finally saw her fifteen feet from the entrance, tapping on her phone.
I walked to her and shoved my hands into my pockets. “I should have been more forceful with Brandon. This whole night is my fault.”
It was too bad it didn’t occur to me before all this that if things went south, she’d go straight to Jenna. Who would now know I was interested in someone. Who would tell Brandon. Who would never back off. I wasn’t prepared for that conversation at all. Not yet.
“It is.” She gripped her phone in one hand and tightened the belt on her coat. “Jenna promised you were a good guy, or that you’d at least be fun. I wasn’t expecting anything, except for a drink or two and some entertaining conversation, Hudson, but this is shitty.”
“I know.” I had no defense. Empty platitudes weren’t my thing, neither were explanations that really weren’t any of her business. Despite the fact I’d screwed up, I had no intention of giving her either. “I’m sorry to have wasted your night.”
“You can go. Uber will be here in a couple minutes and I’m good alone.”
“I’m sure you are.” I rested my shoulders against the brick wall and stayed put. She was probably fiercely independent and plenty capable of looking out for herself and we didn’t have to talk if she didn’t want, not that I could blame her, but I’d stay until I saw her get in the car safely.
Which is exactly what happened. Three minutes that felt like thirty went by when a car pulled up with an Uber sticker on display. She peeked at her phone and then glanced at the license plate.
“This you?” I asked, as she stepped away from me.
“Yes.”
She walked quickly to get to the car before it stopped and opened the door. I gripped the top of it so she couldn’t slam it in my face and listened as she verified her name and her Uber driver before getting in.
Finally she slid in, yanking on her seat belt.
“I truly am sorry, Harper, about all of this.”
“I know, I know. It’s not me, it’s you.” She said it with a slick arrogance and yeah… I knew now. Even without Lilly invading my thoughts, this woman wasn’t the one for me.
“Right. Get home safe,” I said, more in warning to the driver.
She dismissed me with a flip of her hand, already on her phone, probably telling her friends I was a giant jackass. My only defense? The date was more for Brandon than myself, so whatever. But when the Uber was gone and the night was still young, I was in no hurry to return home, to pace my living room, debate figuring out how to get a hold of Lilly and ask what she was thinking. How she was doing.
If she was safe.
If she needed money. Needed help. With anything.
Goddamn, you’re a pathetic sap.
Hearing about her and seeing her pictures was bad. After having met her, and hunted her down a second time, it was worse.
This craving pissed me off… these emotions I didn’t even want.
“Screw it.” I shoved my keys into the pocket of my gray dress pants and headed down the street in the opposite direction of my car. I needed a walk. A few miles or hours to clear my head before returning home to silence.
I walked for what felt like forever, my arches and heels starting to ache in my dress shoes when I noticed a church up ahead. Outdoor lights illuminated the gothic architecture, the dozens of stone steps leading to the entrance with gleaming, at least twelve-foot-high wood doors. At least a half-dozen self-standing signs were lined up right outside the doors, but it was the church as a whole that called to me.
In my youth, I’d spent hours every week at church. Between Bible studies and Sunday morning worship times and Vacation Bible Schools in the summer, I couldn’t remember a time when I hadn’t enjoyed sitting inside the walls of a church, or the peace it brought when I needed a place to reflect on what was going on in my life. As I grew older and then after Mom died, both Dad and I stopped going for the most part. I think we both felt we could show love to others, serve them and care for them, if we spent that time outside the walls of corporate worship than inside, but it’d always been a place that brought me peace.
Tonight, it called to me for a different reason. A place to take a break, relax, and get my head settled after the disaster of my time with Harper. I also needed to figure out what I was going to tell Dad if Lilly never called and decided she didn’t want help.
He hated failing.
“Shit.” I dropped my face to my hands and my elbows to my knees.
I had no idea how long I sat there, lost and confused and pissed off and twisted on those cooling cement steps but the sun had long since set when there was movement around me. I stared straight ahead, hands falling to my lap. At least a dozen people walked by, not so much as sparing me a glance sitting there. Someone walked by me, dress
ed in jeans and a sweatshirt, and paused with their back to me. I looked back down at my feet. It was probably time to get home and forget this day when a shoe came into view and then the tip of that shoe tapped my foot.
“Are you stalking me? This is getting ridiculous.”
Oh damn. I recognized the voice immediately.
I twisted my neck and blocked my eyes against the harsh streetlight… and yup.
The woman I couldn’t get out of my head was standing next to me, staring down at me. And who could blame her for thinking that?
“No. No, I wasn’t.” I stood and brushed my hands down my thighs. She was the exact last person I’d expected to see. “What are you doing here?”
“Meeting.” She pointed back at the church. There were several signs I noticed earlier but didn’t pay particular attention to until now. Al-Anon. Nar-Anon. AA.
Right.
“Was it good?”
Lilly’s head fell to the side, long, blonde hair cascaded down just past her shoulder. She’d kept it short in prison, but it’d grown since then. When she was at the diner, she always wore it back in a ponytail. I’d never realized how long it was. Or full. Or how soft-looking.
Good God, Hudson. Get it together.
“Are they supposed to be?”
She had the hint, the smallest hint of an impish grin. It lit up her entire beautiful face which had much less makeup on it than when she was at the diner. Now it was muted, natural, giving her an incredibly sexy soft look. Had there been more light, I’d be able to see her freckles.
Something I shouldn’t be noticing.
“Your turn. Why are you here?” she asked, and I realized I was gaping at her. Admiring her beauty. She’d absolutely hate it if I brought it up.
Thin, arched brows waited for my answer.
Thinking of you…
I peeled my gaze off her and shrugged. There was no way my presence here didn’t look planned, and she had every right to that suspicious gleam in her eyes and cant of her hips. “I had plans that went bust earlier and went for a walk. Just… ended up here. And now, I’m thinking of getting a cupcake before I head home. Do you want one?”
“A cupcake and a walk.” Her tone was a mixture of thinking I was a liar or an idiot. She was probably correct on both accounts. “You live around here?”
“Few miles away.” More like ten. She didn’t need to know that. If I spoke anymore, I was at risk of spilling everything. The need to lay out all my cards, face up, thrummed in my chest like a bongo drum. This pounding for a woman I couldn’t have and shouldn’t want.
“So, cupcake?” I asked when she didn’t say anything. She kept watching me with this look, like she was trying to figure me out. Dig until she found my motive.
I couldn’t blame her. Running into her tonight wasn’t planned and hadn’t been wanted, but now that I saw her I didn’t want to be anywhere else.
She slid her hands to the butt pockets of her jeans. It pushed out her breasts I liked looking at. I hated everything about her clothes even if they clung to her body perfectly.
They were too worn, too faded… too… used by other people.
She deserved better and I wanted to ask her all my questions.
Did that bother her? Did she mind her hard life now or was she okay with it? What did she miss the most?
“Sure,” she finally said, squinting at the dark sky. “A cupcake sounds nice.”
“This place is really cute. I didn’t even know it existed.”
It’d been years since I saw someone so excited about cupcakes. Yet from the moment we walked in, Lilly’s eyes had been wide with wonder. If all it took was a wine and dessert bar to put that expression on her face I’d bring her here every week.
“A friend of mine from high school opened it.”
“Really?” She almost smiled at me. Almost. Closer though. “That’s cool. You still friends with her?”
“Acquaintances, mostly.”
“Those must be nice to have.”
My heart hurt with her flippancy, but she looked to the board filled with menu items and licked her lips.
Guaranteed, I’d be thinking of that lip lick at the most inappropriate times from here to eternity.
“What should I get?”
“Anything you want.”
We stood back and let customers who seemed more decisive order first and every time they ordered something, Lilly’s face gleamed with delight.
Over a fucking cupcake.
“You can always come back and try more,” I said, trying to prod her along.
“Not in my budget.” She pressed her lips together then and a pink hue creeped up her throat.
Ah. Shit. Sometimes when I was next to her, I forgot.
If it wasn’t in her budget now, chances are, it hadn’t been for the last year, either. When was the last time she’d had a fucking cupcake?
“Come on.” I placed my hand on her lower back without thinking and immediately, a fissure of heat traveled up my arm before I could yank it back.
Goddamn. Even through clothing, she affected me. Lilly flinched from my touch and I cringed, dropping my hand.
Damn it. Had she not liked me touching her?
“Welcome to Crème, what can we get for you this evening?” A perky, high school aged teenager grinned widely.
“I would like one of everything you have left in your case.” Other than the three-dozen selection of cupcakes available, there were rows of pre-sliced cakes and plates filled with cookies.
“What?” Lilly turned to me, mouth gaping in shock. “You can’t be serious.”
The hell I wasn’t. If she hadn’t had these kinds of treats in so long, I’d let her try everything.
“You can try whatever you want so you know what you like next time.”
The cashier choked down a laugh before her grin stretched from ear to ear. “To go, I take it?”
“No. For here.”
“Hudson—”
I looked down at Lilly.
She had her head tilted back; lips parted in surprise. It was fucking cupcakes. A hundred dollars max, and no skin off my nose to give her something decadent. “Don’t argue. It’ll turn me into a dick, and I was trying to be nice.”
“You were?” Her nose scrunched in the most adorable way.
And hell. She was teasing me again. It was a blink in attitude she lost quickly but was probably so similar to how she used to be, before she was abandoned and tossed into the system.
Good God. I might do anything to bring that out more often in her.
If only there was time before whatever this was I was doing with her turned to utter shit.
“I can be nice,” I muttered and handed my card to the girl at the counter. “A glass of chardonnay too, please.” Looking to Lilly, her smile had vanished. “Do you want a glass?”
“Just water,” she mumbled. Her eyes scanned the glass container, but she’d lost her luster. “Thanks, though,” she finally said, as if she was remembering manners and how to use them. They tripped over her tongue on the way out and she turned, her focus now on the windows and the streetlights and passing cars.
Due to her reaction when I touched her earlier, I gestured for her to choose a table and followed her to one at the far side. She put her back to the wall facing the small eating area with only a few tables. Outside were tables with umbrellas, strung fairy lights and not much more room.
Once seated, I tapped my fingers to my knee. I’d done something wrong. Blown out the first shimmering light I’d seen on her and that made something sour curdle in my stomach.
“This was nice of you. To invite me here,” she said. Her hands brushed down her arms and she scanned the small dessert bar, never stopping on one thing for too long before moving on. “I can’t believe you bought everything.”
I shrugged and looked at the dessert trays being loaded. It was ridiculous. “What can I say, I have a sweet tooth.”
“You did that for me.”
&nbs
p; I shrugged. No point in arguing. “So?”
She blinked then and pushed her lips to one side. “It’s been a long time since anyone’s done something nice for me.”
The urge to pull her into my arms and comfort her until she never felt any more sadness threatened to unravel me.
“Your chardonnay and water.” I jolted from the interruption. “We can either bring out your order at once, but it will require to set up a stand of trays, or in shifts. Do you have a preference?”
Hell yeah, I did. I grinned at Lilly and I swore she read my mind.
“All at once please,” she said.
When the server left, Lilly eyed my glass with a look I could only translate as desire.
For wine?
“You can try it.” I pushed it toward her, but she grabbed her water and cupped it in her hands.
“No.”
“You don’t drink?”
There was a sharp edge to her tone as she said, “Did you forget where you saw me tonight?” Quieter and with less force she whispered, “It’s a condition of my parole.”
Oh shit. I was such an ass. I’d totally forgotten and based on the look in her eyes, she definitely didn’t enjoy talking about it. Not that I could blame her. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”
“It’s fine.”
It wasn’t. “I’ll have them take it back.”
“No. Don’t.”
“If it’s tempting—”
“It’s not.” She exhaled and shook her head. I’d already told her we knew she was in prison, but she didn’t know how or how much we knew about how she ended up there. Still, I watched her battle her words, her decisions, before she said, “I’m not an alcoholic. I’ve just never had wine. But I can’t, so…” She shrugged, sipped her water and focused on the server carting out a three-level stand.