by Lizzie Shane
She frowned. “We are?”
“Sure. I aggravate you. You tolerate me. Friends.”
* * * * *
Friends. Andi had never thought of Ty Walker as a friend before, but over the last forty-eight hours he’d certainly stopped being just an employer. Maybe friends was the best word to define what they were right now, but it still felt inadequate. Like that simple syllable was utterly incapable of encompassing all the layers of this ambiguous, constantly morphing thing between them.
“Are you sure you don’t mind the pull out?”
He looked back to where his daughter slept. “Actually I think I will just make a place on the floor. Those rugs look thick and I don’t want to wake her up again.”
“Seriously?” She’d never seen Ty put himself out for someone else’s comfort before. Not that it was usually an issue. He made sure everyone was comfortable when he was around, but it had never been a question of sacrifice, more like sharing the bounty of his life.
“I’m pretty worn out. I’ll be asleep within seconds and the firmness will be good for my back. Do you want some help getting your bags back to your room?”
“No, I’ve got it.” Andi frowned after him as Ty put the peanut butter and crackers back in the pantry. Since when did he tidy up after himself? When he turned back around, she jerked out of her preoccupation and went to grab her bag, shaking away the vague feeling she couldn’t quite identify.
As she rolled her bag toward the hall, she was excruciatingly aware of the man uncomplainingly gathering up blankets from a stack near the stove and spreading them out in a nest on the floor.
She shouldn’t feel guilty.
She’d rented the cabin as a private escape during Alex’s wedding. Ty had invited himself along so it was his own fault if the pampered actor had to sleep on the cold, hard floor. But somehow that knowledge failed to penetrate her guilt.
It got even worse when she opened the door to the cabin’s single bedroom and saw the biggest bed known to mankind taking up almost all of the available floor space.
California King. Easily big enough for two people.
Hell, all three of them could probably sleep in the thing without touching. If Andi tried to sleep there by herself, sprawling out in that big, soft bed, all the while knowing Ty was on the cold hard floor, her conscience would keep her up all night.
She dropped her bag inside the bedroom and retraced her steps to the main room. “Ty,” she called softly.
He’d spread a blanket over Jade where she was stretched out on the couch, and even tucked a little pillow under the girl’s head. Now he stood by the bags at the door, as if trying to decide what to do with them. He looked up at Andi’s call, brows lifting. “Is everything okay?”
“You can sleep with me.” When his brows climbed even higher, she amended. “I mean, in the bed. There’s space. Lots of space. On the other side—” She broke off, her face heating. “Would you just come in the bedroom?”
She wasn’t the kind of woman who was embarrassed by logistical expedience, but Ty Walker could bring out the stammering school girl in any woman. Especially when her body was eagerly remembering that kiss.
“Are you sure?”
“Of course. It’s silly for you to sleep out here when there’s a perfectly good bed with plenty of room for both of us.”
Not that she’d be able to sleep with him lying next to her all night. Damned if she did, damned if she didn’t. Either way, Andi was looking forward to a long, sleepless night.
“I’m really fine out here—”
“Ty. Shut up and get in the damn bed.”
He grinned. “Yes, ma’am.”
Chapter Ten
Women the world over dreamed of sleeping beside Ty Walker.
They had no idea he snored.
Andi could sleep through snoring. Her husband had snored. It wasn’t the snoring that was the problem. It was that every single freaking snore reminded her how close he was. That all she had to do was roll over and she would touch him, that incredible warm mass of male muscle.
So, unsurprisingly, she slept like shit.
Sheer exhaustion should have knocked her out for at least a few hours. She hadn’t slept well the previous night and after a full day of travel and family stress she’d been running on fumes. But no. She tossed and turned, twisted and thrashed—and through it all, Ty snored.
She finally gave up and climbed out of bed around five-thirty in the morning, shivering as her bare feet hit the frigid floor. She crept out to the main room and stoked the fire. Jade’s suitcase was open beside the couch and she’d changed into flannel PJs beneath the ever-present jacket, so the girl must have woken up at some point in the night after crashing on the couch, but she didn’t stir as Andi fed the potbellied stove.
She took a hot shower, thanking her lucky stars that the cabin had a decent hot water heater, and lingered in the bathroom, drying her hair and taking time to moisturize and carefully dab on just enough make-up to make it look like she wasn’t wearing any. Not that she was making herself pretty for Ty. Or that she was trying to impress the people of Clement who had rallied behind Mark in the divorce, trying to show them all that she was still a catch—
Andi cursed under her breath, tossing down her eyeliner pencil. Okay, that was exactly what she was doing. Like an ugly duckling who wanted to look like a swan at her high school reunion, Andi wanted not just Mark but the entire town to rue the day he’d let her slip away. Though her appearance had never been the problem.
No, it was what was inside that had gotten between them.
When Andi finally emerged from the bathroom, Jade was stirring in the main room.
“Good morning,” Andi greeted her cheerfully, passing through to the kitchen where she discovered coffee grounds but no filters as she inspected the meager contents of the cabinets. “Peanut butter and crackers for breakfast?” she suggested as Jade came into the kitchen and settled at the small café table. “We’ll stock up today, but for now the pickings are pretty slim.”
Jade accepted the breakfast offerings without complaint and Andi resisted the urge to pump her for information about her life before. Were make-shift breakfasts the norm for her? Or was her aunt all about balanced diets and organic everything? Andi had managed to glean a bit more information around the edges, but Jade was still playing her cards close to the vest.
Jade nibbled in silence and Andi sipped her horrible coffee, gritty with grounds, until they both heard Ty stirring down the hall.
He entered the kitchen, fresh out of bed, looking like something out of People’s Sexiest Men Alive issue. “Good morning, beautifuls. Did you sleep well?” His eyes were still lazy with sleep—which only made the odious man that much sexier. It really wasn’t fair.
“Well enough,” Andi replied.
He grazed her back lightly with one hand as he passed—a habit she was reasonably sure he wasn’t aware of—moving toward the coffee. He frowned dubiously at the thick, unappetizing dregs in the pot, but gamely poured himself a cup.
Jade watched him, her gaze flicking back and forth between Andi and Ty, weighing something—and Andi realized abruptly how this must look to her. Jade had woken in the middle of the night to find Andi and Ty sharing the bedroom. She could very well have seen Ty kissing Andi last night at the party. And they’d told her they weren’t a couple.
She had to think they were lying to her.
Ty announced he was going to grab a shower and Andi waited until he’d wandered toward the bathroom, humming Jingle Bells to himself. Then she pulled out the other chair at the small table and sat down opposite Jade.
The sound of the shower came on, loud in the quiet of the morning, before she found the words. “You know how Ty and I said we weren’t a couple?”
Jade nodded.
“Well, we aren’t, but we’re telling people we are.”
Jade simply looked at her and bit into another cracker. The kid h
ad obviously learned how to use silence to make people open up—or maybe she was just quiet by nature. Either way, Andi found herself talking to fill the silence, offering explanations where no questions had been asked.
“I know it’s silly to pretend, but I told my mother we were dating because…well, I don’t really have a good reason—” Other than saving face. Other than trying desperately not to be a figure of pity for the next week.
No one pitied the woman dating Ty Walker.
“He likes you,” Jade commented, digging another cracker into the peanut butter jar.
Andi blushed in spite of herself. “Not like that. We’re friends.”
Though it still sounded weird to say that out loud. Somehow both inadequate and presumptuous.
Jade gave her a skeptical look. “You like him too.”
“I do. But not like that.” She was just his employee who was also trying to bully him into accepting fatherhood while pretending to be his girlfriend. “It’s complicated.”
Something shuttered in Jade’s gaze. “Because of me?”
“No. Of course not. Because of…” Everything else.
The water shut off while Andi struggled for some explanation that made sense. Until she wasn’t even sure what she was trying to explain anymore. Before she could find the words, she heard the door to the bathroom open and Ty came whistling down the hall.
He had on a T-shirt and jeans—thank God. She could not have handled the man in a towel. But he still looked like every fantasy she’d never admitted she had.
Why was it complicated? Because of Ty. Because of who he was and who she was and everything they weren’t. Because she wanted him and didn’t want to want him. Because he kissed her like she was the only woman in the world but she could never trust it because he treated every woman like that. Because it was impossible, but something inside her stupidly refused to recognize that impossibility.
But how did you explain that to an eleven year old when you didn’t even understand it yourself?
* * * * *
“Can I ride on the float with Kendall?”
Ty looked down at Jade, wondering if this was a pivotal parenting moment, having no freaking idea how to respond, until he realized Jade wasn’t asking him. Her gaze was fixed on Andi—who didn’t even glance at him before answering.
“Sure. Have fun.”
When Jade and Kendall had run off, Andi looked at Ty and rolled her eyes. “Relax, Papa Bear. They ride down Main Street on decorated trailers pulled by flatbed trucks and ATVs and throw candy at the crowd. She’ll be fine.”
“I wasn’t…”
“Worried? Protective? Feeling a teeny, tiny bit parental?” Andi linked her arm through his, tugging him through the heavy pedestrian traffic toward the parade route—though he reminded himself not to read anything into her casual hold. Her family was all around them, mingling with the crowds around the parade’s staging area. So what if having her tucked against his side felt entirely too natural? It was all a show.
At least that was one part he knew he could play. “Panicked more than parental. I never know what to say to her.”
“You’ll figure it out,” she said with more confidence than he felt.
“You seem awfully certain I’m going to have time to figure it out.”
“No one’s put out an Amber alert on Jade Garcia. Her aunt has to know where she is by now and she’s not calling the cops or even calling you to try to get her back.”
“My number’s unlisted—”
“So is your address, but her husband found that.” She squeezed his arm a little. “I’m only saying you might not want to get too fixated on the idea of sending her back to Aunt Izzy.”
“I’m not.” Not anymore. “But she’s not legally mine.” Not yet. Though he could get his lawyers on that. If the paternity test proved a genetic link…how long could a freaking paternity test take? It’d been thirty-six hours when the test was only supposed to take twelve.
“So you don’t want your daughter?”
Something sharp jabbed into his chest at those bald words. “I didn’t say that.”
“Then you’re gonna have to start being a father at some point.” She shrugged. “Like I said. You’ll figure it out.”
They wove through the mass of bodies—most of whom were too busy in a frantic rush to get ready for the parade to notice the celebrity in their midst. He’d worn a baseball cap pulled low and a parka with the collar flipped up, but in LA that wouldn’t have made a difference. There would have been paparazzi and cell phones popping out around him for surreptitious photos. Here, a couple people gave him a startled second glance, but then they’d shake their heads, as if he couldn’t possibly be who they thought he was, and they’d walk past with a friendly nod to him or Andi.
Andi got almost as many startled glances as he did and more than a few people called out greetings to her and welcomed her home. And every time someone did, she grew stiffer at his side.
“I think I like it here,” he commented as they reached Main Street, which had already been closed to regular traffic. “You’re as famous as I am.”
“I just haven’t been back in a while. Come on. There are grandstands in the square where you get the best view.”
“Were you the town darling before you left? Homecoming queen?” he teased.
“Only my senior year.”
He laughed. “You’re kidding.”
“You don’t think I’d make a good homecoming queen?”
“If it involves organizing the homecoming court, then I’m sure you’d be great, but I always pictured you as more the student body president than a cheerleader.”
“I was neither,” she said without looking at him, still tugging him toward the bleachers that had been set up along the square. “I just had a popular boyfriend. He was student body president. And the quarterback, of course.”
“You like ball players, huh? Would it turn you on to know that I was a star running back in high school?”
“Not even a little bit.”
“Good. Because I was a total theatre geek.”
She cracked a smile at that—and he felt a sharp sense of victory that he’d managed to penetrate the hard defensive shell she’d wrapped around herself this morning.
“Andi!”
A voice called her name and her face went white, her grip on his arm clamping down as her spine went rigid and her defenses snapped up to Def Con One. “Speak of the devil,” she muttered under her breath before turning toward the speaker with a brittle smile. “Mark.”
Chapter Eleven
It took Ty a moment to recognize the man in the Christmas card photo—then his own body went as stiff as Andi’s.
The ex-husband.
He was tall, though an inch or two shorter than Ty, and handsome in a blond, Midwestern way. Everything about him was tailored and polished, his teeth so blindingly white he could have starred in a dental ad. He grinned at them like a politician or a real estate agent. Someone who wanted you to like him so he could profit from his likeableness.
Ty wanted to dislike him on sight—he was Andi’s ex—but there was something inexplicably engaging in his smile. Charismatic. And earnest as he met Andi’s eyes. “It’s so good to see you,” her ex-husband gushed.
“We’re so glad you’ve come home for Christmas this year,” the woman at his side added, drawing Ty’s attention to the wife. The pretty, blonde, extremely pregnant wife. Her coat no longer buttoned over her stomach. She beamed affectionately at Andi before flicking her gaze toward Ty. “Is this your—” Her jaw dropped and her eyes got huge. “Oh my goodness. You’re on Task Force One!”
“I am,” Ty confirmed. “Ty Walker.”
“Mark and Christine Nilsson,” she introduced them both, breathless with awe.
He extended his hand to shake, which dislodged Andi’s grip on his arm, but as soon as he’d given each hand a perfunctory grip he put that arm around
Andi’s shoulders, tugging her tight against his side.
“We watch your show every week,” Christine enthused, flicking her gaze between Andi and Ty. “Are you two…?”
Ty smiled, letting his arm around Andi tell its own story. “I try to keep my personal life out of the tabloids. You understand.”
“Of course!” Christine gushed.
“I didn’t even know you knew Ty Walker, Andi,” her ex-husband added, his smile as firm and fixed as concrete.
Andi’s body was unyielding against Ty’s side. “There are a lot of things we don’t know about one another these days.” Her gaze dropped to the wife’s protruding abdomen. “Congratulations, Christine.”
The blonde blushed and spread one gloved hand over her huge belly. “Thank you. We’re so blessed I can hardly comprehend it sometimes.”
Andi smiled stiffly. “I saw your Christmas card at my parents’ place when we arrived last night. Where are your boys?”
“With their grandparents on the First Lutheran Nativity float. We’d be there ourselves, but we were afraid my water would break at any moment!” Christine giggled.
“We can’t have a live birth upstaging baby Jesus,” Andi said dryly.
Christine smiled uncertainly—as if she wasn’t quite sure whether it was sacrilegious to laugh.
“I think I see my mother saving us some seats,” Andi said, waving to someone on the risers. “Enjoy the parade.”
“You too!” Christine enthused, turning to her husband and exclaiming, “I can’t believe Andi’s dating Ty Walker,” before they were out of earshot.
“Thank you,” Andi murmured quietly, as they threaded through the crowd around the risers.
Ty wasn’t sure what he was being thanked for. He dropped his hand to the small of her back when they reached the steps and followed her up. “So that’s the ex-husband, eh?”
“And his new wife.”
Who looked enough like Andi to be related to her. It was a little unsettling—but there was a lot of blonde in the small town, so maybe it wasn’t so strange.
