by Liz Isaacson
“Are you?” he asked.
Her eyes flew open. “Of course not.”
“Then I’ll be your boyfriend at the party…and around town…and when we go out.”
“What about church?” All her siblings had someone to sit by at church, and Berlin was growing weary of sitting next to Wren just to help with her niece.
“Oh, well….”
“Come on,” she said, somewhat teasing. “You’re a good ol’ Southern boy. You expect me to believe your momma didn’t make you go to church?”
“She did.”
“But you don’t go now.”
“I sort of…fell out of the habit over the years.”
“Maybe you’d like to fall back in, with me.”
A pause came through the line, with only a single bark sounding in her ear. “Is that Honor?”
“She just needs to go out.”
Berlin waited, knowing Cole would come back to what she’d said. At least she hoped so.
He exhaled. “Your faith is important to you.” He wasn’t asking.
“It is.”
“I…was like that once. I could try it again.”
Berlin’s face exploded into a smile. “This Sunday?”
“What time?”
“Ten-thirty.”
“You realize I’m on call. I might not be available every Sunday. All of that.”
“I know, I know.” She sat up and stroked Brownie and then Cocoa, who both lay on the end of her bed. “But I think it’s important that we’re on the same page with church before we go any farther.”
“I’m okay with that,” he said.
Berlin couldn’t believe this gentle giant had been living in Brush Creek for two years and they hadn’t met. Of course, she’d only been back in town for twelve months, but still.
“Thank you,” she said. “I’ll respect whatever you decide to do, but the pastor is really great. And the choir will blow your mind.”
“Oh, wow. I think you said the same thing about your sister’s potato salad, which I’ll get to eat on Saturday. Maybe I won’t make it to church.” He laughed, and Berlin joined him before finally saying goodbye and falling back on her bed, her phone clutched to her chest.
As she laid there, she realized she’d never felt like this about anyone before. This level of spark, this many jitters just thinking about seeing him, this much happiness coursing through her. She’d heard her sisters talk about this feeling, but she hadn’t truly understood it—until now.
“But you’re not in love with him,” she whispered to herself as she crawled beneath the comforter and snuggled in to bed. It was much too soon for that. But she felt herself slipping in that definite direction, much more than she ever had before, even with men where she’d had fantastic first dates and seemed to have a lot in common with.
“I guess we’ll see, right guys?” she said to her dogs as they came to lie on either side of her. She fell asleep with fantasies of her and Cole holding hands as their four dogs ran through the park.
Chapter Eight
Berlin stayed on Cole’s mind every waking minute. While he filled out paperwork. While he joked with his officers. While he got a lecture from his secretary for not putting a flag out in front of her house on Flag Day.
He’d tried to explain to her that the scouts only did the homes that had signed up, but it was a fruitless argument. Lesli insisted she’d signed up, and Cole had personally put a flag on her front lawn on Friday by lunchtime.
He worked feverishly on Saturday morning, hoping to get ahead since he’d be gone for the party and then tomorrow for church too. He had good captains and lieutenants, and he didn’t need to be at the station twenty-four-seven. He simply liked it. Had always lived that way. But he was starting to realize that if he wanted a relationship with Berlin—and he did—his work schedule had to be adjusted.
She’d asked him to come to her house and they’d go to the party together. When he arrived, the front door was open and her two dogs lay at the bottom of the steps, in a patch of shade from the trees edging her yard. He smiled at them, her cute pups bringing him a measure of joy that some would’ve classified as a bit crazy.
“Come on, guys. Go to the back.” Both of his dogs rode in the front seat of the SUV, and Honor always went first, and Sarge waited for her to hop into the back seat. Cole got out and went around the back to open the rear door on the passenger side.
His dogs jumped down and hurried over to Berlin’s, and the four canines circled each other for a minute. “Stay here, guys.” His dogs wouldn’t run off, and it didn’t seem like Berlin’s would either.
Cole climbed the front steps and peered inside. “Hey, anyone here?”
“In the bedroom!”
Well, that was one place he wouldn’t be going. “So I’ll take the dogs out back then?”
“Yes, please. I’m almost ready.”
Cole turned back to the animals and said, “Come on, guys.” His dogs came, and hers followed. When they were in the back and he’d seen the three bowls of water Berlin had already put out, he went back in the house.
Berlin came down the hall at the same moment, wearing a bright pink party dress. Her hair framed her face nicely. With her eyelashes and the copious amounts of makeup, she looked both sophisticated and soft, and Cole’s breath stuck in his lungs.
“Well, look at you.” He inched toward her, his fingers twitching to draw her close, hold her there, kiss her until he couldn’t think straight. Of course, that was how he’d felt the other night after only one kiss.
“Too much makeup, I know.” She flashed him a smile that was tight around the edges and picked up her keys.
“You’re driving?” he asked. “I parked behind you.”
“Oh, no.” She put the keys back on the kitchen counter. “I’m not driving.” She smoothed down her skirt and looked around. “Okay, um.”
Cole smiled at her nerves—it was nice to see her a little bit out of her element. Everything she did seemed to be flawless, even the fact that she’d claimed to be almost a quarter of the way finished with the police audit after only a week.
He drew her into an embrace and said, “Just breathe, sweetheart. It’s just a family party.”
“It’s my father’s retirement party,” she clarified as she pressed her cheek to his chest. “It’s a very big deal for us.”
While Cole couldn’t really understand, he said he could. “Just tell me what to do, and I’ll do it,” he added.
“Just hold my hand on the way in,” she said. “Stay close to me.”
“Hold your hand. Stay close.” He hooked his thumb toward her back door. “Dogs secure.”
She looked up at him and stretched up to kiss him. This was a chaste union of their mouths, and he felt her need to simply anchor herself. So he let her set the pace, and he gave her whatever she needed. She ended the sweet kiss and rested her forehead against his collarbone.
“All right.” Berlin drew in a deep breath. “Let’s go.”
The drive from her place to her parent’s only took a few minutes, and she talked about her grandparents. She’d mentioned them last night, as it had been her grandmother who’d taught her how to cook. She’d spoken of them with fondness, and Cole found himself wanting to be part of a family again.
He spoke to his parents, his brothers, fairly regularly. But it wasn’t the same as having someone to get together with on the weekends, after work, or just when he didn’t want to be alone.
Cole had never thought he would have a problem with going home alone. But the more time he spent with Berlin, the more he disliked his quiet house and empty office.
“Pull over here,” she said, and he eased to a stop behind another SUV. “We’ll have to walk.” She nodded toward a mansion at the end of the street, only about a hundred yards away. “It’s not far, but it seems like all of my siblings beat us here.”
“We’re not late, are we?” He unbuckled and got out of the car, alarm blipping through him.<
br />
“No, we’re fifteen minutes early.” She met him at the front corner of the hood. “Welcome to the Fuller family.” She gave him that strained smile, and he slipped his hand into hers.
They walked down the street and up the circle driveway to the front door. Berlin went inside, and Cole expected a wall of noise to hit him, the way it had at Teddy’s. But it was fairly quiet just inside the doors.
“Grams,” Berlin said. “What’re you doing in here?” She stepped to the left, where a sitting room provided a good escape from the rest of the house.
The old woman looked up at Berlin, a weathered smile wrinkling her face. “Oh, Berlin. I was sent to wait for you.” She stood, using the arm of the chair to steady herself. “You must be Cole.”
Surprise streamed through him, but he stepped forward and shook the woman’s hand. “I am. And you must be….” He tossed a glance at Berlin, but she didn’t come to his rescue. “Grandma Ebony, yes?”
A smile touched her lips again. “I wasn’t really sent here to wait for Berlin.” Her blue eyes sparkled like cold diamonds.
“No?” He chuckled. “Are you telling me I don’t want to go into the backyard?” If anyone ever asked, he’d lie about the slight trepidation tripping through him.
“Oh, my daughter expects perfection from imperfect humans.” Grandma Ebony took his hand between both of hers. “She should be calmed down by now. After all, the guests will be here soon.”
“Come with us,” Berlin said, linking her arm through her grandmother’s. “And I guess you know Cole.”
“The Chief of Police.” Her grandmother moved forward with Berlin, and Cole went behind them. The house had a personal touch to it, with family pictures and whimsical décor on the walls. It seemed her mother loved Paris or France, as there were multiple items in French or with the Eiffel Tower on them.
The kitchen was massive, with pictures of grandchildren stuck to the fridge with colorful, homemade magnets. Again, a pinch of yearning hit him for something he didn’t have—didn’t even know he wanted.
Maybe his mama had been right to badger him and his brothers about getting married and giving her some grandbabies.
They moved through the kitchen and through a set of double French doors which led into an outdoor kitchen. These Fuller’s had some serious money, and Cole’s muscles tightened as Grandma Ebony stumbled a bit on the cobblestone steps. His hand flew out to steady her, and Berlin gave him a grateful look.
“Stay on the path, Grams,” she said. Berlin approached a long picnic table with dozens of chairs surrounding it. A few people sat at the picnic table, but most of them hung out in the camp chairs and loungers. Kids ran on the expansive lawn, way out by the tall trees, and dozens of round tables had been set up in the space in between.
A blonde woman—clearly the one in charge—said something to a couple of other women, and they went to do whatever she’d said. Berlin’s mother.
“There you go. Sit here by Gramps.” Berlin leaned over and gave her grandfather a kiss, then slipped her hand back into Cole’s. The older man followed her movement and looked up at them. “Do you guys know Cole Fairbanks?” She squeezed his hand, and Cole put on his most charming smile, the one he used whenever he had to make a public appearance and wanted to come off as friendly.
“Nice to meet you,” he said, shaking her grandfather’s hand. He surveyed the party, checking for ways into the yard and ways out before he realized he wasn’t working security at this event.
“Aunt Berlin!” A swarm of kids ran toward them, and Berlin laughed as she swept a couple of the smaller ones into her arms.
“I got a new puppy,” one of them said while another told her about an art project he was doing for his preschool class. She spoke to all of them, handed out hugs like they grew on trees, and then everyone sort of stilled and every eye focused on him.
“Hey,” he said, kids completely outside of his wheelhouse. Berlin had mentioned nieces and nephews, but Cole was utterly unprepared to deal with them.
“This is my boyfriend,” she said. “Cole.”
“He’s a police officer,” one of the older boys said.
Cole crouched in front of him. “How do you know?” He wore his cowboy hat and casual clothes.
“You came to my school,” the boy said simply. “You had your dogs.” He glanced around like Cole would’ve brought two German shepherds to a retirement party. “You don’t have them here, do you?”
Cole laughed and tousled the kid’s hair. “Nope. But I take ‘em to the park a lot. Maybe I’ll see you there.”
The boy’s face lit up and he said, “All right. Cool,” before running off.
Cole straightened and watched them all follow him before turning back to Berlin. She looked at him with wonder on her face, and he said, “What?”
“You go to schools?”
“All the time.” He shrugged and stuffed his hands in his pockets. “I mean, not here, because there’s only like, four schools here, but yeah.”
She slid her hands up his chest, obviously forgetting where she was. Still, his blood tingled in his veins and he couldn’t look away from her.
“What else do you do that I don’t know about?”
A lot of things, actually, but he thought he’d save the boring staff meetings and gun safety classes for another time. Instead, he said, “Boy Scouts.”
“You’re a Boy Scout?”
“I am. But I meant I’m a Scout leader now. I work with thirteen-year-olds. That flag on your parents’ front yard? My boys did that.”
Berlin looked impressed, and before he knew it, she’d stretched up and kissed him. Kissed him like they were alone and not standing in the middle of a party, with dozens of witnesses.
He cleared his throat and stepped back despite the fact that everything in him wanted to keep kissing her. “Okay.” He chuckled and glanced around. He was used to having a lot of people looking at him, but this felt different. These people were her siblings, her parents, her friends.
“Hey, Chief.”
He spun to find a familiar face. Finally. “Milt.” The relief in Cole’s voice could’ve been heard in the next county over. He shook the man’s hand. “Good to see you.”
Milt looked to where Berlin stood behind Cole. “And you. I wasn’t sure you’d be able to make it.” His gaze wandered back to Cole, and his blue eyes were sharp.
“Yeah. I’m…well, I’m here with your sister.”
Milt’s jaw twitched. “I saw.”
Humiliation ran through Cole and he couldn’t help the way his own jaw clenched. He had no idea what to say, but it didn’t matter. Milt stepped past him and gave Berlin a hug that lasted entirely too long. When he finally stepped away, he didn’t look back and Berlin had turned the color of a ripe tomato.
Cole suddenly wanted nothing more than to leave this party. At least he’d already lasted more than ten minutes. He sighed and turned away, wondering what in the world had possessed Berlin to kiss him so intimately in front of everyone.
“I’m sorry.” She stepped to his side, her voice barley reaching his ears. She didn’t touch him, and he felt a gulf between them now where there’d been nothing before.
“Should I go?” He spoke without moving his mouth.
She sighed and gestured to three women striding toward him, one of which would be delivering a baby soon.
“You can’t.” She looked up at him and then back to the approaching women. “Those are three of my sisters.”
Chapter Nine
Berlin had never felt so foolish, even when she’d endured a family party where her mom and dad tag-teamed her about Gray’s age and how she was in no way fit to be a mother to a teenager at age twenty-three.
There had been a lot of questions and threats of pulling her tuition money and the whole family had witnessed it. Thankfully, Berlin had been able to go back to Colorado Springs to finish her last year of college, and well, her parents had been right.
And here she was aga
in, parading around a man ten years older than her. Kissing him in front of the whole party. Her stomach twisted, and she could barely breathe.
The stiff way Cole held his body indicated that he was furious with her and barely holding it together. She expected the beast to appear at any moment, but he shook hands with Wren, Fabi, and Jazzy, looking between the twins a couple of times.
“Different hair,” he said. “Let’s see. Berlin said Fabi has the short hair.” He flashed a look at her but their eyes didn’t truly meet. “Right?”
“Right on, Chief.” Fabi gave him a warm smile and then looked at Berlin with all kinds of statements in her gaze. “Can I steal you away for a second, Berlin?”
“Oh, I—”
“Two minutes.” Fabi latched onto her with the strength of alligator jaws, and Berlin tossed a helpless glance at Cole. But he didn’t even look at her. Definitely mad about the kiss. As he should be.
“What are you doing?” Fabi hissed as she walked.
Berlin considered playing dumb, but too much teemed inside for her to blow off. “I don’t know,” she moaned. “He’s just so….”
“Sexy?”
“Surprising,” Berlin said. “I wasn’t expecting him to be so personable.” He’d been nice to her at the summer fair, sure. Even gone through with the date. But it had been a nightmare, a complete one-eighty from the following date.
“Well, sucking face with him in front of the grandparents was a bad choice.”
“I just sort of lost my mind.”
“Don’t let Mom hear you say that, because she’s already quite unhappy with the idea of you and Cole.”
“Why? He’s younger than Gray.”
“Still a lot older than you.”
“Neither of us cares about that.” Berlin scanned the yard but couldn’t find her mom. It didn’t matter. Last time, she agreed with them about certain points when it came to Gray. But there was nothing she didn’t feel right about when it came to Cole. She was an adult. She didn’t need their permission to date a man. He was the Chief of Police for crying out loud.
