Harlequin Superromance September 2014 - Bundle 1 of 2: This Good ManPromises Under the Peach TreeHusband by Choice

by Janice Kay Johnson

  Ally turned on a water faucet to mask any noise she was making.

  “I’ll be fine. Thanks.” The last thing she needed was her mother showing up here. Her mother who was too perfect to ever say she was stressed. Who took so much pride in her ability to do it all that she expected everyone else to be able to do the same.

  “Can I come in, honey?” Trish asked. “You sound awfully sad.”

  The worry in Trish’s voice became more obvious. For that matter, Ally was pretty sure she heard other voices in the background, too. Were they all talking about her? About how she was a total loser hiding out in the bathroom while the one person she cared about slipped away for good?

  She dug her nails into her forearms. Except this time, they were sticky. Like she’d stuck her arms in a vat of thick hair chemicals. What the hell?

  Looking down, she saw bright red covered both arms.

  Blood.

  She was bleeding—hard—from the scratches she’d already made on her arms. Scratches she’d never be able to hide under her friendship bracelets. There were even a few drops on the floor.

  Nausea gripped her stomach. This was bad. Really, really bad. She’d lost more than Ethan. She’d lost control.

  “Ally, I’m going to unlock the door, okay?” Trish’s voice came again.

  It was only a matter of time before her coworkers in the salon found out what a colossal loser she was. Soon, her mother would know, too. But right now, the sadness leaking out of her in blood and tears, Ally felt more relief than shame. At least now she wouldn’t have to worry about being good.

  * * *

  THE FINLEY NAME cast a big shadow in this town. Literally.

  Nina arrived at Finley Building Supply shortly before noon with a basket of cupcakes and parked under the cooling shelter of the sign overhead bearing the family name. Tough not to think about Mack when she saw reminders of him everywhere. His father had opened this store as a young man and grew the business himself along with a construction company, handing it over to his oldest son when Scott and Bethany married. The structure had been expanded multiple times until the original storefront was now just office space for the big, warehouselike building that welcomed shoppers today.

  Locking the truck, Nina hefted the basket of treats and headed toward the main entrance. She surreptitiously glanced around the parking lot, but didn’t see Mack’s car. Her dreams the night before had been full of him, memories of their kiss sparking a longing that had lingered for hours after she awoke. She couldn’t afford another run-in with him until she’d had the chance to think through what had happened between them.

  Inside the building, the scent of pine and sawdust put a sharp tang in the air. Sale signs for windows and doors hung low over bins of hardware. At the end of one row, Nina spotted a small forklift backing up, driven by a young man in a hard hat while Bethany directed him.

  Hurrying toward them, Nina waved when Bethany looked her way. Bethany spoke into a walkie-talkie and then headed for Nina. Her jeans and white T-shirt, emblazoned with the store logo, hung loosely from her thin frame, as if she’d lost weight recently and hadn’t bothered to shop for her smaller size.

  “How thoughtful of you.” Bethany’s eyes went to the basket. “A lot of workers will be thrilled to eat these.” She waved over a young woman who looked like she was taking inventory on a tablet. “Grace, will you put these on the counter in back where the guys will see them between deliveries today?”

  Like the last time they’d spoken, Bethany was polite but didn’t seem remotely tempted by the scents wafting from the basket of cupcakes. Not that everyone had to love the bakery treat of Nina’s choice. But truly? Most people did. Nina got the impression not much would put a smile on Bethany’s face these days. Grace, in the meantime, grinned ear to ear as she took the basket.

  “I came close to the lunch hour in case I could entice you out of the store for a bit.” Nina tugged her purse strap higher on her shoulder, her red sheathe dress all wrong for a casual day around town. She hadn’t quite calibrated her wardrobe back to small town Tennessee from the Upper West Side.

  Which was one of the reasons she wanted to reconnect with Bethany. She could use a friend now as she faced monumental life decisions everywhere she turned. With Gram. With her business. With her living situation.

  Funny how, even with all of that to weigh, she found herself thinking about Mack more than anything else lately.

  “Really?” Frowning, Bethany checked her watch. “Wow, it’s almost noon. Actually, I have some deliveries coming soon. Would you mind if we sat out back for a few minutes instead? There’s a picnic table, and it’s so nice outside.”

  A few minutes? And no food?

  “Is it too late to call Grace back with the cupcakes?” As soon as she said it she realized it was rude to give a gift and then ask to eat it. “Kidding,” she covered lamely. “I’d love to sit outside.”

  Ten minutes later, they had cups of water from the water cooler and cupcakes that Bethany requested on her walkie even though Nina had tried to fake like she didn’t need one.

  Nina devoured a huge bite of hazelnut yumminess while Bethany carefully nibbled the edges of her cupcake where there was no frosting.

  “You seem to have a huge amount of responsibility here,” Nina observed between bites, wishing she could have taken Cupcake Romance to the level of success that the store was obviously experiencing. “I can’t believe the size of the new building.”

  “We’ve more than doubled it.” Bethany set down her cupcake and glanced back toward the building. A delivery truck was just pulling into one of the loading bays. “I thought at the time working on the new building would bring Scott and I closer. I quit teaching so I could be here full-time.” She shrugged. “But I think, since I lobbied for the expansion, he figured I could handle the added workload. I went from occasional hours to full-time to manager in the course of a year.”

  Nina tried to put the pieces together and couldn’t make them fit. “Doesn’t he work here anymore?”

  She didn’t mean to pry, but Scott used to be a fixture at the store when Nina lived in town.

  “Unofficially? Yes, he comes in and helps with deliveries now and again.” Bethany’s posture turned stiff and she crossed her arms. “But he hasn’t collected a paycheck in years. The owners of the company—Scott and his siblings—only make money if the business realizes a profit, so you can bet I’m motivated to see that we operate in the black. Since I left teaching, the store is our only source of income.”

  “You’re obviously doing an incredible job. I wish I had half your business smarts. Maybe I’d still have a bakery business.”

  “Well, thank you.” Bethany gave a clipped nod while twisting the antenna on her walkie-talkie. “I appreciate that. I did have a lot of help from Scott when I was starting out. He taught me so much in the early years about what makes a successful business. Although, if I had it to do over again, I don’t think I would have chosen to run a hardware store.”

  Nina couldn’t miss the wistful note in her voice.

  “If Scott came back to the store, you could open a business of your own.” She remembered the thrill of those early days at Cupcake Romance, setting up all the social-media sites and deciding how the logo should look. Every day had been a new challenge and she’d worked from sunup to midnight for months straight, running on adrenaline and enthusiasm, utterly invested in her dream.

  “That would be...amazing.” Bethany came close to smiling. “Amazing but impossible.”

  Nina wanted to ask why, but maybe the problems in their marriage were too deep for Bethany to contemplate making any other changes in her life right now. It was a shame that she had worked so hard toward her husband’s dream while the whole Finley family benefitted and she grew resentful.

  “Well, I won’t press you about it. But I
’ll bet your husband would come back to the store if you chose to do something else. I remember him being here all the time when I was younger. He’s such a hard worker.” Nina had admired that in the whole Finley family. She and Mack had served on student government together long before the days when he’d helped Nina pick peaches for her grandmother’s homemade jam. Mack and Scott both took after their father, a man who had run a business before he ran the town. Their sisters also owned a business, a second-hand boutique in town, turning their love of flea market shopping into a money-making venture.

  There was no stopping the Finleys.

  Bethany’s smile was tight. “And he still works hard. He helps anyone in town who’s building a house, for example, giving out advice for free that used to be part of the contracting side of the business.” She shrugged. “Between you and me, I think Scott’s been lobbying for that mayor job since the day his father started to cut his hours at the county courthouse.”

  Nina’s vision of Scott shifted as she tried to picture the arrangement in their household. Bethany worked twice as hard to get Scott to notice her contribution. Meanwhile Scott seemed content to let her so he could do good works.

  “Sounds like being the perfect couple is taking a toll,” Nina said before she edited it in her mind. Crap. “Sorry. What I mean is that you two are both working so hard, making a positive difference in the community. But when you’re striving in opposite directions, it must be hard to reconnect.”

  She knew she was oversimplifying. Yet she felt compelled to point out something positive about their relationship. Scott and Bethany weren’t the kind of people who should split up. They had always been such a force to be reckoned with, organizing family reunions or fun-runs to raise money for local families who fell on hard times.

  “I’m sure it would be difficult—if we tried.” Bethany’s voice broke, a small sob escaping. “But when we don’t try, of course, it’s totally impossible.” She clamped her lips shut as if to hold back another outburst. Then she stuffed a big bite of cupcake into her mouth.

  There was no mistaking the frustration in her voice stemmed from more than anger. It hinted at a deep love and a deep hurt. Because who got that upset about someone they didn’t care about?

  Nina weighed her words, not wanting to say the wrong thing.

  She must have taken too long, though, because Bethany shook her head and blurted, “I have no right to burden you with my problems when I haven’t seen you in so long, Nina. It’s just that I’m not close to my family and I can’t talk about Scott to anyone at work because, well, he’s the boss here. You know? I would never undermine him like that.” She blinked fast. “I don’t want to chase you off talking about my problems. It was so nice of you to stop by today.”

  “I’m glad to see you, too. I used to be so sure you’d be my sister-in-law one day, and maybe a part of me still looks up to you like that.” She reached across the table to give Bethany’s arm a quick squeeze. “I hate that you’re going through such a rough patch right now.”

  “This year has been a real wake-up call for me. But I’m sure I’ll find a way to...get through it.” Her shaky smile didn’t seem one bit certain about that.

  “I don’t mean to overstep, but have you considered talking to a counselor about it? I’m not close with my family, either, and a counselor helped me deal with some of my issues after I left Heartache.” Nina had visited the counseling office at Manhattan College, working through Vince’s death and her parents’ abandonment in those first lonely years away from Mack. Those events still hurt, but she’d learned how to deal with them better. She took more time making big decisions, waiting to be sure she wasn’t reacting based on emotion.

  She hadn’t even peeled out of New York at the first sign of trouble. Not until she’d spoken to her grandmother and found out about Gram’s health did she decide to return home. She’d discussed it rationally with her landlord and made practical arrangements for the furniture.

  “I asked Scott to go to therapy with me once, but he’s convinced that counselors are only for people like his mom who have more...overt issues.” Bethany straightened her phone on the picnic table beside the walkie-talkie. Then straightened the walkie-talkie. The stress practically hissed off her.

  “Have you seen much of Scott’s mother since Mr. Finley died?” Nina wondered if it was common for her to lock the door when visitors came over. Or if it was just part of her illness. “His loss must have been hard on her. On all of you.”

  Had Bethany been the recipient of the same kind of scathing set-downs that Mrs. Finley had given Nina long ago? She couldn’t imagine how difficult it would be to have your husband’s mother be so antagonistic toward you. Her stomach still clenched tight to remember Mack’s mother’s words from that night.

  “She’s done better than expected, but her doctor has been monitoring her closely. And while her problems have taken their toll on us, for the most part, we’ve been able to deal with those.” She started to play with her cupcake again, turning it in a half circle and setting it down. Then rotating it another ninety degrees. “The bigger issues are the ones he and I create.”

  Nina wished she had answers for Bethany. What if she could have talked like this to her mother before her parents had separated? Would their reasons for splitting have seemed so...thin? Granted, she was no marriage expert. But if you weren’t going to battle hard for a happily-ever-after, why stand in front of the world and God and promise to do just that? Especially when a child was involved?

  “What does he say when you tell him how you feel?” She folded her discarded cupcake wrapper and tilted her face into the Tennessee sunshine. It was so beautiful here. In New York, the days were turning cold.

  At the thought of New York, she imagined tabloid journalists haunting the corner near her storefront, waiting for news of Olivia, her elopement and the jilted socialite bride. One more love affair gone wrong.

  “He doesn’t even hear me.” Bethany’s voice broke but she recovered herself, waving away the offer of a tissue from Nina’s purse. “He gave me lilacs for my birthday last year. Three days late, too, but...lilacs!”

  “You don’t like lilacs?” Nina must be missing something.

  “I’m allergic!” Bethany’s raised voice was thready and upset. “I had a major allergic reaction to them two years ago and he has zero recollection of that fact. How much more proof do I need of his indifference when he doesn’t even care if his gifts send me to the emergency room?”

  “He must have felt bad when he remembered the allergy.” Nina didn’t know what else to say. Men could be forgetful and clueless. But Scott always seemed so well meaning. She wasn’t sure Bethany would thank her for standing up for him just now, though.

  “I wouldn’t know how he felt. He was in Nashville with his mom that day. I got the flowers from a delivery truck and went into anaphylactic shock. His sister took me to the hospital and picked up Ally from school.”

  Oh, Scott.

  Did he have any idea how close his marriage was to imploding? Nina’s heart squeezed tight for both of them. She wanted to ask more, to find out how Ally was doing, but Bethany stood abruptly.

  “I’m so embarrassed for talking about me the whole time, Nina. We need a girl date where guy talk is off-limits. But there’s the delivery I was expecting.” She pointed to a tractor trailer just pulling into the parking lot, its smokestack puffing a gray cloud into an otherwise blue sky. “I should really—”

  Her walkie-talkie crackled to life, a woman’s voice suddenly blaring from it.

  “Mrs. Finley?”

  “I see the truck, Grace. I’m coming.” Bethany gave Nina an apologetic look as she got to her feet.

  “I’ll let you get back to work.” Nina rose, careful not to split the skirt of her sheathe dress as she hopped off the picnic table bench seat.

  Grace’s voice c
rackled again. “It’s The Strand Salon on the phone for you, ma’am. They said it’s urgent. Ally is hurt and they need you to come down there right away.”

  * * *

  MACK HATED HOSPITALS.

  He shoved through the main doors downstairs at the facility in Franklin, a full half-hour drive from Heartache. He understood why Bethany had brought Ally here after the girl had cut herself—purposely—at work today. But damn it. The scent of antiseptic and bleach always brought him back to the nights as a kid when his mom had an “accident” with her medicine.

  Or later, when he’d brought Jenny to this very same hospital.

  His phone vibrated—as it had every five minutes with a text from his mother asking for an update. Stalking toward the elevators, he pulled his phone out of his back pocket, tempted to heave the thing across the reception area so he didn’t have to answer it anymore. Didn’t have to pretend everything was okay for his mom’s sake.

  “Mack?”

  Nina’s voice stopped him. She appeared out of the crowd on his left, her red linen dress and heels making it apparent she hadn’t planned to spend her day in a hospital, yet here she was. Her expression looked as worried as he felt inside.

  And he couldn’t deny a rush of relief to see her, even if he still wondered what had gotten into him when he’d asked her out again. She’d always be a restless spirit with notions of the white picket fence and family he’d never be able to fill.

  “Hey.” He shoved his phone back in his pocket, another text already causing it to vibrate. “Thank you for coming.”

  She gave a jerky nod, a caramel-colored strand of her hair teasing her cheek while the elevator doors swept open and a crowd of people carrying flowers and “get well” balloons rushed to fill it.

  “I was with Bethany when she got the call that Ally had—” she gave a helpless shrug “—hurt herself.” She breathed out a shuddering sigh. “I feel so bad for their whole family. Bethany was close to the breaking point even before the call. I drove her to the salon because there’s no way she could have gotten behind the wheel.”