He paused. No, it wasn’t what he’d been expecting, but he still owed it to Bree to be honest. After all, having Sloane around for the long haul would affect Bree’s life, too. He pulled in a breath and looked her right in the eye.
“To answer your question, yes, I’m in love with Sloane. And yes, even though I think it’s something we should talk about together, I want her to stay. Forever.”
“But she won’t,” Bree whispered, and finally, Gavin got it.
“Bree, you don’t have to be afraid that anything will happen to Sloane.” He picked up her hand and gave it a tight squeeze. “It’s perfectly understandable that you’d be worried after how suddenly Mom got sick. But I promise, Sloane’s not going anywhere.”
She let go of his hand to take a sheet of paper from her nightstand, pressing her eyes shut as she held it out with shaking fingers.
“Tell that to her. She’s leaving for Greece next week.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
A bolt of unadulterated shock straightened Gavin’s spine, and he barked out a completely involuntary laugh at Bree’s words.
“That’s ridiculous. Why on earth would you think she was going to Greece?”
“Because she booked a one-way ticket. It says so right here. She’s leaving next Friday, and she’s not coming back.” Bree held the paper out, eyes brimming with tears. “She was never going to stay. See for yourself.”
A deep-seated voice at the back of his mind screamed at Gavin not to take the paper from Bree’s trembling fingers. Sloane wouldn’t leave. Sure, she’d traveled the world on a whim in the past, but things were different now. She knew how much Bree needed her, how much he needed her. She wouldn’t do that to him.
She wouldn’t do that to them.
He took the paper from her shaking hands, but didn’t look at it. “Bree, I think this is a misunderstanding. Where did you even get this?” The single piece of paper felt like a ten-ton weight between his suddenly unsteady fingers.
“I found it on the printer when I went to get my English homework. And it’s not a misunderstanding. Have you looked at Sloane’s Web site?”
His confusion deepened, shifting and kicking like a live entity. “What does her Web site have to do with any of this?”
Tears spilled over Bree’s cheeks, her mouth an angry line. “All her books are set in foreign places. And her biography page says she’s been to all of them, you know, for research and stuff. That part of what inspires her is being in all these countries and experiencing them first-hand. And that’s how she writes a book.”
Gavin’s mind took a hard tumble back to the morning when Sloane had run her fingers so reverently over the picture frames in the living room, telling him she’d walked the Via Francigena in Tuscany. France . . . Spain . . . Italy . . . she went wherever the wind carried her, whenever she felt like going. And she wrote a book, fueling her livelihood every time she went.
Oh, I spent time in Venice and Milan, too. But the whole point of the trip was to find inspiration . . .
Oh, God. Sloane had specifically mentioned the six-week time frame when he’d asked her to take care of Bree. And at the time, he’d assumed she’d say no because she had a book to write.
But a lifetime of things had happened since then. Bree had opened up to her, trusted her. And he had trusted her with the most important thing—the only thing—in his life.
Not to mention his heart.
In that moment, as Gavin finally dropped his eyes and saw Sloane’s betrayal right there in black and white, his gut seized with realization. He’d made a huge error in his assumption.
He’d never thought she would agree to stay, but then leave him and Bree anyway.
Sloane made a mad dash for Gavin’s porch, doing her best to dodge the steadily falling raindrops. She was cutting it a little close on the time for Gavin’s Sunday morning shift, but in all likelihood, if he and Bree had spent some time talking last night, then Bree would probably sleep late this morning anyway. God, she really hoped he’d been able to coax something out of Bree to ease her mind. The poor kid was probably aching for someone to talk to, and even though Sloane was more than happy to let Bree bend her ear for the girl stuff, at some point, she and Gavin were going to have to connect, especially about their mom. Sloane shook the cold rain from her blue beret, running her fingers over the soft threads with a smile as she closed her hand around the doorknob to let herself into the cottage.
The door was locked.
“What the heck?” Sloane tried the knob again, but before she could follow the failed attempt with a knock, it twisted in her palm, slipping from her grasp with a firm pull.
“Oh! Jeez, you startled me.” She laughed, but the sound met a quick end in her throat when she walked into the foyer and saw the serious look etched on Gavin’s face. “How did it go with Bree last night? Did you guys get a chance to talk?”
“Yes.” His expression betrayed nothing, as impeccably pressed as his pale blue dress shirt, but she froze midstep on the dark wood of the floorboards.
His expression might not let anything show, but his voice was a dead giveaway that something was horribly wrong.
Sloane’s heart fumbled against her ribs. “Oh, God, Gavin. Is she okay? I mean, I know she’s not okay okay, but—”
“No, she’s not.” A muscle ticked in his angular jaw, and her worry snowballed into fear.
“What’s going on? Where is she?”
“Jeannie picked her up about ten minutes ago. She was nice enough to help me out until Mrs. Teasdale comes back next week.” Gavin’s voice was utterly detached, as if he were reading a produce order over the phone.
Sloane pulled back, trying to make sense of what he was saying. Finally, she was forced to admit defeat. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”
“It’s simple, really. Bree is staying with Jeannie this week while I’m at work. We just thought you might need the extra week to close up the bungalow and pack all of your things. Since you’re headed to Greece, and everything.”
His words slammed into her with tangible force, knocking her breath loose on a gasp. “What?”
He eyed her with steely disdain as he produced a piece of paper from his back pocket, unfolding it from its precise creases. “You should probably be more careful about where you leave your flight confirmation. After all, you’re going to need it when you skip town next Friday.”
Sloane’s mind dipped and spun, screeching to a halt with realization that turned her blood to ice water. “I left it on the printer,” she blurted, remembering too late how she’d clicked the icon to print the flight itinerary the night Bree had woken from her nightmare.
Oh, God. He thought she was leaving. Which meant he thought . . .
“Gavin, I can explain.” Sloane took a wobbly step toward him, but he cut her off with a tight wave of his hand.
“I don’t want you to.” The words arrowed into her, burrowing deep in her bones and stealing her voice as he continued. “You don’t owe me any explanations. In fact, you don’t owe me anything. We had a short-term business agreement. What you do now that it’s over is none of my concern.”
“That’s what you think we had? A business agreement?” Sloane forced herself to breathe, even though both her lungs and her throat had their own agenda. No, she and Gavin had never actually discussed what was going on between them, but it sure as hell hadn’t been just business.
It hadn’t been just anything.
“You’re the one who made it clear from the beginning that sticking around wasn’t your thing, Sloane,” Gavin said, folding his arms into an impenetrable knot over his chest. “And Mrs. Teasdale will be back next week, so you’re off the hook. Feel free to go.” He aimed a pointed, icy gaze at the door, and the move kick-started her mouth into motion.
“I wasn’t going to go. I mean, originally, I was, but—”
“The flight was booked three days ago.” A hint of something dark and thoroughly angry flashed over Gavin’s face as
he lifted the paper. “So forgive me if I have trouble believing you.”
She squeezed her eyes shut, partly to escape from his expression and partly so she could think. Pure survival instinct swirled at the back of her mind, whispering that she should run, but she quashed it.
She could fix this. She had to fix it.
“I know how this looks, but you have to believe me. I wasn’t going to leave. I’m sorry that you and Bree found out like this, but I didn’t think—”
Gavin stiffened at the sound of Bree’s name, cutting her off completely. “That’s the trouble, isn’t it? You don’t think. You live your life from one impulsive decision to the next, just stirring up trouble and never thinking about the consequences. Well, I hate to break it to you, but that’s not how the real world works. Not that you’d know, because you’re too busy racking up frequent flyer mileage to sit still long enough to get it.”
Sloane winced. Just because she’d earned his anger didn’t mean it stung any less upon impact. “I know I hurt you, and I’m sorry.”
“You think this is about me?” Gavin’s frosty stare became downright glacial. “I don’t give a shit if you want to hurt me, Sloane. But if you think I’m going to sit around and listen to anything you have to say after you just destroyed my sister’s trust, you’re out of your mind. That kid cared about you, but you’re too stuck in your own selfish world to see it.”
Sloane’s eyes filled with tears, and they breached her lids to track down both cheeks as she said the only thing she could think of to make it right.
“I’m so sorry, Gavin. I never meant to hurt either of you.”
For just a breath, time melted into slow motion, a flicker of emotion making the tiniest dent in Gavin’s expression, and her chest surged with possibility and hope.
But then it disappeared, his words ripping at her as the banked emotion in his eyes turned to solid ice and he said, “Your apology isn’t good enough.”
He walked to the front door without pause and held it open, and Sloane had no choice but to walk through it and leave her heart behind.
Sloane’s suitcase had seen better days, but that had never stopped her from shoving all her worldly possessions into it. Granted, she usually had an idea of where she was headed when she zipped it up, but having a destination didn’t seem nearly as important right now as getting away from Pine Mountain. Once she was on the road, she’d be able to think, to lift the boulder-sized block of sadness off her chest and at least breathe.
Oh, God, she had to get out of here.
Windshield wipers flashed across the rain-slicked glass, the rhythmic thump-THUMP keeping time in Sloane’s head like a bad-weather metronome. She reached forward to turn the knob to the next setting, her breath leaking out of her in a slow sigh when she realized it wasn’t the rain blurring her vision, but a fresh round of tears spilling involuntarily from beneath her eyelids.
She guided the Fiat carefully down Rural Route Four. While her deeply ingrained survival instinct hollered at her to get out of Dodge as fast as possible, she wasn’t stupid enough to go speeding down the mountain like her hair was on fire. Those guardrails were high and tight for a reason, and it wasn’t to block the gorgeous views.
And besides, the slower you go, the longer you have to change your mind.
Sloane stuffed down the thought about two seconds after it surfaced. Her impulsive ways had gotten her into enough trouble, thank you very much. Recklessly turning around and begging Gavin and Bree for another chance blew right past the border of pointlessness, landing directly in the lap of total frickin’ insanity. He’d made it crystal-goblet clear that he wasn’t interested in anything she had to say, and in hindsight, Sloane couldn’t blame him.
After all, she’d proved the whole not good enough thing in spades.
As she turned off the gravel mountain road and her tires found the smooth ribbon of highway beneath them, Sloane began to cry in earnest.
Gavin sat at La Dolce Vita’s polished mahogany bar, wishing the stack of inventory sheets in front of him was a double shot of Grey Goose over ice. He’d had enough emotion in the past twenty-four hours to last him a lifetime. Considering where it had gotten him, he’d give his right arm to forget the pleasantries of his palate and go right for numb.
“Hey.” Adrian’s gruff voice yanked Gavin out of his wishful thinking, and his head snapped up in surprise. “You’ve got a visitor.”
Gavin’s pulse clattered through his veins. “We’re not open for dinner shift for another hour and a half.”
One corner of Adrian’s mouth kicked up into a half smile. “Yeah, I figured you’d make an exception for this one.” He took a step back, ushering Bree into the bar area from the dining room, with Jeannie right behind her.
“Is everything okay?” Gavin asked, concern flooding through him, but Bree was quick to head it off.
“I’m not hurt or anything. I just . . .” She turned and looked at Jeannie, who put a comforting arm around Bree’s shoulders. “We were all skiing, but the trails are really crummy from the rain, so we came inside and Mrs. Carter said maybe we could catch you in between lunch and dinner. You know, to just say hi.”
“Oh. Sure.” Gavin’s brows slid together, his worry deepening as he caught Jeannie’s troubled expression. “Are you sure everything is okay?”
Bree nodded, but Jeannie shook her head. “Bree seemed a little down, so I thought maybe coming over for a minute would cheer her up.” She gave Bree’s shoulder a squeeze before letting her go. “I’ll give you two a minute. Just come find me when you’re ready to head back to the lodge.”
Gavin’s heart took a nosedive toward his shoes as he watched Jeannie slip through the entrance to the dining room. If he was begging to be numb, it made sense that Bree would be feeling the same way. He looked at her red-rimmed eyes and sullen face, and his words came tumbling out without a second thought.
“Tell you what. Why don’t you stick around here tonight? Dinner rush is earlier on Sundays, and I can probably sneak out as soon as it starts to slow down. Plus, I bet if you play your cards right with Bellamy, she’ll let you taste some of the dessert specials for tonight. Someone in the lunch crowd actually threatened to lick her plate clean after eating a slice of her mocha cheesecake. So what do you say?”
Okay, so it was a pretty transparent attempt to comfort her, which he knew from experience would probably make her feel like a baby, but he was grasping at straws. Keeping her close and feeding her were the only two ways he really knew how to make her feel better, and selfishly, he knew it would make him feel better to have her close by. Gavin steeled himself for her response, fully expecting her to push him away.
But she shocked the hell out of him by giving a tiny nod. “Yeah. I’d really like that.” His surprise threatened to overwhelm him completely when she took a few steps forward and wrapped her arms around him, tucking her head into his shoulder.
There had been a time, God, barely months ago, when putting his emotions on display like this would’ve made him shrink back and hide. But if anything, Gavin knew now more than ever that if he wanted to be a good parent, he had to take a risk every now and then.
So he said, “Okay, sweetheart. I’ve got you. You stay right here with me, for as long as you want.”
And he held her, just like that while she cried.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Sloane got exactly twelve miles down the highway before her cell phone rang, simultaneously scaring the shit out of her and sending her hope through the roof of the Fiat. Both emotions twisted together into a tight pretzel of dread as the caller ID popped up on the hands-free touch screen in front of her.
Jacobs, Belinda, Morton House Publishers
In the flurry of wild emotions that had encompassed her morning, Sloane had completely blanked on the e-mail she’d sent Belinda about her book. Oh, God, her book. The one that had flowed right out of her, despite where she was. The one that was the exact opposite of what Belinda had asked for, an
d could ruin her future at Morton House in a single pitch.
The one she didn’t have to write, because there was nothing keeping her from getting on that plane and writing the Greece book, just like she’d said she would.
Her career was on the line, and it was the only thing she had left.
Just as Sloane was about to open her mouth to tell Belinda to forget the e-mail, her vision caught on the Fiat’s passenger seat. Brightly colored Post-it notes covered the outline she’d hastily shoved in her bag, but the purple square in the center of the page froze the breath to her lungs.
Heroine risks all for love.
Oh, God. Her career wasn’t the only thing she had left. Sloane had her heart, and even if it was broken, it was past time to start trusting that heart to be good enough. Even if it meant risking everything.
“Hi, Belinda,” Sloane finally said as she guided the Fiat toward the nearest U-turn. “I’m so glad you called. I’ve got a lot to tell you.”
Gavin made his way back to the pass in La Dolce Vita’s kitchen, narrowly dodging a harried-looking server with a full tray on her shoulder.
“Please tell me that’s table seven,” he said, hoping like hell to get an affirmative. Although they were keeping a smooth schedule, the dining room was absolutely packed for a Sunday, and the good timing they were currently enjoying could turn on a dime without warning. The server hollered a table seven, out over her free shoulder, slipping confidently through the swinging doors toward the dining room. Gavin grabbed a pair of plates from the expanse of stainless steel counter in front of him, taking the briefest of seconds to admire the pan-seared sea scallops and sunflower-yellow polenta in his hands.
“Table thirteen, scallops and polenta out the door,” he clipped, raising his voice over the din of metallic cacophony from the pots and pans being maneuvered through the kitchen.
“Wait!” Carly’s shrill command stopped him in his tracks, and he swung toward her, brows upturned.
Stirring Up Trouble Page 29
