by Zoe York
“Conference calls you’re not supposed to be having,” Brynn added.
“I can still have calls,” Ava said. She frowned at Evan. “I’m not CEO and I have to make pies, but the trust didn’t say anything about not working for Carmichael Enterprises at all.”
He nodded. “But don’t get too many things scheduled on your calendar,” he said.
“Why not?”
“Because your boyfriend is going to be taking you out and making sure you have some fun, remember?”
Ugh. Cori remembered. And hated it more every time she heard it.
“Right.” Ava, on the other hand, seemed exasperated. “Fine. But we need to put together a schedule for things so that I know when I can work and when I can’t.”
Evan shook his head. “That’s part of the deal. A little less planning, a little more spontaneity in your life.”
“Argh!” Ava ran a hand through her hair and looked around the kitchen again. “Let’s get out of here for now. I can’t start making anything without supplies.”
“There should be enough here to get started,” Evan said. “After all, Rudy was baking up until a couple of days before he…” Evan trailed off, cleared his throat, and finished, “…up until just a couple of weeks ago.”
For a moment Evan looked overcome. But Cori made herself stay put. It would not be a good idea to grab her sister’s boyfriend and hug him tightly. But damn, it was difficult. She wasn’t very good at squelching her urges.
“I’m just going to pretend that there’s a really good reason for me not to dive right in to baking today,” Ava said. “You know, other than the fact that I have no idea what I’m doing and will likely suck at it.”
And then Evan, being the nice, sweet guy that he was, stepped toward his girlfriend, put an arm around her shoulders, and said, “I’m guessing you’re not used to not knowing what you’re doing and sucking at things.”
Ugh. Yuck.
Ava smiled up at him. “No, not really.”
Gross.
Evan squeezed her and started for the door with his arm around her. “You’re going to be fine. It’s just pies. You can do this. And we’re all here for you.”
Ick.
Cori hung back, took a couple of deep breaths, gave herself a pep talk about only wanting Evan because Ava had him, and then started after them.
But when Evan kissed Ava goodbye on the lips, beside the limo, in full view of the diner, Cori actually said the ugh out loud. And then had to tell Brynn that it was nothing.
The limo had to go to the house since all of their bags were in it, but Cori volunteered to drive Elvira home. Evan gave the limo driver the address and directions—which were, “go a couple of blocks, take a left, it’s the fourth house on the right”, and then stepped back as they pulled away.
Cori was scrambling to get into Elvira before he came over and said something sweet and flirtatious to her. She wasn’t even sure he was aware of the fact that he was flirting with two sisters. Because ugh. Even if one was pretend. Though it didn’t seem entirely pretend with Ava. It seemed like Evan Stone just couldn’t shut it off.
“Need help?” he asked as she failed, again, to get the key to unlock the door.
She fumbled with the keys. “Nope, I’m good.” Then they dropped to the ground. Well, who the hell had old-fashioned car keys anymore? What happened to keyless entry and fobs and stuff?
She bent to retrieve them, but Evan got there first. He rose with the keys in hand. “You sure?”
“Absolutely sure,” she said, focusing on the car door instead of him as he inserted the key, turned it, and opened the lock.
He pulled the door open and stepped back to let her in. But before she slid into the seat, he moved in close. “Cori.”
Don’t look up. Seriously.
But she did. “You shouldn’t stand like that,” she told him.
“Why?”
“Because it looks like you’re going to kiss me. And you can’t.”
His gaze flickered to her mouth. Then he sighed. And didn’t deny that’s what he’d been thinking about. And stepped back.
Cori managed to shake her head and shut down the say to hell with it and kiss me anyway thought. “I’d better go or Brynn will claim the best bedroom without drawing a single straw.”
“You girls draw straws to make decisions?”
“Yeah, but we always make sure she wins anyway,” Cori said, sliding into the seat.
“You let Brynn win?” Evan asked. “Why?”
“Because she never asks for anything or makes any demands,” Cori said. “And she’s going to be stuck living with me and Ava in the same house for the next three hundred and sixty-five days. She deserves the best bedroom.” She started the car as Evan laughed.
“Well, look at it this way, today’s more than half over. It’s more like three hundred and sixty-four days.”
Right. But who was counting? Oh, just the girl who had to resist this guy for at least one hundred eighty-two days.
Chapter 5
It wasn’t right for a guy to think “oh, shit” when he saw his mother. But that was exactly what went through Evan’s mind when he saw his mother approaching the pie shop from the opposite direction three days later.
In part, because she was with Jill’s mother, Holly, and Jill’s best friend, Liz.
And in part, because he was lying to her about his relationship with the woman who she was no doubt heading to the shop to meet.
Evan lengthened his strides and managed to reach the women on the sidewalk before they got to the pie shop door. “Hi, Mom,” he said with a huge smile. “Ladies.” He gave them all a quick smile as he leaned in and kissed his mother’s cheek. “What are you doing here?”
Diane Stone looked a little sheepish having been caught trying to meet her son’s girlfriend without him present. “We decided we were in the mood for pie,” she said, glancing at her longtime friend, Holly.
Holly nodded. “We were so happy to hear that the pie shop was open again.”
“They’re not open again just yet,” he said focusing on his mother and trying to sound regretful that he was going to thwart this particular attempt to ambush Ava. “Soon. The girls are working hard to get it cleaned up and ready for business again.”
“Are you sure they’re not open?” Holly asked, looking past Evan’s shoulder to the front of the shop. “There sure are a lot of people in there.”
Evan glanced toward the huge window as well. Then paused. There definitely were a lot of people in there. And one of them was Cori Carmichael. And she was, finally, in blue jeans. Kind of. She wore what looked like they’d once been jeans but had been cut off for shorts. The white fringes hung from the bottoms, brushing long, smooth, tanned thighs. Thighs that were streaked with green and pink paint that matched the façade of the pie shop. She was also wearing a fitted baby-blue tank top with a long sleeved white button-down shirt—also streaked with green and pink—open over it. Her hair was piled on top of her head in a messy bun, but a long strand escaped as she tipped her head back and laughed.
Holy. Shit. For a second Evan couldn’t think of anything other than that. But the next second it hit him that he’d been coming to see her. That shouldn’t have been a revelation, of course. He should know why he was going somewhere. He’d left his office and turned in this direction with the purpose of coming to the pie shop. But he’d ignored the fact that he’d wanted to see Cori. Not Ava. The woman he was supposed to be dating. The woman he was now going to have to act boyfriend-ish with in front of his mother and two women who would really like for him to not be serious about Ava. Dammit.
“Weren’t you on your way in?” Holly asked.
He had been. Because Parker had called to tell him that the back door of the pie shop and the back door of the diner were both open and he’d heard glass breaking and swearing coming from the pie shop’s kitchen. When Evan had asked why Parker didn’t go check on things, he’d laughed and said that was above his
pay grade. Since Evan didn’t know, without looking it up, what Parker was getting paid as the manager of Blissfully Baked, he couldn’t argue.
And it had been the perfect excuse to come down and see his girlfriend’s sister.
Evan rolled his eyes. “I am,” he finally answered. “Had a break and wanted to see how the cleanup is going.”
“Well, even if there’s no pie, coffee sounds good,” Holly said. “And it looks like they’re serving that.”
Evan was able to look back in the window and not just see Cori this time. Now he took a quick attendance and realized that all of the guys who used to hang out with Rudy were inside. Parker had to be happy about that at least. They weren’t taking up booth space and wanting constant refills at the diner.
“I guess it does,” Evan had to admit.
“Oh, and while we have you, we’d love to have you over for dinner tomorrow night. Your mom and dad are coming too,” Holly said.
Diane nodded.
“I’ll have to see if Ava has plans for us,” Evan said. She would. He’d make sure of it. “But maybe.”
“Oh. Ava,” Holly said. “I guess I was thinking it would be nice to have you over to catch up. It’s been a while.”
Evan lifted an eyebrow. “Just you and Larry and mom and dad and me?” he asked, knowing that was not what she’d meant.
“And Jill, of course,” Holly said.
Yep, that was what she’d meant.
“She might be leaving in a few days, you know,” Holly added.
He definitely caught the might. And the unspoken words unless something changes her mind.
Evan gave her a smile. “I don’t know how Ava would feel about me having dinner with a beautiful woman I have a history with.”
“Oh, you and Ava are really that serious already?” Holly asked. “She got you on a short leash quickly.”
“Well, maybe she knows how much wandering he does,” Liz said. “Even as recently as a couple of weeks ago.”
Technically, Jill had “wandered” over to his place, but he didn’t think pointing that out was a great idea. Both Holly and Liz were looking at him with barely disguised disdain. Evan sighed. He couldn’t even blame them. He’d slept with Jill and, according to the rumor already going around town, broken her heart. The whole story about him, Jill, and Ava had been startlingly easy to spread. And it seemed the town in general had no trouble believing that Evan had done Jill wrong. But it was, apparently, harder for them to believe that it was because he was madly in love with someone else.
He definitely needed to sell the idea that he’d already been interested in Ava because of the things Rudy had told him and that it had become much more once they’d met. For one, because while Jill was the leaving town, on to bigger and better things, Holly and Liz weren’t. Ever. And they could make his life very unpleasant if they held a grudge. For another, the more skeptical everyone seemed over his ability to actually have real feelings for a woman, the more determined he became to prove to them that he was, in fact, capable of a committed, adult relationship.
And then he remembered that he and Ava were faking the whole thing. And then he became even more determined to actually be a boyfriend to Ava. Maybe not in the usual sense of the word—at least in his usual sense of the word—but he could be there for her as she went through this transition in her life, help her adjust to living in a small town and running a new business, and make sure she relaxed and had fun too.
In fact, he had to. That was part of their deal.
“This thing with Ava…was unexpected…” Well, that was true. “…for me too.” He glanced at the window and saw Cori, a hand propped on her hip, talking to the men at the table, all of whom seemed to be hanging on her every word. “It’s amazing how quickly a bond can be formed, though,” he said, not talking about Ava.
Cori was going to be a definite wrench in his Ava plan. Of course. Because he was naturally drawn to fun. Especially when he was supposed to be doing something responsible.
“You’re not just filling in as the guy she needs to date to get her millions of dollars?” Liz asked.
He turned his attention back to the women on the sidewalk. “It’s billions, actually,” he corrected dryly. Then added, “And once you meet Ava Carmichael, I think you’ll agree that she doesn’t need to ask anyone to ‘fill in’ for that. Or for any other occasion. Ever.”
That was true enough. Ava had agreed to this plan because it was a simpler means to the end. Not because she wouldn’t have had any other eager, temporary-boyfriend candidates. The guys in Bliss would have been lining up to spend six months with her.
“I went to New York to help her and her sisters understand the will, and I was prepared to be their liaison for anything they needed here, and their friend. But once we met, it became much more.” That was true too. They’d met and formed this plan. Which was more than just showing her around town or keeping track of the trust from a legal perspective.
It was him spending time with and committing to a woman for more than sex. Or, more accurately, for something other than sex. It was her settling him down and teaching him to be a boyfriend and not just a hookup, dammit.
Which was not something Cori could help him with.
Evan frowned. Where had that come from? That thought was completely unwelcome and probably unfair. He only knew what Rudy had told him about Cori, and he got the impression that neither Rudy nor Cori had really known the other that well. And just because Rudy had mentioned that Evan and Cori had a lot in common didn’t mean they had everything in common. Evan only went for short-term flings and fun, but that didn’t mean she did. And hell, there was nothing wrong with that anyway. She was a gorgeous, adventurous woman who liked to have a good time. So what if she didn’t know how to make a commitment or have a long-term relationship? He was hardly one to judge.
And none of it mattered at all. Ava was the one he was involved with. With Ava, it was a win-win situation. Cori and her feelings about relationships and settling down had nothing to do with him. Even if it felt like it all really mattered anyway.
“Anyway, I definitely shouldn’t be having dinner with another woman,” he told Holly. That was also true. He was serious enough about this relationship with Ava and what it meant for both of them to not fuck it up. He hoped.
“Well, then I’m even more interested to meet her. Since we also haven’t seen you out together. At all,” Holly said.
Right. The public appearance thing. The being in love in front of people. They were going to have to do that. Convincingly. Evan nodded. “She’s been very busy, relocating her life here, getting the shop up and running, dealing with her grief.”
He’d laid that on a little thick, but Holly did have the decency to look slightly abashed with that reminder of all that Ava was going through.
“Of course,” Holly said, her tone gentler now.
“Maybe we should come back another time,” Diane said.
Evan gave her a grateful smile. “That might be best. Maybe next week sometime.” After he’d had a chance to talk to Ava about how they were going to act in public. It might be best for them to not be overly touchy-feely. That would require less acting and would mean less chance of screwing something up. Ava was beautiful, but they didn’t have much chemistry. Every bit of this won’t be so bad that he’d felt in the hallway outside of her apartment had been because it was really Cori that he was feeling it with.
And there he was with Cori on his mind again. Or still.
“If you’re this serious, then there’s no reason for her not to say hello to your mother,” Holly said, pushing past him. “We won’t stay long.”
Evan sighed. Ava was a bright woman. She knew what was going on. Surely she’d be able to act happy to see him. “Fine. A quick hello.” He put a hand on his mother’s back and steered her around Holly to the door. When he pulled it open, he was surprised by the merry tinkle of a bell overhead. He looked up. Rudy had never had a bell. Then he was hit by the
smell of fresh paint.
He hadn’t been able to see the entire shop through the window…okay, that wasn’t true. He hadn’t looked past Cori to see anything else about the shop.
Now the scene inside made him think of a preschool. There were bright pastel colors everywhere, it was a huge mess, several voices were talking at once, and someone was saying, “Okay, hold up your cups if you want more” in an upbeat, yet firm voice.
He zeroed in on that voice. Cori. She was refilling the coffee cups that had been hoisted into the air over one of the tables. That table had been pushed to the side, off of the huge plastic drop cloths that covered everything else. There were buckets of paint, brushes, two ladders, a long-handled roller, several rags, and paint trays scattered throughout the room. The wall behind the counter had been painted a robin egg blue, the wall to his left was the same green as the front of the shop, the wall behind him—he noted as he turned to take it all in—was a sunshine yellow, and Brynn was up on a step stool painting the last wall bubblegum pink.
“Hi.”
He focused on Cori again. She was coming toward him with a bright smile and a coffeepot. Two of his favorite things. Smiles and coffee. Not Cori and coffee. No, of course not.
“Hi.”
“What do you think?”
“I think it looks like a rainbow tornado hit the place,” he said with a grin.
She nodded and laughed. “Right? But hey, if the town likes bright colors, we thought, why not? The trim and the floor will be white. So will the chairs and tables, but we’re going to do different colored cushions on the chairs. Mix it up. Like a giant crayon box got dumped out.”
Her grin was contagious. “I didn’t know you were open for business,” Evan said, looking pointedly at the men sitting at the table.
She shrugged. “The door was unlocked, these guys came in and asked if I had coffee, which of course I did, and so they pulled out chairs and sat down.”
“She asked me if I wanted caramel and cream in mine,” Walter said. “I said I’d never tried it and she said that she couldn’t let me leave here without at least one cup.”
