by Jen Gilroy
“If you think Naomi would forget Ty so fast you should talk to your daughter and listen to her. As for you and me, we’re over. There’s no way I’ll move to California.”
“I made a big mistake and I’m sorry. Maybe it was one of those midlife crisis things or stress. You know how stressful my job is.” Jay reached for her and his tone was coaxing. “Come on, babe, you have to believe me. You and the girls are the best things in my life. Tiffany’s a great girl, but she’s not you.”
“No.” Mia picked up Pixie to evade his touch. “I’ve got a new life here, my life, and you can’t walk in and take it away.”
Not even if he was sorry. The word he’d never said before. The word that might once have made a difference.
“You don’t want to let people down. I finally get it, okay?” Jay took another step forward, and Mia took one back. “We’ll commute for a while. You can finish the work for Gabrielle and teach here until Christmas and move to California then. Emma’s still young so changing schools midyear won’t hurt her. As for Naomi, I talked to that boarding school and they can take her last minute. There’s a uniform so you’d have to—”
“No boarding school for Naomi, ever. You didn’t listen to anything I said. If you had, you—”
“Okay, forget the boarding school for now.” Jay gave her the look of love she’d once been powerless to resist. “You’re the most important person in my life. Without you, everything’s meaningless. I need you.”
“You think you need me. But you don’t, not really. I don’t need you either. Not anymore.”
To her surprise, it was true. She couldn’t go back to the woman she once was, even if she’d wanted to. Although it hadn’t seemed that way at the time, Jay had done her a favor. She was stronger now, more powerful, and it felt good.
“It’s Nick McGuire, isn’t it?” Jay’s blue gaze narrowed, and his smile slipped. “You’re sleeping with him.”
“That’s none of your business.”
Pixie quivered in Mia’s arms, and she stroked the dog’s head.
“If he’s around my daughters, it sure is my business.” Jay’s voice held a sneer. “He was with Emma when she had her accident.”
“We’ve already been through this.” Mia made her voice calm. “Emma had the accident because she went too far out in the lake, even though Nick told her not to. He apologized for taking her to the beach, but I said he could so it’s as much my fault as his. If Nick hadn’t been there and known CPR, Emma would’ve died.”
“Still, he—”
“It was a mistake, but it’s not as if you haven’t made mistakes with the girls. Remember when you took Naomi to the park and she jumped off the top of the slide and broke her arm? You didn’t expect a four-year-old to jump from such a height. Like I never expected Emma to ignore an adult who told her to stay close to shore.”
“Point taken.” Jay’s smile was sulky. “But what about that Kylie the girls told me about? Nick’s mixed up with her, and what kind of influence is she?”
“Kylie’s a girl in foster care. She needed help for a few days, and Nick and I, as well as his mom, met with her social worker as part of a risk assessment. If we hadn’t said we’d look after Kylie, the social worker was convinced she’d run away, and who knows what would have happened to her.” Mia tightened her grip on Pixie’s collar. “I want to make a positive difference in a child’s life, and it’s good for the girls to see not everyone’s as fortunate as they are.”
“They can help out at a food bank or a senior center. A girl like Kylie shouldn’t live in the same house as my daughters or share Emma’s room.”
“Naomi and Emma are my daughters, too, and I’d never put them at risk. Besides, Harbor House is Gabrielle’s home. Kylie’s only here temporarily, as Gabrielle’s guest, because her social worker requested it.”
“You always were too soft-hearted.” Jay’s mouth flattened into a hard line. “You’re naïve too, because all a man like Nick’s after is sex.”
“Which you’d know all about, wouldn’t you? You never wanted to have sex with me after Emma was born.” Mia spoke through stiff lips. “You’d never go for couples’ counseling either, even though I begged you.”
“I wasn’t the one with the problem.” Jay kicked a low-hanging rose of Sharon branch.
“You never understood. You weren’t there for Emma’s birth, so you didn’t see how hard it was. I needed time but—”
“The doctor said you were fine.”
“Physically maybe, but…” Mia stopped. She’d needed tenderness and gentleness, patience and understanding. Everything that wasn’t in Jay to give.
“You were frigid.” He tossed the word at her. The one he’d always used to describe what he called her “problem.”
Except, it didn’t wound her like it had before.
“This conversation is over.”
Pixie growled and showed sharp little teeth.
“I have to get to the airport, but this conversation isn’t over.” Jay turned and crushed several blossoms under one polished shoe. “I’ve apologized and admitted I was wrong. What more can I do? I want you back, Amelia. I want our family back. If you won’t agree to come back to me, I’ll fight you for full custody of the girls.”
“You…you wouldn’t.” Mia’s voice caught.
Pixie growled again, louder this time.
“Try me.” Jay raised his hand, and Mia flinched and backed away. He held his hand poised for several seconds before he dropped it back at his side.
“You travel so much for work, and you always said you didn’t want Naomi and Emma full time. Although we make decisions about the girls’ upbringing together, you agreed they would live with me here. Vacation visits were all you ever wanted.”
“I want the four of us to be a family again.” Jay’s smile didn’t reach his eyes. “I’ll do whatever it takes to make that happen.”
“What if I don’t want that family?” Mia set Pixie on a flagstone, but the dog stayed close beside her and yipped.
“You always wanted a family. You never wanted anything but a family.” He dug in a pocket of his navy chinos and fished out the keys to his rental car. “From what people say about Nick McGuire, he’s not a family man.”
Jay walked away across the grass with the swagger Mia hated, and flower blossoms fluttered in his wake.
Jay was right about one thing. She’d always wanted a family, but she and the girls were that family, and she’d fight with all she had to keep the three of them together and safe. She wouldn’t let him control her again, either.
From the driveway, Jay’s car started. Pixie growled then barked.
Mia stared at the dog for a long beat. “You looked out for me, didn’t you? You wanted to protect me.” Four pounds of fur might not be fierce, but Pixie was on her side.
Like Nick. He’d be on her side, too. But did she have the courage to trust him? Maybe the real question was if she had the courage to trust herself and trust what she wanted along with her family.
“Mom?” Nick came through the side door of Harbor House with a can of paint in one hand and a dropcloth in the other. He scanned the empty kitchen before he moved into the hall.
“In here.” His mom’s voice was muffled.
Nick went into the dining room. “What’s wrong?” She sat at one end of the long table and rested her chin in her hands.
“Nothing.” She tried to smile as she ran a finger over the cover of one of her sketchbooks. “I’m fine.”
“You don’t look fine.” Nick set the painting supplies on the floor and sat on the chair beside hers.
Her face was pale and drawn.
“Should I call your doctor?”
“No.” She flipped the sketchbook open and rifled through pages.
“These are good.” Nick took the book from her. Her usual delicate watercolors of flowers and the Vermont landscape were juxtaposed with abstract sketches and bold arcs of color across the page.
His mom too
k the book back. “I tried something different but…” Her throat worked, and she touched the soft wisps of hair against her jaw.
“Is it Ward?” If the guy had hurt her, Nick would make him pay.
Her blue eyes filled with tears. “He flies back to Seattle tonight. He had to leave all of a sudden because something came up with work.” She dabbed at her eyes with a tissue. “He said he’d come back as soon as he could so we could talk, but I told him he shouldn’t and I don’t think…”
“Ah, Mom.” Nick wrapped his arms around his mother’s shoulders where the bones protruded.
“After your father, I can’t…” Her chest heaved. “Besides, I can’t ask a man like Ward to tie himself to a sick woman.”
“You’re not sick.” Nick held her close. “You were sick, but you’re fine.”
“For how long?”
“Don’t even think that. All through your treatment you were so positive. You fought so hard.”
“I didn’t want to worry you and your sisters any more than you already were.” His mom sniffed and pulled another tissue out of the box on the table. “I’m still fighting and I’m still positive, but sometimes the disease gets you anyway. It’s not fair to ask Ward to deal with all that, a man I only met a few weeks ago who doesn’t even live here.”
“Shouldn’t that be his choice? When I was growing up, you always said go after what you want, no matter what. Don’t let anyone stop you. Do you want me to go after him?”
“No, you won’t go after Ward.” She gave him the ghost of a smile and tapped his hand with the sketchbook. “I never expected to have any of you kids give my advice back to me.”
“It was good advice.”
“Maybe he doesn’t want me. Maybe work was an excuse and he was glad to leave.” Her shoulders drooped.
“Ward’s crazy about you.”
“Nicolas.” She said the name in the French way, and her cheeks went pink.
“Well, he is. Mia said so, too. I bet she’d tell you to at least email him and explain.”
“Has Mia called you?” His mom’s eyes got a worried expression.
Nick tensed. “No. She had to do some things to get ready for school while Jay took the girls out for lunch. Why?”
“Jay dropped the girls off a while ago, and then he talked to Mia in the garden.” His mom twisted her hands together. “I didn’t mean to spy on them, but I happened to look out my bedroom window and see his face. He scared me. I think he scared Mia. The way he raised his hand…”
Nick shoved the chair back and got to his feet. “Where did she go?”
“Upstairs to talk to the girls, and then they all left in her car.” His mom’s hand shook as she gathered watercolor pencils into a holder. “Kylie’s watching a movie in the living room, but Mia didn’t stop to talk to either of us.”
“I’m sure everything’s fine.” Nick wasn’t sure at all, but he didn’t want his mom to worry. “You and Kylie stay here, and I’ll go look for them.”
“Where would they go? Sean and Ty are finishing the new kitchen at Mia’s house today.”
“I have an idea.”
“I called Mia and it went straight to voice mail.” She stood and squeezed his arm. “You try, too.”
“I will.” But if he knew Mia like he thought he did, she’d gone underground. No calls or text messages. He squeezed his mom’s arm back before he released her and fumbled in his pocket for his phone. “I’ll call you as soon as I find out anything.”
“You’ll go after what you want?” His mom eyed him, as sharp and knowing as ever. “Promise me?”
“I’ll make sure Mia and the girls are okay.”
He couldn’t go after what he wanted. Because what he wanted, he couldn’t let himself have.
Nick left Harbor House at a jog and scrolled to Allison’s number on his phone. If Jay had threatened Mia, he needed to get Allison onto the situation fast. After he left her a message to call him ASAP, he jumped in the truck he’d borrowed from Sean to haul painting supplies around and headed for Lake Road, out of town.
Fifteen minutes later, he pulled into the driveway at Camp Rainbow and cut the engine. There was no sign of Mia’s car in the empty parking lot, and the buildings were shuttered because the staff and all the campers had gone home. He got out of the truck and circled around the cottage on foot to the lake.
Mia sat on the end of the dock, with her back to him, her head resting on her knees.
Nick pulled out his phone but, as if she sensed his presence, Mia turned. He caught his breath at the expression on her face. A mix of loss, despair, and fierce determination.
He moved across the strip of beach to the dock. “I thought I’d find you out here.”
“Did Charlie tell you where I was?” Mia hugged her bare knees below a pair of black shorts that showed off those endless legs Nick couldn’t stop thinking about.
“No, I haven’t talked to Charlie. Are Naomi and Emma with her?” He toed off his shoes and socks, rolled up his pant legs, and sat beside Mia to dangle his feet in the cold water.
“With her and Lexie. I told Charlie I needed some time by myself. She understood.”
“Mom said Jay came by the house.” Nick battled to keep the anger out of his voice.
“He said if I didn’t come back to him and give our marriage another chance, he’d fight me for full custody of Naomi and Emma.”
Nick made a fist. “That’s a threat.”
“It sure sounds like it.” Her voice was devoid of emotion.
“Did he hit you?” Nick held his breath.
“No, but I thought…he looked like he wanted to. If we hadn’t been in your mom’s garden…maybe…I’ve never seen him so angry.” She stared at the water as if she didn’t see it.
“What will you do?” Nick relaxed his fist.
“I’ve already called Allison.”
“Good for you.” His heart resumed its normal beat.
“I don’t know if Jay’s serious, but I can’t take any chances.” Mia’s dark eyes were bleak.
“You won’t go back to him?” Nick fought the urge to wrap his arms around her, hold on tight, and never let go.
“Even if getting back together with Jay was right for Naomi and Emma, it’s not right for me.” A sad smile curved Mia’s mouth. “It’s not right for the girls, either.”
The pressure in Nick’s chest loosened. He had no long-term claim on Mia, but, for reasons he didn’t want to examine, he didn’t want Jay to have any such claim either. “He doesn’t deserve you.”
“No, he doesn’t. He lied to me, cheated on me, and betrayed his daughters and what our family stood for. I tried to convince myself he’d change, although he never did. But I changed, and I can’t go back to the woman I was when I was with him.”
Nick squeezed her hand. “You stood up to him. I’m proud of you.”
“I’m proud of me, too, but I’m also scared. I came out here to think because it’s a link with my mom. This cottage is the place she loved most in the world. She came here from Montreal with her parents when she was a child, but Dad…she was so unhappy with him he spoiled this place for her. Even though I didn’t plan on it, I married a man just like my dad.”
“That’s the past.”
“Yes, but until Jay left me, I never believed I had choices. He said all I ever wanted was a family.” Her gaze locked with Nick’s, her expression firm. “Jay’s right. I did want a family. I still do, but I only had one idea of what a family was, what a family could be, or what I could be.”
“And now?” Nick held his breath. Even Jay’s name made him angry.
“I’ve got my family. My girls, and Charlie, Lexie, and Sean are my family. I moved to Firefly Lake because I thought Charlie needed me, but I need her even more. And although I didn’t realize it until today, I need this place. It’s a special part of my mom and her family, and it’ll always be a part of me and my girls.”
Nick hadn’t needed Firefly Lake or Vermont. He’d broken a
way from his home, family, and friends when he went to college, and until last year, he’d never looked back. But he needed Mia, more than he’d ever needed any other woman. And maybe, like her, he needed this place with its memories and roots both good and bad.
He looped one arm around Mia’s shoulders and pulled her close. “Allison will handle Jay. It’s the kind of challenge she thrives on. After she crushes him under those spiky heels of hers, you won’t ever have to worry again. I bet she even skewers him for more child support while she’s at it.”
Mia’s eyes widened. “She seems so nice.”
“You haven’t seen Allison in court. When she’s on a mission for justice, grown men cower like little boys.” Nick laughed then sobered. “I…I…”
“What?” Mia nestled closer to envelop him in the scent of the north woods and floral shampoo. She was tender, trusting, sexy, and so sweet his heart twisted, and his desire for her became mixed with something that felt an awful lot like love.
“If Jay ever threatens you again, or if he even raises a little finger to you, call Allison or me anytime, day or night. We can slap him with a temporary relief from abuse order so fast he won’t know what hit him.”
Which wasn’t what Nick wanted to say, but he needed to put the brakes on until he figured out how to handle these new feelings for her.
“Thank you.” A faint flush stained Mia’s cheeks.
He dropped a gentle kiss into her hair. He wanted her in all the ways it was possible for a man to want a woman. Body and mind, heart and soul. But friends with benefits was what he’d said he wanted, and what she’d agreed to.
Except, it wasn’t what he wanted after all. Mia wasn’t the only one who’d changed. If she wasn’t the woman she’d been before, he wasn’t the guy he’d once been either.
Chapter Sixteen
Nick respected her. Mia read the truth in his eyes. More important, though, she respected herself in a way she hadn’t back when she’d been the girl who sat by this lake for hours and whiled away the endless summer days with fashion magazines and books she’d borrowed from the library in town.
