by Jill Shalvis
“Not exactly children,” Chloe said. “More like horn-dog teenagers. Come on, admit it. You’d totally do it up there if you could.”
“No, I wouldn’t.”
“Oh, right. That’s me. I’d do it up there if I could. Should I pull out my phone and ask Mr. Magic Eight app if that’s anywhere in your near future?” Without waiting for an answer, she did just that, then smiled at the answer.
NOT LIKELY.
Chloe slid her phone away. She’d changed her hair streaks to midnight blue. They were twisted and pulled up, holding her hair in place like a headband. “So since Maddie and Jax are taking a break—and each other—and since you don’t seem to have that kind of a break in your future, I think we deserve a break of a different kind.”
“Can’t.” Tara handed over a bucket of bathroom cleaning supplies.
Chloe frowned down at them. “Cleaning is your thing.”
“Not today it’s not.”
“What’s wrong with our teenage slaves?”
“Carlos is cleaning the front yard, and I’m acclimating Mia to my kitchen.”
Chloe blinked. “Huh?”
“Yeah,” Tara said. “In a blatant attempt to bribe her into liking me, I’m letting her bake the meet-and-greet cookies.”
“Wait a minute.” Chloe narrowed her eyes. “She gets to bake cookies, and I have to do toilets? I have seniority! Where’s the justice in that?”
“You’re completely missing the significance of my gesture. You know how important the meet-and-greet cookies are.”
“How could I have forgotten?” Chloe said dryly. “What an honor you’ve bestowed upon her.”
“Hey, she’s my daughter.” As the word left her mouth, Tara smiled. She couldn’t help it, she liked the way it felt rolling off her tongue.
Chloe grinned unexpectedly. “You got a kick out of saying that.”
“I’m just stating a fact.”
“Admit it, Tara.”
Tara nodded and let a small smile escape. “I like saying it.” So very much.
“So she’s baking cookies, huh?”
“Yes.” Tara took in Chloe’s smug smile. “What? What don’t I know?”
“Nothing. Except that she’s not baking. She’s nose up against the living room window watching Carlos hose down the yard.” Chloe smiled. “Acclimating.”
Tara sighed.
“I saw her at the diner this morning with Ford,” Chloe said. “They seemed to be having a good time.”
Something inside Tara warmed a little at that. For a guy who’d grown up without much direction or authority, Ford had some amazing people skills. Caring for and about others came naturally to him. Mia would love him instantly. But along with the warm fuzzies the image of them together gave her, she also felt a twinge of regret that she hadn’t yet gotten there with Mia.
“She has his smile,” Chloe said. “And his laugh.”
So Mia was laughing for him. Of course she was. Ford did things like take her out to breakfast, employing his effortless charm and likability, while Tara burned breakfast and froze up when answering the simplest of questions.
And now she was jealous. Perfect. Jealous, because Ford made it easy to love him, and Tara… well, she didn’t make it easy for anyone to care about her; she knew that. “Get cranking on that bathroom. I’ll be making beds.”
“One,” Chloe said. “You have to make one bed. For our two guests, who are married. Plus they’re newlyweds. They probably wouldn’t notice if you gave them no sheets at all. Now back to me for a minute—asthma makes me exempt from cleaning.”
“I realize that your asthma is a free get-out-of-jail card for just about everything you don’t want to do,” Tara said. “But I bought chemical-free cleaning agents. Nothing in any of them should bother you.”
“Fine. Just fine then. Call me Cinderella.” Chloe blew out a breath and looked out the window, then let out a soft laugh.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
Oh, it was something. Tara moved to the window. Indeed, Carlos was out there hosing down the yard.
With Mia now at his side.
Carlos was both tough and quiet, and for the most part, utterly unreadable. His clothes added to his bad-boy persona, but he showed up on time, and until today, had always worked his ass off.
At the moment, he wasn’t so much working as… posturing. And although Tara had heard him utter maybe ten sentences total in the past three months, the two of them were talking nonstop.
Carlos smiled down at Mia and entirely missed the flower bed that he was supposedly watering.
Mia was standing as close to him as she could get without sharing his too big, unlaced Nikes. She was also doing something Tara had heard about but had not yet seen firsthand.
She was laughing, a warm, genuine laugh that transformed her face.
“It’s sweet,” Chloe said.
“No. Not sweet.” Tara shook her head. “He’s a seventeen-year-old boy, and there’s only one thing seventeen-year-old boys want.”
Chloe laughed. “Wow, you’re such a hypocrite.”
Tara sighed and rested her forehead on the glass. “She doesn’t smile like that for me.”
“Of course not. She’s not hoping that you’re going to kiss her later, either.”
Tara sighed again, and Chloe slid an arm around her. Shocked, Tara turned her head and met her younger sister’s gaze. They’d spent summers together as kids, and the past six months in each other’s pockets, and yet Tara could count on one hand the number of times they’d touched each other in affection.
“It’s going to be okay,” Chloe assured her with a surprisingly gentle squeeze. “She’s going to be okay. She’s happy here.”
At the unexpected comfort from the most unexpected source, Tara felt her breath leave her in a whoosh. “You sure?”
“Yes. And I get the feeling she hasn’t been happy in a while. Breathe, Tara.”
“I really hate it when people tell me to breathe.”
“Then you should do more of it on your own.”
Tara inhaled deeply, held it, then let it out. “I just wish she’d warm up to me.”
“Hey, she’s here, isn’t she? It’ll come.” Chloe squeezed her again. “Let her be. For once in your life, don’t direct. Just let it happen and enjoy the ride.”
Tara paused and gave her the once-over. “Look at you, being all sweet.”
“I know, right?” Chloe flashed a grin. “I think I’d be great at sweet, but the truth is, that’s not what I’m doing.”
Tara sighed. She knew that was too good to last. “Okay. What do you want?”
“To take off next week without you bitching about me leaving right before we open.”
“Where’re you going this time?”
“Cabo. Got a friend who works in a five-star hotel there, and they’re interested in my skincare line.”
“The last time you went to Cabo, you were gone for four days, dyed your hair platinum blond, and got a nipple pierced.”
Chloe winced in recollected pain. “Yeah. I’ll be working, so there’ll be no alcohol involved this time.”
“Good to know,” Tara said. “You’ve got to be running out of parts to get pierced by now.”
“Actually—”
“Don’t.” Tara held up a hand and grimaced. “I don’t want to know.” Oddly unwilling to break the rare sweet moment, she pressed her cheek to Chloe’s. “Love you, you know.”
Chloe hesitated a moment, then hugged her back, hard. She didn’t repeat the vow of love, but then again, she never did. But perhaps in a gesture that meant even more than the words would have, Chloe took a long time to let go. Then she nodded and carefully steered Tara away from the window and the view of the teenagers. “Did you see the paper this morning? Logan and Ford are neck and neck in the townwide vote. Probably because of last night.”
Tara went still. “Oh, God. What happened last night?”
“Logan was at The Love Sha
ck again.” Chloe smiled. “You had your current lover serving your ex-lover. Never thought you had it in you to catch two alpha men like that.” She eyed Tara speculatively. “You must have some moves once you lose all the control issues you have going on. Or hell, maybe guys like that, I don’t know. Do you boss them around in bed?”
Tara ignored that. “Logan was at the bar again?”
“Well, mostly it was Ford at the bar being accosted by Lucille and her friends. They’re on a mission to see you settled with Ford. Not that they don’t think Logan is hot, but you know how they all love and adore Ford.”
This was true. The whole town loved and adored Ford. Everyone did. He had effortless charm and ease, no matter what he was doing.
Or who.
“They’ve decided to try to sway the vote in his favor,” Chloe said. “There are signs up in town and everything. The one outside the post office has Ford’s high school yearbook picture. He was Class Flirt, did you know that?”
Tara stared at her. “There are not signs in town.”
“Okay,” Chloe said agreeably. “But there are.”
Tara moaned. “Okay, new plan.” She shoved the sheets at Chloe. “You’re doing the bathrooms and the beds. I’m going to town to pull down the signs.”
“How did your problems become my problems? And if you’d just pick one of the Hot Guys, the voting would be a moot point.”
“It’s not about picking one,” Tara said. “Logan wants a woman who no longer exists, and Ford wants…”
But Chloe was gone. And Tara was talking to herself. Perfect. Turning, she walked directly into a brick wall that happened to be Ford’s chest.
Chapter 13
“It’s impossible to be both smart and in love.”
TARA DANIELS
Ford’s hands went to Tara’s hips to steady her. Dipping down a little, he met her eyes with his. “I want… what?” he asked.
Tara pushed past him and headed for the kitchen.
He followed her. Of course he followed. She was annoyed with herself for allowing it, but also a little discombobulated. Her usual state around him.
“Talk to me,” he said. “I want what?”
“You tell me,” she said, going for flirty because she wasn’t at all sure whether or not she wanted to hear his real answer.
His eyes dilated. “I’d rather show you.” He reached for her but she backed up, directly into the pantry.
He simply stepped in as well and shut the door behind them. His expression resembled that of a lion stalking its prey.
“Okay, here’s the thing,” Tara said, hand on his chest to hold him off. “I meant what I told you that night after we…”
He cocked a brow.
“Were together.” She backed up a step and came up against the pantry door. “I told you I’m working on things. Things inside of me. And you—you distract me from those things.” She poked him in the chest. “So I’m asking you to stop doing that. Stop distracting me. Yes, we slept together. Hell, we have a lot of chemistry, and I was out of control that night. But I have a lot going on, Ford. We have a lot going on, so we really need to try to ignore us. Okay? No more of this dance we have going on. We have to control ourselves.”
His silence was deafening.
“Well,” he finally said. “That’s all fascinating, and informative as well. And we’re going to circle back to parts of it, especially the part where you can’t control yourself around me, but I was only trying to…” Slowly he reached out for her again and pulled a Post-it note from her back.
There were two words on it: Bite Me.
Tara groaned. “Chloe’s idea of a joke. Can we focus here?”
“I’d rather bite you.”
“Very funny. Look, I get how you might think that the natural progression would be for us to have sex again, but we can’t. I can’t.”
“Because you’re working on yourself.”
So he was listening. “Yes. And because when I’m with you like that, I’m…” She searched for the right word.
“Multi-orgasmic?”
She closed her eyes. “You’re not taking me seriously.”
“On the contrary, I’m taking you very seriously.”
Their gazes collided. Held. And something jumped in her stomach. His eyes were dark and solemn, belying his easy tone. He’d heard everything she’d said. He’d also heard everything she hadn’t said. What she didn’t know was if he agreed with her. “Someone’s going to get their emotions in the wrong place, Ford.” And by someone, she meant her. They had a track record. The last time she let her emotions get tangled up with his, it had been the most painful time of her life. People didn’t recover from that kind of screw-up; they didn’t get second chances.
“Ah,” he said quietly. “Now we’re getting somewhere.” He ran a finger over her jaw. “You’re afraid.”
“Yes. Join me, won’t you?” She gripped his shirt. “Mia—”
“Is amazing.”
“Yes.” Tara let out a breath. “She is. But that’s what I mean. We’re in danger of misplacing emotions—”
“I’m misplacing nothing.” His eyes softened, and he touched her face. “Tara. It’s not the same now.”
Because it was just sex. She swallowed the hurt. “Look, all I need is for you to agree that we should just go back to how we were before.”
“Before what?”
He knew before what. “Before we made love,” she said uncomfortably, hating him for making her say it out loud.
“At least you know that that’s what we did.” He paused. “How much of this has to do with Logan?”
“None.” She met his gaze head-on. “Okay, maybe a little, but not how you think.”
“Well, that makes me feel all better.”
“I tried to explain this to you before,” Tara said with a sigh. “I’ve got some issues. And so do you.”
“I thought this wasn’t about me.”
“It’s a roundabout thing,” she said.
Ford paused. “Okay, help me out here. Who exactly is working on whose issues?”
“I’m working on mine.” She lifted her chin. “And you should be working on yours.”
“And mine are?” he asked mildly.
“Well, for one, you don’t stick.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that you’re laid-back, easygoing, and you like your life the same way,” Tara told him. “And let’s face it, you’re good at just about everything. So when something’s hard, or difficult, or doesn’t drop into your lap, you don’t tend to work at it.”
Only his eyes reflected his tension. “You think things drop in my lap? That I haven’t had to work hard at life?”
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “I know where you came from. I know how you busted your butt to get to where you are, but sailing… face it, Ford. Sailing came easy. And Logan hasn’t been the only man in my life to find his face in the papers. You’ve been there, too. Cosmo had some really interesting things to say about your bachelor life and how you live it.”
“So I haven’t been a monk. Jesus, Tara, I was in my twenties with too much money and women throwing themselves at me. Yeah, I enjoyed it all way too much, but I also eventually grew up.”
“Yes, you got engaged after your gold medal to someone you met while training. You broke it off at the last minute.”
Something flickered in his eyes at that. Annoyance at having to explain himself, probably. Typical male. “Because,” he said, “she’d gotten caught up in the fame and fortune of the sponsorships and wanted to live in the public eye. She went nuts for the attention, and I—” He broke off and frowned. “I wanted my same old, simple life. The life I’d worked hard for.”
“You took a huge contract for sponsorship and then dropped it.”
He stared at her. “You have been reading the papers.”
Truthfully, Tara had devoured every little scrap on him over the years. “Yes.”
He was qui
et a moment. “I wasn’t feeling as competitive as I’d been, and I wanted to slow down. It didn’t seem right to stick with that contract when I wasn’t going to be giving them their money’s worth. So yeah, maybe I haven’t exactly done what was expected, but I’ve always done what I felt was right.”
“And us?” Tara asked. “Seventeen years ago?”
His eyes hardened. “You’re the one who walked away.”
“Yes, but you let me.”
“What? Are you kidding me?” He shoved his hands into his hair, and arms up, muscles taut, he turned in a full circle. When he faced her again, a very rare display of temper and frustration was showing on his face. “No one has ever had any luck stopping you when you have your mind set on something, Tara, and you damn well know it.”
“But you never even tried.” Her throat was tight with remembered pain. God, the pain. She didn’t want to ever feel that scared and alone and anxious again. Yes, she’d been the one to walk, but she’d been so young and stupid. “You never even attempted to contact me.”
She’d been okay with that in the end. Because the clean break had given her the time to get over the heartbreak without having to constantly relive it. But it was bothering her now, she realized. Deeply. She knew Ford felt very strongly about her, but she wasn’t sure he felt strongly enough. Certainly not enough to want to stick for real, for the long haul. And with him, she was beginning to realize she could handle no less.
Sure, back then he’d been willing to make things work, but the promise and drive of a teenager didn’t mean that it would have. And what did teenagers know about love anyway? If he’d really been right for her, wouldn’t he have followed after her, or at least tried?
She knew he’d wanted to do the right thing by her, she believed that. And he was a good guy: reliable, warm, caring… but she could only go on what she knew. And she knew she hadn’t been important enough to him.
She had no reason to think now would be any different.
“I remember things differently,” he said quietly. “I remember that you gave up. You ran. I’d have gladly taken it to that happy-ever-after you were too guilt-ridden to allow yourself.”
