Forever And A Day (Montana Brides, Book #7)

by Leeanna Morgan

  Jordan didn’t know what to say. He felt like he’d walked onto the set of a horror movie. Or one of those reality shows where everyone knows the truth about what’s going on except the idiot in the middle of the deception.

  He cleared his throat. His anger had been replaced by a hurt so deep that he didn’t know if he could speak. “I’m sorry you feel that way.” Without looking back, he opened the door and left the house.

  Sarah ran down the steps after him. “Jordan, wait. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it.”

  He kept walking, started the engine in his truck and drove away.

  ***

  Four days later, Sarah walked into Angel Wings Café.

  “What happened?” Tess asked. She pulled Sarah across the room and pointed to a table. “Wait here.”

  Sarah sat down and watched Tess walk back to the counter. She disappeared behind a door. A few minutes later, Annie, Tess’ part-time baker came out of their kitchen, tying an apron around her waist.

  Tess stood in front of the coffee machine, flicked some switches, then carried two mugs across to their table. “Drink this.” She put one of the mugs of in front of Sarah and sat down. “You look like death warmed over. Is something wrong with your parents?”

  Sarah shook her head. “They’re fine. They left on Monday afternoon.”

  “What’s happened since then?”

  Sarah dropped her head into her hands. “It’s more like what happened while they were here. Jordan and I argued. It was bad.”

  “So does that mean you’ve broken up or are you just not talking to each other?”

  “There was nothing to break up.” Sarah’s bottom lip started wobbling. She was going to embarrass herself, start crying in the middle of the café.

  “I’m missing something…” Tess pushed Sarah’s coffee under her nose. “Drink this. It will make you feel better.”

  “What is it?”

  “Grande latte with a shot of caramel. You look as though you could do with the extra sugar.”

  Sarah knew sugar wouldn’t solve her problems, but she took a sip anyway.

  “Let’s rewind the conversation. What did you mean when you said there was nothing to break up?”

  Sarah stared into her cup. “Jordan and I weren’t going out together. He wasn’t my boyfriend.”

  “What was he?”

  Sarah took a deep breath. “I hadn’t figured that out.”

  “And I’m guessing you told Jordan he wasn’t your boyfriend and he wasn’t impressed?”

  “Something like that,” Sarah muttered.

  Tess pulled her chair closer to Sarah. “You mean there’s more?”

  Sarah nodded her head. There was so much more. She knew Jordan wouldn’t speak to her again. “I told him I wasn’t willing to give everything up and move to the middle of nowhere.”

  “Do you really think that?”

  “No…Yes…I don’t know.” Sarah took a tissue out of her bag and blew her nose. “I wasn’t thinking straight. I didn’t know what to tell mom and dad. They don’t know about Jordan. Mom thinks I’m moving back to Portland in a few months.”

  “Why didn’t you tell them about Jordan?”

  “I made a mistake once. I don’t want to make another one.”

  “I need cake.” Tess pushed her chair away from the table and headed over to the counter. She came back holding two pieces of lemon meringue pie. “Eat this.”

  “I can’t, I…”

  Tess pointed her dessert fork in Sarah’s direction. “Eat.”

  Sarah picked her fork up and stabbed the pie. “I tried to call him on Sunday night, but he wouldn’t talk to me.”

  “He’s a guy. They don’t handle rejection well.”

  “But I don’t want to reject him. I just don’t want to be his girlfriend.”

  Tess put her fork carefully on the side of her plate. “So you’d be happy for him to date other women, maybe even sleep with them?”

  “No.” Sarah looked around the café. No one was paying them any attention.

  “You can’t have it both ways.” Tess picked up her fork and started eating her pie.

  “He’s going to hate me. He must think I’m some kind of tease. We never talked about being girlfriend and boyfriend. He thought that just because we…”

  “Just because you slept together you were more than friends? That something special was happening and you both wanted to explore it and see where it led? How shallow could he be?”

  Sarah sighed. “I’m an idiot.”

  “You’re only an idiot if you want to be more than his friend.”

  “I’m an idiot.”

  “Okaaay,” Tess said. “Now that we have that little gem sorted out, what are you going to do about it?”

  “There’s nothing I can do. I’m flying to Portland tonight. Tomorrow I’m meeting my lawyer and accountant. I told mom and dad I’d stay with them for a couple of extra days before heading back to Bozeman.”

  “While you’re away you can think about what you really want. If Jordan’s still on that list, you can decide what to do about him when you get back.”

  Sarah pushed her half eaten plate of pie away and stared across the café. “I wish I could turn back the clock, or at least take back what I said. He didn’t deserve any of it.”

  “No one likes to be told they aren’t good enough.”

  “I didn’t say…” Sarah slouched in her seat. “Maybe I did. How will he ever forgive me?”

  “I don’t know if he will, but you need to give it another try. That’s if you decide what you could have is worth the effort.”

  Sarah didn’t know what would happen once she got back, but she did know she had to apologize. Jordan didn’t deserve the words she’d thrown at him. And she definitely didn’t mean to make him feel as though he wasn’t good enough for her.

  With how she’d been acting, she doubted she was good enough for him.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Sarah looked down at the contract in her hands. She’d been working with her lawyer and accountant, negotiating a deal with the company that wanted to buy her software program.

  Richard Connelly, her lawyer, specialized in IT contracts. He pushed his glasses further up the bridge of his nose and stared at his copy of the contract. “I made the adjustments we discussed on the phone to section four. Datajet came back with another counteroffer late last night. I think you’ll be happy with what they’ve proposed. They also reviewed the position they offered you on their research and development team. The salary isn’t negotiable, but I think you’ll see from these papers,” Richard passed her another set of forms, “that their offer is very generous.”

  Sarah flipped to the back page and gulped. It was more money than she thought she’d ever make. “Where’s the job based?”

  “Their head office is in San Francisco. They want you to spend one week per month in Walnut Creek. Other than that you can work from anywhere as long as you have suitable connectivity with the rest of the team.”

  Richard drunk his coffee while Sarah considered the offer in front of her. Everything had happened so fast. Once all of the paperwork had been filed, Sarah wasted no time in contacting the companies who had expressed an interest in purchasing her software.

  Within days, her lawyer and accountant were in negotiations with Datajet, the company that had offered her the best deal. She’d made four counteroffers and each time, Datajet came back closer to where she wanted be.

  “What are your thoughts on the offer for the software, Richard?”

  “It’s a fair price and the best we could negotiate.”

  She looked at the employment contract for the research and development team. “If I accepted the job, when would they want me to start?”

  “Before Thanksgiving. I imagine it’s got something to do with their recruitment team being short-staffed over Christmas. I don’t want to state the obvious, but with the multimillion dollar deal they’re offering you for your software, you won’t need to
work again.”

  “I know. But I need to do something. At least until I sort out what I’m going to do with all of the money.”

  “When are you meeting your accountant?”

  Sarah looked at her watch. “In an hour.”

  “Talk it over with her. You don’t need to make a decision about the software or the job now, but I wouldn’t leave it too long. They’re both good offers.”

  Sarah took a deep breath. “I don’t need to think about the contract for the software program. I’ll sign that now. I just need a couple more days to think about their job offer.” She opened the software contract and started signing the bottom of each page. “This is more money than I thought I’d ever get. Thank you for all of your hard work.”

  “It’s my pleasure, Sarah. It’s nice to be part of your success.”

  Richard had stood beside her through all of the mud-slinging and innuendoes James had dredged up out of nowhere. He’d offered her expert advice and been every bit as hard-nosed as James’ legal team.

  They’d won their case, proved that James was more than a thief. He was a liar, someone who wouldn’t find another job in a hurry. And now she was signing away all rights to the software program that had consumed her life for two years.

  After Richard had witnessed her signature he slid the document into an envelope. “I’ll scan and email the contract to Datajet. They should get the hard copy by ten o’clock tomorrow morning. I’ll call you as soon as I receive confirmation that the sale is complete.”

  “Thanks, Richard. I guess that’s it?”

  “Let me know what you decide to do about the job offer.”

  “I will.” Sarah picked up her bag and shook Richard’s hand. “I’ll talk to you soon.” As she walked out of her lawyer’s office, she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Once Datajet signed the contract, she’d be a wealthy person. A successful somebody who’d developed a niche product and sold it to the highest bidder.

  She breathed in the exhaust fumes of downtown Portland and headed to the nearest Starbucks. She needed coffee. It wouldn’t be the same as Angel Wings Café, but at least it would give her something to do before she spoke with her accountant.

  ***

  ***

  “How was the meeting with your lawyer?” Sarah’s mom grated more cheese on top of the lasagna she was making.

  “I signed the contract. Richard’s going to call me tomorrow once they’ve countersigned.”

  “Congratulations,” Angela said. “What do you plan on doing now?”

  Sarah stared at her mom, not fooled for one minute by her casual question. “I’ve got another couple of days here, then I’m heading back to Montana. Alex needs me on the ranch. I’ve still got to finish the website I’m working on with Sally’s class.”

  “And after that?”

  “I’m still figuring out what I want to do.”

  Angela wiped her hands on the side of her jeans, then put the dish of lasagna in the oven.

  “You should wear an apron. It’ll save your clothes from getting dirty.”

  Her mom looked down at her tomato stained t-shirt and cheesy jeans. “But then I’d have to be organized and find an apron. What’s a little lasagna topping between family?”

  Sarah leaned against the kitchen counter. “Why did you give up your career when you met dad?”

  Angela smiled. “I didn’t give it up, not right away. Your dad is such an amazing man. I wanted to be part of his life and the job I had took me away from him more than I liked. So I resigned from my full-time position and did contract work for a while.”

  “But you weren’t working when you were pregnant with me?”

  Angela put the empty pasta packet in the trash. “I hadn’t been working for nearly a year when I found out I was pregnant with you. Your dad and I had been trying for a long time to get pregnant. I’d had three miscarriages and neither of us wanted to risk another one. We made the decision together that I wouldn’t work. When we got pregnant with you, work didn’t seem to matter anymore.”

  “Why didn’t you go back to the senator’s office after I was born?”

  “Because you were more important.” Angela rinsed out the empty tomato cans and put them in the recycling bin. “Your questions wouldn’t have anything to do with the man we met on the ranch after our tour, would they?”

  “Why do you say that?” Sarah cringed. She sounded like her mom, and from the look on her mom’s face, she thought so too.

  Her mom picked up a jar of crushed garlic and put it in the fridge. “You weren’t happy after he left. Did you have an argument?”

  “Something like that,” Sarah muttered.

  “Not everyone wants to be a rocket scientist or a political analyst,” Angela said with a smile. “I’ve got a sharp mind. It was even sharper when I was in my twenties. I wanted to fix the world, be part of something that made a difference. When I met your dad, everything changed. He had a demanding career and he needed my support. So I changed my focus. Instead of saving the world I helped my husband.”

  “That doesn’t sound as important as what you were doing.”

  “It was important to me. It was important to your dad, and I hope it became important to you.”

  Sarah remembered all of the parent-teacher interviews, the end of year school plays, the car rides between music practices. Her mom had always been involved, made sure she never missed one performance or play.

  She’d taken her mom for granted, known she’d always be there for her.

  “While you were at school I did all sorts of things. I volunteered with the Red Cross, took art lessons, joined a mentoring program at the local High School. I got more satisfaction from helping people in the community than I ever did in Senator Bryan’s office. Does working with computer programs make you happy?”

  Sarah thought about her mom’s question. “I like the structure of programming, figuring out how the algorithms will work together. I’ve made a lot of money.”

  “Money isn’t everything.”

  Sarah stared at her mom. “You and dad always wanted me to be successful. You sent me to so many after school programs that I never had a moment to myself.”

  “We did that so you wouldn’t be lonely. You enjoyed them and met some nice children.”

  “I had friends at school.”

  Angela frowned. “Why didn’t you tell us you didn’t like going to the extra classes?”

  “It wasn’t that I didn’t like them. I didn’t want to be so busy all the time.” She stared at her hands, then up into her mom’s blue eyes. “I didn’t want to let you down.”

  Angela came around the counter and hugged Sarah close. “Oh, honey. You could never do that. We love you as you are. It doesn’t matter what you do, we’ll always love you.”

  “But dad thinks I’m wasting my time in Montana.”

  Angela kissed the side of her face and smiled. “As well as being your parents, we’re human. He knows how much effort you put into your studies and into your business. He didn’t want you working in the middle of Montana if it wasn’t what you truly wanted to do. And he knows how much you enjoy cooking and housework.”

  Sarah’s lips twitched into a smile. “It’s easier when you’re getting paid.”

  “I guess it is.” Angela took two mugs out of the pantry and started making coffee. “Tell me about Montana. What’s the best thing about living in the middle of nowhere?”

  “Mom.”

  “Just kidding.” She smiled.

  And Sarah knew she was. So she started telling her mom about the crystal clear mornings, the sky that stretched into forever, and the people she’d met. And she told her about Jordan, about his ranch vacation business, the difference he was making on his land.

  She didn’t know when it happened or why it happened, but somewhere between all of the stories, she began to realize what was important.

  It wasn’t the job she had or the salary she made in Bozeman. It was the people, the values that s
trung the community together like a carefully woven web. It was the way everyone helped and supported each other when times were tough.

  It was celebrating the good times. It was falling in love…

  ***

  “Are you pushing or just standing there looking pretty?” Trent sounded pissed off.

  Jordan grunted against the weight of the mattress. The commercial cleaners had dropped the mattress and curtains off this morning and he’d stupidly told them to leave them in the entranceway. “I’m moving as fast as I can. If you lifted the mattress off the stairs, it would make it easier to move.”

  “Whose idea was this anyway?” Trent heaved the mattress higher and Jordan gave it an almighty push.

  “I forgot how weak you are,” Jordan huffed as he pushed again. “A few days away with Gracie and you’ve gone to mush.”

  “Can’t help it if I’m a stud. Oh shit, I think I’ve put my back out.” Trent collapsed on the floor at the top of the landing.

  “Stop acting like a baby and give me a hand to get this sucker into the room.”

  Trent pulled himself off the floor, adding a dramatic groan for extra effect. “You’re going to regret not believing me tomorrow. I might need to take the day off to recuperate.”

  “You just want to sleep-in with Gracie. Is Jessica still keeping you awake?”

  “She slept through last night,” Trent said proudly.

  Jordan poked the mattress over the last stair. “So when will she start sleeping through every night?”

  “Damned if I know. I’m lifting this mattress on three and running toward the bedroom. If you don’t keep up with me, I’m dropping it and you’re on your own. Got it?”

  “Maybe you should take afternoon naps? It might make you easier to live with.”

  Trent glared at Jordan. “Shut up and lift. One, two, three…”

  His brother hadn’t been joking when he said he was going to run with the mattress. Jordan nearly tripped over his feet when the mattress started moving at break-neck speed toward the bedroom. “Straighten up. I’m going to whack my knuckles on the door.”