Soft Spot: A Hale Street Novella

by Amy Knupp

  Idiot that he was.

  He wiped the memory from his mind and set his jaw.

  As she approached, she self-consciously pushed her hair behind one ear and flicked a smile at him.

  "Hi," she said when she was a few feet away. Her arms were at her sides, and he noticed one of her fists opening and closing. "Am I interrupting something?" She glanced back at the guys as Keaton backed out and reached the street.

  "We were done," Jackson said, realizing maybe it would've been wiser to ask the guys to stay. He wasn't in favor of being alone with her, afraid he'd forget where they stood and do something stupid.

  As if sensing he needed an ally, Galileo trundled onto the pavement and made a slow-motion beeline for Asia.

  "Galileo," she said, her smile appearing again, this time less nervous and more genuine. She bent down and threw her arms around the dog's neck, earning her a giant lick across the cheek.

  "Gali!" Jackson scolded. "Bad form."

  Asia murmured some sugar-sweet baby talk to the beast, her message something along the lines of forgiveness. Jackson had a soft spot for anyone who treated his dog well, and dammit, a soft spot was not appropriate here.

  It hadn't been long enough. He needed a couple more weeks to get back to his status quo and adjust to not spending ninety-five percent of his spare time thinking about this woman. Then he could stand here and act like she didn't affect him.

  "Why are you here?" he asked, not worrying about the brusqueness in his voice.

  She straightened from spoiling the dog. Sucked in a breath, causing her chest to rise and then fall. "Could we talk? Maybe go on a walk or something?" She looked up and down the street.

  He didn't think they had much to talk about, but he kept that to himself, straining to seem indifferent instead of disappointed or … hurt. He wasn't hurt. They hadn't known each other long enough for him to be hurt.

  "Let's go walk in the backyard. Plenty of space and I won't have to put Galileo on a leash."

  She bobbed her head, then followed him through the garage and out the door to the backyard, the dog bringing up the rear without being called. They crossed the asphalt and passed the pool to catch the path that wound in and out of the mature trees from here to the very back of the two-acre lot.

  Thirty yards down the flagstone path, she still hadn't spoken. "I didn't know this was so big," she said, regarding the far reaches of the yard.

  "It's what sold me on the place. The house needed a bunch of updating, which my sister's construction company did for me, but the yard was perfect."

  "The pool's a nice touch."

  "That too." Spotting one of Galileo's play balls, he bent down and picked it up. "Gali. Ready?" He winged the ball as far as he could throw it, and the dog went galloping after it.

  With each step, Jackson's nerves went tauter, and he tried to figure out what Asia's intention was.

  "How's your mom?" he asked once Gali returned the ball to him.

  "She's … good, actually." Asia sounded surprised at her own answer. "She's in rehab. Something about last Sunday opened her eyes, and she admitted she needed help not long after you left."

  "That's great news," he said, genuinely glad to hear it. Even though he didn't know her that well, there was no doubt her mom worried her a great deal. For good reason. "Has she tried rehab before?"

  "Never. Not once. It's been a tough week on her, but she seems to be making progress."

  "No physical repercussions from her fall last weekend?"

  "Paramedics couldn't find anything."

  "That's good."

  The small talk fell off and they curved along the back fence in silence.

  "It's going to be a long journey for her. Vegas and I are dedicated to helping her however we can."

  "You two are good to her. She's lucky to have you."

  "That's exactly what Vegas said." Asia smiled, and maybe it was wishful thinking, but she seemed a little bit lighter than she'd been since he'd met her. "Jackson, I'm sorry for last weekend. You were being supportive, and I wouldn't let you." Her steps slowed. "Because I was embarrassed. And scared."

  "Pretty normal to be scared when the EMS guys are working on your mom."

  "That's not what I mean." Asia stopped walking and faced him. "I mean, sure, I was scared for her, more so before we got there and I could see she was okay, but…"

  Galileo tramped up to them, sat on his haunches, and peered up between them. Asia absently reached down and ruffled the dog's fur.

  "Vegas says I was jumping ahead by about twenty steps. Worrying that I would get used to leaning on you and then you would get sick of the mama drama and move on. And I would get hurt. Again."

  "Happened before?"

  She nodded. "More than once."

  "Nobody wants to get hurt," he said, acknowledging now that was exactly what had happened to him even though they'd really only known each other for just over a month. And somehow, that realization, and the common ground, had his defensiveness melting away.

  "My sister reminded me that maybe I should wait until we go on at least one date to worry about being hurt," she said with a sheepish grin.

  His gaze got momentarily caught up on the hint of her dimple. He could stare at that dimple for hours and not get tired of it. And there he went, down the wrong road. Maybe it had been better when he'd had his guard up.

  "I see how it is," he said, trying for flippant. "Vegas tries to come across as the carefree, shallow sister, but when you get down to it, she's the Yoda of the Knowles sisters."

  "I wouldn't go that far." She laughed quietly, studying her orange shoes. "But she was spot on. And I was stupid. So I'm trying to take one thing at a time. I know it's going to be a long trek with my mom. Based on the research I've done in the past week, the chances for a relapse are pretty good. And once she's out of treatment, she'll still need a lot of help, finding a new place to live, a job, some hobbies to occupy her mind and keep her away from alcohol."

  "Sounds like you've done your homework." He wondered again why she was there. Just to give him a report? Did she need his help with something?

  "What I'm saying is, my life is still going to be messy. My mom might still call for help at inconvenient times. But I was wondering…" She fidgeted with her hands, then clasped them together in front of her chest. "Shit, this is hard. I don't know how guys do this all the time." She finally looked him straight in the eye. "Is there any chance you would go out with me sometime?"

  A smile broke out on his face, and he stepped closer to her. "You mean, like, on a date?"

  "I do. A date."

  "What'd you have in mind?" he said, taking her clasped hands in his and enjoying the way she was flustered.

  "I don't know… Dinner? Maybe a boat ride? There's a place we could rent a canoe for a couple of hours." She looked momentarily panicked. "Do you like the water?"

  "It sounds perfect. When do you want to do this?"

  "Well, I know this probably goes against all the so-called rules, but since we've kind of done this backwards from the start, what would you think about this afternoon?"

  "I'm for it."

  "Is that a yes?" Asia asked, her doubts gone, flirtatiousness moving in, dimple appearing.

  "It's a heck yes. I thought you'd never ask." He felt light, like he could float right off the ground like the guy in the movie Up. "Would it be wrong for me to kiss you before our date?"

  Her sparkling, full-of-life brown eyes dipped down to his lips, then back up. "Did I mention we do things backwards?"

  "You did mention that."

  "As long as we know we're backwards, then I can't think of single reason for you not to kiss me."

  He closed the space between them, leaned down, and pressed his lips to hers. “Fair warning,” he said. “I can be persistent. And I might want more than kisses later.”

  Asia grinned up at him. “That sounds pretty damn incredible to me.”

  Author’s Note

  Thank you for reading S
oft Spot. I hope you enjoyed it!

  If you’d like to know when my next book is available, you can sign up for my newsletter at www.amyknupp.com, like my Facebook page at http://facebook.com/AuthorAmyKnupp, or follow me on Twitter at https://twitter.com/amyknupp.

  Reviews help other readers find books. I appreciate all reviews, whether positive or negative.

  You’ve just read the fourth book in the Hale Street multi-author series. Though each book can be read as a stand-alone, the series order is:

  Sweet Thing by Emily Leigh

  Sweet Spot by Amy Knupp

  Sweet Nothings by Natasha Lake

  Soft Spot: A Novella by Amy Knupp

  More Than Words: A Novella by Natasha Lake (November 2016)

  Kiss Me, Cooper: A Novella by Emily Leigh (December 2016)

  Micah and Sloan’s story (Title TBD) (early 2017)

  Hudson and Daisy’s story (Title TBD) (early 2017)

  Sin and Jilly’s story (Title TBD) (early 2017)

  If you’d like to read an excerpt from More Than Words by Natasha Lake, book five in the Hale Street series, please turn the page. If you’d like to read an excerpt from Sweet Thing by Emily Leigh, book one in the Hale Street series, you’ll find it after the More Than Words excerpt.

  Excerpt: More Than Words by Natasha Lake

  HALE STREET BOOK 5

  CHAPTER ONE

  Roxie Giardini watched the last of the sparkler she held in her hand sputter out and wondered why it made her feel so down. It wasn’t like she didn’t have a great job. Working at Sugar Babies Sweet Shop had been like taking a deep breath after swimming underwater two strokes longer than you should have. It was just that she hadn’t been able to work on her own dream for a while now.

  “Want another one?” Ivy Gibson’s smile was brighter than the sparklers that were lit in her hand. Not content with one, the petite blond woman held five at a time. One for each of them. As she tried to push away the feeling her unfulfilled dreams always gave her, she reminded herself it was awesome that Ivy held one of those sparklers for her.

  “You’re going to burn your hand.” Violet, Ivy’s cousin and co-owner of the bakery, cautioned. Looking at Violet, dressed in pristine white capri pants and a blue-and-white-striped tank, chocolate hair in a side braid, a person might think she belonged on a yacht sipping champagne cocktails. Until that person noticed her hot-pink-painted toenails complete with white flowers.

  “Band-Aids, first aid ointment, and aloe are in the basket,” shot out the third partner of the bakery. Kennedy Lowell, cinnamon-colored hair flowing over her back and wearing a pair of jean shorts and a navy T-shirt, was mixing up margaritas. Because when you were in your thirties and handling fire, you definitely wanted alcohol around.

  “Ivy went almost all day today without running into something,” murmured Jilly with a small smile. Jilly had started at Sugar Babies a few months after Roxie.

  Working at Sugar Babies and with these women, Roxie reminded herself, was amazing. She’d been an assistant at Trident Records for too long. She’d had so little time to work on her dream, she’d nearly forgotten it. She had just thought things would come together once she’d started at Sugar Babies. And they hadn’t. Roxie dumped her dead sparkler into an empty mason jar in the middle of the table that Violet had filled with water.

  “Yeah, almost all morning!” Ivy lit a fresh sparkler and handed it off to Roxie.

  Roxie took the fire-spitting stick and twirled it in the air, writing out a giant R in the dark Nashville night. Despite the music and sparkle not far away on Broadway, it was fairly quiet behind the bakery on this Saturday night. Sugar Babies had closed hours ago, but all five of them had stayed late to work on catering plans for a big upcoming event. Ivy had lasted about two hours, which was ninety minutes longer than Roxie had expected. Then the blond-haired pastry chef had dragged them out the door and into the backyard space behind the bakery declaring it was time to have some fun. It hadn’t taken Ivy long to run up the stairs to the apartment above the shop and come back with smoke bombs, snaps, and sparklers. Lots and lots of sparklers. When Kennedy had seen the size of Ivy’s post-Independence Day shopping splurge, she’d gone up for the tequila and sweet and sour mix and plopped them in the middle of the wood-plank table they sat at.

  But then, Roxie figured, if she had just become the official girlfriend of Burke Wentworth, real estate mogul and owner of the newly remodeled and updated Wentworth Hotel, she’d probably want to light up some fireworks too. Of course, if she wanted to find a guy like Burke, she was probably going to have to actually go on a date. Roxie sipped from a glass tumbler Ivy had hand painted with dragonflies and flowers, the tart hit of margarita making her cheeks squeeze.

  “I think we should have a party.” Violet slid the words in as smoothly as frosting on a cake.

  “Not another one.” Kennedy shifted on the bench. “Can’t a girl just live in jean shorts for a while?”

  Violet nudged Kennedy with her shoulder. “Not a formal party but kind of a block party. Something that all the people on Hale Street can attend.”

  Kennedy’s hazel eyes narrowed. “I smell a theme.”

  “Fiesta!” Ivy raised her own margarita, this one in a glass covered in cupcakes.

  At Ivy’s enthusiasm, even Jilly’s mouth tipped up a little. Her butterfly-laden glass had barely been touched. Roxie knew there was a lot going on under Jilly’s quiet nature. She’d loosened up a bit since she’d started almost a month earlier, but she was still careful with them. Roxie was dying to ask her why she dressed in clothes that were too big and never did anything with her hair more than pull it in a low ponytail. As Jilly was the sister of a country star with three Top 40 albums, Roxie would have thought she’d have more polish. Or wear rhinestones or even cowboy boots.

  “We’ve already done a fiesta,” grumbled Kennedy. “There’s no way we’re going to beat Nick in a mariachi suit.”

  Ivy’s laughter pealed out, quickly joined by Violet’s high-pitched giggle. Violet shook her head. “No themes necessary. Something like a potluck, getting to know each other.”

  “Business owners only?” asked Kennedy.

  “Nope. Everyone. Owners, tenants, residents. I’m thinking we might close the street down between Peach and Wentworth Boulevard.”

  “Frank should bring his blueberry pie,” breathed Ivy.

  Roxie blew her bangs out of her eyes and noticed she needed to refresh the blue streaks in her hair. Though they’d been more of a statement of her transition out of the corporate world, she liked them. And she was keeping them, no matter how her mother badgered her. “I think that sounds like a fun idea. But have you considered what Lurlene might bring to a potluck?”

  The table went absolutely silent.

  “Bacon-wrapped grasshoppers,” muttered Ivy.

  “Arsenic-laced spinach dip,” put in Kennedy.

  “She’ll be fine,” said Violet. “We’ll give her guidelines.”

  “She’ll bring a very, very nice turtledove casserole,” said Jilly.

  The four of them stared at Jilly for a minute before descending into laughter again. There was definitely more to Jilly than met the eye.

  “Poor Snowball,” said Kennedy. “I wonder what she feeds him.”

  “Poor Snowball my rear end,” blurted out Roxie. “That ferret is mean as a snake to everyone but Lurlene. Has he ever hissed at you? Gave me bad dreams for a week.”

  “I wonder what Lurlene dreams about,” mused Ivy.

  “Oh, no,” muttered Kennedy to Violet. “I think the tequila is getting to her.”

  “No, really.” Ivy reached to the center of the table and grabbed a tortilla chip. Then she passed one to Jilly on her left. “I mean, we all have dreams. What’s Lurlene’s dream?”

  “I shudder to think what Lurlene might dream of.” Kennedy wiggled her shoulders.

  Everyone paused for a moment before Violet laughed. “Too trippy to think about. These days I dream about cupcakes and pro
fit margins.”

  “And Nick,” put in Ivy.

  “And Nick,” agreed Violet. “What do you dream about, Gypsy Chick?”

  Ivy tossed her blond hair over one shoulder with a ring-bedecked hand. “There’s a tiramisu cupcake I’ve been trying to get right, so mostly I dream about mascarpone.”

  “Ivy,” warned Violet.

  “Okay, okay.” Ivy took a deep breath. “I want to redo the Dragonfly Lake house.”

  Violet blinked and then blinked again as a clear sheen of tears filled her eyes. “Ooh, Ivy.”

  “Don’t cry, Vi.” Ivy waved a hand. “Or you’ll start me too.”

  “Hell.” Kennedy looked up toward the night sky and blinked three times in quick succession.

  “Just some updates,” Ivy said and then took a deep breath. “And maybe adding an addition so my family can come any time they want.”

  “Do you think Aunt Margie and Uncle Johnny will use it?” asked Violet.

  “No. I meant you guys.” Ivy squeaked as Violet rushed around the table and gave her a hug. She rolled her eyes at Roxie, but Roxie could see how Ivy loved her cousin. It was a big step for a woman who hadn’t ever admitted she wanted a home before. Ivy looked at Kennedy. “Before this descends into a crying fest, how about you, Ken? What dreams do you have these days?”

  “Besides world domination, you mean?” Kennedy smiled wide, still blinking moisture from her eyes. “I’d like to get a companion for Rebel. And get Hale Street on a list of top places to shop and spend time in Nashville.”

  “Are you trying to distract me with a kitten?” Violet teased.