by Easton, Meg
Back inside, he put on his apron, washed his hands, thanked Ann in a less gruff voice, and let her know she could go. He didn’t know what Ann had said to Hani while he’d been outside, but the kid was working hard and barely saying a word outside of the necessities. Part of him felt bad and wanted to tell Hani that he could be his normal chatty self, but the bigger part desperately wanted the quiet.
Several times he found himself staring at the little dragon chef that Brooke had given him. Each time he shook his head, trying to clear it, and made himself get back to work.
When Susan came in to pick up Sam, Cole wiped off his hands and went up front to greet her. As usual, he thanked her for coming to get Sam, then gave Sam a hug and told her when he’d be by to pick her up from her grandma’s.
As the two of them were about to leave, Susan said, “Sam, do you mind waiting for me by the door?”
Sam nodded and went and sat on one of the benches in the waiting area.
Susan studied Cole for a long moment, and he tried hard to smooth his face into something less like an ogre. Susan exhaled, her face softening. “Amanda wouldn’t have wanted you living in a state like this. She wanted you to be happy and to move forward.”
“I know she would. It’s just...complicated.”
Susan nodded. “I know.” She paused for a long moment, then added, “For what it’s worth, Amanda would’ve approved of Brooke.”
An emotion-filled breath escaped Cole. He hadn’t realized how badly he’d needed to hear those words until they came out of Susan’s mouth.
* * *
An hour and a half later when Cole showed up at Susan’s house, Sam opened the door and he was surprised to see that her spark had returned.
“Daddy, Daddy,” Sam said, “come see what I did!”
She grabbed hold of his hand and pulled him into his mother-in-law’s kitchen and then held out both arms toward the papers, signs, and little cars made out of colored, folded cardstock that filled the dining table.
Sam picked up one of the cars and held it toward him, resting on both outstretched palms. “Remember when we made this? I took it to school and Anna said it was so cool and told me that she would pay me a dollar if I made her one too. A whole dollar!
“And I still had two of the cardstocks that had the car template on it, so I made one for Anna. When I colored it yesterday, I was trying to decide which colors and almost did it the colors I wanted it to be. But then I got thinking about how Brooke said that she puts herself in the other person’s shoes and tries to imagine what they most want, so I did that. When I gave it to Anna today, she said it was the most beautiful coloring job she’s ever seen! And then she paid me the dollar.”
She set down the car and picked up another one. “Lincoln and Jayce saw and said they wanted one too. So Grandma took me to Elsmore’s today and I used that dollar from Anna to make more copies of the cars, and I colored this one for Lincoln. What do you think?”
Cole smiled at his daughter. “I think you did an amazing job and he’s going to love it.”
“Well, I figured when other people see Jayce’s and Lincoln’s cars, they’re going to want to buy one, too. So then I decided that it has reached the time for me to become a businesswoman too. Come see—I made this order form where people can say how many cars they want, and if they want to choose a color or have me choose for them. And I made these flyers to pass out to everyone to advertise, just in case Jayce and Lincoln and Anna talking about them isn’t quite enough.”
As he marveled at his daughter and everything she had created, it hit him how much Sam had learned over the years from Brooke’s example. Sam told him all about her big plans and big ideas as he helped her to get everything packed up to take home. Then he thanked Sam’s grandma for supporting her project.
All during the drive home and while they were eating the chicken fettuccini Alfredo and salad that he had brought home for dinner, Sam kept telling more about her plans, her excitement not dying down.
“And I figured that if everyone in my class goes crazy for these and this business goes really well at school, then maybe I can make some to sell at a booth in Snowdrift Springs during the summer. But if everyone doesn’t,” she tapped a finger on her temple, “I already have ideas in here for my next business.”
Every time Brooke went out of town, Cole had seen it as Sam being deprived of someone in her life who she really cared about. But he was realizing that having a successful businesswoman like Brooke in Sam’s life instead was providing her with a role model who was helping her to grow into a strong, capable, confident person.
“You’re thinking about Brooke.”
His eyes flew to Samantha, who was sitting with her elbows on the table, her chin resting in her palms.
“I can tell because you always get hearts in your eyes when you do.”
“I do not.”
“Don’t worry; they aren’t like cartoon hearts that are big and red. They’re like...shiny sparkly hearts, and you have to look close to see them.”
“So I’ve been walking around everywhere, showing my sparkly heart eyes to everyone, and I didn’t even know it?”
Sam nodded. “Pretty much.” A smile spread across her face. “Also, you just admitted that you think about Brooke, like, non-stop.”
He laughed. That much was true. He wasn’t sure she’d been far from his mind for more than a few seconds for a while now.
“Do you miss her?”
He nodded. He missed everything about her.
He had always thought that he wanted someone who was a homebody like him. Stability was important to him, and he felt like he couldn’t get that from Brooke. It wasn’t until now that he realized that the kind of stability he truly wanted was a stability in love itself, and over their almost three years of friendship, Brooke had been showing that all along.
Sam stood up and took both of their plates to the sink. “When I’m sad and missing Mom, you have me talk about her and that always makes me feel better. Do you want to talk about Brooke?”
He shook his head. He didn’t want to burden his daughter with his scattered thoughts and relationship woes.
She walked back to the table and put one hand on each of his cheeks, turning his face to hers, her eyes fixed on his with all the determination an almost ten-year-old could muster. “Daddy. You’re the one who told me not to keep my feelings trapped inside me.”
He stood up and walked around the kitchen, hands on his hips, trying to decide what kinds of things he could share with Sam that would show that he practiced what he preached, without putting too much on her. His mind was a jumbled mess of thoughts, memories, realizations, hopes, and fears that he wasn’t sure he could even pull into sentences.
“Brooke and I are opposites. I like everything scheduled and she likes to make plans at the last second. I like being at home and she likes traveling the world. I’m a single dad and she said she wanted to always be single. But even with all that, I guess I’m just realizing that maybe we aren’t as opposite as I thought. Maybe we’re not opposite at all in the things that really matter.”
“Like what?”
“Like caring about people and doing what we can to help them. Working hard. Having fun. Loving you. Loving each other.”
Sam grinned and clasped her hands together in front of her heart. “You love her! I knew it!”
He paused and then nodded. He’d never admitted it out loud before but it was something he had known for a very long time.
“I have to find a way to make things right with her.” He paced through his small kitchen some more. “I have to convince her to give us another shot. I know the two of us can make it work. Do you think she’ll want to try?”
“Daddy. She has hearts in her eyes, too. I’ve seen them.”
“You have?”
Sam nodded.
He wished Brooke was in town right now. He’d race to her and tell her how he felt and somehow get her to change her mind about long-term relatio
nships. Specifically, a long-term relationship with him.
“You need to tell her you love her, Daddy.”
“I know, but she’s still in New York. I don’t want to tell her over the phone.”
“So go to New York!”
“I can’t. I’ve got to take care of you, and I can’t leave the restaurant with so little notice.” He knew all of this. Still, though, his mind raced through ways to make it work. Through what it would be like to go to Brooke in New York and confess everything to her.
“You help people all the time, Dad.”
He looked at his daughter.
“Let them help you back.”
He stopped pacing, eyes on Sam. “Do you really think I can make this work?”
“Yes. You should go drive to Denver, get on a plane, and fly to New York. When you get there, you should go up to her building holding a dozen roses in each hand and yell ‘I love you, Brooke McClellan!’ loud enough that all of New York can hear you. And then she’ll come down and she’ll put kisses all over your face, mwah, mwah, mwah. And then all the people in the streets will say, ‘Aww!’ and they’ll have hearts in their eyes just from watching you and Brooke, and then you can both fly back home holding hands.”
Cole smiled at Sam, shaking his head. “You paint a pretty convincing picture there, Samster.”
So convincing, he had to find a way to make it work.
Chapter Twenty
The energy in the green room at Van Zandt was one of nervous anticipation. All four designers—Brooke, Ian, Amica, and Kale—were dressed in suits and pacing, shaking out their hands and mumbling to themselves as they went over their presentations.
“Distract me,” Ian said to Brooke. “Since I’m going first, I won’t have time for these nerves to relax on their own and I’m going to go in there a frayed mess. Please. Distract me.”
Brooke motioned to the suit hanging from a hook on the wall. “The suit you made for your ‘branching out’ requirement is brilliant and amazing.”
A genuine, relaxed smile crossed Ian’s face. “Not every girl wants to wear a fancy dress to prom. If she wants to wear a suit, she should have one that’s every bit as fancy as one of your dresses. I think this might be my favorite thing I’ve ever designed. But that’s not going to work, Brooke. Step it up. Distract me with something other than my presentation.”
The thing that was distracting Brooke was thoughts of Cole, and how she could possibly change some things in her life to make herself available for the kind of relationship he had been offering. The more distance she got from what she’d had within grasp, the more she realized that what she could have with him was something beautiful and priceless and worthwhile and exactly everything she never knew she wanted.
She didn’t want to talk about him before her presentation, though, for fear that it would leave her scatterbrained and unfocused. Or possibly emotional, which would be disastrous. So she looked all around the room, grasping for anything else to bring up to Ian.
“I’ve got it,” Ian said. “Let’s talk about combining our businesses into a partnership.
Brooke laughed. “I’m actually shocked that we’ve been in this room for a full thirty minutes and you haven’t brought it up yet.”
“Okay, now hear me out. I know the statistics, Brooke, and your dad isn’t wrong—partnerships are the business type that fail the most frequently. Usually that’s because both partners don’t have similar visions or morals or work ethics. But partnerships can also be the most successful business type. This,” he said, motioning at all of Van Zandt, “is one of the businesses where a partnership was successful.”
Over the past several days, Brooke had been realizing just how many things she’d been wrong about. Things she’d grown up her entire life believing. The awareness that she could possibly be wrong about this, too, opened her mind to hearing his proposal more than she ever had before.
Ian faced her, excitement filling his eyes and his voice. “Brooke, we graduated from the same design program together. We started our businesses as babies at the same time. We have practically grown up together as fashion designers and business owners. We’ve known each other long enough to know that we have the same work ethic, the same goals, the same vision. The fact that we’ve been at this for the exact same amount of time, and the net worth of both our businesses are virtually equal, proves that.”
He paused a moment, then his words came out more relaxed but more earnest. “I know that your dad says that equal partnerships never work. But Brooke, I think that being so equal is exactly why this partnership will work.”
An assistant opened the door and stepped into the room. “Ian Bancroft, you’re up in two.”
Ian nodded his acknowledgment at the man and then turned back to Brooke. “So say we partner and everything works, because it will work. We’ll have a company with more contacts, more resources, double the brilliant brains powering it, double the workforce, and, when one of us is working a deadline and a trip out of town needs to happen, we’ll have double the people who can do it.”
“Sir,” the assistant said, “it’s time. Would you like me to help you with your things?”
“Yes. Just give me one moment.” He turned back to Brooke. “What do you think?”
“I think,” Brooke said, drawing out the words as she worked through so many things in her mind, “that you might not be wrong. This could be good for both of us. I will definitely think about it more.”
A grin spread across Ian’s face. As he headed toward his portfolio and suit, he turned, calling back, “This is going to be good. I know it.”
“Good luck on your presentation,” Brooke said.
“Thanks,” Ian said, pausing at the door, smiling wide. “And thank you for so fully distracting me from my nerves.”
The Brooke who stood in this room last time, as one of a group of twelve of the thirty-six original designers, would’ve never guessed that Ian’s words could’ve made so much sense. The old Brooke would’ve closed off her mind to the possibility of a partnership working before Ian even said two words about it, because she had known partnerships were doomed since she was old enough to know what one was.
But she stood in this same room today, as one of four designers, with the knowledge that not everything she had known and believed in the past was absolute. She had been pulled toward both Cole and Sam from the start, not realizing how much she had been wanting a husband, a daughter, a family, right from the very beginning.
And how much she wanted that family to take the spot of highest importance in her life.
* * *
Brooke chatted with Ian, Amica, and Kale after each had their turn to present and came back to the green room, each collapsing onto a sofa in relief at being done. Then the assistant popped his head in and told Brooke that she was up.
Brooke walked into the presentation room with the same panel of executives sitting behind the same long row of tables, but this time both Arbor and Mazarine Van Zandt were seated at the tables too.
This time there was no question about what she should prepare—Van Zandt Corporate had given all of them a very specific list, and her and her team really had dedicated their all in the previous three weeks to perfecting the items on that list. Presenting was one of her strengths, and she walked in confident that she was going to nail it.
Brooke greeted each of the executives as she entered the room, then placed her oversized look book on the easel at the front and placed a regular-sized copy in front of each of them. She started by showing off all the designs she’d like Van Zandt to consider carrying, then talking about all the places that her product could currently be found, then moved on to explaining the details about her manufacturing center, their current output, and what their maximum output was.
As she was giving each part of her presentation, everything clicked into place—partnering with Ian’s label would be like two halves of a whole that would be more effective together than either two would be apart.<
br />
Brooke presented her conceptualized plan to design high-end, unique, and customized dresses to fit the individual personalities of customers needing special dresses for big occasions. Then she showed off the dress that she had designed for Sam, smiling at the positive comments from the panel. They asked her several questions—all ones she had the answers to—until the timer sounded the end of her presentation and she thanked them for their time.
When she headed back into the hall with her portfolio and Sam’s dress, she was shocked at the realization that she didn’t want to go to the lunch Van Zandt had set up for the designers, where they could talk shop to their hearts’ content. She didn’t want to hang out in the green room after that, even though she loved being with people who had the same passion as her.
And the biggest surprise of all was that she didn’t want to go to the party tonight that was planned for the designers in town, along with all of her friends who were designers living in New York.
All she really wanted to do was to go home. She missed Cole terribly and just wanted to go see him and find some way to not only repair the damage done from the last two times she’d seen him, but to figure out how to stay together as a couple.
For the first time since she was a little girl, she actually allowed herself to picture what it would be like to have Cole as a husband. To have him to come home to at the end of each day—a partner to share her life and her hopes and her dreams and her struggles and her disappointments with. And to not only have Cole as a husband, but to have Sam as a daughter. A family to come home to.
The thought made her feel so complete that she inhaled a quick breath and leaned against the wall in the hallway, eyes closed, relishing the feeling.
Noemi had been right when she’d talked about Cole being the only one who could fill the hole in her heart. Because right now, the mere thought of being his partner in life seemed to fill it to the top.
