Somebody to Love

by Ann Christopher

  Sean blinked. Replayed all that in his head.

  “What?” he said, aghast. “Since when do you have anything nice to say to me?”

  “Since you earned it. Dara’s got me watching cooking shows with her lately. I heard Gordon Ramsey say something about kitchens being hard environments. Says they make for incredibly strong characters. I think that’s what’s happened to you.”

  The warm sincerity in Mike’s face put Sean over the top and drove away the lingering remnants of his anger. Honestly, he was over his bitterness. Now that he’d said his piece and had Mike’s acknowledgment that he’d been hard on him in the past, Sean had much bigger and more important fish to fry. Both literally and figuratively. The restaurant’s pending opening and all the turmoil with Amber had already fried his brain and his nerves, and he still needed to get those parts of his life together. He had no reserves left for processing the look of pride on his brother’s face. It had been way too long coming. Felt way too overwhelming.

  Sean turned away, embarrassed, as he hastily wiped his eyes with the heel of his hand and tried not to unravel any more than that.

  “Thanks,” he said gruffly.

  To his further astonishment, Mike came up behind him and squeezed his shoulder. “What’s going on?”

  Sean didn’t hesitate.

  “Why is everything so easy for you and so hard for me?” The question, which had been brewing Sean’s entire life, shot up and out of his mouth before he could think to stop it. But he was desperate and Mike was older and wiser. He’d seen all the stumbles and falls that Sean had made along the way and, more than that, he’d already achieved the career and personal success that still eluded Sean. Maybe he had some answers that could prevent Sean from blowing up his relationship with Amber or ruining his brand-new restaurant before it even got off the ground. Now was not the time for letting his pride stand between him and getting the reassurance he needed. “What do I keep doing wrong? Am I always going to be a loser no matter what I do?”

  Mike’s heavy brows contracted. “You’re not a loser. Don’t let me hear you say that again.”

  Sean snorted. “Like you never thought it.”

  “It was never true. And the fact that I thought it before, back in the day, is proof that I’m nowhere near as perfect as you like to accuse me of being. If I were, I wouldn’t have wasted so much time being a judgmental SOB.”

  Sean turned back and gaped at him, wondering when he’d ever heard Mike be so willing to admit he was wrong or suffered from a human frailty. “Where are you going with this?”

  “You don’t know my struggles,” Mike said. “And there have been plenty with my practice and my clients and with building a good marriage. Maybe you didn’t know about them, but they were there. I never appreciated your struggles. You took longer to find your stride than I did. But you found it. That doesn’t make me a winner and you a loser. It just means we’re on different paths. There’s enough winning to go around. I’m sorry for my part in making you feel like a loser. ”

  “That’s fair,” Sean said, beginning to feel marginally better.

  “You’re easier with people than I am. You relax and have fun. I wish I had that.”

  “You do?”

  “Yeah, genius. I do. Do you know how many times Dara has accused me of being arrogant and overbearing and told me to ease off?” Mike said with open exasperation. “What’s going on with you? What’s the real issue? You’ve got a great new restaurant that’s going to be a huge success. You’ve got your dream girlfriend. What’s the problem?”

  Sean stuffed his hands into his pockets and kept his attention firmly glued to the tips of his shoes, unable to believe that he was about to spew his deepest and darkest secret to Mike.

  But desperate times called for desperate measures, didn’t they?

  “I think she might still be hung up on Ella’s dad,” he quietly confessed, deciding to risk it and look Mike in the eye. “I’ve had my lifetime limit of getting kicked to the curb by women who are in love with other men. As you know. I don’t want to be anybody’s second choice or their consolation prize.”

  Mike absorbed this in silence, his steady gaze never wavering even as his supportive grip tightened on Sean’s shoulder.

  “I’m no expert, but if Amber is the right woman for you, she’ll figure out a way to be with you and make it work. No matter what. Even if it’s complicated and you have to go to a lot of trouble to get to where you need to be. She won’t be thinking about some guy from her past. Trust me.”

  A distant memory chimed in the back of Sean’s mind.

  “That’s what Dara told me. Years ago. She said that when the right woman for me comes along, she’ll know that I’m the only man for her.” Sean paused, trying to marry Dara’s wisdom with some action words that involved him grabbing Amber, dragging her back to the carriage house and refusing to let her leave until she acknowledged that the two of them and Ella belonged together as a family. “The only question is what I’m supposed to be doing in the meantime while we get all this figured out?”

  “That’s easy,” Mike said grimly, turning him loose with a light shove. “Wait and suffer in misery like the rest of us.”

  Chapter Twenty

  That evening, after a quick dinner at Pub 221B with his mother, Mike and Dara, Sean dashed back to the carriage house for a much-needed shower. Working in a restaurant might be exciting, invigorating and intensely rewarding, but it was also hot, sweaty and periodically disgusting. He suspected he smelled like an escapee from the elephant house at the nearest zoo, so getting clean again was a welcome relief.

  Duly refreshed with a fresh T-shirt and a clean pair of jeans, he cast a longing glance at the weathered leather sofa and big-screen TV over the mantle, grabbed his keys, chef’s jacket and windbreaker from their hooks in the foyer and swung the front door open on another chilly spring night.

  His mind was full of his scrolling to-do list, which he and his employees had whittled down to only about a million items, a significant improvement from the million or so items this morning, so he almost plowed straight into Amber, who had her diaper bag slung over her shoulder and Ella perched on her hip.

  Wait, Ella?

  He blinked. Stopped dead and looked closer, certain his eyes were deceiving him.

  Yeah. Ella.

  “It’s Sean, Mommy!” Ella cried, looking as surprised and delighted as he felt as she wriggled and pointed at him. “Look! It’s Sean!”

  “I told you I had a surprise for you, Miss Ella,” Amber said, beaming as she watched closely for his reaction.

  But Sean’s brain sparked and shorted out like a toaster tossed into a bathtub while one joyous thought raced through his head:

  They’re here.

  The dazzling enormity of this move on Amber’s part meant far too much for him to risk any misunderstandings. He stared at her smiling face, searching hard, and was rewarded when she nodded. A clear Yeah, I really mean it if ever he’d seen one.

  Relief surged out of him on a burst of startled laughter that quickly threatened to turn into a sob.

  Ella opened her arms and leaned forward for him to take her, all but tumbling out of her mother’s grip in her eagerness to get to him.

  “Hi, Sean!”

  “Hi, Ella,” he managed, his voice thick as he took her and settled her sturdy little baby fresh body, all bundled in her pale-yellow jacket and topped with her panda backpack, into his arms.

  She hugged him around the neck, which she’d done before, then gave him a soft little smack of a kiss on the cheek, which she’d never done before.

  With that, he was wrecked. Absolutely wrecked.

  His face twisted with more emotion than he could control or even attempt to control. He scrunched his eyes closed and surrendered to it for a couple of seconds, shuddering with those repressed sobs and beyond shame when it came to letting Amber see him fall apart like this. She hurried forward to join in the hug, creating an Ella sandwich on his thre
shold as they shared a quick kiss.

  Then Hurricane Ella ramped up into category five status, leaving him to hastily wipe his eyes, school his features and scramble to catch up.

  “What’s this, Sean?” Ella asked, squirming to get down and gesturing at the foyer before racing through to the living room.

  “It’s my house.” He hurried after her, signaling for a bemused Amber to shut the door.

  Everything seemed to meet Ella’s approval as she made a slow circuit of the room.

  “I like this,” she said, touching the velvet pillow on the sofa. The conch shell on the end table, fleece throw and framed picture of Nigel and Ada were similarly blessed.

  “Is that the TV?” she asked, pointing to it when she’d exhausted all the tchotchkes.

  “That’s my big TV.”

  “I like it! Can we watch The Lion King?”

  Sean was on the verge of telling Ella she could watch any damn thing she wanted any time she wanted when Amber deftly intervened.

  “Yes, but not tonight, Miss Ella,” she said, putting the diaper bag on the coffee table. “Sean has to get back to work soon.”

  “But not that soon,” Sean said quickly, not caring for the gathering storm clouds on Ella’s face. “In a little while.”

  With that, peace was restored in the kingdom.

  “Yay!” Ella zoomed into the kitchen and headed straight for the pantry, which she opened. “Where are the snacks?”

  “Excuse me,” Amber said, shutting the pantry door again and giving Ella a stern look. “We don’t get into other people’s pantries. We say, ‘May I have a snack, please?’ and wait to see if it’s okay. Plus, you just had dinner. And I have snacks for you if you’re still hungry. A lot of adults don’t have kids’ snacks.”

  “I have kids’ snacks,” Sean said, edging Amber aside and opening the pantry door again. “I have… Let’s see…Cheddar Goldfish. Ranch Goldfish. Animal crackers. Graham crackers. Fruity snacks. Cheerios. Honey Nut Cheerios…I think that’s all. Well, except for the yogurt and fruit pops in the fridge.”

  He emerged from his inventory to discover Ella jumping up and down and clapping with juvenile ecstasy and Amber gaping at him.

  “You have all that?” Amber asked.

  “Of course.” Sean clamped down on some of his amusement. “I’m a player. I thought you knew.”

  “I didn’t know,” Amber said, eyes still wide and brows raised. “When did you do all this? How did I miss it?”

  “Last couple of weeks. I thought it was time. And we’re usually at your place, aren’t we?”

  “True. Childproofing?”

  “Respect my skills,” Sean said, flapping a hand at the nearest outlet, which featured plug protectors, and at the cabinet under the sink, which he’d latched.

  Amber put her hands together in prayer position and bowed at him.

  “You are a master.”

  They burst into joint laughter.

  “I want Goldfish, Sean! And animal crackers!”

  As a player, Sean knew that there was only one acceptable answer to such a demand:

  “Ask your mother.”

  “Mommy—”

  “I have heard zero nice words from you, Miss Ella.”

  Ella quickly regrouped and tried again. “Can I have Goldfish and animal crackers please, Sean?”

  “You certainly may.”

  This was the moment he’d been waiting and planning for. He went to his Ella cabinet next to the refrigerator and extracted both a snack cup (Toy Story) and a sippy cup (Beauty and the Beast) because no toddler could choke down all those dry snacks without getting parched. Amber, who seemed to have swallowed her tongue by this point, watched in amazement as he doled out the appropriate serving sizes and presented Ella with her treat.

  Ella immediately presented the items to Amber for her approval. “Look, Mommy!”

  “Amazing! Make sure you thank Sean for his thoughtfulness.”

  “Thank you, Sean!”

  Sean absorbed the hit from those bright eyes, chipmunk cheeks, sparkling teeth and dimples as best he could while melting into chocolate goo. “You’re welcome, Ella. Anything for you.”

  Still grinning, Ella plunked her items on the kitchen table and attempted the arduous climb into one of the chairs.

  “Let me help you, Miss Ella,” Amber said, stepping forward.

  “Allow me,” he said, shooting her an arch look.

  Amber froze, bemused, and waited to see what he’d do next.

  Back into the pantry he went, emerging with a booster seat.

  The Lion King.

  Ella shrieked with delight, threatening to break all the glass surfaces in the house. “Look, Mommy!”

  “Unbelievable,” Amber said, smacking her forehead and laughing.

  Sean helped Ella settle into her booster seat, helped her off with her little jacket and sat next to her to make sure she didn’t need anything.

  A smiling Amber faded into the background.

  “Here,” Ella said, passing him both a Goldfish and an animal cracker.

  “Thank you, Ella.” Honestly, after the day he’d had, a winning lotto ticket wouldn’t have meant this much to him. He crunched them down with enthusiasm. “You’re very nice about sharing.”

  She giggled, kicking her legs as she smacked happily and made quick work of her snack. When it was all gone, she downed her milk with a few deep gulps, hopped down and raced to the counter, where she deposited her empty cups. Then it was back out to the living room at maximum warp speed.

  “Look, Miss Ella.” Amber, who’d made herself at home on the sofa while they enjoyed their snacks, pointed toward the fireplace. “What’s that?”

  Sean glanced around. And froze when he discovered that his Christmas gift for Ella had magically appeared on the mantel. He looked to Amber for some sort of explanation, his swelling heart in his throat, and was rewarded when she gave him a conspiratorial wink.

  Sean nearly expired from happiness on the spot.

  Meantime, Ella’s entire body seemed to quiver with excitement in addition to her happy-dancing footwork that would have put Bruno Mars to shame. “It’s the Ginch, Mommy! The Ginch!”

  “I see that,” Amber said wryly. “Maybe it’s for you. Why don’t you ask Sean if you can have it?”

  Ella skipped, hopped and bobbed her way over to him, wrapping her arms around his legs and leaning way back to look him in the face.

  Another dose of those soul stealing eyes. Honest to God, Sean was starting to feel woozy.

  “Please, Sean?”

  “Absolutely.” He picked her up and swung around to allow her to grab the gift bag. Then he sat next to Amber and arranged Ella and her bag on his lap.

  Ella dove in with gleeful abandonment, yanking out the red tissue paper, thrusting it at Amber and screeching when she discovered what was inside.

  “It’s a panda, Mommy,” she shouted, eyes bulging. “A panda!”

  “A panda?” Amber watched the proceedings, now looking a little teary at all this toddler delight. “Make sure you—”

  “Thank you, Sean!” Ella said, throwing her arms around his neck for a grateful snuggle.

  With that, Sean lost most of the rest of his shit. When the tears came, as they had to come, he quickly wiped them away with the thumb and forefinger of one hand, held Ella and her panda close with the other and turned to Amber.

  She slung an arm around the back of the sofa, squeezing his shoulder and smiling without smiling as she looked at him over the top of Ella’s head.

  “I gotta tell you, this little girl’s got a piece of my heart. A big piece.” He pressed his lips together, determined to keep his voice soft and to stop with the crying nonsense. “But not as big as yours.”

  Amber’s dimples deepened with such quiet joy that she seemed to glow when she looked at him.

  “And I gotta tell you…Ella’s father was my first love.” She paused. “But you are my great love.”

  A partial
sob (joy; relief; disbelief; overwhelming gratitude and absolute determination to treat these two females like the queen and princess that they were) snuck past his lips, resisting all his efforts to block it.

  So much for his no-crying pledge.

  But he figured he was allowed a little emotion. God knew it had taken him more than long enough to arrive at this place of peace and contentment in his life. He’d endured his share of failures, many of them unforced. Why not wallow in the success for a minute and really allow himself to feel it?

  He leaned in. Amber leaned in. And they exchanged a salty kiss over the top of Ella’s head.

  “The panda’s soft, Mommy! Look! It’s soft!”

  “You might have mentioned that she’s a whirlwind,” Sean whispered in Amber’s ear as they broke apart. “I’m exhausted.”

  “Look! Feel, Mommy! Feel it!”

  “Be careful what you wish for,” Amber said in a teasing singsong, leading to more laughter on both sides. “Next time you’ll do more research before you jump into something with both feet, won’t you?”

  “Live and learn,” he said with mock regret.

  “Guess we should leave and let you get back to the restaurant, huh?” Amber murmured a little while later, an interesting light in her eyes and a husky note in her voice. Ella having eventually worn herself (and them) out, they’d all collapsed back on the sofa. Ella now occupied Amber’s lap and lay with her cheek against her mother’s chest, breathing deeply and dead asleep. “I know we’re keeping you from a lot of work back at the bistro.”

  Sean, who had been experimentally stroking the side of Amber’s neck for the last couple of minutes or so, praying that Ella would eventually fall asleep if they were patient long enough, decided his time had come. He kissed Amber’s neck for the thrill of hearing her coo. Nuzzled his way up to her ear, nipping it.

  “I have a minute. Work will keep.”

  “I thought you had a restaurant to open,” she said, her breath hitching.

  “I have my priorities straight. Family comes first. Doesn’t it?”