Evangeline Jackson sat at her desk, her head a million miles away.
Two weeks had passed since she’d returned from the US and her Christmas break, and yet it felt as if she wasn’t fully back.
She might not be in love, but she’d left her heart in the US. Heck, it had gone back to California when her best friend had left for that award show. Tessa and she had been like sisters for most of their lives and now she was alone with no one but her mother there, and even that had come to a standstill when her mother had found someone new.
Evy was happy for her, more than she could say, but she was also lonely and missed adult company.
She missed Tessa more than she’d ever be able to say.
“Miss Jackson.”
She jumped at the harsh tone and knew the voice even before she looked up at the biggest regret of her life. Ian was handsome, no doubt; at least she’d thought so months ago. He had brown-green eyes and light brown hair styled to perfection. His suits fit him like a glove, but she no longer found anything appealing about him.
After all, she knew now he was the biggest jerk on the planet.
“Yes, sir?”
Hard to believe they had a child together.
“I promised you a promotion and I’m giving it to you. You’re going to be head of the new field office.”
Her stomach dropped. She knew there was talk about a new sister location in Canada, and it would be the farthest location from where she currently was.
“Oh?” It was all she said.
“It’s going to be in Monterey, California. I hear you are familiar with the place?”
Her heart thumped in her chest and she gaped at him. Had he said what she’d just understood?
“Excuse me?”
“There’s this new radio station… well, it’s not that new anymore, but it had a huge boom with one of their shows. Tagged For Life? Have you heard about it?”
The way his non-descriptive murky brown-green eyes watched her told her all she needed to know. He knew she’d heard about it.
“Tessa Rowan leads that show,” she said as a way of agreeing.
He nodded, rubbing his hands together. “Your work visa is done; we’ll take care of your apartment here in three months’ time.”
“Why in three months?” Would she leave so soon?
“You’ll be arriving in the US in two weeks from now, and you’ll have until the end of March to secure the Tagged For Soldiers event planning and make the event great. If you succeed, you’ll stay there and keep that position. If not, you’ll return here. That’s why three months.”
Evy felt like throwing up. It was one of California’s biggest events, co-hosted and presented by Tessa and her station, and organized by the United States Army.
“And how in the world do you expect me to land that deal?” Especially because she was sure the planning had long started.
“Well, isn’t Tessa Rowan your best friend?”
She nodded, not even able to say anything anymore.
“Then I suggest you get onto the phone and call her up. You know, ask her to actually do something for you.”
He shrugged and left, only to return a second later. “Oh, and your info is at Cecil’s desk.”
He couldn’t have brought it, could he? And how in the world was she supposed to organize a place to stay? And whatever else she needed to arrange?
God, just yesterday she would’ve said that nothing could’ve ruined an offer like that, and she’d have been ready to pack up whatever she could fit in her suitcase and leave everything else behind, but that moment she couldn’t see it. She was tempted to just tell her boss to find someone else, but she had a feeling that wouldn’t only be the end of her America dream, but also the end of her working for Lanestrong Parties and Events.
Evy stood, her legs shaky, and made her way over to the welcome counter and Cecilia, the person currently owning her future life—if she could use her best friend’s connections.
“Ah, Evangeline! Isn’t it exciting? You and your daughter moving to the US…” She shook her head while handing her a huge manila envelope. “Everything’s in there. The only thing I couldn’t secure yet was housing… I wasn’t allowed to. Sorry.” She gave her an apologetic smile and Evy forced herself to mirror that expression.
Cecilia was young and eager, still idealistic with too blonde hair and pink tips as well as too bright lipstick.
She’d soon feel drained. It was what this office did to you, and although Evy hated working there by now, she couldn’t leave. Finding a new position when she had Leila was anything but easy.
Then Cecilia’s words settled in. “I don’t have a place to stay?”
Cecilia shook her head. “Lanestrong told me explicitly that you’d be staying with a friend of yours,” she reported. “However, I can still try and find something, but the office won’t pay for it.”
Evy shook her head. “No, I’ll figure it out.”
And that only because she didn’t want Ian Lanestrong to have the satisfaction of hearing through the grapevine that she struggled.
And she knew that was going to happen because housing was hard enough to find for Americans. How would she do it as a British person not even there yet?
She went back to her cubicle and opened the envelope, reading over everything in there.
Sadly, she didn’t remember most of it even after she’d been through the papers once. Her mind was on the fact that her asshole of a boss expected her to ask Tessa to stay with her and to make it so that she could organize the event.
The latter would be hell, and the former was utterly impossible. Yes, Tessa and Jazz lived together in a house, one that belonged to him since Christmas, but his sister and his mother were also still there, and while Evy knew they weren’t exactly imposing, she had no doubt that the small family would be happier without them there.
They just had finally settled into a routine.
Her heart heavy, she texted the only other American she could think of who could maybe help her.
I need a place to stay in two weeks from now. As in… stay rather permanently… maybe… in Monterey.
She put her cell down on her table, staring at the flight tickets she’d gotten. They were one way, and she knew without asking, should she fail she’d have to pay for the return tickets all by herself.
She read over the papers again, this time more closely, and made notes of the most important things, like where she’d find the office—as if she needed to know that just that moment—and what the pre-budget was for the party. She planned on starting on notes and suggestions for the event although she was missing a lot of the info. She had some thanks to Tessa, but that was all she could go on. Truth be told, it wasn’t much, but hey, how much could you do wrong where soldiers were involved? People loved them anyway.
Gathering her things, her cell vibrated on the tabletop and she picked it up, smiling as she spotted Tank’s name on the display. As much as she’d heard about him, and everything she’d witnessed when being with him and others, she couldn’t complain about him.
Whenever she needed something, even if it was just a kind word, he was there.
Tank: No worries, you’ll have a place. Text me your arrival times and I’ll make sure you’ll be picked up, too. Does Tessa know?
No questions asked, he jumped in and promised to save the day. She wanted to tell Tessa, but wasn’t sure yet how much she’d say over the phone, so she pocketed her cell, deciding to answer later, when she hopefully knew what to tell him.
* * *
It was barely eight in the morning and Tank already felt as if the day should be over. He was living in two different time zones at once and it was fucking crazy.
The thing was, he had always felt the need to step in when guys were douches. He’d usually protected the girls from beatings and whatnot, and would walk away.
Clearly he wasn’t the most romantic guy, but he never would hit a woman or otherwise put marks on them—unless they explicitly asked for it.
And love bites didn’t count, either.
Then Evy had come along and he couldn’t just leave her behind.
“Care to share?”
Jazz’s dark head popped from under a hood and Tank rolled his eyes. The guy hadn’t stopped grinning since he’d been allowed back on base, and even if he spent a night awake with his son Johnny, he was chipper in the morning.
“I don’t share, and no, I’m not going to have emotional talks with you. We’ve had fucking enough because of Tessa.”
Jazz rubbed his hands clean with a cloth and pushed it back in his pocket. “So it’s an emotional talk, and I assume about a woman. I’ve almost thought as much because you’ve had your panties in a twist since Christmas or so.”
He sat down next to him and Tank got up, reaching for a screwdriver. “As if you notice anyone besides Tessa and your son.”
He didn’t need to turn back to Jazz to see the smugness on his friend’s face. He could very well imagine it because the jealousy in Tank’s voice was hard to ignore.
“You’re my brother-in-arms, Tank, closer to me than family a lot of times. I notice when you’re off. Especially when not seeing you with chicks anymore.”
Tank swallowed. Yeah, that was something he should correct. He needed a woman under him, something warm to sheath himself in, and then he’d probably be better again.
Only he couldn’t really get it up anymore—or at least not with just any woman. Now, when he thought of a certain curly head and hazel eyes…
He didn’t finish that thought because yeah, it almost always worked.
Glancing at Jazz, who waited patiently, he realized even if he wanted to, he couldn’t talk to him. Telling Jazz his heart was doing insane things when he considered Evy was coming back stateside, and permanently the way it seemed, would put his best friend in the position to tell Tessa, and Tank didn’t even know if Evy wanted to inform her best friend yet or not.
Issues on top of issues.
The whole thing was a huge pile of shit.
Turning to the Jeep he’d promised to repair, he loosened the first screws on the engine. It probably had to be replaced, but he felt like doing a puzzle, so he wanted to take it apart first to see if maybe he could find the problem.
“What if I were in love?” He had no idea where the words came from, but they were there suddenly, and out before he even considered really saying them.
The chair scraped against the stone floor as Jazz pushed back. “You?”
“Maybe.”
Or maybe not. And maybe not with Evy. Maybe it was like Jazz had said the very first time Tank had done something as stupid as calling up Evy when being drunk.
“You know, Tank, you should get her out of your head… She’s not a fuck or a fling or whatever you want from her, so please, forget it and don’t call her again!”
Evy was neither a fuck nor a fling. Hell, she was so different from all the girls Tank usually took with him.
Then again, he’d never taken Evy home.
“Since Christmas, huh?” Jazz suddenly said into the silence. He was bent over a tire on one of a private’s cars. “Tell me it’s not one of Tessa’s girls,” he then pleaded quietly.
“What? Am I not good enough for them?” Tank snarled, pissed at his best friend. He leaned over, needing to see Jazz’s reaction.
His best friend hung his head. “I think you could be whatever you told yourself you wanted to be, but let’s face it, Tank: You and women don’t have the best track record, and the first time you met Tessa, you asked me if I was really going to leave you for some pussy.”
Tank didn’t need a reminder of that inglorious day.
“Tessa loves me now,” he pointed out, and it was halfway true.
“Tessa is grateful for everything you did for her when I was out of it, and a douche. We both are. We can never pay you back for that.”
Tank sighed. “Shut the fuck up, you don’t need to tell me that each and every time. I’m your best buddy. It’s what you do for them. You couldn’t take care of your woman, so I had to.”
“Speaking about that woman. Hey, you two.”
Tank recognized the voice, and as much as he wanted to be annoyed at it, he couldn’t be. Glancing around the hood of the car, he spotted Tessa and Johnny in the open gate to the garage on base.
Since she’d agreed to help the army with promotions and similar things, she was on base every other day—and naturally dropped by to see Jazz because they, god forbid, hadn’t seen each other in two hours.
“Johnny boy, come and hang out with Uncle Tank while mommy and daddy make kissy-kissy.”
Tessa arched a brow at him, her chocolate eyes soft with amusement. “Kissy-kissy? He’s not even old enough to understand what that means,” she pointed out while Tank walked over, leaning in to kiss her cheek and take the boy.
“Why the hell did you put him in black clothes? He’s a fucking child, not a Goth chick.”
Tessa crossed her arms in front of her chest. “Because last time Uncle Tank left grease prints on my child and I couldn’t get them out of the clothes.”
Tank grinned guiltily, but Tessa only laughed. “Besides, I didn’t come to talk to Jazz.” Jazz, who’d just walked up, pulled his fiancée into his side and held her.
“You didn’t?” his best friend asked and Tessa shook her head.
“You promised Evy to find her a place to stay?” she asked instead, directed at Tank
Uh oh, he knew that tone. He kept his eyes on the little boy and sighed in exasperation.
“I cannot keep anyone at base and you know I don’t have another apartment in Monterey.”
You could always offer her a room at your mother’s house, a small, mocking voice in the back of his mind whispered. Make her see exactly what kind of guy you are.
“Which is exactly why I’m curious as to how you plan to find something for her in such a short time.” Tessa’s tone, pleasant when she’d arrived, took a turn for the worse with every new sentence coming out between them.
“I’m going to ask Mother Teresa to take her in.”
Silence met his statement and he glanced up, finding both, Tessa and Jazz, with furrowed brows.
He cocked his head, rolling his eyes. Did they really not get the reference?
“Seriously? I mean the only person in town who always has an empty house and an open door.”
Tessa’s expression brightened. “With Mother Teresa you mean Hilary?” she clarified in disbelieve while Jazz started laughing.
“I think you know nothing about Mother Teresa,” he wheezed, his hands resting on his knees as he tried to catch his breath.
Tank shook his head, returning his attention to the babbling child in his arms. “Your mother and father have no sense of humor.” Although Hilary, one of Tessa’s closest friends, wasn’t that much like the saint he’d compared her to.
Johnny stared up at him with Tessa’s beautiful eyes and Jazz’s dark hair.
Damn, he loved that child like he never thought he could.
“Hilary is a perfect option,” Tessa decided, her expression clouding. “She’s been lonely since I moved out.”
“Hard to believe. I’d be glad if you’d be moving your ass out of my house. She can finally run around braless again,” he explained with a grin and Tessa giggled.
“Braless? We’d been running around naked when I lived there. Benefit of being platonic girlfriends. Okay, I gotta run. Thomas, I swear…” She didn’t finish and didn’t have to, either. He knew exactly what she was warning him about.
One wrong move with my bestie and you’ll have hell to pay.
She kissed Jazz, took Johnny from him, and then made her way over to where the offices were located. Tank returned to his car, not missing how Jazz took his side.
“Evangeline? Seriously?”
Tank snorted. “Please! Me and that proper and prim lady? Remember, I’m no one she would go for.”
Yes, they’d been over that before, too.
“I do. I’m surprised you remember that talk though,” Jazz replied.
Yeah, Tank remembered almost everything he’d ever said to and about Evy—except for those words he had probably uttered during the one drunk-dial he’d ever done in his life.
The one he was still too chicken to ask about.
* * *
Evy had started sorting through her stuff.
There were pictures on pictures, from the time before selfies and cellphones were such a big deal. Evy had a hard time just skipping over those memories and allowed herself a few minutes to flip through them. Most of them were of Tessa and her from trips they’d taken together, parties they’d been at, or their high-school-graduation.
It was incredible how much they both had changed over the course of time, and yet even in the later pictures they’d always been cheek to cheek, grinning because they were together.
Man, Evy missed those times. Putting the photographs away, it finally settled in that she’d be back by Tessa’s side the moment the plane touched down in the US, and she was determined to never return to England once she made it over the sea to the other side of the world.
Would she use Tessa’s connections? Not if she could help it. However, she was convincing, good at her job, and she had charm. She’d find a way to make at least part of the event organization her task. Something had to be missing still, right?
Either way, she had her books sorted, knowing which would find a new home in a library in town. Her heart bled with each and every paperback she had to leave behind, but it didn’t matter, because she couldn’t take them all.
She also had the cardboard boxes with her pictures ready, planning to leave those with her mom and get them to the US step by step.
Her cell rang and it was Tessa. She was probably on her way to some place or another.
As it was, she could hardly reach her best friend anymore because she was always on the go, meeting with soldiers, with officials, planning her show, seeing Jazz, taking Johnny out and whatnot.
Tessa’s life worked finally the way her best friend had hoped for, while Evy’s life was in shambles.
For a moment she wondered if this was how Tessa had felt when going to the US that first time for her holidays, before meeting Jazz.
Had she gotten up every morning thinking there had to be more? Had she sat at work, considering just getting up to leave and causing a real uproar? Had she curled up on the couch each and every night, crying quietly for herself until telling herself to put on her big girl panties?
The only ray of sunshine Evy had—which Tessa never had possessed—was her daughter. There were moments when Evy felt almost happy.
Followed by moments where she felt utterly guilty for not being happier with her beautiful Leila in her life.
She couldn’t even begin to imagine how it must’ve been for Tessa.
She reached for the phone as the incessant ringing didn’t stop.
“I’m asleep,” she said as a way of greeting. There were noises in the background, proving Tessa was indeed in the car again.
“You’re not, you’re probably packing. You will be ready to leave tomorrow. Unlike me.”
Tessa had never really emptied her apartment. Evy had gotten all the important documents and jewelry, all things of worth, and the rest Tessa had left behind without a second glance.
“I’m sorting my books. I figured I’d start with my bedroom. I have a hard time letting go of everything.”
“I’m not surprised,” Tessa replied.
“I am,” Evy confessed. “I’ve been dying to get out, get away, but now that it’s suddenly there…” She couldn’t be excited anymore because her asshole boss expected her to rely on the good will of her best friend.
“I had nothing to lose. You had a great life in London. Still have.”
Evy rested her head back against the bed, the cold from the floor seeping into her body. “I’ve never been as lonely in my life as I am right now. I feel as if there’s something missing inside of me.”
She was fully prepared to get the ‘you have a child’ speech from Tessa, but instead she heard her best friend park and get out of the car.
There was quiet around now, only a few birds chirping and Evy could very well see the clear blue skies and still-green trees.
Winter in California was her personal heaven when it came to the season… although she generally preferred every other season to winter.
“Of course you are, Evy. You suddenly have no life outside of the office and your daughter. Having been there, I’m not surprised you think something’s missing in your life. I can go over to Hil’s and hang out with her, or just have Ela watch Johnny and meet up with the guys. With me here, you don’t have many people there.”
No one she really wanted to see, but Evy didn’t say that out loud. “What? No ‘you have a daughter, be happy’ speech?”
Tessa didn’t even laugh.
“Do I think you owe it to Leila to be happy? Yes. Do I think you should be happy because of her? Yes. However, I also know a child sometimes is not enough.”
Evy cursed herself. Of course Tessa knew. During those months where Jazz had pushed her away because of his PTSD she’d struggled between her job, nightly visits to the man she loved, and her son. However, she hadn’t been happy most of the time because not being with Jazz had been hard on her.
Jesus, Evy remembered those months, and all the check-up phone calls she’d had with Hilary, just to get an update on her best friend.
“It’s hard to believe you’ve been where I am, and harder to believe I had no real idea what you were going through until I hit the same low.”
“Except you’re coming over. And maybe then you’ll explain to me why you told Tank before you told me.”
Yeah, Tessa wouldn’t let that go. She’d not said anything earlier, but Evy had expected it. The problem was, she didn’t know why she’d messaged Tank first.
Or maybe she did.
He was the one she’d told everything she’d been through because he was a mess just as much as she was, and he didn’t blab. He wasn’t a guy to go around and share what she said. Hell, she didn’t even think he would remember it longer than their talks went.
He’d called her that morning to check on her, and that night he would probably pick up a chick in a bar, take her against the side of said bar and then walk away, only remembering Evy when glancing at his cell and remembering they’d texted.
She hated the thought of him with someone else because of how he was with her compared to how he talked about women in general.
His attitude toward them pissed her off, especially when he’d proven time and again that he was a good guy.
The other possibility was that she was simply jealous he was with another woman, but that she scratched from her mind instantly…again.
She could never go for a man-whore like Tank. She wasn’t someone you had and then left again.
Especially because her daughter was on the line. Every decision she’d make she’d make for her daughter, too.
Or rather because of her daughter.
And Tank surely wasn’t the safest decision for a child.
“Evangeline? Jesus, did you tune me out again?”
She clearly had.
“I’m sorry, Tess. I have too much on my mind.” Like Tank and a faceless woman, having sex against a bar wall. “Look, I need to get to bed anyway. I’m going to text you, okay?”
Tessa sighed. “When you’re here, you’re not getting away so easily anymore. I love ya and cannot wait to have you here.”
“Love you more and I’m sorry. Don’t be mad, okay? It’ll be all different in the US.”
“I guarantee you that,” Tessa replied and then hung up.
Evy rested her cell against her chin with a long sigh, closing her eyes against the unbidden tears that threatened yet again to roll down her cheeks.