After the trip to Cape Arago, Adam pulled back so suddenly Ellie nearly got whiplash from the change in his attitude. Not that they’d had anything going on before that day, but he’d never dropped Sophie off at school or picked her up in the afternoon without stopping to chat a little with Ellie. Two weeks into this new routine, where Adam barely said hello and goodbye, looking like he couldn’t get out of Spring Bunnies fast enough, Ellie wondered whether she should talk to him and ask what was wrong. She didn’t think it had been her fault, but maybe she’d inadvertently said something that had annoyed him or, worse even, that had given him a hint of her inappropriate thoughts.
“Hey, Ellie. Good to find you here. I meant to call you.” Jared sat down at her table in Spring Delights, a to-go cup of steaming brew in his right hand and a cinnamon roll in his left. No surprise there. “Mind if I take a seat?”
Ellie smiled. She could use a little company and a distraction from the silly musings about a certain deputy sheriff she couldn’t stop thinking about. Stupid woman.
“I haven’t heard from you about the new article yet, so I wanted to make sure you’re still on board.”
With all that had been going on in her mind, she’d totally forgotten about the article she was supposed to deliver to Jared in time for next week’s edition.
“I’m sorry, I’ve just been, uh… busy.” She took a sip of her cinnamon latte to swallow her lie, but it didn’t make her feel less guilty. Jared and Lauren had been her friends from the very first minute they’d met her, and she’d promised she’d contribute regularly to Jared’s newspaper. Instead, she got all caught up in a man who was off-limits and forgot everyone else.
“You know you’re free to pick the topic you want to write about, right? I mean if you’re not comfortable with the option I gave you, we can totally change it. No one besides the two of us will know.”
She nodded. “Yeah, maybe we could brainstorm while you’re here, and come up with something. I think I’m having writer’s block or something.”
He bit off half of the cinnamon roll and munched slowly for a couple of seconds, looking lost in thought, then turned his attention back to her.
“How about an article with tips for single parents? Since you live right next door to Adam?”
Her throat constricted at the mention of his name, to the point she nearly couldn’t swallow the latte she’d just sipped. Jared seemed oblivious to her reaction and sat up straighter, holding on to his to-go cup.
“I could totally see this becoming a regular column, especially once the online version is up and running. There are lots of single, divorced or widowed parents. I think a few tips from an expert would help them a lot.” He nodded and his smile grew wider, as if he were mentally commending himself. “You could ask Adam about his life as a single dad, his struggles, his routine… you know, stuff like that.”
The last thing Ellie wanted was to interview Adam. Spending one-on-one time with him was out of the question, especially since he didn’t seem to want to be in the same room with her for more than two-point-five minutes tops. How was she going to get herself out of this mess, without Jared realizing why she didn’t want to do it?
He stared at her over the rim of his glasses, which had slid slightly down his nose. Heat crept up from her neck, and her heart bounced in her chest. She’d never been good at lying, and right now she felt like she was being interrogated and she didn’t know how to get away with her crime.
“Well, you shouldn’t be so over-enthusiastic about my proposal.” He tilted his head to the right and winked. He adjusted his glasses with the tip of his finger, then tilted his head to the other side.
She smiled. “No, I think it’s a good idea. It’s only that... well, I think Adam’s been a little busy lately. I haven’t seen much of him, except when he drops Sophie at school. I wouldn’t want to steal his free time with his daughter, on top of everything else.”
“Maybe he’s working on some new project with his grandpa. He could totally have a career outside the force if he wanted. But he likes being a super hero.” Jared shrugged, taking a sip from his cup, and grimaced when he scalded his tongue. “Must have something to do with the men in uniform charm you ladies are so fond of.”
“I was an Army brat, with a brother who’s currently in Afghanistan. I’ve seen enough uniforms to last for a lifetime and beyond, thank you very much.”
Jared grinned. “Hey, that’s cool. You could write an article about how to make things work when one or both parents are in the military?”
Ellie scrunched her nose. “That topic is a little too tough for a newbie like me. I’d need more time to write something worth publishing.” She rested her chin on her propped hand and chewed her lip, thinking. “How about something a little more cheerful for this article? I don’t know, maybe since Halloween is only two weeks away, I could write something about that?”
“Like, ‘How to carve a pumpkin with your munchkin’?”
Ellie laughed. “Yeah, that sounds fun. I’ll see if I can jot down some ideas tonight.”
“Great.” He wolfed down the cinnamon roll right as Ellie finished the last sip of her latte. “I’d better get going now. Don’t want to keep my minions waiting.”
“Your minions?” Ellie quirked an eyebrow, and Jared gave her a mischievous grin as he stood up.
“The kids at school. They’re staying overtime today to finish a project for the blog. I promised I’d bring cookies.”
She followed Jared outside, where they parted ways. Then she got on her bike and rode down Cypress Road to the marina, where she stopped to buy fresh cod to make fish and chips for dinner.
Two hours later, as she sat at her table and took her first bite of the food, her taste buds reminded her of the last time she’d had fish and chips, and her stomach twisted. She remembered sitting across from Adam, laughing as Sophie spoke with her mouth full while he tried to teach her to swallow first, watching Sammy eat quietly but with the appetite of a three-year-old, and thinking it felt a lot like they were a happy family of four on a day trip—and for a moment there, she’d wished it was real.
She tried to erase those memories and the feelings that were connected to that day, but with every bite she was reminded of something that had happened, an expression on Adam’s face, a funny thing Sophie had said, a twinkle in Sammy’s eyes that was worth more than a thousand words of appreciation.
She’d thought she was over her dream of having her own family, with her own happily-ever-after, but spending a day with her handsome neighbor and two adorable kids had crushed all of her certainties.
Maybe her heart still wanted to believe the fairy tale, after all. But her mind didn’t want to. She didn’t need to depend on a man for a happy life. She didn’t want to, period.
Once she was finished eating and had tidied up, she picked up her laptop and walked out onto the back porch, where she hoped the cool night air would clear her mind.
* * *
Adam walked through the French door of the kitchen onto the back porch, with a bottle of chilled beer in his hand. He’d received a call from Mendosa today. He was risking his job sharing information with Adam, but besides being his former partner, Xavier Mendosa was a friend. A loyal buddy who’d helped him to his feet and kept him up straight when the paramedics had loaded Hannah’s lifeless body into the ambulance, in a black body bag that had haunted his nights for weeks. Xavier had understood, even when Adam’s captain and his parents hadn’t, how vital finding the man with the knife was for Adam. He’d risked his career back then, and he was risking it again now, just to give Adam the peace of mind Xavier said he deserved.
The call had left a bad taste in Adam’s mouth, though. The lead they’d had only a couple of months before was now a dead-end. The man had disappeared from the police radar, and even though the detectives had been asking around, they hadn’t been able to find him. He’d probably left Seattle, and unless he came back and started dealing drugs again, Xavier would have no way of helping Adam. Wherever the man had gone, it was out of Seattle PD jurisdiction—out of Xavier’s hands. Adam would have to do some digging of his own now, and he’d intended to do it tonight, if only Sophie had agreed to go to bed at a decent time, like he’d planned.
Now he was too worn out to concentrate on a case that had been eating at him for three years. He just needed a little thinking time before going to bed.
He plopped himself down on the Adirondack, leaned his head against the hard wood and took a long pull from the bottle.
“Tough day?” A familiar voice coming from his left made him choke on his Guinness, and the lilting laughter that followed showed him she’d noticed his reaction. “Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you.”
After the trip to Cape Arago, he’d tried to avoid her as much as he could. The sense of guilt was still gnawing at his gut; every time his eyes rested on Hannah’s smiling face in any of the several pictures scattered around the house, he felt as if he were cheating on her. Yeah, he promised her he’d move on, that he’d be happy again, but how could he?
He shook his thoughts away. He could at least be a polite neighbor, if nothing else. It wasn’t Ellie’s fault that he was so messed up.
“No, you…” His voice came out raspy, and he cleared his throat. “Yeah, you sort of did. I mean, sitting in the dark and waiting to jump out and scare me… you’re lucky I lock my gun in the safe when I come home or I would’ve shot you.”
Ellie laughed again. The sound, against the background of owls hooting and the distant sound of the waves, brought on a welcome sense of peace, of familiarity.
Of home.
This was what he’d hoped he’d have with Hannah one day: relaxing on their back porch after a long day at work, simply enjoying each other’s company with the sounds of nature as their own, personal soundtrack.
He swallowed the lump in his throat and took another long pull from the bottle. “And to answer your question: yes, it’s been a tough day.” He closed his eyes for a moment and opened them again to stare at the starry sky. “Long day at work. Then it took me forever to put Sophie to bed. She spent the afternoon at the bakery with my mom while I was busy outside town, and apparently she managed to stuff her mouth with cookies behind my mom’s back. She’d barely come down from the sugar high when I finally convinced her to go to bed five minutes ago.”
“I think almost every other child dreams of having a bakery as a day care. Didn’t you and your brothers?” Ellie asked, with an amused tone.
“Yeah, we did.” Freshly baked cookies, muffins, and cakes had been their favorite kinds of breakfast and snacks all through their childhood and adolescence. Thinking back to the sweet tooth the three of them had, and how they enjoyed stealing just-out-of-the-oven cookies when their mother wasn’t looking, he wondered how the poor woman had coped with a bunch of kids on a nearly constant sugar high. He cringed and made a mental note to ask his mother how she’d dealt with it back then. He needed all the advice he could get, if he didn’t want to end up being a failure as a father.
“I guess my mom was a saint or something. But I’m not trained to deal with a three-year-old on a sugar high, bouncing around the house like a kangaroo. Not after the kind of day I’ve had.”
“You’ll get used to dealing with it, just like everything else.” Her reassuring tone brought back a little bit of his own confidence. “I’m sure at first you had no idea how to change a diaper, but eventually you learned, right?”
“I was never really a pro at that.” He’d always had a hard time changing Sophie’s diapers. It used to be Hannah’s specialty, and he’d stopped changing diapers the moment he’d come home to Spring and his mother took charge of the situation. He’d been an emotional mess back then, and if it hadn’t been for the support of his whole family, including his in-laws, he wouldn’t have been able to take care of a six-month-old. “But I hope I can learn to be a better father, now that we’re living on our own.”
“I already told you, you’re a better father than you give yourself credit for. You love Sophie more than life and always put her well-being and happiness first. That’s all that really matters.” Ellie’s tone was soft. Whether it was out of politeness, or if she really meant it, he appreciated her words. She was a good woman, who’d make a good wife to some lucky man. A man who’d never be him. “And it’s okay to spoil her and give in to her requests every now and then.”
Adam let out a chuckle and took a swig of his beer, closing his eyes as he rested his head against the hard wood. He should remember to buy some cushions one of these days. “She’s already spoiled enough, thanks to her grandparents, aunt, and uncles.”
“Well, that’s the best part of having a big family.”
“I hate to admit it, but you’re right.” He smiled, opening his eyes to stare at the starry sky again. “Even though my family and Hannah’s have a penchant for giving in way too easily to the only grandchild’s requests, I wouldn’t have it any other way. I’ve always loved having a big family.”
“You were lucky. It was only ever Ethan and me growing up. We had a few relatives on my mother’s side, but we only ever got to see them at Christmas, if we managed to fly over.” He heard the sadness in her voice and wished he could go to her and give her a comforting hug. Just a friendly, neighborly hug.
Yeah, right.
“I’ve always wanted a big family, but Hannah didn’t exactly agree with me—especially after she gave birth to Sophie.” Adam smiled at the memory of his adorable wife crying out all kinds of obscenities in the delivery room and telling him that if he ever made her go through such pain again she’d cut his male attributes while he was asleep.
He’d blamed it on the labor pains and thought once she held their baby in her arms she’d change her mind—but even a few months later, when they’d ended up talking about having more babies, she’d put her foot down and firmly stated she was happy to adopt, if he was so determined to have more kids.
Ellie laughed when he told her about their conversations, and the sound did something funny to his stomach. Talking about Hannah lately didn’t hurt as much as it did once—as it had before he met Ellie. Realization dawned on him, and he quickly shrugged it off. Maybe it was just easier talking about Hannah with someone who hadn’t known her, who hadn’t seen the miserable version of himself after he lost her. He didn’t want to see anything more in it than there actually was. He couldn’t fall for another woman—he didn’t want to.
“When we were young, our house was always full of kids. Hannah, Dylan, and Lauren spent an awful lot of time at our place, since it was bigger than theirs. When my aunt died, and Cayden and his siblings moved in with us, Kean and I were already in college, but I loved coming home to a house full of people.”
“Cayden lived with your parents?”
Adam nodded. “His father was a firefighter. He died during a rescue when the twins were two. Cay’s mother moved the family to Spring to be close to us, and when she died a year later of an aneurysm my parents took them all in.”
Ellie let out a soft gasp, and in spite of the darkness he saw her hand go up to her mouth. “That’s really sad. Poor kids.”
“Since we were all grown up by then, my mother was happy to have kids back in the house. Besides, she’d always wanted a girl, and she got two all at once. Win-win.”
He took another sip of beer, and for a minute or two they sat there in silence, the only sound the rumble of the waves and the ceramic of Ellie’s mug clanking against the glass top of her coffee table next to her Adirondack. The quiet was comforting, and in a way it felt intimate. Something he’d thought he’d never get to experience again.
“Would you like a big family one day?” He grimaced when he realized he hadn’t just thought the words, and wondered what was wrong with him—and why he was hopeful she’d give the right answer. She didn’t reply straight away, and he leaned on his side, trying to make out her facial expression in the darkness lit only by the full moon and the million stars dotting the pitch-black sky. Had he struck a nerve?
“I already have a big family,” she said softly after a beat. He frowned. Hadn’t she just said it was only her and her brother? “All the kids in my class are like my own kids. Being at school is like being in a big family, more so now that I’m in this small community and people truly care about one another. I thought I’d feel lonely when I first moved here, but I’ve never felt more at home in my whole life.”
Adam smiled. She was a sweet woman, one with a big heart who deserved a man who’d treat her like the princess she was.
Wait, what?
He shook his head, clearing his mind. The beer was already kicking in—that must be the reason for his stupid thoughts. He’d better get rid of the three bottles of Guinness left in his fridge. And maybe tomorrow he should choose another story as Sophie’s bedtime read. Too many princess fairy tales were messing with his head.
“So, seeing as you spend all day with kids you’re not planning on having a bunch of your own?” Aw, damn. Shut up, Adam. Just shut up.
She chuckled. “I don’t know, maybe. I’m not really sure I believe in the proverbial happily-ever-after stuff, but if Prince Charming came charging in on his white steed, who knows? I might change my mind. I’ve kissed my share of frogs, so maybe the next one who comes around might be the prince.”
Why did the thought of Ellie kissing another man bother him so much? He’d loved Hannah, would always love her, and he’d promised himself he’d never let another woman into his heart. But when Ellie was around, he felt… well, not so sure anymore.
“My boyfriend of nearly three years left me for the Navy. I just wanted the white picket fence, while he dreamed of being a doctor on one of the medical ships and forgot to inform me. After him, I only dated a couple of other guys, but they were never the kind to think about a future.”
“Hannah was my one and only girlfriend, and in a way we’d always known we’d end up married.” Well done, Adam. Talking about Hannah would bring things into the right perspective, and maybe he’d stop acting like a hormonal teenager. “Our mothers had been best friends since baking school. When my parents got married, they spent their honeymoon driving down from Seattle to California. They stopped in Spring, to visit Jenna and her husband, and Mom fell in love with the town, so a few months later they moved here. We all grew up together, like one big family, and since Hannah and I were only a few months apart, we spent a lot of time together—in and out of school.”
“Bet you barely noticed the transition from friends to sweethearts.” He could hear the smile in her voice, and he smiled too.
“Being a guy, it sort of took me by surprise. Hannah was the one who took the first step, who kissed me first and told me she’d been in love with me all her life. We were fifteen, and believe me, nobody was more surprised than me.” He laughed, remembering the shock that had coursed through him when Hannah’s lips had brushed his and she’d looped her arms around his neck. “Our parents had seen it coming, our mothers had wished for it. I, on the other hand, still dreamed of becoming the next Magnum P.I. and enjoyed spending time with my grandpa in the workshop. Definitely hadn’t seen it coming.”
“Boys will be boys,” Ellie said, chuckling.
He couldn’t object to that. He’d been a big boy who thought girls were just a hindrance, but after that first kiss, he’d turned into a love-sick puppy. Once his teenage hormones had kicked in, he’d enjoyed the new status of their relationship.
He closed his eyes again, letting the memories fill the quiet, letting the warm feelings he always experienced whenever he thought of Hannah come to the surface and envelop him. But for the first time in three years, those feelings didn’t pierce his heart, didn’t hammer inside his brain until he nearly wanted to cut his head off and smash it against the wall just to stop the guilt, the pain, the sense of loss.
For the first time in three years, he felt peaceful. His lips curled up in a contented smile, and his body relaxed, his muscles loosening with every comforting tick of the watch on his left wrist. In the quiet of the night, he couldn’t help wondering whether his pretty neighbor had played a part in helping him find the peace of mind Hannah’s death had stolen from him.
“I miss her every single day.”
The words were out of his mouth before he even realized he’d said them. He brought the bottle to his lips and took a long pull. “I still dream about the day she died and wish I could go back and do things differently. I’d never killed a man, although I’d been trained to, and when it came to saving my wife, I hesitated only a second too long, and Hannah died.”
His voice cracked, but he’d opened the dam and he just wanted—needed—to let it all out. Opening up with Ellie was easier than with his family, because she didn’t tiptoe around him, waiting for him to break down. She listened, asked questions and even managed to say things that made him laugh in spite of his heartbreak.
“Two men were involved in the robbery. My partner shot the one who killed Hannah, but the other one ran away during the commotion. For months after she died I was obsessed with finding him. I probably needed to get him behind bars more to ease my guilt than for anything else. It nearly killed me.”
The wood creaked as Ellie shifted on the chair. “My mom overdosed on antidepressants three years after my dad died on his last tour. In her letter she told me she couldn’t live without her one true love, so she took the easy way out. After she died, I carried guilt around with me as if it were a backpack on my shoulders, weighing me down.” Her tone was soft, and even though she tried to keep a neutral tone, he could hear the slight tremble in her voice. He wanted to stand up, reach for her and hug her. “The ‘what-ifs’ obsessed me for weeks afterward. If I’d seen the signs, if I’d been there, if I’d given her the comfort she needed, if I’d forced her to talk to me about how she was feeling…”
Yeah, he knew the feeling too well. “It’s useless, though, isn’t it?” he said instead.
“And dangerous, too. When you start spiraling down the whirlpool, it takes all your willpower to bring you back up. I was lucky I had a very good friend who helped me at the time. She pulled me by the hair out of quicksand and shook me out of my guilt-induced daze, making me see the light of reason again. And I have to say, yoga’s been helping a lot lately. You should try it sometime.”
He chuckled. Yeah, Lauren had tried to involve him in one of her classes. Had even offered to give him one-on-one lessons and teach him the deep breathing techniques that would help him relax and sleep better. But as much as he loved his sister-in-law, he didn’t really believe some breathing would slay the demons in his soul.
“Of course, you have to hand in your man card before you step onto a yoga mat. Not sure you’d be willing to do that.”
He laughed out loud and choked on the beer he’d just taken a sip of. “I guess my man card expired the day I started having tea parties with Sophie and helping her get her Barbies ready for the ball.”
Now it was Ellie who laughed, and not just a polite chuckle. A full belly laugh that was so genuine and so captivating that he eventually ended up laughing at himself, too.
“Please, next time you have a Barbie makeover session, give me a shout,” she said, fighting the hiccups of laughter. “I’d really love to see that.”
“Say one word to anyone, and I’ll find a pretext to arrest you and keep you in jail.”
“Sorry.” Although she sounded anything but, seeing as she was still laughing. She cleared her throat, and her tone turned serious. “I actually think that’s really sweet of you. My dad was great, but he wouldn’t be seen dead playing silly girlie games with me. He pushed me on the swing or threw a Frisbee on the beach. That was as far as he’d go, unless I joined his football games with Ethan.”
“My brother Kyle tried to get Sophie to like baseball, but even just a game of catch was out of the question. Kean’s been a little luckier—seeing as she likes horses, his babysitting time usually involves horseback riding, horse grooming, or stuff like that. Way more manly than brushing dolls’ hair.”
“I bet when she starts hanging out with boys, you’ll long for those tea parties.”
He let out a desperate growl and stood up from his chair. “And after that final kick to my male ego, I think I’m officially unfriending you. Good night, Ellie.”
She laughed again. “I didn’t take you for such a lightweight, Deputy.” Her chair creaked as she stood up and faced him. In the dark, he could barely make out the smile on her face. “You’ll be all right. Adolescence is still a long time away. Maybe by then you’ll have other kids to worry about.”
Her tone was light and she meant no harm, but he couldn’t help stiffening at the turn the conversation had taken.
“I have no intention of ever replacing Hannah, so more kids are out of the question.”
An embarrassed silence followed, and he wished he’d been able to keep his tone from sounding so harsh. His quills shot out just like a porcupine in danger as soon as someone mentioned his future without Hannah. His family had learned the hard way to never go there again, if they didn’t want their heads bitten off.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to—”
“No, I’m sorry,” he interrupted her. She had nothing to apologize for. “My reaction was out of line. I still get a little touchy when it comes to Hannah. I can’t forget she died because of me, that she’d still be here if I hadn’t hesitated. I don’t want anyone else to take her place—I don’t deserve it. And I’m sorry if I ever gave you the impression I was flirting with you or you thought—”
“Adam,” she cut him off, her tone sounding like the patient one he’d heard her use with the kids. “Don’t worry about it. I never thought there was anything but neighborly friendship between us. And I’d really like to keep it that way. If you ever need to talk, have a laugh or just get some parenting advice, I’ll be happy to lend a hand, but you don’t have to worry about me wanting anything more than friendship from you.”
She moved closer to the invisible border dividing their properties, and he fought the urge to take a step back. He felt like a royal idiot right now, and the fact she was being all nice and sweet didn’t ease the sense of guilt one bit.
“Being the new girl in town has always been tough, and seeing as my only family member left is in Afghanistan and my best friend would rather stick a hot poker in her eye than spend a weekend in a small town, I treasure every new friend I make. I’m sorry if my actions made you think I wanted more. I know you’re still in love with Hannah, and I wouldn’t expect anything different. She was taken from you; it’s not as if you left her because things didn’t work.”
“Now, if the ground cracked open and swallowed me up I’d be grateful. You shouldn’t be so understanding, after all. It would’ve been easier if you’d called me a conceited jerk and stormed back inside.” He let out a long sigh, squeezed the neck of the bottle in his hand and thought about smashing it on his head in punishment. “Please, forgive me. I’d really like for us to be friends. I like the idea of having a grown-up I can chat with at the end of a long day, especially if she can provide free parenting guidance.”
She laughed, and his shoulders relaxed. She held out her hand, and he took it without too much thinking. “Friends it is, then,” she said. “No strings attached.”
His lips curled up in a smile. After weeks spent chastising himself for his sudden need to feel carefree and to enjoy life the way a normal person would, he’d finally found a little peace of mind. And all thanks to the beautiful person living next door.