Brayden

 

“This is it.” I lead Mom into the new Jackson Brews taproom. She didn’t want to see it until it was finished, but after months of construction, we’re finally getting there. Thursday is our grand opening, and I want her to see the space dedicated to our father before we open it to the public.

Her eyes widen as she scans the room—the long, polished walnut bar with the live wood edge, the high-top round tables lining the bank of windows that overlook the harbor, the dark tiled floor, and the muted turquoise walls. She takes in every detail, and the emotion in her eyes fills me with a pride I can hardly speak around.

“What do you think?” I manage to ask.

A big chalkboard for our offerings spans the space between the open shelving on either end of the bar, and beneath it is the dedication plaque.

 

In loving memory of Frank Jackson, who dared to chase his dreams.

 

Mom presses a hand to her chest. “Oh, your father would be so proud of you.”

“This is all because of him.” My voice sounds like sandpaper. Selfishly, I’m glad I decided to bring her here alone instead of making it a family affair. My siblings will get their chance to celebrate with her during the grand opening.

Mom shakes her head. “Oh, no, Brayden. This is because of you—all of my kids, but mostly you and Jake, of course. All the hard work you’ve put in turned your father’s little dream into something bigger than he ever could have imagined.” She swipes at her cheeks, at the tears that flow easily. “And now Levi is part of the legacy too. Your father would be proud indeed.”

The door to the kitchen swings open, and a dark head flies past us in a flash, little limbs pumping. “You can’t catch me!” Noah shrieks.

Molly emerges behind him, her face glowing with joy as she chases her son. “Wanna bet?”

He circles back and moves to dart behind the bar, but Molly wraps him into her arms before he can pass her. She lifts him off the floor and swings him around. He giggles madly in response. “Faster! Faster!”

I’m vaguely aware of my mother beside me—the way she watches me watching Molly—and I school my expression the best I can, giving away nothing of what this sight does to me. Molly’s love of Noah transforms her face from beautiful to radiant. And maybe it’s because I was thinking about my father or because bringing Mom here has my emotions at the surface, but seeing Molly like this and witnessing the bond between her and her son does something to me. It reminds me that she isn’t just the beautiful woman I took to my room one night. And she isn’t just my employee. She’s this beautifully layered and complex human who has become one of the brightest spots in my life, whether she knows it or not.

And she’s completely off-limits.

My chest goes tight with the longing I’ve done my best to ignore since she returned to town. It’s hard to ignore something that grows with every passing day.

Molly spots us and stops spinning. She was so lost in her time with Noah that she ran right past. Some of that raw joy fades from her eyes and is replaced by caution. “Oh, hi.” She lowers her son to the ground. “Sorry, we didn’t know anyone else was here. Noah just got done at preschool, and we were having lunch together in my office before I take him to Veronica.” She holds his hand, as if trying to keep a leash on that wild energy now that they have an audience. “How are you, Kathleen?”

Noah waves at us with his free hand. “Why are you crying?” he asks Mom. “Are you sad?”

Mom shakes her head. “I’m just fine.”

“’Cause it’s okay to be sad,” Noah says, nodding solemnly. “Mom said it’s okay to cry too. Even for boys.”

Mom beams at Molly, and if my mom hadn’t already been half in love with my new banquet center manager, I know Noah’s words have sealed the deal. “Your mom’s right, but these are happy tears.”

Noah frowns as if he’s trying to make sense of that. “Why?”

“Because I have so much happiness in my heart, it bubbles up and leaks out my eyes,” Mom says.

“Oh. Okay.” Noah nods, seeming content with this answer and ready to move on to something more interesting.

“I was showing Mom the taproom,” I tell Molly. “I wanted her to see it before the grand opening.”

Molly hoists Noah into her arms, and the boy wraps himself around his mom, leaning his head against her chest like I’ve seen him do a hundred times in the few months they’ve lived here. “Have you seen the banquet rooms?”

Mom shakes her head. “This is the first time I’ve been to this location. I wanted to wait until everything was ready.”

“I can give you the tour,” Molly offers.

Mom grins. “I would love that, if you have time.”

The banquet center has its own entrance on the opposite side of the building, but Molly leads the way through the kitchen, showing off the setup she painstakingly picked out as she prepared the space. “I brought the chef on early so she could help me design the kitchen,” she says. “In addition to having a modest selection of small plates for the taproom, we want to be able to serve full meals for as many as two hundred and fifty guests at a time on the banquet side, so we needed a design that could accommodate both jobs in as little space as possible, since we’re paying for prime real estate on the water.”

Mom flashes a look to me, a single gray eyebrow arched. My siblings have made enough comments over the last few months that I can guess what she’s thinking.

“This is Molly’s project,” I say, reading the question in her eyes. “She made the decisions. I wasn’t exaggerating when I said this wasn’t going to be another responsibility on my plate.”

“Don’t believe him.” Molly laughs, shifting Noah in her arms as she leads the way to the hall that runs behind the kitchen and banquet center. “He keeps careful tabs on everything I do here, so the banquet center has definitely added work to his plate.” She shrugs. “But it’s true that he let me have the reins and gave me the final say on design. I know—wonders never cease.”

Mom huffs. “To say the least. But maybe he just needed someone like you in his—”

“I’m working on it,” I say, flashing a warning look to Mom. I’m really not in the mood to fight her matchmaker instincts today.

“Our offices are all off this hallway,” Molly says, pointing out each. “Levi’s, mine, and Brayden’s.”

“You’ve finally given yourself an office away from home,” Mom says. She squeezes my wrist. “It’s about time.”

I never wanted an office at the bar, even when Jake offered to give up his apartment for me to set up shop above Jackson Brews. It seemed easier and quieter to work from home, but not having a work space for business meetings has been an obstacle over the years. When we were designing this space, Molly suggested I could put my office here and hold meetings in the small conference room. It made sense, and it seems like it’s going to work out great.

“Down at the end of the hall is the stairwell,” Molly says. “You can take them up to get to the employee entrance of the rooftop terrace, and down to get to the locker room and break room in the basement.”

Noah wiggles in her arms. “Down,” he says, wiggling with more vigor until Molly sets him on the floor.

“On the other side of the stairwell,” she says, pointing, “is the storage room, and beyond that, a kitchenette that leads into two smaller party rooms and the small conference room. Off the hall opposite that is the main banquet hall.”

I lead the way, opening the door just as Noah races past me and into the big, empty room. The lights are off, but the wall of windows overlooking the lake provides enough light to illuminate the vast space.

“Oh, it’s absolutely stunning!” Mom scans the room as if she can imagine what it’ll look like when it’s set for a reception—the floor filled with tables and fine linens, the far alcove made into a dance floor, the rustic wooden rafters overhead draped in tulle. I was never very good at imagining such things, but once the space was ready, Molly had it set up, and a photographer came in to take pictures for the website. Now potential clients don’t have to use their imagination. They can see for themselves how every detail was planned for elegance.

Noah races to the alcove at the end of the room and shakes his booty. “This is where you dance!”

Molly grins, and a little sound escapes, like she’s biting back a laugh. “That’s right, Noah.”

“Come dance with me, Kathleen!” he calls.

Mom watches him with the same delight I see on her face when she’s around my niece, Lilly. “You’ve done a spectacular job, Molly,” she says, and I’m not sure if she’s talking about the banquet center or Noah. Probably both, and I would have to agree.

“Thank you,” Molly says.

Mom heads to the sunny alcove to dance with Noah, and Molly shifts her gaze to me. “I hope you don’t mind me bringing him in. I wanted to spend a little time with him before I have to go house hunting. I didn’t think anyone else would be here.”

“I don’t mind at all.” I shove my hands into my pockets. “House hunting?”

“Rental hunting, at least. There isn’t much available in my budget. After looking at them online, I’m not very hopeful.” With a sigh, she shrugs. “Can’t hurt to look, right?”

“Right.” I follow her gaze to where Mom is doing her best funky chicken. Noah laughs so hard that he drops to the floor in delight. “Let me know how I can help.”

She shakes her head. “It’ll be fine. We’ve been through worse.”

I know it’s true, but that doesn’t mean I like it.

Some of the worry on her face fades as she studies her son. “Come on, Noah. We have to get going.”

The boy folds his arms and pouts. “Aww! Why, Mom?”

“Because Veronica’s waiting.”

He lights up at the mention of his babysitter and races across the room to his mom.

“I’ll lock it all up on my way out,” I say.

Molly nods, then calls to my mom, “It was good to see you, Kathleen.”

“And you too, Molly,” Mom says. “Bye, Noah.”

“Good luck,” I say, watching Molly and her son leave through the back.

“Bye, Rayden!” Noah calls over his shoulder.

I don’t even notice Mom’s moved until she’s standing at my side. “She’s a lovely woman,” she says softly.

“I know.”

“And a good mom.”

I nod. “That she is.”

“And she looks at you like you walk on water.”

I frown. Mom sees what she wants to see. “Resist the urge to set me up, please.”

Mom just laughs and shakes her head, walking back to the tasting room. “I’m hungry, Brayden. Could I talk you into taking an old lady to lunch?”

Molly

 

“I’m so sorry,” Teagan says, frowning into her beer.

“Why are you apologizing?” I drain a quarter of my beer in one pull and sigh. It’s been a long afternoon spent looking at the best rental homes and apartments Jackson Harbor has to offer. It turns out that Noah’s Santa-friendly chimney requirement is the least of my concerns, because 1) hardly anything is available right now, and 2) my budget is laughable in this town. “You warned me it’d be slim pickings.”

“That doesn’t mean I wasn’t hoping that one of them might have been a hidden gem. Sometimes they look worse in the pictures, but the potential is clear when you see them in person.”

“Sadly, none of these. If anything, I should apologize to you. You wasted an afternoon off work.”

“Oh, I had my own selfish reasons,” she says. “I have a perfectly good alarm and don’t need a four-year-old bunking with me and waking me up at ungodly hours.”

I laugh. “I promise Noah and I won’t be crashing at your place. That’s what hotels are for.”

Teagan frowns, and I know she’s no happier about that potential solution than I am.

Today was hard. When I woke up this morning, I had to fight an old heaviness to get through my normal routine. Life should feel easier. We buried my asshole stepfather almost two months ago, and I finally don’t have to worry about him finding out about my son. My stepbrother, Colton, is out of rehab, and I’m preparing for the very first event at the Jackson Brews banquet hall. Despite my looming homelessness, everything is amazing. And yet I woke up this morning feeling the old ache of loneliness gnawing at my bones, and it hasn’t let go all day.

Jake emerges from the kitchen. He’s in such a good mood that he’s damn near swaggering. “Smile, ladies,” he says, leaning on the edge of the bar opposite us. “It’s snowing. We’ve got beer. Life is good.”

I’m not in much of a smiling mood, but I can’t help but obey when I realize he’s wearing one of the new Jackson Brews T-shirts. As I suspected, Brayden’s the only one who doesn’t think it’s funny.

“Easy for you to say,” Teagan says. “You’re not going to be homeless at Christmas like poor Molly here.”

Jake grimaces as he turns his attention to me. “Shit. I’m an ass. I forgot.”

I roll my eyes. “She makes it sound like Noah and I are going to spend our Christmas sleeping beneath the overpass and huddled around a burning trash barrel. We’ll be okay.” That’s what I keep reminding myself—it’s not ideal, but it’s okay. We’re always okay, my boy and I. This is nothing but another bump in the road that’s turned Noah into the most awesome tiny human I know.

“Hey!” Teagan nudges me with her elbow. “Don’t ruin a perfectly good guilt trip.”

“No luck finding a place?” Jake asks.

I shake my head. “Maybe I’m too picky, but . . .”

“I saw there’s a small house on Crawford for rent,” he says. “It’s close to the park.”

I stifle a shudder at the memory of the rat-infested two-bedroom on the east side of town. “Saw it. Hard pass.”

Ava comes out from the kitchen, smoothing her skirt down around her baby bump. If Jake’s long stare at his new wife didn’t give away what they were doing back there before Jake emerged in a suspiciously cheerful mood, Ava’s flushed cheeks would. The new husband and wife can’t keep their hands off each other, and her pregnancy hasn’t seemed to slow them down at all.

A tug of longing rips through my gut, sudden and unexpected. My pregnancy was long, lonely, and wrought with too many fears for the future. Noah was worth every bit of it, but to get the joy of a child without all those moments of terror and self-doubt . . .

I push my envy aside and paste on a smile. Wishing I’d had just a little of what she has doesn’t change that I want it for her or how happy I am that she and Jake finally found their way to each other.

“What are you all talking about?” Ava asks.

“Molly was house hunting today.” He waves to someone in one of the back booths. “There’s nothing good available.”

The next thing I know, Brayden’s standing beside me at the bar. Brayden, who was so sweet with his mom at the banquet center this morning. Brayden, who wasn’t annoyed at all to see I brought my wild child into the office, but instead lit up at the sight of Noah running through the place. I didn’t realize he was here.

“How’d the house hunt go?” he asks.

“Bad,” Jake says.

“The place on Crawford was actually pretty nice,” Teagan says. “If you don’t mind rats.”

Jake mimes puking into his hand.

“I was hoping you’d get lucky.” Brayden scans my face like I’ve been in some awful accident and he’s looking me over for injuries. “Are you okay?”

“We’ll be fine.” Dear Lord, if I have to take one more pitiful, sympathetic stare aimed in my direction, I might lose it. Those looks make me feel like I’m six again and being told my father isn’t coming home. I hate pity. I’d prefer a high school full of assholes calling me Blowjob Molly to even a handful of people feeling sorry for me.

“What kind of guy kicks his tenants out before Christmas?” Anger twists Ava’s normally smiling face. “Did he really just now find out his niece needs a place to stay?”

“Who knows?” I shrug. I’m too ashamed to admit what I believe to be the real reason behind my sudden eviction. “Maybe I can make it up to Noah and find a hotel with an indoor pool.”

“The hotel on the interstate has a pool. A slide, even,” Jake says.

Brayden shakes his head. “Didn’t they shut down for some sort of asbestos removal?”

I grimace and take a deep breath. “Somewhere else, then. There are plenty of vacation homes in this town. Surely one of them has the holiday available.” I can already feel my credit card groaning at the possibility of paying holiday rates to stay in a Jackson Harbor vacation rental.

“Why don’t you just stay at Brayden’s?” Ava asks.

I stiffen at that, and Brayden stills beside me—just enough of a reaction that I understand exactly how he feels about that possibility. “Don’t be ridiculous,” I say, trying to wave away the words like she never spoke them—because I’d prefer that to the awkwardness that’s settled between my boss and me.

“He’s in that big house all alone,” Jake says. He turns to his brother. “You probably wouldn’t even notice Molly and Noah were there.”

I’m surrounded by crazy people.

I’m pretty sure all the Jacksons know that Brayden and I hooked up in New York last spring. Secrets are a rare commodity in this family. Given that, you’d think it would occur to someone that it’s not a great idea to put us under the same roof.

“The whole reason you didn’t sign a lease with Tom was because you were looking for a house to buy, right?” Ava asks. “If you just move in with Brayden temporarily, you don’t have to worry about finding a place to stay until a house comes on the market.”

“It would be ideal,” Teagan says softly, breaking her silence, but from the way she’s looking at me, I feel like she understands why this “ideal” solution would also be complicated in ways I don’t want to admit out loud.

I meet Ava’s eyes, trying my best to silently communicate that this is a bad idea. Am I the only one who’s noticed how still Brayden has gone? God, he’s probably desperately trying to come up with a polite way to take Ava’s naïve offer off the table.

I do it before he can. “I wouldn’t intrude like that.”

“We don’t want you to spend your Christmas at a hotel,” Jake says.

Ava chimes in, oh so helpfully, “The last thing you need is a vacation rental gobbling up your hard-earned down payment, should you finally find a house you want. Staying at Brayden’s is a logical solution. And since you could put all your rent money into savings, you’ll be that much closer to buying your own home.”

“Noah and I will find our own place.”

Ava leans forward on the bar, her expression serious. “The Jacksons are going to drag you and Noah to the cabin with them anyway, and every other family event they have. It’s their—our way,” she says, seeming to remember that she’s a Jackson now too. “There’s room for everyone, whether you want them to make room for you or not.”

“And it’s really sweet.” I keep my eyes on Ava. I can feel Brayden watching me, but I don’t want to see what’s in his eyes. “It really is, but it’s unnecessary.”

Making an excuse about needing to get Noah, I pay my tab and hurry out of the bar before they can subject me to any further attempts to convince me, and before Brayden’s silence can slice into me any further.

The truth is that the idea of sleeping under the same roof as my boss and seeing him when I wake up every morning . . . I don’t want to put on my mom hat and go retrieve my son. I want to put on my sexiest underwear and start drinking.

No matter how tempted I am to sleep with Brayden, I shouldn’t, and I especially shouldn’t plop myself right in front of that temptation at the loneliest time of the year.