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“I can’t be with you anymore,” I tell Burke when I find him at the restaurant. Bistro 530 is about to open for lunch, but I texted him and he met me at the back door.
Burke is stoic, running his hand down his face as he turns away from me. When he turns around, he can’t look me in the eye.
“It’s Olive’s dad, isn’t it?”
I don’t admit it, but it is. It’s funny how three days can make me so sure I have feelings for someone, when I spent two months hoping feelings for Burke would develop.
“I didn’t expect him to come back.” I swallow down a thick lump in my throat. “It’s just very confusing.”
He nods once. I feel like absolute shit. “He’s the reason, right? Why you never let your guard down with me?”
There were so many things he did to try to break me open, just for me to clam up. Burke is a casualty of an impossible situation. My chin bobs slightly.
“Well, he’s a lucky man,” Burke says. His gaze pierces me. “Tell him one thing for me. If he breaks your or Olive’s heart, I will punch him in the fucking throat.”
I chuckle. “I’m not sure it’s like that.”
“I saw the way he looked at you at dinner. I was hoping it wasn’t true, because I really, really like you. But I get it.” Burke rests his hands on his hips.
Lifting onto the balls of my feet, I kiss his cheek, and he leans into it. Why couldn’t I feel this way about Burke, an uncomplicated man who is easy to be around and cares about me and my daughter?
“I got to go. Take care, Emily.” He opens the heavy door to his restaurant and disappears.
I expected to feel heavy after breaking it off with Burke, but I feel the opposite. I feel light, like I could fly. It feels like helium filled my veins and I could crawl out of my skin. In a good way.
Bistro 530 is a couple storefronts down from Ice Dream, and I stop in front of the window, looking on the dreamy parlor, full of white-wire furniture and cartoons of smiling ice cream cones. Max sits there, across from our daughter’s ponytail, as her little hands flail as she tells a story. Max laughs with his whole body as she tells it.
He catches me in the window, and his eyelids crinkle as he stares at me. Olive touches his arm, so he refocuses on our daughter as he pumps his straw into his milkshake. Heat curls low in my belly as his gaze sears me. I’m a free woman, he’s a free man, but my knowledge presses on me like a weighted blanket. He wanted me, would’ve wanted us. When he told me the other night he fell in love with me, I now finally believe him.
Seeing him with our daughter does something to me. A long-dormant desire whispers to me, making me want to jump his bones. What happened with his stepdad holds me back.
“I’ll be right back,” I mouth to him, pointing with my thumbs.
“Okay,” he mouths back, his face so wide in a grin.
When I open the door to Woody Finch Brewery, my mother clocks me instantly.
“I thought I gave you the day off.” She folds her arms across her.
“Max is having some alone time with Olive. They’re drinking milkshakes.”
“That’s sweet.”
“Yes,” I say, walking to the office I share with my siblings. Mom follows me and stands inside as I sit down at the computer. “I just broke up with Burke.”
“I’m not surprised.”
I swivel in my chair. “What?”
“I knew you and he had an expiration date.”
“Mom, really?” I ask. “Why didn’t you say anything?”
“I learned a long time ago that voicing opinions on my children’s partners was a bad idea. I said something once about Callie.”
“Callie was the absolute worst. Did Reid get defensive?”
“He did. Dated her another year, though. I always thought it was out of spite, but you know your brother.”
