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Technically I walked back into his life.
And seduced him.
And messed up birth control.
And got pregnant.
It was kind of hard to maintain the moral high ground in this situation, but when it came to him sweeping in and taking over her life, it just wasn’t going to happen. The sooner he figured that out, the better.
To end the conversation, she turned toward the storefront. The place looked exactly like it had when she was in high school. It was crazy. So much had changed—she had changed—and yet Devil’s Falls was practically the same. It made it hard to differentiate between the past and present, too easy to fall back into the old rhythms she and Daniel had had. I can’t. The minute she dropped her guard completely, he was going to have her quitting her job, moving in, and the man would probably go so far as to propose because he thought that it was the right thing to do.
Once upon a time, she’d wanted to marry Daniel Rodriguez. But not now. Not like this. Not when he was operating under some misguided belief that he was going to do right by her.
She moved away from him and into the store. The whole point of coming into town was to get some of the stuff she needed for the night—mainly food. She might be leaving in the morning, but she still had to eat in the meantime. She didn’t know how he lived on the grand total of three items in his kitchen, but she wasn’t about to start smearing mayonnaise on saltine crackers.
Hope froze, her stomach lurching. Mental note—don’t think about gross food combinations if you want to be able to eat breakfast.
The woman at the counter looked up from the magazine she was idly paging through and gave a shriek fit to wake the dead. “Holy crap, Hope Moore, is that you?”
It took precious seconds to place the blonde, and by then she had hopped over the counter and was coming at Hope, arms spread for a hug. “Jessica Stroup?”
“The one and only.” She engulfed Hope in a hug that popped her back. “It’s been a million years! Why on earth are you back in this little shithole?”
She and Jessica had been on the cheerleading team back in high school, and the other woman had always had big dreams about heading west to L.A. and getting into modeling or acting. She was certainly beautiful enough for it. Hope smiled. “Visiting some old friends.”
Jessica peered around her, her blue eyes going wide when Daniel pushed through the door. “Old friends indeed. We’re going to have to go share a drink at the Joint and catch up. I know the bar isn’t as fancy as the places you must be used to in Dallas, but it’s what we have up here.” She grinned. “You look a little frazzled, and I know I’m talking a mile a minute, so I’m just going to write down my number and you can give me a call. We don’t have to drink. We can totally go for coffee or something. I’m off at three. Have you heard that Jules Rodriguez opened up a cat café down the street? Strangest concept I ever heard of, but it’s loads of fun to go in there and play with the cats while you chat and drink coffee.”
“Oh, ah, okay.”
“I’m doing it again.” She backed toward the counter, still smiling. “Go on and do your shopping. We can talk later.”
Hope had forgotten how overwhelming Jessica was—but in a good way. It was actually kind of nice to have an interaction in town that wasn’t fraught with undertones. She wasn’t ready to confide about the pregnancy, but a break later today from Daniel’s intense presence would be a good thing. Even though he didn’t say anything, she felt him at her back as she grabbed a cart and headed down the first aisle.
Glowering.
It took all of ten feet before her patience ran out. “You have something to say, so say it.”
He grabbed a can of soup off the shelf, seemingly at random. “I open doors, Hope. It’s what any man worth his salt in the South does. It has nothing to do with what you can or can’t do.” Another can of soup hit the basket of the cart hard enough to bounce.
So they were back to that. She should have known. Daniel could be like a dog with a bone when something bothered him. She took a deep breath and turned to face him. If they were going to fight about every little thing, this would never work.
If she was going to be honest, her pride was as much to blame as his stubbornness.
Hope took a deep breath and tried to take the high road. “I get overly defensive. I’m sorry.” She held up her hand. “I can’t promise I won’t snap at you again, but I’ll try to relax about the door stuff.”
