“Just because I don’t like to bake, that doesn’t mean I can’t.”
“Frank didn’t know his way around the kitchen. Are you a unicorn?”
He wasn’t going to touch that one. “Didn’t you guys run a bakery?”
“I baked. He ran our business. Right into the ground.”
Something twinged inside him. He knew what Bread N Butter meant to Teagan and how much pressure she put on herself to do right by her family. That someone had taken the business from her pissed him off.
“I had no idea. I’m sorry.” He’d always known Frank was a prick and never trusted him. Especially with Teagan’s heart, which she pretty much wore on her sleeve. Even now, after Colin had only grudgingly invited her in, her body language was open, her eyes cautious but willing to trust.
“Me too.” She was silent for a long moment. “Do you still miss her?” she asked, then held up a silencing hand. “I’m sorry, I promised no more personal information. Maybe we should change the topic.”
“Definitely,” he said, not wanting to talk about either of their exes. “How long are you back for?”
So much for not sharing personal information.
“Ready to get rid of me?” she teased, but she looked as if his answer would shift reality, crack the space-time continuum, and magically erase the past twenty years.
A few minutes ago, he could have cared less about reconnecting, wishing she’d just leave. Now he wasn’t sure what he was wishing for. Maybe a little part of him was wishing her move to Pacific Cove was more than a temporary stopover.
The timer buzzed and they were back to the silent staring thing. It was as if they were each waiting for the other to talk first. For one of them to say, “Hey, let’s keep talking.”
Four words that would never come out of his mouth. He was safer sticking with two. “You’re buzzing.”
She blinked and the openness vanished a little. “That’s the bread at my house.” She slipped off her barstool. “I have to put in the next batch.”
Chapter 6
Whoever said negotiating with terrorists is a bad
tactical move has clearly never raised twins.
—Unknown
The frosty relationship after Parmesangate had been weighing heavily on Harley. Another transgression she needed to atone for was showing up uninvited. But she didn’t really have anyplace else to go. After Bryan had suggested they move in together, Harley did what any cornered chicken would do.
She ran like hell.
She packed her bags, her fear of commitments and rejection, and every other insecurity left over from a lifetime of emotional neglect. Oh, Harley had never gone hungry or been left wanting, but to Dale, love was a noun instead of a verb. He was the first man in her life who had trouble expressing emotion. There followed a string of men who expressed those eight letters, then quickly retracted their proclamation when things became difficult. And Harley always managed to make things difficult.
As far as she was concerned, love was a fiction. Like Santa and the Tooth Fairy, it was something parents told kids to make life a little magical. But magic was another fiction, especially the magic of marriage. Not that Bryan would lie. There wasn’t a disingenuous bone in his body, but the second he realized how difficult she was to love, he’d call it quits.
So Harley was just saving them both heartache, because the last thing she’d ever want to do was hurt Bryan. After losing his fiancée to breast cancer, he’d had enough heartbreak for a lifetime.
Her What’s Best for Bryan plan had been going swimmingly, until Teagan turned up and activated a countdown clock on Harley’s peace and tranquility. She needed at least another month to get her head on straight, but her sister had made it clear she wanted her gone yesterday.
When it came to her sister there was a large, complicated knot of emotions, history, and disappointment always at war in Harley’s stomach. Today, the disappointment was winning. Not about coming to Nonna’s house—she’d never feel bad about that—but about how Teagan had responded. Her sister might hold the deed but that didn’t make the house hers. Regardless, the mature thing to do would have been to give Teagan a heads-up about Operation Goldilocks—or at least apologize.
Then again, if Harley made mature decisions, she wouldn’t be hiding out in Pacific Cove because some cute boy said he liked her. But when it came to Bryan, like and love were closely related.
With a heavy sigh, she slid her laptop into her yoga bag and headed downstairs.
Even before she hit the landing, any thoughts of apologizing went right out the window. Because there, on the entry table, stuffed into a garbage bag, sat Harley’s prized possession—her macramé hammock-style chair. It was Teagan’s passive-aggressive way of saying, Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.
Hurt and pissed, she shoved Teagan’s “shoes off and no eating on the furniture” white linen, modern wingback chair under the ceiling hook. Slipping her shoes on—her sandy beach yoga shoes—Harley climbed up and rehung her swinging deathtrap.
Too Short Teagan would have to drag the ladder out of the garage, through the house, down the long hallway, and into the family room. Her sister was a perfectionist, so a bohemian hammock violating her “showroom inspired” decor would drive her crazy. Just as Harley’s presence did.
