Page 50 of Suddenly Yours

Then he turned and stalked back to his car. When he drove off, his tires kicked up gravel on the side of the road as he sped off.

I stood there long after he was gone with my fists clenched at my sides, trying to breathe through the rush of anger and something darker beneath.

“You okay, boss?” Mark asked.

“Yeah.” I turned to walk toward my truck. “Mark, do me a favor, for the next couple weeks, double-check everything. Make sure we are one-hundred-percent locked down.”

“You got it boss.” Mark nodded.

I turned and climbed into my truck. Instead of driving off, however, I sat there, counting my heartbeats until I felt back in control.

He was wrong.

About her. About me. About everything.

And as I headed out, one thought anchored me, solid and unshakable.

Whatever this was with Missy, whatever it became, I wasn’t walking away or screwing it up like Levi had.

Not now. Not ever.

Chapter Fourteen

Missy

“Dad?” I gasped and blinked a few times and caught the tray of brownies before they slipped out of my hands. “What are you doing here?” I glanced around, stupidly looking for my mother, only seconds later remembering that they were no longer together.

Gerald Sharpe stood just inside the door of Sweet Expectations, looking as if it was the last place on earth he wanted to be. He also looked as if he hadn’t just dropped into my carefully balanced life without any warning. He wore an expensive navy coat, tailored slacks, and that familiar look of mild impatience, as if the entire world had inconvenienced him by continuing to exist without his permission.

“I was in town,” he said easily, already glancing around the front dining area of my bakery as if looking for the exit, “and thought I’d stop by.”

Of course he had. I knew that my father never did anything without an angle. There was no way he was “just in town”. A five hour trip didn’t just happen. He was here for a reason.

I hadn’t heard from him in more than six months. No calls, no text messages, not a peep.

I set the tray down on the counter and wiped my hands on my apron. I tried to force myself to meet my father’s gaze. “You could have called and told me you were coming.”

“And risk you being too busy to see me?” He smiled, the practiced, charming smile that had lured young dancers to his bed for decades. “Besides, I didn’t want to impose.”

The irony almost made me laugh.

“Take over for me for a few minutes?” I said to Brit.

I walked over and sank into a chair at the table in the corner and waited for my father to follow. “Coffee, tea, something to eat?” I asked as he sat down across from me, even though I knew that the man wouldn’t eat anything in the bakery or anything with sugar in it, for that matter.

“No, thank you,” he said.

I gripped my hands together and placed them on the table in front of me, bracing myself.

I hadn’t seen my father in almost a year.

“So,” I said carefully, “what’s really going on?”

He sighed, as if burdened by the weight of my question. “Your mother is being… unreasonable.”

There it was.

“She wants the divorce settlement to include her buying out my share of the company, the company I started.”