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Oddly, he’d just assumed that they were both going to be single, best friends, relying on one another for the rest of their lives. But that was hardly reasonable. Of course, Carly might be interested in a relationship, marriage, kids.
Maybe she just hadn’t found the right person.
Maybe with Sebastian appearing in town, she now had...
Tension crept across his shoulders as he once again peered inside. Where was she?
The interior light flicked on and he saw her opening the window blinds at the back of the store. He moved away from the window and attempted to casually appear as though he were just arriving.
He waved as she approached the front door, stifling a yawn.
Definitely a late night.
She unlocked the bolt and flipped the Closed sign to Open as she opened the door for him. “Hey, Oliver. Sorry to keep you waiting.”
He shrugged. “I just got here.”
She frowned. “You’ve been here fifteen minutes. I saw you from my bedroom window,” she said with a look. “What’s wrong?” she asked as he stepped inside.
“Nothing. What makes you think something’s wrong?” Besides the fact that he was practically buzzing from too much caffeine and anxiety, which had been mounting over the last few days and was nearing a breaking point.
“The pacing. The tension in your shoulders. The crazy bedhead.” She grinned, glancing up at his hair.
Oliver caught his reflection in the window and sighed. He did have bedhead and Carly knew him too well to fool her. He sighed, handing her the coffee cup. “It’s Tess.” He’d start there—it was easier than trying to decipher his own conflicting emotions right now, and he really did need his friend’s advice regarding his daughter’s new reading interests. Her stunt with Dr. Ann had him wondering if the book might be influencing her a little.
Carly’s expression changed to one of worry. “Tess? She okay?”
He nodded quickly. Scanning the store, he reached for a Sealena book from the display. “It’s this,” he said with annoyance. “She’s reading it.”
He still didn’t know how to handle finding the book under Tess’s Nancy Drew mysteries in her dresser, dog-eared on rather...interesting pages. Should he ask her about it? Pretend he didn’t see it? The adult content was relatively mild—from what he’d quickly scanned. But he wasn’t sure these adult fairy tales were the right message for her at this age. She’d definitely been more interested in these things lately. Not boys. Just his love life. It was slightly unnerving.
But he also didn’t want to censor what she read. He allowed her to make her own choices, guiding her toward what he felt was the right decision. It was the way he and Alison had agreed to raise the girls. It worked perfectly with Catherine—the more independence they gave her, the more mature and levelheaded she was. She’d self-policed her actions and Oliver always knew they could trust her to make safe, healthy decisions, whether they were around or not.
Tess was a little different. His firecracker daughter seemed to struggle sometimes with making the decision he’d like her to make. Her adventurous streak sometimes overpowered her safety guide. She was far from a troublemaker and Alison used to call her the free-spirited one. But with Alison around, Oliver hadn’t worried. He knew Tess had an amazing role model in her mother and older sister to help guide her or help her get back on track if she did stumble or make a mistake.
He questioned if maybe a stricter, more rigid approach to raising her now, on his own, might be a better way...
Carly’s cheeks flushed slightly, confirming his suspicions that there may be content within the pages that could be a little advanced for Tess’s reading level.
“Where did she get it?” Carly asked, gulping the hot coffee, then wincing as the liquid must have burned the back of her throat.
“That’s what I was hoping you could tell me.”
She shook her head. “She didn’t buy it from me. And I didn’t loan her a copy, if that’s what you think,” she said slightly defensively.
“I didn’t think so.” He ran a hand over his face. “But you’ve read them, right?”
Carly nodded, the flush still in her cheeks. He wasn’t quite sure why she’d be embarrassed about it. Carly read everything. It was part of her job. And there was no guilt to be had in reading romance. Hell, he’d read his own share of romantic suspense years ago when Alison liked to read them. She sometimes asked him to read passages to her at night.
“How sexy are they?” he asked, flipping through the pages again himself. That was really all he wanted to know. And not because he didn’t want Tess reading about sex, but because he needed to be prepared for a conversation about...anything she might have read. How much ice cream would be needed for any conversation about the books?
Luckily, Carly shook her head. “These aren’t too sexy. There is...relations...but the author has kept them tender and heartwarming and mostly off the page,” she said.
His shoulders sagged in relief. “So...no whips and chains?”
Carly laughed over another yawn. “You’re safe.”
Oliver put the book back and followed Carly to the counter. She set the coffee cup down and started to count the float in the cash register. “Tess is getting older. I guess it’s natural that she’s interested in reading more mature content. I assume she didn’t tell you?”
