AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Yeah, my mom was obsessed. I think it comes from being a military wife. She was alone a lot while my dad was working—she was a stay-at-home mom—so she watched a lot of movies. And when I came along, we watched them together. Dirty Dancing was one of her favorites. That’s why I thought of it… you know, that night.” Color spread over his cheeks, and his gaze dropped to the floor.
My heart picked up speed, heat rushing to my face at the reminder of the night we met. I spoke quickly to get past the pregnant moment. “My mom’s favorite was Dirty Dancing, too. She always admired Baby, how she was such a rebel. An independent woman.”
Jake’s head tilted to the side, and his eyes narrowed in thought. Unfortunately, there was no angle where he didn’t look absolutely delicious. “Mmm, would we call Baby a rebel? I think she was more of a hormonal teenager.”
“Hey now, watch yourself. Baby was definitely a rebel. First she was planning to join the Peace Corps, which, let’s be honest—that’s already rebel territory for a woman in the fifties. Then she started hooking up with the biggest hunk on campus, who was from the other side of the tracks. It’s like Romeo and Juliet, with less death and whining.”
Jake chuckled. “Fair enough. I suppose for the era it was pretty rebellious. What other movies did your mom like?”
“Big Business, Baby Boom, Nine to Five… she loved how they portrayed career women in the eighties.”
“That’s… oddly specific. Any reason why?”
The familiar ache that clutched my heart when I thought of Mom pushed all of my attraction to Jake aside. “Well, my mom gave up her own career goals to stay here and marry my dad. She went to school, planning to move to New York and live in a penthouse overlooking Central Park. She studied finance, wanted to work for a big bank and live a fancy city life. But she fell in love with my dad at college and moved here to help him run his family business instead. She worked for the resort for a while, but once she had my brother, she stayed home to be a full-time mom. Which was awesome, and she said she loved it…”
After waiting a moment, Jake interjected gently, “But?”
“She died of cancer a few years back. And one night when she was feeling particularly poorly, she had a fit of remorse-fueled-honesty, I guess you could call it. I was the only one home, and we were watching her movies, just hanging out. She started telling me all these things she needed to get off her chest. One of them was that she wished she’d still pursued her dream and gone to New York.”
Jake’s voice dropped an octave. “Wow, that must have been hard to hear. I’m sorry, by the way. That she’s passed.”
I waved him off. “It’s okay. We knew it was coming. She insisted she loved Dad and wouldn’t trade her life for the world, but she said she believed that she could have had both—had her career, and the love of her life. She regretted choosing just one.”
“How did you feel, hearing that?”
The pain clenched again, and I answered honestly instead of giving him a trite answer. “I mean, I kind of blew it off at the time—she was on a lot of medication. But those words stuck with me. It’s hard to explain; she didn’t say it in such a way like she regretted being a mother or any of the choices she made. She just kind of made it sound like… she thought she could have had her big city life and then come here when she was ready to settle down. My parents didn’t have James until their late thirties, so they had over a decade after college with just work and being young. I guess she thought she could have done something else with that time.”
“She wanted to have it all, huh?” Jake’s expression darkened even though his tone was light. His eyes focused off to the side, as if lost in thought.
“Yeah, something like that, I guess. Anyway,” I added more loudly, and his focus snapped back to me, “the trivia night isn’t a monumental event, but it’s a good time. We host it in the bar at Seasons, and mainly what needs to be done is making the questions I pulled off the internet into slides.”
“I think I can handle that. You should know, I earned a specialty badge as a PowerPoint Ranger.”
Now I regarded him skeptically. “That’s not actually a thing, is it?” I never knew when he was talking about actual military stuff or their inside jokes.
Jake’s head rocked back, and he released the warm, genuine laugh that made my insides gooey. “No, it’s not. But you know how it is: we’re in the military, we have to make everything sound cool.”
“I dunno, Mister Ranger Sir, that sounds like an old person thing. I don’t think anyone under sixty-five calls it PowerPoint. But do it your way. I’ll email you the questions, just put the answers on the slide immediately following. The trivia night is next Friday, if you want to come.”
“Sweet, I have a feeling I’m going to win.” He stood from the chair and locked me in that gaze that stole my breath away.
My stomach fluttered, and I struggled to keep up the flirtatious tone. “Funny… but you know you don’t get to play, right? You’re already disqualified for being so old, let alone already having the answers.”
“Ouch, you wound me!” He turned and headed out the door with a wink. When he reached the hall, he spun and stuck his head back inside. “But just so you know, I would have won without all the answers.”
With one final wink he left, and it took me the rest of the morning to drag my thoughts away from how his eyes twinkled when he did that.
Chapter9
Jake
* * *
It seemed as if the weather in Aspen Ridge turned to autumn over night. Leaves began turning colors and dropping, much like the temperature outside. Now when I bundled the kids up to catch the bus, we could see our breath as we walked outside in the near-darkness.
I’ve always loved fall; it seemed filled with the promise of new things happening, the excitement of sports and upcoming holidays. I found myself thinking about activities I could do with Ethan and Olivia, ways to share more with them, improve our relationship. I knew there was a lot to do and it was a process, but the moments they let down their guard and acted more like kids and less like little soldiers gave me hope.
It also seemed as if the Fall Fest and our almost-kiss were an unconscious turning point for the dynamic between Ellie and me. There wasn’t anything explicit or direct said between us, but our conversations always had a flirtatious edge when no one else was around. Every time we spoke, it was more banter and less business. Something about the way she was dressing now—all buttoned up and professional—turned me on even more than the breezy sundresses had. It was like a tempting package I couldn’t wait to unwrap, and she occupied way more of my thoughts than I cared to admit.
