“Oh yay!” Maggie chirped. “You’re up.”
Ava, sporting nonsexy bed head and a pillow crease on her cheek, shot daggers at her through puffy eyes. “You know it’s five in the morning here. I know you know it, because I set my digital clock to California time and left it next to yours.”
“Mm-hmm, yeah, sorry about that.” She wasn’t.
“You don’t look sorry. Actually, you look sort of freaked.” The video feed spun, went dark, and then returned to Ava, now propped up against her extended-stay hotel headboard. “What’s going on?”
Maggie tried to swallow down her guilt, but finally let it go instead. “It’s the wedding. I thought I’d made the right decision, but—”
“Wait,” Ava snapped. “This isn’t about the shoes again, because the sun’s not even up here and, for cripes sake, I already told you twice, they don’t make you look like a hooker—”
“It’s not the shoes,” she cut in. “It’s—Leo asked me if I’d stay at the hotel with him. In his room…overnight…in his bed.”
Ava rubbed her eye with her wrist. “And you said no.”
“I said yes.”
“Yes?” Those puffy eyes went as wide as their sleepy state would allow. “What—you dirty little harlot! Finally, it’s about time! So what’s the problem?”
The problem?
“I’d only be doing it as some last-ditch effort, hoping he’d be able to coax me into feeling something I don’t actually feel.” About the last reason she’d ever want to fall into bed with someone.
“While Leo’s already all in. So if you do the deed, he’s not going to be looking at it like some relationship-potential litmus test, he’s going to think you’re all in, too. He’s going to believe you guys have moved to the next level.”
Maggie nodded, hating that she’d let things go this far already. That despite being upfront about not being sure she was ready for something serious, she was still going to hurt him.
“You know, Maggie. You could be honest about it. Tell him you want to try, but he needs to understand that it doesn’t mean—”
“I can’t.”
Ava stared, and then reached out for her phone, her fingers looking freakishly big as she patted the device. “Aww, honey. I’m sorry.”
So was Maggie.
Leo was her friend. An amazing friend. The kind she’d told herself she wanted Tyler to be—before she’d gone and fallen in love with the guy. Something she suspected had been happening from the first and, worse yet, she didn’t see changing anytime soon.
—
“Thought you were riding with Sam?” Tyler asked as Ford folded himself into the front passenger seat and buckled up.
“He’s tough to follow on the road. Even with the big van, he gets lucky catching the tail end of lights like nobody else and then assumes you’re still behind him until he thinks to check twenty miles later. I’ll ride along to give you directions. And Maggie’ll ride up with him.”
Tyler shot a look at the van parked in front of him and then back to their building. “Maggie?”
What the hell?
“Oh yeah. She’s coming, too.” Ford shrugged, scanning some list on his phone. “Change of plans, I guess.”
Just then, the woman in question came jogging out the front door, hair pulled up into a loose knot, wearing a cropped jacket in army green over a T-shirt, tie-waist khakis, and old Converses that really shouldn’t have been sexy but, God help him, were.
She swung open the door to Sam’s van and leaned in with her bag, then slowly leaned back out, her smile wavering for only a second as she cast a look back at Tyler.
Uh-huh. So she hadn’t known he was going to be there, either.
But then her smile was restored, and with a friendly wave she hopped in the passenger seat. The van’s lights blinked and the tailpipe offered up a plume of exhaust as they pulled out.
Hands locked around the wheel, he stared out the windshield.
Bailing now would be bullshit.
They were both adults. And hell, Sam was right. He needed to get out of town.
Tyler put the car in gear and Ford pointed to the corner. “Up here, you’re going to want to take a right.”
Chapter Twenty-eight
The cabin wasn’t exactly the classic Lincoln Log–style, woodsy hideaway Tyler had been envisioning. Rather than the simple rectangular frame with a kitchen at one side and a couple of bunks at the other, Ford’s family cabin was about three thousand square feet of vaulted ceilings, exposed beams, modern appliances, and floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the woods and bay beyond. And that was just the main building. There was a detached garage, two sheds, and when he followed the flagstone steps down to the water, a two-story boathouse and dock.
The water was calm, lapping gently beneath the worn planks as he walked out to the edge.
On the left, the land curved around to a sheltering point, while to the right the rocky shore extended for miles, broken up only by the docks marking the properties protected from view by the woods.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?”
Tyler turned to see Maggie walking up the dock. She’d taken off her jacket, and the few strands of blond waves that had slipped free of her bun were fluttering around her face. “Very.”
He’d gotten over finding out Maggie would be at the cabin quickly, realizing this weekend might be his last chance to see her. And he wanted to see her.
He wanted to feel that thing between them once more. Wanted to remember what it was like to have something real, even if it was something he couldn’t keep.
Nodding up to the house, he asked, “They ready for some help yet?”
Apparently Ford and Sam had a whole ritual where they worked their way through the house the first time after the winter and put together a list of anything they needed to fix. Without knowing much about the place, this part he left to them.
“Not yet. They’re very thorough. I mean, it’s Ford, so obviously, but in this arena, believe it or not, Sam actually makes him look like a slacker.”
Sam ran one of the most successful contracting businesses in Wicker Park. He’d seen him work a couple of times, and the guy was a machine.
“Here, come around the back side—I’ll show you how to get into the boathouse. The upstairs is pretty cool.”
Following her around the structure, they passed the bleached wood bench and took the stairs up to the second floor. Maggie unlocked the door and let them in. It was a single room, with a central table surrounded by eight chairs, a small bar at the back, and windows on three sides with a couple of love seats facing the water.
Maggie walked from window to window, opening them wide. The bay breeze rushed through, catching and tossing the sheers in its path and transforming the still, quiet space into something that felt alive. Energized.
Turning back to him, she smiled. “This is my favorite spot. The house itself is gorgeous, but this”—she took a deep breath and then, sinking into one of the love seats as she blew out a contented breath—“this is what I dream of.”
Tyler nodded. He would dream of it, too. Maggie, with her feet tucked beneath her, smiling up at him like there was no other place she wanted to be. Only then he realized he wasn’t looking away, and neither was she. And that gorgeous smile had started to falter beneath the weight of everything that was still there between them.
“Maggie,” he started, just as she said, “Sam tells me you’re moving.”
Stuffing his hands into his jeans, he propped a shoulder against the wall. “Gina says she misses New York.”
“So it’s done?” But then she shook her head. “No, or you wouldn’t be here.”
“She’s taking a few days to think things through, but yeah—I think when she gets home.”
“Have you seen Charlie?”
“Not yet. But I’ve got a couple new pictures of him.” And then he was crossing to her, pulling up the snapshots on his phone so she could see. “He’s so big, Maggie. I barely recognize him as
the same boy I used to hold.”
And then because it was Maggie looking up at him, and he could tell her the things he didn’t even want to admit himself, he looked back to the picture. “He won’t recognize me.”
Taking his hand for a brief squeeze, she met his eyes. “You’ll have time, Tyler. He’ll love you, because of the way you love him. It’s all going to work out.”
—
That evening they grilled burgers and corn in the husk, eating down on the dock at a rickety set of table and chairs that looked like they’d been purchased sometime in the early nineties and had weighed about two tons when Tyler carried them down from the storage shed with Sam after a few good hours of work around the cabin.
Beneath the watercolor sky, they talked about the repairs that needed to be done, Ford’s plans for his new game, and Maggie’s new job. She said the first few weeks had been an adjustment, but she was happy to be working toward the next stage in her career.
He’d asked the guys about how the change was going for her, and they’d always said she was fine. But it was good to hear direct from the source. Good to see her face and posture when she said the words and know he could believe them.
The conversation rolled back through the years they’d all been coming up there together and the years before Maggie became part of the mix. When it had been Ford, Ava, and Sam riding up in the back of the Volvo wagon. The time Ford’s dad hung the swing with the boys. The canoe they’d snuck out in the middle of the night. The local girl whose mad crush on Ford had been the reason he’d refused to come up for a whole summer. A girl, Maggie clarified, had grown into her looks the next year and had been the reason Ford threw Sam into the lake when the competition got fierce between them. Not that the girl had been willing to give either of them a chance by then.
There’d been summer jobs and ghost stories and misadventures and even an arrest.
And as the sun set to the sound of laughter and easy talk, Tyler closed his eyes listening to one voice above the rest, the full-bodied laughter wrapping him in a peace he so seldom found and knew he couldn’t hold on to.
—
“Hey, time to wake up, sleepyhead.”
Maggie. He opened his eyes to her slender hand hovering next to his temple as if she’d been about to brush his cheek or brow, or maybe even stroke his hair. That hollow place inside him yawned wider as her hand dropped away.
“The guys are back up at the house arguing the merits of Scrabble over Boggle. I know you don’t want to miss out.”
The sun had set, but enough of the evening light remained to see Maggie clearly. The loose strands of blond that had escaped her windblown knot, the sun-kissed glow across her cheekbones, and the soft curves filling out her T-shirt. Damn, she was so beautiful.
In another life, he would have taken her hand and pulled her down into his lap. Kissed her long and slow, feasting on her sweetness as the waves lapped against the rocky shore. In another life, he’d have led her back to the room they’d be sharing. Or maybe just to the house, where she’d sit beside him and let him rest his hand on her leg while they laughed, whiling away an evening with their friends.
“It was nice today. Hanging out a little again.”
Maggie glanced out to the water. “I’ve missed it.”
He wanted to pull her against him. Touch her face. But he kept his ass in his chair and the distance between them. “I know it’s none of my business, but can I ask what happened with Leo? Sam mentioned you guys were going down to a wedding this weekend. He get called into work or something?”
For a moment there was only the quiet creak and groan of the dock beneath them, the water and the wind, and he wasn’t sure she’d answer. But then she pushed a few strands of that flyaway silk from her eyes and turned toward the water, so he couldn’t see her face.
“No. Not work. We just—I just—” Her shoulders shrugged, but he could see the tension in them. “Leo is an awesome guy, but it wasn’t going to work with us. Better things end before they went too far.”
Shit. He shouldn’t want her alone. He didn’t. But the petty, jealous part of him that couldn’t forget what it was like to have all those gorgeous smiles and laughter be for him heaved a sigh of relief.
He was so messed up.
Waiting for one woman’s relationship to fail so he could pick up the pieces and hoping for another’s to crumble because if he couldn’t have her, he didn’t want anyone else to, either.
He hated himself right then. Hated what his life had become.
But he was so close to having Charlie back, to giving his boy the support and love he needed, he couldn’t quit.
“You okay with it?” he asked.
The breeze picked up, turning chilly, and Maggie’s arms wrapped tight around her waist. “I feel crappy for causing someone I truly care about pain. But it was the right thing. I’m sure.”
When she looked back, it was as a friend. The small smile understanding. Accepting.
“I’m heading back up to the house. Come on when you’re ready.”
—
The next morning Maggie woke to a sullen sky, the waves rushing the rocks at the shore, and something that nearly brought tears to her eyes. The sounds and smells of breakfast cooking slipping beneath her bedroom door. Oh man, the promise of Sam’s high-carb and artery-clogging overload, fresh-brewed coffee, and breakfast table conversation had her practically skipping down the stairs at whatever ungodly hour it might be.
She’d missed this. Missed the routine she’d groused and grumbled about so many mornings, until Ava left and she’d found herself waking to the horrible sound of her own alarm clock at whatever time she’d set it for. Eating cold cereal or instant oatmeal. And doing it alone.
There were no surprises.
No warm greetings.
No Sam and Ava making her almost every day feel like it started with a kind of emotional embrace.
She needed this. This morning, after spending too many hours the night before staring at her ceiling, thinking about the man sleeping across the hall, and wishing for all the things she couldn’t have. She needed the reminder of the things she could.
And with that grateful welling of emotion within her, she stopped at the doorway to the kitchen and, eyes closed as she drew in a deep whiff of every bacon-laced fantasy she’d ever had, slid one arm up the frame, striking a faux provocative pose for Sam’s benefit.
“This is your window,” she teased. “Ask me to marry you now and I’m yours. Or just feed me a strip of bacon and you can have me on the table. No strings.”
The answering silence was the first clue. Followed by the slap of a wide hand on her ass and Sam’s voice emanating from too close to her ear and definitely the wrong side of the doorway.
“You heard the lady. Three, clear out.”
Maggie jerked back as Sam brushed past her into the kitchen, her eyes shifting to the room’s only other occupant. Tyler, standing at the stove, one arm cocked behind his head, the other wielding a spatula that appeared to have lost its way as a small splatter of scrambled eggs now decorated the stovetop.
His dark stare locked with hers.
Whoops.
Sam snatched a thick slice of perfectly crisped bacon off the tray and wagged it back and forth in front of her. “And Maggie”—his voice dropped to a seductive growl—“the table it is.”
—
The key was keeping busy. Something Tyler was busting ass to do. He’d hit the hardware store with Sam after breakfast, picking up a few supplies for the indoor repairs as bouts of hard rain blew through. Helped out with as many repairs as Sam would relinquish, and when the well of busywork ran dry, he watched the weather advance and retreat from the bay window. And then badgered Sam until he dug up a few more odd jobs.
It hadn’t kept him from thinking about Maggie, who was spending the day checking out the local galleries, or wondering about Gina, or making plans in his mind about Charlie. But at least he’d pushed through enough hours t
hat he was closer to tomorrow than yesterday. Which was something.
Now the weather had mostly cleared and the guys were talking about some bar called The Eight Ball for dinner, while Maggie teased Ford about his insistence it was the food that kept him going back.
His phone started vibrating in his pocket and it was like a cattle prod requesting his attention.
The guys didn’t miss a beat, going back and forth about burgers and some waitress named Livie, but Maggie’s eyes cut straight to him, like she’d felt it, too.
Gina.
This could be it. He’d figured she’d take the whole week’s vacation and tell Ray she was leaving him after they got home, but maybe she’d finally had enough of his not playing by her rules, and wanted out now.
“Sorry, gotta take this call,” he said, heart racing as he headed for the kitchen. “Don’t wait on dinner for me. I’ll catch up.”
Chapter Twenty-nine
Ford and Sam had left for the bar with instructions that Maggie and Tyler meet them over there once he’d wrapped up whatever he was doing. Ten minutes after they’d gone, she heard the muffled thud of the kitchen door closing. And then she’d seen Tyler with his phone at his ear, walking down the steps toward the water until he disappeared around the back side of the boathouse.
That had been an hour ago.
And with every minute that passed, her anxiety grew. If Gina were coming home early to be with him, he would have left already. But his car was still parked in the drive, his bag still in his room. Which meant he was still down there.
She wanted to go to him.
Find out what Gina had said. If he was getting what he wanted. If the next few hours would be the last she had with him before he started his life over.
Only something deep in her gut was warning her this wasn’t the happy ending Tyler had been waiting for.
She waited a few more minutes, but when the first drops of rain hit the windows she texted Ford, telling him to have fun. She and Tyler were going to hang back at the house. By the time she was out the door, the rain was coming down harder than it had all day.