Her Fill-In Fiancé (16 page)

“I think so. You're taking them out to tour the newest house you're building, so that should give us plenty of time to set up the tables and decorations. Sam, you'll be there to help, right?” At his nod, she added, “I ordered the cake today, and I'm going to call Rolly's to give the final head count for the food tomorrow before I go into work at The Hope Chest.”

She took a deep breath and exhaled on a sigh of relief as she realized how close they were to pulling off this surprise. “I don't think Mom and Dad suspect a thing. They're going to be so excited. But—”

“But what?” Jake asked. “Sounds like you've thought of everything.”

“Everything except a present,” she confessed guiltily. “I was going to mail them a gift from St. Louis, but once I decided to make the trip home, I thought I'd find something here. So far, I'm coming up empty.”

“You know just being here is the best present you could give them,” Drew said, giving her the all-knowing big brother gaze.

“I know they're glad I'm home—”

“Ecstatic is more like it,” Sam chimed in.

“They worry, you know.”

Yeah, she knew. The sinking feeling was all too familiar.

“But you've changed, little sis. I can see it, and I'm sure the folks can, too.”

The acknowledgement wasn't something she expected or was even 100 percent sure she believed. “I—you really think so?”

“Just coming back here and facing the past shows you've changed. Add in all you've done for the anniversary party and going back to work at The Hope Chest…” Drew shrugged. “You've grown up.”

Sam sighed. “I suppose this means I can't call you Fifi anymore, huh?”

Touched by her brothers' words, Sophia gave a watery laugh. “You know, I think I'd miss it if you stopped.”

Her brothers shared a look, wrapped her in a group hug and took turns saying, “Welcome home, Fifi! We've missed you, Fifi!”

Laughing at their antics, Sophia couldn't remember when she'd last felt so carefree. Probably not since the time when she hadn't minded being her big brothers' little sister—their Fifi. Amid the teasing, Sophia caught Jake's eye. This was what he wanted for her and her baby. Not her family's protection because she couldn't take care of herself, but their laughter and their love. And it was everything she wanted for Jake, too. Everything she could give Jake if only he would let her.

“I've missed you guys, too, and I'm glad to be home.”

Home, a word that would always mean Clearville for Sophia. But she pushed that realization aside for now. “We do still need to come up with a present for Mom and Dad, though.”

“Nick was talking about the three of us going in together. Might as well be the four of us instead,” Sam suggested.

“What are you getting them?”

Drew huffed a sigh. “That's still up for debate. We can't agree on anything.”

“I told you I know a guy who has a vintage bike like the one Dad had when he was a teenager—”

“Forget about the motorcycle, Sam,” Drew cut in with an exasperation that told Sophia her brothers had had this argument many times before. “Anyway, assuming the four of us can agree, we'll all pitch in.”

“I don't suppose Nick's coming tonight?” Her oldest brother's presence always added an element of tension, but Sophia worried about the way he'd secluded himself and Maddie since the divorce.

Sam shook his head. “Nope. It's getting harder and harder to drag him away from that hole.”

“Hey, I helped him build that ‘hole,'” Drew protested, referring to the cabin outside of town he and Nick had built as one of Drew's first construction projects.

“You did too good of a job. Maybe if Nick wasn't so comfortable sitting at home, we'd see him out more.”

“Way I see it, Nick's gotta start taking some responsibility for his own misery. We all feel bad for the way things ended with Carol, but it's not our fault.” Drew's gaze singled out Sophia as he repeated, “Nick doesn't have the right to take his anger out on you, Sophia. We should have made that clear a long time ago, and I'm sorry we didn't. You made a choice to leave, but no way does that make you anything like his ex. Right, Sam?”

Caught up in watching a grand slam replay on a screen above the bar, Sam rejoined the conversation with a distracted, “Never said it did…”

“But we never said it
didn't,
” Drew stressed.

“Huh?”

Her youngest brother's confusion was enough to make Sophia feel like she'd stepped into a comedy skit. Still,
she found their somewhat clumsy, yet endearing support touching and leaned forward to give them each another hug. “Thank you both. Now, go have a good time.”

“Only if you do the same,” Drew stipulated.

Sam gave in a little easier. “First round's on me!” he called as he grabbed Drew and pulled him toward the bar.

“You should go,” she told Jake. “Knowing Sam and Drew, they'll expect you to buy one of the rounds whether you're drinking or not, so you might as well.”

He hesitated for a moment before saying, “Maybe I'll have a beer. Do you want anything?”

“Just a sparkling water.”

Sophia had a good idea that Jake had played a part in her brothers' sudden apology, much in the same way her dad used to make them shake hands as kids and say sorry after one fight or another.

“Families are forever,”
Vince would say,
“so you might as well learn to like each other.”

Families are forever…she'd taken that for granted growing up. Had even foolishly distanced herself from the people closest to her, knowing all along they would be waiting for her when she finally came home.

Jake had never had that sense of security. She could see how perfectly he fit into her family, but childhood had taught him he couldn't trust that closeness. When he'd told her how the search for his father ended in tragedy, the pain and resignation in his eyes revealed that he'd given up on finding the family he wanted. Jake couldn't change his past anymore than she could change her own, but was there a chance that
she
could change
his
mind about a family in his future?

S
ophia watched as the crowd around the bar seemed to part as Jake neared. Dressed in charcoal-colored slacks and a slate-blue dress shirt, he looked amazing. The sleeves were rolled back to reveal tanned, muscular forearms and a stainless-steel watch on his left wrist. Amid a sea of T-shirts and blue jeans, he moved with a confident ease.

With his attention centered on the bartender, she had the chance to study the way his hair gleamed like aged gold in the overhead lighting, the way his rugged features made his face just shy of perfect, the way the corner of his mouth kicked up at some silly thing Sam said.

Todd had taught her that no matter how expensive, style could never add up to substance, but with Jake, Sophia had learned the deeper she looked, the more she would find.

This baby is part of you. That's all that matters.

Sophia was frightened by how desperately she was clinging to those words—like dangling over a hundred-foot drop
by threadbare rope—hoping she wasn't reading more into them than she should.

“Definitely a billboard.” Recognizing Debbie Mattson's voice, Sophia turned to find the blonde gazing at Jake with comically lovesick sigh. “Full color. Full…everything,” she teased. “You are a lucky, lucky woman, Sophia Pirelli.”

“I'd have to agree. Having Jake here has been amazing.”

In a matter of days, he'd become such a part of her life, Sophia didn't know if she would ever look around her hometown again without picturing him there. She never would have gone to the party without Jake by her side. She likely wouldn't have agreed to work at Hope's shop.

As if picking up on the turn in Sophia's thoughts, Debbie said, “I heard you had some excitement at The Hope Chest after you left the bakery this afternoon.” She leaned closer, although Sophia doubted anyone could hear much of anything over the music and laughter. “I saw Marlene Leary and some of her followers lined up like crows on a fence, all beady-eyed and preening to one another as they watched. Wouldn't surprise me if she was the one to call the sheriff in the first place.”

“The thought did cross my mind,” Sophia admitted. Her mother may have believed it was all a misunderstanding, but Debbie didn't seem to have any doubt.

“Marlene's been out to get Hope for years.”

“Out to get Hope?” Sophia blinked, startled by the certainty in Debbie's words. Sophia had been the target of Marlene's wrath, going back to the days after the break-in—the break-in at
Hope
's shop. Sophia had always known she'd given Amy a golden opportunity, but had the location been something more than easy pickings? “But why would Marlene be out to get Hope?”

Debbie raised her glass in a
who knows?
gesture. “Bad blood between the two of them for some reason.”

Bad blood.
Had some of it spilled over, fueling Amy's scheme?

“Look, don't worry about any of that tonight. You have a good time while the rest of us single women drool with envy.”

Sophia was still chuckling at Debbie's parting line when Jake made his way back to her side, a bottle of beer and glass of ice water in hand. “What's so funny?”

“You've got a fan in Debbie. Play your cards right, you might get free doughnuts for life.”

“Hmm.” Jake set his beer and her water on a nearby table. “Tempting, but not as tempting as this…”

Ignoring the people gathered at the bar, he leaned close and brushed his lips against hers. Once, twice…

Each barely-there pass made her long for more—more pressure, more passion, more
Jake.

The crowd surged around them, bumping Sophia closer to Jake, and he wrapped a protective arm around her. “How about we go outside? The patio's pretty much empty.”

At Sophia's nod, they made their way toward the side door. Jake was reaching for the handle when the door swung out and a young woman rushed inside.

“Oops, sorry!” she apologized, and Jake did a double-take, barely recognizing Kayla Walker. The new mother wore enough makeup to give the impression she was actually old enough to be in a bar, and her blond hair tumbled around her shoulders.

“Jake! Sophia! I should have known you'd be here tonight. Seems like the whole town has shown up.”

“You look amazing,” Sophia said. “Has Annabel started sleeping through the night?”

“Even better!” Kayla glowed as she laughed for no reason. “There's someone I want you to meet, and as soon as you do, you'll see why I'm so happy.”

She caught the arm of a thin young man with bleach-blond hair beneath a backward baseball cap and brown eyes identical to Annabel's. “Sophia, Jake, this is Devon Dees,” Kayla announced with a flourish that whipped the rug right out from beneath Jake's feet.

Devon, the father of Kayla's baby. The man Kayla had sworn she never wanted to see again, and the man Sophia had insisted the other woman still loved. Judging by the way Kayla locked her arms around the man's waist and rested her head against his chest, Sophia had been dead-on.

Barely aware of the conversation going on around him, Jake still picked up a few key words—marriage, father, family. He thought he might have managed a few appropriate responses before Sophia made their excuses and he made his escape onto the patio.

Leaving the noisy, crowded bar, Jake sucked in a gulp of fresh air. His ears rang in the almost overwhelming silence. Maybe he should have stayed inside where the music and laughter had a chance of drowning out the doubts raging through his thoughts.

“Jake, is something wrong?” Sophia asked, following him to the far end of the patio where he'd braced his hands against the wrought iron railing.

“You called that one, didn't you?”

“What do you mean?” Her expression a bit wary, she stopped just shy of standing by his side.

“Even after everything Kayla said that day at the farmhouse, you knew. You knew she wanted Devon back.”

“It was obvious she still loved him.”

Thoughts of his relationship with Mollie swirling through his mind, Jake argued, “No, it wasn't! What was
obvious
was everything she said about never wanting to see him again, about not taking him back even if he came crawling…that was obvious.”

“Kayla was hurt and angry. She said some things she didn't mean. Couples fight, but then they make up. It hap pens.”

“Yeah.” It certainly did…

“Wait a minute.” Realization dawned in Sophia's expression, anger sparking in her dark eyes. “You don't think that
I'm
waiting for Todd to come after me, do you? That after what he did, I'd take him back?”

Jake wanted to deny it. He wanted the whole idea to be as ridiculous as she made it sound. “It happens.”

“Just because Kayla and Devon got back together—”

“Not them. Me,” Jake interrupted. “It happened to me when my fiancée went back to her ex-husband.”

Even in the patio's dim lighting, Jake saw her face pale. Too late Jake remembered Todd Dunworthy had a fiancée, too, one he failed to tell Sophia about. “Ex-fiancée,” he quickly clarified. “Our relationship is over.”

“Is it? Because if either of us still has feelings for an ex, I'd say it's you, Jake. Not me.”

He started to protest, denials that pretty much echoed Sophia's, and he realized he was likely acting like a total ass. “I don't have feelings for Mollie. Not anymore, but…”

“But what?”

“She has a son. Josh.” He had yet to figure out how simply saying the boy's name could make him happy and make him hurt all at the same time. “I loved—I
love
that kid.”

“A son? She—how old is he?” Sophia asked, even though he could read a dozen other questions circling in her wide eyes.

“He's six. He was a year old when his parents separated and two when Mollie and I met. She was divorced by then and quick to tell everyone—including me—how glad she was to be rid of her husband.”

“When did that change?”

Jake gave a rough laugh. “I honestly don't know how to
answer that. On one hand, I felt blindsided when Mollie told me she was getting back together with Roger. But on the other hand, I wonder if she was in love with him the whole three years we were together.”

“You were together for three years?”

He heard the shock in Sophia's voice. “Surprised I lasted that long?”

“You're the one who said you weren't a family man, Jake! Now you're telling me that you were engaged, that you were a part of a little boy's life, and one short trip down the aisle from being a stepfather. So don't blame me if this has taken me by surprise.”

Sophia was right; he had sprung this on her with no warning. But everything about his relationship with Mollie left him feeling defensive. “You're right. I'm sorry.” Determined to finish what he'd started with as little emotion as possible, he said, “I suppose I should have realized something was wrong with our relationship when Mollie couldn't settle on a wedding date.”

There'd been other hints, too, mostly to do with Jake's involvement with Josh. At the time, he'd taken Mollie's determination to see to all of Josh's daily needs as a single mother's over-protectiveness. He should have questioned her attempts to keep him on the sidelines, but then again, the position was one Jake was used to after all the years he'd spent as an outsider in his own home while growing up.

“I wrote it off as cold feet and didn't think anything of it. Then one day she had a fender bender coming home from work. She was already late getting Josh from daycare, so when she called, I told her I'd do it. No big deal. Only it turned out to be a very big deal because I wasn't on the list of people approved to pick him up.”

Mollie had sworn it was an oversight; after all, Josh had only started school a few weeks earlier, and she simply
hadn't thought Jake would need to pick the boy up. But Mollie wasn't the type to forget even the smallest detail, especially not when it came to her son.

“I told her I wanted a bigger part in Josh's life after that. I wanted my name on that damn list, and I wanted to take him to a ballgame and to go to the movies and teach him to ride a bike—” Jake voice cut out, and he swallowed hard, wishing for the beer he'd left indoors.

“Did Mollie agree?”

“Not without a bit of a fight, but yeah, she gave in.”

Jake could still picture Josh grinning up at him from beneath the Dodgers cap he bought for him and the delight the boy had taken in tossing peanut shells on the ground instead of in a garbage can. And the cartoon they'd seen so many times in the theater both he and Josh could practically recite the entire movie.

Dammit, he should have stuck to baseball games and movies! But Josh had wanted the bike so bad…

“A few months before his fifth birthday, Josh started hinting around that he wanted a bike. A
real
bike, not some little bike for babies. I figured, why not? All boys have bikes, right? I told him I'd teach him how to ride and he'd be cruising the neighborhood in no time.

“It never occurred to me Mollie would disagree, but she flat-out refused. She said I'd overstepped by promising Josh a bike without talking to her first. I accused her of being too overprotective again. I was sure that once Josh learned how to ride, she'd see how safe it was and would realize she'd overreacted. So I bought him the bike a few weeks before his birthday.”

“Oh, Jake.”

“Stupid, I know, and it only gets worse. A week before his birthday, I took Josh out for his first lesson. He was going great and having a blast when—somehow one of the training
wheels got stuck in a crack in the sidewalk. The bike pitched to the side, and Josh fell over with it.

“I couldn't get there fast enough, but at the same time, watching him fall was like being stuck in one of those slow-motion nightmares where everything moves like it's underwater.”

And that was exactly how he'd felt—trapped, suffocating, unable to breathe—when he saw that Josh wasn't crying, wasn't moving, wasn't conscious despite the helmet meant to protect him. The call to Mollie to tell her to meet him at the hospital was the worst he hoped he'd ever have to make.

“But Josh was okay,” Sophia stated as if refusing to accept any other outcome.

Reaching out, he pulled her into his arms, taking comfort in the warmth and softness of her body fitted perfectly against his own. “Yeah,” he said, gruffly, inhaling the strawberry scent of her shampoo. “He was okay. But they had to run tests and keep him overnight for observation.”

At which time the nurse had informed him visiting hours were over and he would have to leave as only family was allowed to stay past that time. Family being Mollie and her ex-husband, Roger.

“I should have realized then there was no way Mollie would forgive me—”

“Jake, it was an accident. Accidents and kids go hand in hand!”

He heard what Sophia was saying, but the words couldn't penetrate the scar tissue of guilt hardened around his heart. “I was trying so damn hard to prove that I could be a good father when the truth was, I didn't know what the hell I was doing! I never knew my father. My stepfather was the worst example I could have when it came to parenting. Mollie was right when she said I didn't have what it took.”

Listening to Jake, Sophia could feel her heart breaking,
her hope for the future being torn apart by his rough words. All because of an accident.
One
accident.

“Mollie was wrong, Jake. Can't you see that? One accident doesn't mean you're a bad father. One accident doesn't mean anything! If I have a boy and he's anything like my brothers, I have no doubt he'll give me gray hair by the time he's two. He'll probably strip years off my life with crazy stunts, and I'll have to threaten to lock him away in his room until he's twenty-one. Just like my parents did with all three of my brothers!”