The One Real Thing (Hart's Boardwalk) (32 page)

A few weeks before, we’d stumbled over the awkward subject of finances. My finances. My now limited finances.

Emery, because she was kind and did it without hurting my pride, offered to let me borrow books from her instead of buying.

“I need your help,” I called to her after the only other customer in the store had left.

It was still early in the morning. Not Emery’s busy time.

A few seconds later she was by my side. “You can’t choose?”

“These two.” I pointed to the books on her bestsellers chart.

She contemplated them. “That one.” She pointed to the one on the right. They were both thrillers. “It’s smarter.”

“Cool.” I took a copy down off the shelf and hugged it. “Thanks again.”

She shrugged, wearing her usual shy smile. “Do you want a coffee?”

“I sure do.” I followed her to the counter. “So what’s new with you?”

“Um . . .” She frowned, thinking about it, and then her eyes lit up. “I ordered a new espresso machine.”

I opened my mouth, not even sure how I was going to reply to that, when my phone rang, saving me. It was Bailey. She was, thankfully, over being pissed at me. “What’s up?”

“George Beckwith isn’t selling to Ian Devlin!”

I winced at her excited, shrill cry. “What?”

“George Beckwith! We just got word. He refused to sell his building to the Devlins.”

I grinned as she laughed. “Good news. So who is he selling to?”

“Not a clue. But who cares? It isn’t Devlin! Oh, and he is furious.” She tee-heed.

Emery gave me a quizzical look as she watched me chuckle. I mouthed,
Just a sec.

“Ooh, and another positive! George is coming back to town to deal with everything. You can give him Sarah’s letters.”

Sarah’s letters.

Wow.

Like everything about my old life, I hadn’t thought about those letters much in the past few weeks. I guessed because I didn’t really want to think about them or the connection I felt to the woman who had written them.

They were tucked away in a drawer in my room at the inn.

But George deserved to see those letters.

“That’s great.”

“Look, a guest just walked in. Gotta go. But spread the good news!” She hung up.

I grinned at Emery. “George Beckwith isn’t selling to Ian Devlin.”

She smiled. “That’s good.”

To be fair, Emery hadn’t seemed as concerned about Devlin buying property as everyone else, and I’d put it down to the fact that she wasn’t as big a part of the boardwalk community. I had learned
that she and Iris were friends, but I worried that Iris and I were the entirety of Emery’s social circle.

“Bailey is ecstatic.”

“I could hear.” She laughed a little.

“Yeah, she can be loud,” I said, affection clear in my voice.

Emery gave me a rueful look. “I wish I had her confidence.”

I wanted to ask why she didn’t have that kind of confidence. She was smart, she owned her own business, and she was beautiful. What was there not to be confident about? Before I could slip in a sneaky, prying question, the bell above her door jingled and we both turned our heads.

My heart immediately shriveled up at the sight of Dana Kellerman.

As per usual she was stunning and perfectly put together. I’d learned she was a hairstylist at the best salon in town. For that reason (and monetary reasons) I hadn’t had my hair trimmed since I got to Hartwell.

Her cat eyes widened at the sight of me, suggesting she was just as surprised to see me, but I couldn’t tell if it was an honest reaction or not.

She sauntered up to the counter, giving me a sharp nod, before turning to Emery. “Skinny latte,” she said.

Emery nodded and proceeded to make her the latte.

The most awkward, awful silence fell between the three of us, broken only by the sound of the coffee machine.

“So . . . you and Cooper are for real after all?” Dana said suddenly.

I didn’t say anything.

It was a known fact that vipers could inject as much venom as they wanted depending on the circumstances. I wasn’t prey and I wasn’t predator, but I had the feeling this viper saw me as both. I didn’t want to help her out in deciding which one I was more of to her.

She sighed. Heavily. “Look, I’m not trying to cause trouble. I’m just saying, I get it now. You two are obviously solid. I mean, you’d
have to be.” She threw me a wry smile. “Other women might have left over the whole kids thing.”

“Kids thing?” Damn. It was out of my mouth before I could stop it.

“Yeah.” She leaned in closer. “I know Cooper likes to tell people that my infidelity was the end of our marriage, but everyone knows the truth—I couldn’t have children and he resented me for it. And me . . . well, I was stupid. Instead of discussing adoption like he wanted, I let my hurt over his attitude get the better of me. But he was in the wrong, too. He . . . he’s not a very forgiving person and when you don’t act a certain way he . . . just shuts down. And kids . . . well, of course you know how important they are to him. He wants to be a father more than he will ever want you or me.”

“Your skinny latte.” Emery slammed it down on the counter, momentarily pulling me out of my increasing panic.

I’d never seen her glower at someone before.

Dana seemed just as surprised. She sniffed haughtily, threw a few dollars on the counter, grabbed her coffee, and walked out before anyone could say anything else.

“You’re not going to listen to her, are you?” Emery said.

“Is it true?” I said, feeling this growing, horrible tightness in my chest. “Did that happen? Between them?”

She gave me an apologetic look. “I wouldn’t know. I’m sorry.”

“I know she’s a snake . . . but . . .” I’d seen something in Dana’s eyes—a flicker of real pain. “There was a kernel of truth in what she was saying. I could tell.”

“Don’t jump to conclusions. Talk to Cooper.”

I nodded.

I would.

If only to get this sudden feeling of dread out of my stomach.

“I’m telling you I like the menu just fine,” Cooper said, trying not to get exasperated with his cook.

Crosby frowned at him. “So you’re sure you’re not telling people that you’re worried customers are bored with it? That it’s not fancy enough?”

Patience. Give me fucking patience.

“Crosby, this a fucking bar.”
So much for patience
. “I don’t want fancy-ass food on my menu and people don’t expect it.”

“Well, I heard—”

“I couldn’t give a shit what you heard.” Who the hell was riling his temperamental cook? “You add anything to the menu, you and Dean won’t be able to cope.”

“I could cope on my own if he wasn’t in my way.”

“Is it him?” Cooper sighed. He hated this crap. “Is he fucking with your head?” He’d hired Dean as an extra cook to help out during high season.

“He thinks it isn’t fancy enough.” Crosby rubbed his forehead, looking at the menu. “I started to think maybe he was right.”

“The menu stays as it is. And when Dean gets in today I’ll tell him the same thing, and if he doesn’t like it he can leave.”

Crosby nodded, looking relieved. “Okay. Sorry, boss.”

“Jesus,” Cooper muttered and strode out of the kitchen. His cook needed to get a social life. Making his job his life was turning him into an even bigger nut than he already was.

“Hey.”

The familiar soft voice shot through him and he looked over toward to the door to see Jess stepping inside the bar. He immediately crossed the room to her, his irritation dying on the spot. “Hey, yourself.” He wrapped his arms around her waist, drawing her to him for a kiss.

“It’s good to see you.” He looked into her eyes as he pulled back and his happiness at seeing her dimmed. “What’s going on?”

“I . . . uh . . .” She sighed, her fingers tensing against his shoulders. “I just had an encounter with Dana.”

And this morning just keeps getting better
. “What now?”

“Oh, she had something very interesting to say.” Jessica pulled away, only to take a chair off a table and hop up onto the space it had made. He tried not to be distracted by the reminder of the first time they’d had sex together.

He crossed his arms over his chest, willing the memory out for now. “Hit me with it.”

Jessica gave him an inscrutable look. “She said that you want kids more than anything and that when you found out she couldn’t have them, you resented her for it, that you were cold and distant and she got hurt, that she wouldn’t talk about adoption and then took her hurt out on you by cheating on you . . .”

His gut tightened.

His blood heated.

For a second he couldn’t even speak, he was that mad.

“Cooper?”

He held up a hand, needing a minute.

Finally, when he felt like he wasn’t going to throw a table through the window, he choked out, “
She
would tell it like that.”

Jessica hopped off the table and came to him, sliding her hands up his arms and around to clasp the back of his neck. She stared up into his eyes, showing him all the things she felt for him but had never said. “I’m sorry she’s such a bitch, Coop.”

And just like that he found himself laughing.

Calling Dana a bitch at this point was such a goddamn understatement.

He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close. “Don’t you think if I wanted kids more than I wanted to have them with someone who meant something to me that I’d have started on that as soon as my divorce finalized?”

She gave a soft smile. “Yes.”

“So do you want to hear the real story?”

“If you’re willing to tell it.”

“It’s just another example of what an idiot I was to marry her.” He nudged her back over to the table and lifted her onto it. He wrapped her legs around his hips, keeping them connected. “I want kids. Back when I thought I knew her, I wanted them with Dana. We talked about it; she said she wanted kids, too. Outright said it. So as far as I knew we were trying. A few months went by and nothing happened, and I discovered why when I found the damn pill in her purse.”

Jess gasped. “She was still taking the pill?”

“Yep.” He no longer felt the betrayal and confusion he’d felt back then. But he remembered the ugly feelings. There was nothing worse than the realization that you didn’t know the person who lay in your bed as well as you thought you did. “I confronted her and she cried a lot, promised me that she just got scared and that she really did want to have children. She said that. She said it straight to my face: ‘I want kids with you, Cooper.’ So I forgave her and we tried again.

“Nothing happened again and we argued because I thought she was still on the pill. She denied it and said we needed to go to the doctors to see what was wrong. Turned out this time she wasn’t lying. She’d had something called an ectopic pregnancy just after high school that I didn’t know about.”

“Jesus,” Jessica muttered.

“I learned that was partly why she’d been afraid to get pregnant to begin with. But she could have told me that.”

“She could have,” Jess agreed.

“I think she was ashamed.” He shook his head, not understanding that shit. “The problem pregnancy damaged one of her tubes. Significantly. We couldn’t afford IVF so adoption was our only option. Dana didn’t want to adopt. In fact, she was relieved about the whole thing. Turned out she didn’t want kids after all. We argued a lot. All the time, in fact. And then she cheated.”

“I’m sorry,” Jess whispered, her fingers tangling his hair the way he liked. “I’m so sorry.”

“Done now, Doc.”

“Yeah.” She frowned.

“What is it?”

“It’s just . . . Dana seemed . . . She really seemed to regret how she acted. She said that she acted out of hurt.”

“That might be true. I tried to understand where her head was at about the whole kids thing because she’d been through a lot, but she wouldn’t talk about it. She just got defensive and argumentative. Who knows with Dana what the truth is anymore? She has gotten pretty good at constructing fairy tales.”

“So.” Jessica dropped her gaze. “That does mean kids are important to you.”

He felt something an awful lot like fear at her refusal to meet his eyes. He and Jessica were already in a fragile place. With her refusing to share whatever was haunting her, and him getting increasingly frustrated by it, he’d been using sex as a way to keep them close. It felt a little like the past repeating itself, but he was hoping this time if he fought hard enough he’d wear Jess down. But if she didn’t want kids, that was a whole issue he might not be able to fight. “Like I said, I want them with someone who means something to me. But I do want them. They’re a deal breaker,” he said, giving her his honesty and dreading her answer when he followed it with, “You want kids, right?”

After a few seconds she lifted her head and stared into his eyes. He saw the truth in them when she said, “I really do,” but for the
life of him he couldn’t understand the darkness that mingled with her honesty.

“And you can have kids, Doc?”

“As far as I know. But if I couldn’t, I would do whatever it takes. Adoption, IVF, surrogacy . . .”

Relief moved through him. “Good.” He lifted her chin because she’d dropped her gaze again and he kissed her.

He kissed her hard.

Then harder, longer, deeper.

He did it to shove out the voice niggling at his conscience to question her more.

Because he was gone for her.

And he needed to believe that everything was going to work out for them.