“Isn’t that the new ADA at the table by the window?” Regan asked, when Deacon lowered himself into the empty seat across from her at The Daily Grind.
He glanced in the direction she’d indicated, as if he hadn’t seen Sierra the minute he walked through the door. As if he hadn’t noticed that she was wearing the cranberry jacket again—this time over a black turtleneck sweater with black pants, having adjusted her wardrobe to the northern winter. Or that she’d done something a little bit different with her hair today, so it had that sexy, slightly tousled look, as if she’d just rolled out of bed—inspiring a man to fantasize about taking her back there again.
“Deacon?”
His sister-in-law’s prompt drew his attention back to her table. “Yeah, that’s Sierra.”
“I didn’t get an introduction at your birthday party, but I can see why you’re smitten,” Regan said. “She’s gorgeous.”
He frowned. “Who said I was smitten?”
“Your brother.”
“I don’t know why he’d say something like that.”
“Because he saw the two of you facing off in court last week.”
“When? I didn’t see him.”
Her smile was smug. “Exactly. So why did you bring your coffee over here to sit with me instead of taking it over there?”
“Because I didn’t want to hurt your feelings.”
“Nice try,” she said. “Now try the truth.”
“It’s complicated,” he hedged.
“Isn’t it always?” Regan said, not unsympathetically.
He intended to leave it at that. But his brother’s wife was also his friend—and one he’d found himself confiding in frequently over the years.
“Do you remember the day that I drove you to your doctor’s appointment?” he asked her now.
“As if I could ever forget it.” She sipped her latte. “It was the day we found out I was pregnant with twins—again.”
“Well, as we were entering the clinic, another woman was exiting.”
“I’d guess a fair number of women are in and out of that clinic on any given day,” she remarked dryly.
“I’m sure you’re right,” he agreed. “But this particular woman was Sierra.”
“Oh.” Then, “Oh.”
He nodded.
“I’m beginning to understand the complication,” Regan said.
He nodded again.
“Where does the baby’s father fit into the picture?”
Deacon wasn’t entirely sure. It seemed to him that Sierra had been deliberately cryptic about the details of her pregnancy, but there had been one point about which she was clear. “She assured me that they don’t have any kind of romantic relationship.”
“Okay, then—what’s the problem? Is it that you don’t want to be a dad to another man’s kid?”
“I don’t want to be a dad—period.”
The blunt assessment made his sister-in-law frown. “Why not?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” he challenged.
“Not to me.”
“Maybe because you never knew my dad.”
“You’re right. I didn’t know him,” she said. “But I know that he was an abusive alcoholic, and I’m sorry that you had to grow up with that.
“I also know that the absence of a positive role model can make parenting a challenge. But your brother was raised in the same house, and I can’t imagine a better father to our daughters than him.”
“He is an amazing dad. But Connor is only my half brother,” he reminded her. “He doesn’t carry the burden of Dwayne Parrish’s DNA.”
Regan seemed to consider this as she took another sip of her drink. “That’s true,” she finally acknowledged. “Instead, he carries the burden of never having known his father. Of not even knowing who his father is. Half of your brother’s DNA is a question mark. His dad could be a schoolteacher or a serial killer—he doesn’t know and he has to live with the not knowing.”
“I never looked at it from that perspective,” Deacon admitted, duly chastened by his sister-in-law’s words.
“I’m not trying to make you feel bad,” Regan said, in a gentler tone. “I’m trying to make you see that biology is only a small part of the equation. What matters more—a lot more—is how you feel about both the mother and her child.
“If you really like Sierra, and it seems obvious that you do, then you shouldn’t let the fact that she’s going to have a baby scare you away.”
“You don’t think I should be concerned about the possibility that I might turn out like him?”
“Your past isn’t nearly as important as your present,” she insisted.
“Do you really believe that?”
“Absolutely.”
“You never had any qualms about me babysitting your girls?”
“Never,” she replied without hesitation. “Because you are the best—and their undisputed favorite—uncle.”
“I’m not sure I deserve that kind of praise.”
“You didn’t even raise your voice when they painted your shoes.”
“My new Cole Haan loafers,” Deacon clarified. “And I think I was too stunned to speak.”
“But when you did, you commented on their creative use of color.”
He sighed. “They were so proud of their handiwork. I knew that if I got mad, they’d be crushed.”
Regan smiled and touched a hand to his arm. “And that is why I have no doubt you’ll be an amazing dad when the time comes.”
It was Friday night, and though dinner wasn’t long past, Sierra was rummaging through her cupboards.
“What are you looking for?” Deacon asked her.
“Salt and vinegar potato chips.” She closed one door, opened another. “I’m sure I bought some when I was shopping last weekend.”
“I saw an empty bag in the trash can in the garage when I dropped Remy’s evening deposit in there.”
She sighed. “I guess I finished them.”
“Do you want me to pop over to the convenience store to pick up another bag?” he offered.
She hesitated, just long enough to let him know that she wanted to say yes, before she shook her head no. “I’ve got some fruit in the fridge. I can have an apple or a pear.
“I’ve got grapes, too,” she discovered, when she opened the refrigerator to examine the contents. “Do you want some grapes?”
“Grapes are an after-school snack for a ten-year-old, not a game-watching snack for grown-ups,” he protested.
“I could make popcorn,” she said.
“In an air popper with no added butter?” he guessed.
“It’s healthy.”
“I think I’d rather have the grapes.”
“I’ll make a fruit tray,” she decided.
He glanced at the time displayed on the stove. “There’s at least twenty minutes until puck drop—I’m going to go out to get some real snacks.”
She should have objected—not to the snacks but to his plan to come back to watch the game. She felt a little guilty that he’d been spending so much of his time with her, but she didn’t say anything, because that tiny bit of guilt was greatly outweighed by the pleasure of his company.
He returned from the store with the coveted salt and vinegar potato chips, a bag of white cheddar popcorn and a veggie tray.
“You dissed my suggestion of fruit, but you came back with veggies,” she noted.
“The veggies aren’t for me—they’re for the baby,” he told her.
“And the popcorn?” she prompted.
“You want some popcorn?”
“If you don’t mind sharing.”
He emptied the bag into a big bowl, and they sat close together on the sofa, watching the game and sharing the snack. But when there was a stoppage in play, she found herself asking, “Wouldn’t you rather be watching the game at Diggers’, where you could flirt with the pretty servers?”
“If I wanted to be at Diggers’, I’d be at Diggers’,” he told her, turning his attention back to the screen when the puck dropped again.
“You should want to be at Diggers’,” she said. “It isn’t normal for a young, single guy to spend his Friday nights hanging out with a pregnant friend.”
Deacon slid her a look. “Are you going to talk through the whole game?”
“Maybe.” She considered for a brief moment then revised her response. “Probably.”
“Well, I guess that’s proof we’ve come a long way from the early days when I could barely get you to say two words to me.”
“I didn’t like you at first,” she admitted.
“Yeah, you did.” He winked. “But you didn’t want to like me.”
She rolled her eyes. “And that’s one of the reasons—because you’re entirely too cocky for your own good.”
“And yet here we are.”
“Seriously, you’re wasting your time with me,” she told him, even as she leaned back against his shoulder.
Remy, not wanting to miss out on the cuddles, put his front paws up on the edge of the sofa cushion. Deacon scooped the little dog up with one hand and deposited him in Sierra’s lap.
“That’s not how I see it,” he said, giving the Chihuahua a gentle scratch beneath his chin. “But even if I am, it’s my time to waste.”
A body check against the boards sent both players crashing to the ice.
Sierra turned her face into Deacon’s shirt, her hormones stirring anew as she breathed in his familiar, masculine scent. She tamped down on her hormones and reminded herself that she was trying to be as good a friend to Deacon as he’d been to her.
“Do you know Madison Russell?” she asked, forcing herself to stop sniffing him and resume their conversation.
“Judge Wilkerson’s clerk?” he guessed.
Sierra nodded as she stroked Remy’s soft fur. “Who apparently has a major crush on you.”
Deacon frowned. “She’s barely twenty years old.”
“Twenty-two,” she told him.
“Still.”
“I was in the judge’s chambers to get an order signed and overheard Madison talking about going to Sparkle—that new dance club in Elko—with some friends tonight.”
“And you’re telling me this...why?” he asked, sounding genuinely baffled.
“Because I thought you might want to go.”
“Are you saying that you want to go?”
She huffed out a breath. Obviously she was going to have to spell it out for him. “No, I thought you might want to go because Madison is going to be there.”
He shook his head. “I’ve outgrown the club scene.”
“You’re twenty-eight years old,” she pointed out.
“My mother always said that I was an old soul.”
It was an offhand remark that served the dual purposes of distracting her from the original topic and also providing an opportunity to learn a little about the family he was usually reluctant to discuss.
“You don’t talk about your mom very much,” she noted, her tone deliberately casual.
“No,” he agreed.
She waited for him to expand on that single word, but he remained tight-lipped, focused on the game.
“Can you tell me about her?” she prompted, after another minute had passed, the silence broken only by the play-by-play on the television.
“My mom was a good person who made some bad choices, and the people in this town never let her forget it,” he finally said.
“Does she still live in Haven?”
He shook his head. “She died ten days after my high school graduation. Brain tumor.”
She touched a hand to his arm. “I’m sorry.”
“Yeah, it sucked,” he agreed. “But it was a long time ago.”
Still, it was obvious the loss had left a mark, as she knew only too well the loss of a parent could do.
It was something else they had in common.
“You don’t talk about your dad much, either,” she remarked.
A muscle in his jaw flexed, the only hint of any kind of emotional reaction, before he deliberately relaxed it.
“He was one of my mom’s particularly regrettable choices,” Deacon said, his tone flat. “He took off when I was eight. I haven’t seen or heard from him since, and I definitely don’t miss him.”
“I lost both of my parents, too,” Sierra told him, shifting the focus of their conversation away from his family in an effort to ease some of his obvious tension.
He turned so that he was sitting almost sideways, facing her. “I didn’t know that.”
She shrugged. “It’s not something I like to talk about—mostly because...it was my fault.”
She felt the unexpected burn of tears behind her eyes.
After more than fifteen years, she should have been able to talk about her mom and dad without being flooded by the emotions that had overwhelmed her fourteen-year-old self, but apparently not. Or maybe it was that this was serious confession time. Because she’d never told anyone about the guilt that she’d carried in her heart since that day—not even Nick.
But she suspected that her brother knew. Because he knew the details of the tragic accident that had taken their parents’ lives. And yet, he’d never blamed her—even though she knew that he should.
“Why would you think it was your fault?” Deacon asked.
“Because they were on their way to watch me play basketball.” Remy, as if sensing her distress, nudged at the hands folded in her lap. She untwisted her fingers to stroke his soft fur. “My parents were both lawyers. Both very busy and very successful, and while I appreciated that their work gave us a comfortable lifestyle, I sometimes resented their preoccupation with their careers.
“Anyway, I was playing in a big tournament hosted by one of the local high schools—a showcase of future varsity talent. Our team was playing well, and I’d scored double-digit points in each of the three previous games. But my parents were working a big case and hadn’t managed to make it to any of them, so I had a bit of a hissy fit, and they promised to be there for the championship.
“They never showed, but I was more angry than worried, certain they’d just decided my game wasn’t as important as whatever work they were doing. It was only after, when we were getting onto the bus to go back to school, that one of the tournament officials tracked down my coach to tell her the news—that their car had been hit head-on by a stolen vehicle being chased by police. They were both killed.”
According to the police report, her mom had died instantly. Her dad had been rushed to the hospital with life-threatening injuries that he’d succumbed to three days later.
“A horrible accident,” Deacon murmured sympathetically. “But an accident. You’re not responsible for what happened, Sierra.”
“I’m the reason they were on that road at that time. If I hadn’t asked them to come to my game, they would have been safe at the courthouse, miles away.”
“Or maybe the police chase would have happened on a different route at a different time...but with the same result.”
“You’re suggesting destiny killed my parents?”
“I’m saying you can’t know. And you need to stop blaming yourself.”
“I miss them.” Her confession was an anguished whisper.
He pulled her into his arms. She didn’t resist.
“It’s okay to miss them,” he told her gently. “And it’s important to hold on to all the good memories. But you’ve got to let go of all the other stuff so that you can live your own life.”
“Is that what you’ve done?”
He hesitated before saying, “I’m working on it.”
She snuggled into him then, wanting to give back some of the comfort he’d given to her, and drifted off to sleep listening to the beat of his heart.