HARLEY WAS STILL asleep when Vince got out of the cramped shower the next morning.
The pajama wars with Harley last night had been amusing. And after spending time with his family, he’d needed something to smile about. Truthfully, it wasn’t so much the family that had bothered him as their buildings and the memories contained within.
Vince sat on the bed and tied his tennis shoes, glancing at the mass of blond hair on Harley’s pillow. He’d never told her how much he was drawn to her thick, blond hair or the honesty in her clear blue eyes. He was fairly certain he’d never look at her without remembering the softness of her lips beneath his or the richness of her laughter.
Regardless, that wasn’t enough to entice him to break his rule about relationships never being permanent. His goals today were to keep up the dating façade without leading Harley on and to contain the memories of the past.
To do so, he needed caffeine. Vince went in search of coffee. He found his brother instead.
“This is my dream breakfast, Reggie.” Like Vince, Gabe was wearing basketball shorts and a T-shirt. His short, dark hair was rumpled, as if he didn’t own a comb or had left it back in the barracks. “I may just have to marry you.”
“Let’s not get carried away.” Reggie wore a skirt, a soft pink blouse, and heels better suited to downtown Houston than Harmony Valley. She caught Vince’s eye and pointed at Gabe’s plate. “I’ve never seen anyone top pancakes with blueberries, powdered sugar and syrup.”
Vince scrutinized Gabe’s breakfast. “My brother has always lived for carbs.”
“Hey, I need the energy.” Gabe loaded his fork with dripping blueberries and pancake. “I ran up Parish Hill this morning while you were getting your beauty rest.” He stuffed the large bite in his mouth and talked around his food. “This is my reward.”
“Your heavenly reward? Because eating like that will send you to an early grave.” Vince inventoried the sideboard and selected two hard-boiled eggs and a large apple. Before he sat next to Gabe, he poured a tall mug of black coffee.
Reggie disappeared into the kitchen, leaving the two brothers alone.
“Speaking of heaven…” Gabe swallowed and reached for a glass of orange juice. “Where is your angel?”
Vince’s shoulders tensed. “Harley’s sleeping. I’ll bring her something when I’m done.”
“You’ll be regretting not having carbs when we’re working on the house this morning.” Gabe poured more syrup on his pancakes. “In addition to installing the flooring, I hear Brit found a deal on new doors. She’s nearly as good as I am when it comes to bargaining.”
Be inside the house? Vince’s stomach churned. “I didn’t bring my tools.”
“Not to worry. I borrowed everything we’ll need.” Gabe loaded his fork once more. “Nail gun, compressor, level, crowbar.” He always had been one to make things appear out of thin air, which was why he was so good at managing supplies for his Marine unit. “We’re only working through the morning. Brit’s got a shower this afternoon, leaving us some down time.” His hand stilled midway to his mouth. “It’s weird, isn’t it? Being back in town after all these years?” He lowered his fork. “Without Dad. Without Uncle Turo.”
Their uncle had raised them after their dad committed suicide.
“It’s weird without Mom,” Vince added. She’d tried to keep things normal for more than a decade.
“Mom?” Gabe rolled his eyes and jammed the fork in his mouth. “She deserted us.”
She hadn’t. “Like Dad didn’t abandon us when he overdosed on pills?” Vince lost his appetite. He pushed his plate away. Two shelled eggs and one apple untouched.
“That was different.” Gabe’s fork drowned in a sea of syrup. “Dad carried the burden of chaos inside his head, and not by choice.” Gabe’s voice was too loud, too hard, too full of conviction. He’d never see anything but his own view of the world. “Mom gave up on her wedding vows, by choice. She left her kids, by choice.”
By choice? Vince felt sick.
“And don’t tell me there’s ever an excuse for that,” Gabe railed. “It’s like going AWOL on the battlefield. You don’t put yourself above the good of your unit.”
Vince leaned back in his chair, needing a steadying force. He stared across the hall at the antique couch with its carved wood trim. It looked about as comfortable as the short bed he’d slept in last night, and as painful as this conversation.
He had a sudden urge to see Harley, to exchange a good-natured barb. Anything but this attack on their mother, when it had been Vince’s fault that she’d left.
“Do you ever see Mom?”
Gabe’s question wiped Harley’s smile out of Vince’s head. “No.”
“Harley let slip something about her being in Texas.” Gabe would have made a good interrogator. He continued to devour the sugar-laden pancakes on his plate as if this talk wasn’t vital to the stability of their worlds.
Vince pressed his lips together. He should have told Harley his brothers didn’t know he’d found their mother. “You know Mom has family in Texas. I don’t see her or her relatives.”
“Seems funny you’d stay away from Mom since you’re always sticking up for her.” Gabe tapped his fork on his plate. “When she left, we made a pact. We vowed not to mention her anymore, not to see her, not to look for her.”
“That came from Dad.”
He’d wanted them to pretend she was dead. Except there’d been no body, no funeral, no eulogy. Vince hadn’t had any closure. Truth was, he didn’t have any now, either. But he had peace and predictability. That was worth more.
“I know how you think, Vince. You believe everybody needs a helping hand, including our cold-blooded mother.” Gabe stared at Vince as if he was a misbehaving puppy. “You need a head-clearing session with Dr. Gabe.”
“There’s the pot offering to sandblast the kettle.” Nothing Gabe could say would clear Vince’s head.
“What did you tell our sainted mother when you first saw her?” Gabe’s demand came fast, made assumptions, accused.
Back when they were kids, Vince had fallen for Gabe’s quick, bulldog inquisitions once too often. When in a sparring match with Gabe, he’d learned to remain calm or he’d give everything away.
Gabe waited for Vince’s answer with a casual look that was anything but casual. He shouldn’t have become a supply chief. He should have gone into interrogation. It was unfair to blame Harley for her slip about Mom being in Texas, but Vince couldn’t not fault her, either.
Vince tried to give his reply finality. “I told you, I haven’t seen her. End of a nonstory.”
Needing to get away, Vince moved to the sideboard and filled a plate for Harley, nearly dumping a hard-boiled egg onto the wood floor. He hadn’t drunk near enough coffee to be feeling so jittery. His fumbling fingers were a result of his irritation at Gabe, his annoyance at Harley, his anger with himself for telling Harley about his mother in the first place.
Gabe was uncharacteristically silent, not even offering a parting shot as Vince left him, coffee in one hand, Harley’s plate and utensils in the other. The buildup of anxious energy continued with each step down the hall. Vince needed to vent. Slamming their bedroom door and letting Harley know what she’d done was a good place to start.
Harley pried her eyes open when Vince opened the door. She stretched and then sank back beneath the blankets, nothing but a blond halo visible on her pillow.
Now this is how a man should wake up in the morning.
Tension drained from Vince’s body like a fast-receding tide. He closed the door softly instead of slamming it the way he’d planned just seconds prior.
“What time is it?” Harley asked in a muffled voice.
“Seven thirty.” He came over to sit on the single bed across from hers. Bitterness pressed on the verbal gas at the back of his tongue. Words spewed out, fast and low. “Don’t ask me how I slept. You snore. And you blab, although, not in your sleep.”
“Shoot. Gabe.” Harley bolted upright, thick, blond hair a tumbled mess that his fingers wanted to straighten. “I meant to tell you last night. I meant to apologize. Gabe and Joe have a bet about whether we’re a couple or not.”
Vince didn’t have to ask to know which brother was betting he and Harley were faking.
“Gabe pushes buttons like a kid playing video games, over and over, until you can’t take it any more. And then I… It was just…” She lifted those big blue eyes to him, making it hard to stay angry. “He’s as frustrating as my own brother, challenging everything I say simply because I don’t agree with him.”
How right she was. “That was why you kissed me?” Because of Gabe? The tide of tension began to flow back in, flexing his fingers, working his jaw.
Harley nodded. “He didn’t ask about your mother specifically. I just felt as if he needed some kind of proof that we were a couple. And since he probably knows about the scar on your bicep from that bar fight, and since you don’t have a beauty mark only a lover would know about, it was all I had.”
“You kissed me to…protect me?”
“That sounds so honorable.” Harley’s cheeks pinkened. She threw off the covers and swung her feet to the floor near his. Her toenails were painted a soft shade of blue. “I did it for purely selfish reasons.”
“I like where this is going.” Vince couldn’t contain his smile. It felt as if it spread from his lips to Houston.
“I kissed you to put Gabe in his place.” Harley straightened the offending football jersey and stood, staring down her delicate nose at him, her hair in a tangled cloud about her face. “I didn’t enjoy it.”
Oh, what a lie. “It didn’t feel that way to me.”
Cheeks reddening, she stomped into the bathroom and slammed the door. And then she shrieked. “Why didn’t you tell me my hair looked like this?”
“Because it’s karma.” Vince went to the door so he wouldn’t have to shout and potentially be heard by the entire bed-and-breakfast. “That’s karma coming around to get you for telling Gabe about my mother and telling me you didn’t enjoy that kiss.”
Sometimes the smallest victories were the most enjoyable.
* * *
THE CLOSE QUARTERS of the bathroom made Harley nauseous.
Her upset stomach was more discouraging than her bed-head reflection and realizing she’d been talking to her ex-boyfriend while looking like the Bride of Frankenstein.
She sniffed when she got out of the cramped shower, trying to uncover a smell that turned her stomach. She sniffed as she dressed in a pair of black capris and a gray-striped sleeveless blouse. She sucked in air through her nose like a bloodhound as she tamed her hair into a single braid down her back, but still, she couldn’t identify anything amiss.
She’d dreamed of Dan chasing her through a shadowy playhouse last night and being unable to escape him because there were no balconies to run to. Maybe her stomach trouble was a product of stress, not environment.
“Hey, let’s get moving.” Vince knocked on the door. He was a morning person, always the first one to the job site, but he had a point. Brit and Joe probably had a ton of things to do for the wedding and needed their help. “You should eat something before we leave.”
She opened the door. Vince stood holding a small plate of food.
Ugh. Neither the hard-boiled egg nor the bagel and cream cheese he’d brought appealed to Harley. “I’d like tea, thanks.”
“And I’d like a new deal.” Vince’s smile was lukewarm. “Given Gabe doesn’t believe we’re the real thing, he’s not going to let Joe win the bet without a fight.”
“Don’t get overly dramatic.” Harley grabbed her cell phone and a five-dollar bill, shoving both in her pants’ pocket, wanting to get some tea in her stomach as soon as possible.
“He’s not going to give either one of us any peace.”
Vince looked serious and seemed seriously annoyed, as if he’d been tearing out his Disney prince-like hair.
Harley crossed her arms and thought about peppermint and apples, anything that might calm her stomach. There had to be something funky in the bathroom, something that made her feel queasy. Was Reggie using an odd brand of bathroom cleaner? A cheap brand of shower caulking? “And what do you propose to do to convince Gabe?”
“Another kiss.” Vince said it straight-faced, standing in front of the door like a palace guard. “This time in front of both my brothers. So that Gabe will have to concede. Joe will make him concede.”
“No.” Her suspicion meter pinged a warning. “I might consider it if you were a frog prince and my kingdom rested on this kiss.”
“Ribbit.” He didn’t crack a smile. “Your Highness.”
“There’s nothing in your proposition for me,” she said, putting her royal nose in the air.
What a flimsy statement. A kiss from Vince wasn’t a hardship.
Vince knew it, too. He quirked a brow.
Her gaze went from that brow to his mouth to the floor, which made her dizzy.
What was going on here? She drew a deep breath in, willing herself to feel better. She couldn’t handle Vince when she wasn’t on top of her game.
Harley raised her gaze to his once more. “Cut to the chase. What are you willing to offer?”
His smile was sly. “I could clean your engine when we get back to Houston.”
She waved that bargaining chip aside. “Offer me something you can deliver here. Like the truth. About anything.”
He made a derisive noise and glanced away.
Harley reached up and cupped his smooth-shaved chin, forcing his gaze back on her. “Tell me something…” She wanted to know more about the man she’d once given her body to. “Tell me why you’re not a mechanic. Gabe mentioned you were talented with engines. He was surprised you were no longer on an oil rig. Why?”
Vince seemed taken aback. His brows converged. His dark eyes narrowed. “It’s…complicated.”
Diversion. Denial. She was over it. “I need fresh air and tea.” To settle her stomach so she could handle these negotiations to her utmost advantage. She reached for the doorknob.
He pressed the flat of his hand against the door, holding it closed. “And for this, you’ll agree to stage the kiss?”
The room shrank from the size of a jail cell to a cardboard box. Even the shower seemed larger than the space they currently occupied.
Every inch of Harley’s body pleaded for caution.
“Yes,” she said, throwing caution to the wind.
Vince took a deep breath, as if what he was about to disclose was going to be painful. And then he said, “My mother is dating Jerry.”
What did that have to do with Vince not being a mechanic?
“That’s it. End of truth telling?” And then a thought struck her, so hard she forgot about upset stomachs, fresh air and tea. She grabbed his white T-shirt. “Did you know this before you came to work for Jerry?”
He nodded.
Harley’s mind raced. “And you were on an oil rig…”
His gaze darted sideways. “My mom dated an oil company mechanic.”
“There were…other men? Other jobs?”
He nodded, standing still, telegraphing that this conversation was too close to his soft emotional center.
“You realize that’s creepy, right?” Her stomach came back on line, agreeing.
Vince washed a hand over his face. The same hand that had held the door closed.
Harley made no move to go.
“It didn’t start out like that. I wanted to make sure she was okay and not making the same mistake, choosing a guy who couldn’t make her happy.”
“You wanted to make sure she wasn’t dating someone like your father,” Harley said slowly. “You mentioned your father had mental health issues. Did your mother care for him? Support him? Nurture him?”
“Yes.” The relief in his voice was palpable. “They say people have a romantic type.”
Crikey. Her type was probably him. Tall, dark and emotionally unavailable.
“You were worried about your mother getting into another codependent relationship.” Harley digested his nod, his past, her reaction. “You were…trying to watch out for her.” She gaped at this caring, complex man. When she’d dreamed of her Prince Charming, she’d imagined him to have come from a happy home, without emotional baggage or misdirected good intentions. To be fair, she supposed men wouldn’t be attracted to a woman who was thousands of dollars in debt and a professional failure.
“You don’t approve,” he said.
She stared into Vince’s eyes, those black eyes that could express so much warmth, so much humor, and so much pain. “It’s not the way I would’ve gone about it.” Understatement. “And when your mom finds out, she’s going to be upset.”
His eyes widened. “She’s never going to know.”
“Or maybe she knows already.” The sickening feeling of claustrophobia returned. Harley couldn’t wait any longer for fresh air and green tea. She opened the door and hurried down the hall. “All it would take is one of her boyfriends to mention your name.”
Vince made a sound that was half groan, half sound of disgust. “No one’s ever said a word about me.”
“Meaning no police officer ever came to your door with a restraining order.”
Harley greeted Reggie in the dining room and asked about tea.
“I just dumped the hot water.” Reggie apologized. “You can get tea at Martin’s on Main Street. It’s on your way to the garage. I’ll see you there in thirty minutes.”
“So we’re good?” Vince asked Harley when they’d stepped onto the broad front porch.
“Honestly? I don’t endorse you stalking your mom, but I understand why you did it.” Harley tried to smile, but between the stomach upset and the choices he’d made, it felt more like a grimace. “And you have delivered on your end of the deal.”
“Yes,” he said firmly.
“Well…” Harley licked her lips. She was in big trouble here. Should she set a time limit on the upcoming kiss? She had a tendency to lose track of time when his arms came around her. “As long as you agree our performance is no longer than ten seconds, we’re good.” There. That ought to do it. Nothing bad could happen in ten seconds. Harley scurried down the porch stairs before she could dwell on the bargain she’d made. “Did you smell something strange in our bathroom?”
“No.”
Harley widened her stride, breathing deeply, trying to clear out whatever was making her feel out of sorts. “Does your head feel heavy or your stomach odd?”
“No. And since when do kisses have time limits?” The Vince she’d dated was back. His tone invited her to play on the flirtatious playground.
“They do.” Harley couldn’t resist a ride on the merry-go-round. “Gratuitous kisses always have time limits. Hadn’t you heard?”
He laughed, making her heart beat faster. “Where do you come up with this stuff?”
“I have a folder with all my silly ideas to make you cross-eyed.” Actually, it was a sketchpad and made architects like Dan cross-eyed. “I keep a scorecard.”
He laughed. His laughter filled the street. It filled her chest. It made regrets about obligatory kisses fade.
The temperature was brisk, quite a change from hot, muggy Houston mornings. Wisps of fog still lingered on the broad expanse of grass at the town square. Floating, the way Harley’s balconies couldn’t.
“We don’t have oaks like that in Texas.” Harley slowed to appreciate the lone tree in the town square. Its branches spread at least twenty feet on either side of the trunk like sturdy bird balconies. “They could put ten more benches under there. Why is there only one?”
“Because that’s the bench where folks in Harmony Valley propose.”
And presumably kiss afterward. Granted, she was becoming a bit obsessed about kissing.
She’d missed his wit. She’d missed his laugh. She was afraid to admit she’d missed his kiss.
Harley turned her feet in the other direction, not thinking about kisses or sons who kept tabs on their wayward mothers. She stayed a step ahead of Vince, having remembered where Martin’s was from their drive to the bed-and-breakfast last night, a few doors down from El Rosal.
They turned onto Main Street. The sidewalks were brick with gas streetlights every thirty or forty feet. El Rosal was doing a brisk breakfast business, one that spilled out onto a patio ringed by a black wrought-iron fence.
A few elderly patrons pointed and whispered as they passed.
Mildred was among them, standing out with her thick, round glasses and thick, round, white curls. She didn’t whisper. She called out a greeting when she realized who they were.
“They’re talking about you and your Rapunzel-like hair,” Vince teased.
“Vince, Vince, Vince. They’re talking about you and the infamous Messina hair,” Harley shot back. “With hair like that, you’ve got to be somebody.” This last she put in air quotes.
“They already know who I am.” He said it as if it was a bad thing to be a Messina in Harmony Valley.
She’d witnessed both a positive reception and a negative one, and refused to validate Vince’s fears.
She couldn’t let his gloomy mood set the tone of the day. “They may know your name, but they don’t know you.” Heck, she hadn’t really known him until this trip.
The architecture on Main Street was from the Gold Rush era. Lots of brick. Lots of square lines. Not exactly Harley’s preference, but the style was charming in its authenticity.
Beyond a few more storefronts, they reached Martin’s Bakery.
“We used to get doughnuts here on the first day of school.” Vince paused outside the door. “Gabe would order a bear claw and Joe liked sprinkles.”
“What did you order?”
Vince opened the door for her. “Whatever was in the day-old section.”
Harley’s heart panged. She touched his arm as she passed. “You don’t have to do that today.”
He gave her a small smile.
The bakery was filled with mismatched wooden tables and chairs. True to the Gold Rush style, the ceiling was high and plain. One wall was cluttered with old yellowed photographs of what looked to be previous bakers. Her father had a similar wall at the tile store, but it only went back one generation, not one century.
The bakery case was L-shaped, broken up by a counter with a cash register near the middle. The case was filled with cookies, doughnuts, scones and all kinds of flaky confections. The scent of warm chocolate and fresh coffee filled the air.
Harley’s stomach shimmied, overwhelmed by too many smells.
Nearly every table was taken. The customers were mostly gray-haired, except for the salesclerk and two toddler boys who played with blocks in front of the window seat. All conversation ground to a halt when Vince and Harley entered. Even the toddlers looked up.
And then the commentary came as fast as popping corn.
“Is that one of the Messina boys?”
“’Course it is. Those boys always did have a preference for blondes.”
“Except Joe. He got himself a brunette.”
There was a smattering of laughter.
“Okay, okay. You’ve had your fun. Don’t scare away my customers or I’ll raise my prices.” A pregnant woman with dark hair and a soft smile stood behind the counter. Her brown apron had Jessica embroidered across the breast pocket in block letters. “Welcome to Martin’s. What can I get for you?”
Her customer service didn’t halt the crowd’s observations.
“It’s the middle boy. He’s back for the wedding.”
“Is he the one who dated all those girls?”
“No. He’s the one who barely graduated high school.”
This last remark slid between Harley’s shoulder blades with a sharp edge that made her suck in a breath.
Vince pretended he was hard of hearing, standing erect as if he were in the military. They’d shut up if he glared at them or laughed it off.
Harley opened her mouth to defend him but Vince laid a hand on her shoulder. “Don’t bother.” And then his hand drifted to her nape, where he gave her a gentle squeeze, as if loosening her tense muscles.
Her tense muscles? His must be locked in place.
Their gossip made her wonder. What would people back home in Birmingham be saying about her?
“I told Harley her ideas were too bubbly and cartoony.” That’s what her brother Taylor would say.
“Some people do and other people teach.” That would be her high school principal, Mr. Ethridge, hoping she’d decide to return to her alma mater as a teacher.
“It’s better to be a big fish in a small pond than a little fish in a big ocean.” That’s what her mother had said just last week when she’d asked Harley to come home.
Harley sighed, demoralized by her train of thought. She could really use a hug right now, something to validate the bad feelings and let her know someone cared.
Vince sidled closer, giving Jessica his coffee order.
Or she could use a kiss. Kisses rated right up there with hugs in terms of emotional therapy credits. With the right guy.
She couldn’t stop staring at her wedding date.
I am so in trouble.
“And what do you need this morning?” Jessica asked.
Harley yanked her gaze from Vince. “Hot green tea to go.” She pulled the five out of her pocket and pushed Vince’s wallet out of the way when he tried to pay for her order as well as his coffee.
A tablet propped on top of the bakery case had a message scrolling across the screen. “Horseradish chocolate cake?” Harley’s stomach twisted.
“Horseradish grows wild here.” Jessica smiled over her shoulder as she filled a large paper cup with hot water. “I blog about modernizing old recipes, but I fear I’m becoming the Horseradish Queen. I keep finding ancient recipes that include it.”
“There’s nothing wrong with that,” said an old woman with short purplish-gray hair. She wore a lime-green track suit. A set of black reading glasses perched atop her bangs. “Eating horseradish leads to a long life.”
“As does being ornery.” Jessica was still smiling when she unwrapped a tea bag and dropped it in a cup.
“Classic Harmony Valley,” Vince whispered in Harley’s ear, his lips close enough to kiss her cheek. “Wait for it.”
If she turned her head, Harley wouldn’t have to wait for anything, including that kiss.
She stood as still as Vince.
“You could live a long life if you ate your greens.” Jessica kept the ball rolling. “If you walked. Or sang. Or just spoke your mind without a filter.”
“Is that a dig at me?” The purple-haired woman raised her voice primly. “Duffy told me the other day he thought I talked too much.”
“I think Jessica was referring to me,” an old woman with jet-black hair and a widow’s peak said. “I always speak my mind.”
“There are no digs. This is a dig-free zone.” Jessica moved from behind the counter to hug her concerned customers and then she leaned down to kiss one of the toddlers. “Now, who’s up for horseradish chocolate cake?”
Several patrons raised their hands.
The way she was feeling, Harley wasn’t brave enough to try it, but something else caught her eye. “What pretty mermaid cookies. They look just like Brittany’s sculptures.”
“We’re partnering with her.” Jessica selected a mermaid with purple frosting hair and gave it to Harley. “A free sample with the hope you’ll come back for more.”
That started a whole new line of banter.
“Is that Messina boy staying after the wedding?”
“If so, I hope he’s single. My granddaughter can’t hold on to a man.”
“There’s no ring on that girl’s finger, Vince.” Someone tsked.
This last comment seemed like Harley’s cue to leave. Vince had his coffee.
“Um…” Harley’s tea steeped on the back counter, out of reach. She caught Jessica’s eye.
Jessica dunked the tea bag a few times. “Almost done.”
“Vince!” A woman about Vince’s age stood in the doorway. She had short, streaky, teased blond hair and the kind of curves that made Harley blush, mostly because there wasn’t enough material in her blouse to cover them. The woman ran forward, flung her arms around Vince and squeezed.
“Hey, Sarah.” Vince pried himself free with a jolt and draped an arm over Harley’s shoulders. “I heard you were back in town. This is Harley.”
If the bakery had been quiet before, the patrons held their collective breath this time while Sarah processed Vince being unavailable.
Moving his hand to Harley’s waist, Vince snuggled her body next to his, which made Harley momentarily forget her stomach woes, personal boundaries and the appropriateness of kissing one’s ex. Her heart beat faster. Her lips curled upward. And she angled her face up to his. All conditioned responses from weeks spent dating him.
But, hey, this was part of what she was here for, wasn’t it?
Instead of planting a big one on Harley or looking at her with googly eyes, Vince flashed Sarah a friendly smile, warm without being too warm, like the ones he’d given Harley after their breakup. “It’s always good to reconnect with school friends, isn’t it?”
He’d managed to put both his ex-girlfriends in their places without elevating either one.
Annoyance tangoed with jealousy in Harley’s stomach. Or maybe the smell of all that sugar was turning her belly in a different way. She wanted to grab hold of Vince and give a little PDA to brand him as taken. But what she was going to do was take her tea and hightail it out of there.
“Almost done,” Jessica said, reading Harley’s mind.
Sarah stared at Harley as if trying to place a once-familiar face, perhaps having taken Vince’s comment about reconnecting and assuming it included Harley.
“Um…” Harley took pity on his ex. Sarah wasn’t going to recognize her. “I’m not from—”
“Sarah?” Vince interrupted, pointing to the sidewalk and an old woman moving slowly with the aid of a walker. “Is that your grandmother?”
“No.” Sarah glanced over her shoulder and then back at Vince, unconcerned. “She’s my client. I work for Becca Harris as a caregiver. That’s Mrs. Edelman. She used to teach third grade.”
“She was one of my favorite teachers.” Vince hurried to the front, angling his head as if to tell Harley to follow him out the door. He stepped outside and greeted his former teacher.
The bakery customers jumped into the void.
“Did he dump the blonde?”
“Which blonde? They’re both blondes.”
“He left them both for Carly Edelman.”
“He’s got good taste.”
Laughter filled the room, bouncing off those high ceilings.
Harley’s cheeks felt warm.
By contrast, Sarah seemed oblivious, either because she was hard of hearing or she’d become immune to the long-living blurting residents in Harmony Valley.
“Ignore the peanut gallery,” Jessica advised, finally handing Harley her tea. “Not much happens around here, which means every little thing is a big deal.”
“Vince is just the nicest guy, isn’t he?” Sarah sighed. She gave Harley a competitive woman’s once-over.
Harley tried to look unthreatened.
“Well…” Sarah pouted. “Let me know if you cut him loose. I was a fool to let Gabe turn my head.” She went to find her client a chair, waving to catch Mrs. Edelman’s attention when Vince held the door for her.
“For what it’s worth, they talked worse about Joe when he first came back.” Jessica nodded, smiling. “They’d all defend Joe now.”
That didn’t mean their words didn’t hurt Joe’s pride or Vince’s, for that matter.
Harley carried her tea and cookie, and joined Vince outside. She tried to make light of his reception. “You must have broken Sarah’s heart. She latched onto you like a bride at a wedding dress clearance sale.”
“She’s scary.” Vince took Harley’s arm and led her down the sidewalk, adding in a lowered voice, “She pinched my butt.”
“You lie.” Harley stopped, completely taken aback. “She wouldn’t do that in front of a roomful of people.”
“Oh, yes, she did.” With a furtive glance over his shoulder—possibly to see if Sarah was following them—Vince tugged Harley back into motion. “Didn’t you see me jump?”
Harley chuckled. She had.
“Don’t laugh. You’re supposed to protect me from her.”
How she wished someone could have protected her from failure with Dan. “You should have bargained for a kiss in front of Sarah.” She knew the words were a mistake as soon as they left her mouth.
“I still could.” Vince’s gaze fell to her lips, his steps downshifted to slow-mo and his expression turned serious.
Harley’s breath caught in her throat. Against her better judgment. Against all experience to the contrary. Harley wanted to be held by Vince.
Not for show. Not to fulfill her end of a bargain. But because she liked him and because, when he kissed her, when his arms came around her, she felt that all her mistakes didn’t matter.
All her mistakes…
Pride had led her to accept a job with Dan. Pride had made her show her sketches to him. Pride had made her quit.
“You were wrong the other day about men needing pride,” Harley stated. “Pride steals your footing. It makes you doubt. It brings you down.” To a place where you needed someone to lift you up.
She wanted that someone to be Vince. But that would go against the pep talks she gave herself about being resilient, not to mention, Vince didn’t want to be her rock.
“You don’t need another kiss.” Her voice was a thready whisper.
He cocked a brow. “I don’t?”
She hadn’t been talking to him. She’d been talking to herself, talking herself down from the kissing ledge. “No. You need this.” She didn’t kiss him. She hugged him. She hugged him tight.
And, for just a moment, she didn’t worry about balconies in the clouds, dreams lost or hearts that might be broken.