Forbidden Fling (Wildwood Book 1) (25 page)

They stayed like that, suspended in that moment, lost in each other’s eyes with thoughts and emotions floating between them for what seemed like forever, yet wasn’t near long enough.

The ring of his desk phone broke the trance.

Ethan swore and hung up on whoever was calling.

Delaney pulled in a breath and pushed out a soft, “Thank you. If you find a problem as you’re going through it, you know how to get a hold of me. And you can have the stills. Come pick them up anytime.”

This was the beginning of the end, and a jagged streak of panic flashed through Delaney’s chest. The kind of panic that signaled she was losing something she could never get back.

Second, third, and fourth thoughts chased one another around Delaney’s mind, but she’d done all the preliminary work, had all the numbers. From a business perspective, taking on this project was just the no-brainer Trace had labeled it. She couldn’t justify walking away from it now. And she shouldn’t have to.

She cleared her throat and forced the words forward. “I think this goes without saying, but since this change creates a concrete conflict of interest for you—”

“We can’t see each other anymore,” he finished, his tone harsh, his voice final. But it was the damn-right look in his eye that cut into Delaney’s heart.

She pressed her lips together, nodded, and, with nothing more for either of them to say, walked out of his office, leaving with what felt like a gaping wound in her chest.

TWELVE

Delaney paused on the sidewalk outside Black Jack’s and observed the crowd inside. The small café was packed. People of every age filled the main restaurant and mingled between tables, from Heidi’s wailing two-month-old baby girl to the cackling members of the Geri-Hat-Tricks bridge club.

She was tired and sore from long days of demolition work, and all she wanted to do was go back to Phoebe’s house and sink into that claw-foot tub and a mountain of lavender-scented bubbles. But over the last couple of weeks she’d promised half a dozen people she’d come tonight, and Trace was going to swing by to go over the grand plan for the renovation and talk timeline and budget and crew.

Laughter broke out in the restaurant again, drawing Delaney’s gaze to the back room, where the open space was crowded with people closer to her own age. The huge television hanging on one wall played a Giants game.

Delaney scanned the space, searching for a head of golden blond and a smile that lit the room. She hadn’t seen or spoken to Ethan since she’d dumped the building permit application on his desk and he’d discounted both her abilities and the importance of this project in the scope of her life.

Her gaze grabbed hold of him where he sat at the end of a large table of men around his age, and even still pissed and hurt, the sight made her stomach float. It was a damn good thing this renovation had forced them to distance themselves, because she’d realized in their time apart that she was truly crazy about him.

Allowing that to grow would have ended in nothing but heartache.

Her insides jittered with the knowledge that she would face a lot of people in town here tonight for the first time in decades. People who both loved and hated her. She didn’t doubt Jack, Wayne, and Austin would pass through at some point, and she only hoped she could avoid direct contact with them. She wouldn’t back down from a confrontation, but she certainly wouldn’t instigate one either.

She took a deep breath, stepped toward the door, and her cell rang. Delaney gritted her teeth and sank back to a spot alongside the building to pull the phone from her bag.

“Hello.”

“Hey, Delaney,” a rough female voice responded. “It’s Avery. I know I don’t sound like myself . . .”

Delaney’s face broke into a smile, and excitement rushed into her belly. “Hey!” Just hearing Avery’s voice made a long-lost sensation of warmth and belonging swamp her. Tears of love and loss rushed to her eyes. Regret swelled in her chest. The urge to apologize for everything she’d done wrong as a teenager, for leaving too soon, seeped in. “How are you? Phoebe told me you’ve been sick.”

Avery cleared her throat. When she spoke again, she sounded more like herself. “Better now, but yeah. It hit me pretty hard. Sorry I didn’t call earlier. Phoebe told me about the bar. Man, that sucks. I want to help—I really do. You always take the brunt of everything, and it’s not fair. But, honestly, I’m always in the red. Phoebe floats me five hundred dollars every month, which is the only reason the collection agencies aren’t coming after me. But we all have our own problems. Mine are no rougher than yours. It’s all relevant, right?”

“God, it’s great to talk to you.”

“You, too. I’m sorry it’s been so long.”

And just like that, the eight-year gap closed and they were sisters again. Delaney closed her eyes, pushing tears down her cheeks. “Me, too. And I’m sorry it took this situation for me to call.” She tightened her muscles for the answer to her next question. “Have you heard from Chloe?”

“Off and on. She’s . . . well . . . she’s a nomad. Doesn’t stay any one place very long. Don’t tell Phoebe, but part of that five hundred goes to Chloe.”

The guilt expanded, and her tears flowed. Delaney pressed her fingers to closed lids to stem the flow. “But she’s okay?”

“I think so.” Avery laughed softly. “I guess we’re all survivors in our own way.”

“I guess. Phoebe said you and David are struggling? Do you think you’ll be able to work it out?”

“Nope,” she said, clipped and matter-of-fact. “I got the final divorce papers in the mail today.”

“Oh, Avery . . .” She slid her hand down to cover her lips. “I’m . . . God, I’m
so
sorry. That must be so hard.”

“Yeah,” she said on a heavy exhale. “It’s been a really long, rough road. I’ll be okay. You know, we’re always okay, but man . . .”

Delaney thought of Avery on the other side of the country, feeling abandoned by her husband, with no family to support her, and her heart broke. Enough was enough. “Bet you could use some serious Phoebe time right about now, huh?”

Avery chuckled. “Oh, God, could I.”

“If I bought you a plane ticket, do you think you could find time to come out? I’ll pick you up at the airport. I’m staying with Phoebe, so we’ll all be together. You can even sleep in the guest room with me—it’ll be like when we were kids—or I’ll take the couch. During the day you can hang at Phoebe’s shop or pound a few nails with me.” Delaney laughed. “Wouldn’t Dad just roll over in his grave if he knew you and I were wielding hammers in his bar?”

Avery burst out laughing, and the truly light sound gave Delaney hope.

“I’d really like to share my plans for the place with you,” she said. “Explain what that means for all of us in the future. It’s good, Avery. Really good. I want to do right by you and Chloe. I know it’s taken me too damn long to do it, and it isn’t the same, but . . . I really do.”

“Delaney, don’t. You did your best, and you held us together until Phoebe got there. You did more than enough.”

She couldn’t accept that, but she didn’t want to argue either. “The weather’s perfect right now. At night, the three of us can hang on Phoebe’s porch with a few bottles of wine and talk. It would be great. What do you say?”

She held her breath and prayed her sister said yes.

“Well, since I lost my two biggest clients while I had bronchitis, and they were my only daily deliveries . . . and since I’m not making any money anyway . . . and since I don’t have anything to stay here for . . .”

“I can have a first-class ticket in your in-box by midnight.”

Avery paused, then exhaled an, “Oh, hell, why not?”

Delaney squealed. “Wait until I tell Phoebe. Oh my God, she’s going to start nesting and driving me crazy.”

They both laughed and said their goodbyes. Delaney was grinning so big her cheeks hurt when she turned for the door of Black Jack’s to find Harlan McClellan standing at the base of the stairs, his hand closed around the railing.

“Oh.” She stopped short. “Hey, Harlan.”

“Homie still smells like that lavender crap you washed him with last week,” he said, his voice grouchy, but his mouth half curved in a Harlan-style grin. “Everyone’s gonna think he’s a girl.”

Delaney laughed and propped a hand at her hip. “
That crap
keeps fleas away. And what’s wrong with smelling like a girl?”

“Nothin’—if you’re a girl.” He glanced at the windows, then back. “Amazing what a ruckus small-town folk can make. Food smells good, though.”

“It does.” She pressed a hand to her stomach. “I’m starving.”

“Guess that means you’re goin’ in, not comin’ out.”

“Yep.”

“You probably deserve your very own pizza judging by the work I hear you’ve done at the bar in the last week.”

“Oh, how I love the small-town gossip mill.”

“Is it gossip or is it true?”

“It’s true,” she conceded. “I happen to love demolition. It’s a great way to release frustration. Which is probably why it’s going so fast.”

He chuckled. “This place can do that to you.” But his smile faded quickly and his gaze went distant in a way that made Delaney uncomfortable for a reason she didn’t understand. She was just about to segue into a goodbye, when his gaze returned to hers. “Avery comin’ for a visit?”

“Yeah.” The reality softened Delaney’s heart. “But don’t tell Phoebe. I want to surprise her later tonight with the news.”

That got a full smile out of Harlan, and for the first time Delaney caught a glimpse of Ethan in his grandfather, which pulled at something deep in her chest. “Bet it will be good to see her.”

“
So
good,” Delaney agreed.

“Yep, family . . .” Harlan sounded as if he were going to say something profound, but then came back with a quipped, dry, “Can’t live with ’em; can’t kill ’em.”

Delaney laughed and squeezed his arm. Harlan patted her hand, then gestured toward the stairs. “After you.”

She pulled in a deep breath as she ascended and slipped into the restaurant, grateful for the crowd enabling her to get her bearings without dozens of pairs of eyes on her.

It seemed the whole town was there. People she recognized from her past. People she’d reconnected with recently. And new people to the community who were complete strangers.

“You’re here.” Heidi spotted her first and pushed through the crowd with her new baby cradled in one arm, using the other to hug Delaney. “I was starting to think you weren’t going to show.”

If she were honest, she’d thought about it. Seriously thought about it. Just knowing Ethan was in the other room made her stomach jump. And that place deep in her body that had started aching when she’d laid that application for a building permit on his desk deepened now.

“Lots to do,” she said, hugging her friend back.

She’d barely pulled away when another mutual friend from high school came flying her way, grin wide, arms open. “There she is!”

Delaney laughed and hugged Shiloh while Heidi greeted Harlan.

“Mommy.”

Shiloh pulled back. “Yes, yes, honey. Delaney, this is my daughter, Hunter.”

Delaney dropped into a crouch, managing to smile at the girl through all the pulls and aches in her muscles. “Hey there. How old are you?”

“Five. Mommy says you build things.”

“I do.”

“Mommy said that you might build me a princess bed if you have time.”

Delaney cast a look up at Shiloh and found her brows tipped in a look of guilt. “Hunter, I told you to wait.”

Harlan chuckled. “Should have known better than to expect this little go-getter to wait for anything.”

Shiloh sighed.

“Hi, Mr. McClellan.” Hunter turned her bright eyes on Harlan. “Can I come out to the farm again sometime?”

“Hunter—” Shiloh started.

“Don’t bother.” Harlan waved off Shiloh’s reprimand easily. “Hunter’s welcome at the farm anytime. I’ll let you ladies chat.”

As Harlan wandered toward the corner housing the boisterous Geri-Hat-Tricks members, Shiloh took one of Delaney’s arms, Heidi took the other, and they wandered toward the back room with her. Delaney’s gut tightened with each step, but she figured she might as well get it over with. The angst of seeing Ethan after the way they’d left things the day before was killing her.

They entered the room with Hunter bouncing in front of her talking about her princess bed, Shiloh murmuring about a master bedroom renovation she was dying to get Delaney’s take on, and Heidi’s news about the increase in business since the scrub-a-thon.

“Look who I found,” Heidi called out, causing two more women to pop up from a long table in the back of the room and rush forward to hug her.

“Oh my God,” Delaney said, hugging them each in turn. “Stella and Susan? Wow, you two look amazing.”

Sisters, just a year apart, the women had been part of Delaney’s devilish high school clique.

“Stella is a buyer for Nordstrom,” Heidi said. “And Susan is head of sales at Silverado Vineyards.”

Delaney laughed and curved her fingers around Hunter’s as she tugged on Delaney’s skirt for attention. “Oh, man. I guess we proved everyone wrong, didn’t we? None of us turned out as bad as everyone thought we would.”

That brought the entire table into a round of roaring laughter. And as Delaney relented and pulled Hunter into her arms, she experienced the kind of cohesiveness within a community that she’d always strived to create in her restaurants when she designed for Pacific Coast’s Finest, but one she’d never known herself. One a part of her had never even believed possible. And most certainly not possible in Wildwood.

Ethan watched Delaney carry his angelic little goddaughter to a table where a boisterous group of women greeted Delaney like a celebrity. She wore a sheathlike dress that was both simple and sexy. The way it draped over her curves made a familiar ache stir low in Ethan’s gut.

“Triple black Indian pale . . .” Todd’s voice brought Ethan’s attention back just as his friend lifted his glass and gazed at the dark, clear liquid. “Man, you went all out. This has to take a shitload of work to get right.”

“I didn’t want to bring a triple.” Ethan’s attention returned to Delaney, his fingers tingling to comb through her soft waves. “But Drew insisted.”

“It was worth it,” Caleb said.

Caleb and Todd continued talking, but Ethan was lost in Delaney’s smile, her laughter, her easy, animated conversation. She looked so happy. So comfortable. So at home.

“Would you stop staring at her?” Caleb’s hushed rasp prickled down Ethan’s spine and drew his gaze. Todd had peeled off and was now talking with other friends in another group. “You’re infatuation isn’t going to stay much of a secret if you drool every time she walks in the room.”