Love, Laughter, and Happily Ever Afters Collection (146 page)

“Very,” Lauren replied

“That he’s having the best time, and the best sex, of his life?”

Lauren leaned her hip against the counter. “Yes.”

“Because he wants to stay here and keep doing it?”

“Yes.” Lauren said it with feeling.

Yeah, she’d figured. It was crazy to Adrianne that Mason had decided to uproot his life and move to Sapphire Falls after only three days. She could only imagine what it would sound like to someone who hadn’t been there to see how things had evolved.

“Listen, Adrianne, here’s the thing. I’ve known Mason very well, for a very long time. I think it’s natural I have some concerns when he leaves for a weekend high school reunion and then suddenly calls to tell me that he’s turning his whole life, our work, everything upside down to move to the town he hasn’t had a single desire to see in over a decade.”

Exactly.

“I do understand,” Adrianne said. “But if you—”

“I think it’s great that he’s having a good time,” Lauren broke in. “I’m thrilled, in fact. You’re a nice perk of this little weekend getaway. He hasn’t been this happy in a long time.”

Warmth spread through Adrianne’s stomach with those words. But then she frowned. She was a
perk
of a
little weekend getaway
?

“But,” Lauren continued, “he’s…overreacting. You have to agree.”

Adrianne started to respond—with what she wasn’t sure—then she realized Lauren was talking to Phoebe.

Phoebe paused in the midst of stirring hazelnut creamer into her coffee cup. “Why are you looking at me?”

“You’re her friend, aren’t you?” Lauren asked, gesturing toward Adrianne.

“Yes. Which means I’m happy that she’s happy,” Phoebe said. “I think it’s wonderful that she found a great guy.”

“It’s been three days,” Lauren said. “Come on. He’s letting his apartment in Chicago go to move to a town of less than a thousand people, giving up his career, pissing the vice president of the United States off—again—all because he’s finally feeling popular.”

“The vice president?” Phoebe asked, her eyes wide.

Adrianne sighed. That was what Phoebe was focusing on?

“I—” she started.

“I understand how he’s feeling,” Lauren went on. “I was like him in school. An outcast, a misfit, a nerd. Then I moved to a new school my junior year of high school and I took the chance to start over. I realized that if I could look and act like everyone else, it wouldn’t matter if I thought like everyone else. And it worked. For two years, I was kind of normal and I loved it. I went a little crazy. I smoked. I drank. I dated. A lot. I did all the things I thought normal kids did.”

“That’s all very nice for you,” Phoebe said, one eyebrow up. She leaned her elbows on the center island. “But Mason isn’t a teenager, or a kid for that matter. He’s a grown man with more than enough brains. He can make his own decisions. I don’t think he needs a babysitter.”

“Mason wants normal. Or he thinks he does,” Lauren insisted. “And he’s never really had that. Especially here. But until he came back, he had accepted that being…abnormal was a good thing.” She shrugged. “He’s found a place where he fits in perfectly. The scientific and agricultural communities look up to him, people seek him out, he’s been praised and rewarded over and over. For not being normal.”

Adrianne scowled at her. “He’s normal. There’s nothing wrong with him.”

Lauren studied her. “Of course there’s nothing wrong with him. But he’s not like other men. He’s better. And until you came along, he believed that.”

Adrianne mouth dropped open. “Hey.”

“She hasn’t done anything but think he’s awesome,” Phoebe protested. “She’s spent a ton of time with him, she admires him, she hasn’t done anything but—”

“Chill, Red,” Lauren said. “I’m not saying she’s a bad person. She’s just bad for Mason.”

“Hey,” Adrianne said again. “Mason is very happy here with me. So happy he wants to stay if you remember.”

Dammit, who did this woman think she was? But right on the heels of that thought came the answer—she was Mason’s best friend and partner. She knew him. Had known him a hell of a lot longer than Adrianne had.

“That doesn’t mean it’s a good idea,” Lauren returned. “To Mason, normal people farm and have barbecues and have girlfriends. So that’s what he wants.” She focused on something over Adrianne’s shoulder for a moment and sighed. “Normal people do not work for days straight in a lab, forgetting to eat, not even knowing what day it is sometimes, blowing off dates to work on a bunch of seeds.”

“Seeds?” Phoebe asked.

That seemed to shake Lauren out of whatever thoughts she had going. She sat up straighter and frowned at Adrianne. “Do you have any chocolate?”

Adrianne looked closer. Lauren seemed truly upset. She took three of the finished truffles from the counter top by the stove and laid them on a napkin in front of Lauren. She immediately picked one up, bit into it and moaned. Then she took a deep breath and focused on Adrianne again.

“Normal people don’t put their own lives on hold for months at a time to go to a painfully poor country that’s been devastated by a natural disaster, political unrest and disease. But Mason’s doing that. So I, for one, am glad he’s not normal. As is the US Government, Outreach America and most of the population of Haiti.”

“Haiti?” Phoebe asked.

“Adrianne, I’m thrilled—and jealous—that he came here and got to be normal for a while. But it can’t last. It shouldn’t last. If he stays, he’ll change your life. But if he goes, he’ll change the lives of thousands.”

Adrianne had a hard time swallowing. He’d already changed her life. And it made her heart pound to think of all the people he was going to help in Haiti, and God knew where else.

“He deserves to be special,” Lauren said. “Mason Riley doesn’t deserve to just be normal.”

Holy crap, Scott Candies should look at hiring Lauren in the sales department,
Adrianne thought as she tried to process everything. “So you’re saying that he can’t work in Haiti and also have barbecues,” she summarized dryly.

Lauren smiled. “Buying a grill and eating bratwurst once in a while won’t change who he really is. Like I figured out in high school—you can look and act normal even if you don’t think normally. But then in college I figured something else out.”

“That bratwurst is a terrible food?” Adrianne asked.

“That no matter how much I dressed him up, no matter what I taught him, there was something about Mason I couldn’t cover up. And then he started showing me the stuff he was figuring out with conservation and recycling and alternate energy sources and then these damned seeds.” She said it with an affectionate smile. “And I realized that being special trumped being normal. So he helped me too. He made me want to do big, fantastic things and I helped him feel more comfortable and…we balance each other.”

Adrianne blinked hard and pressed her lips together. She didn’t really want to like Lauren. She was convinced that Adrianne and Mason were moving too fast and that she wasn’t good for him. At the same time though, it was quite obvious that Lauren loved and believed in Mason. How could Adrianne not like her for that?

“Wow,” Phoebe said to Lauren. “You sure you’re not sleeping with him?”

Adrianne’s eyes flew to Lauren. When Mason had talked about Lauren it hadn’t seemed like a sexual relationship, but she wouldn’t mind a bit if Lauren would deny it out loud.

Lauren leaned forward and ran her fingertip over the back of Phoebe’s hand. “Mason’s not my type. But I am into redheads.”

She was into…oh. Adrianne turned to her friend with wide eyes. She hadn’t seen that coming.

Unfazed, Phoebe grinned. “Everyone’s into redheads,” she said. “They just don’t all know it. And I realize it will be a crushing disappointment to you, but I like the outies.”

Lauren nodded. “Me too sometimes.”

Adrianne was trying to keep up. Maybe outies didn’t mean what she thought. “The outies?”

Phoebe answered. “The parts that stick out rather than the parts that go in.”

Adrianne rubbed her forehead. How had they gotten on the topic of sexual orientation—and possible changes to that orientation? “So you’re not a lesbian?” she asked Lauren, just to clarify.

Lauren smiled. “I’m open minded.”

“You go both ways?” Phoebe asked, eyebrows high.

Lauren gave her a wink. “I like to have lots of options.”

Adrianne wasn’t sure what to say to that.

Thankfully, Lauren’s attention shifted back to the main topic at hand. Mason. “We have to be in DC next week,” she told Adrianne. “And in Haiti in two weeks.”

“Two weeks.” She swallowed. That wasn’t very much time. She felt like Lauren had blown into her kitchen like a tornado and spun everything around. She’d had a hard time believing that Mason really wanted to stay. Now she was being told all the reasons he couldn’t. And they made sense. At that point, all she could really do was nod. “Okay.”

“What’s going on in Haiti exactly?” Phoebe asked.

“Our company is working with the White House and Outreach America to bring an innovative planting program to Haiti,” Lauren said, glancing at Phoebe. “We’ll be going to some very rural areas of Haiti and implementing the program by teaching farmers to plant and tend the crop as well has how to reproduce the seeds on an ongoing basis.”

“Wow.” Phoebe was staring at her. “I have to say, I’m kind of fascinated by you.”

Lauren gave her a wink. “Lots of people feel that way. Wait until I get some liquor into you.” Then she turned back to Adrianne. “I hope I’ve helped you see that there’s no way that Mason can give all of that up for you. No matter how much fun it is here, how good he feels, how great the sex is, there is a lot bigger picture.”

Adrianne felt like she was in a haze. Of course there was a bigger picture than Sapphire Falls for Mason. That had been true for the past eleven years. She’d known that when he’d said he wanted to stay. “I don’t expect him to give anything up for me.”

Lauren laughed lightly. “Right. Nothing except his apartment, his job, his life in Chicago.”

“No.” Adrianne shook her head. “None of that was my idea. I was as surprised as you are.”

“Good. Okay,” Lauren took another sip of coffee. “So then you need to break up with him now before he blows the whole thing in DC”

Adrianne started. “Break up with him?”

“Yes. Today. He needs to be on a plane with me this evening.”

“Today?” Adrianne felt like Lauren had slapped her. “But—”

“Whoa, hang on,” Phoebe said. “No one said anything about breaking up. Adrianne’s totally supportive of Mason and his work. She’ll still be here when he gets back.”

Adrianne smiled at her friend. Right. She’d be here when he got back. That wasn’t so bad. It wasn’t as good as seeing him every day, but she’d survive for a few days.

“Mason will be in Haiti for a month the first time,” Lauren said calmly.

Phoebe turned to Adrianne. “Oh. Okay, well that’s not so bad. There’s the phone, texts, email, Skype.”

Adrianne took a deep breath. This was big. This…made sense. A strange, rational part of her brain told her that it was completely logical that Mason had a huge project to work on and that it would take more than a long weekend. But her heart still hurt.

“Right. A month is no big deal. I’ll see him when he gets back,” she said.

“He’ll be gone for at least six months after that,” Lauren said, watching Adrianne closely.

Six months.

Okay.

Half a year.

Great.

Adrianne sat down hard on the chair at her kitchen table.

“Ad, breathe,” Phoebe ordered, coming to stand beside her. “Listen, there are military families that are apart for longer than that. I’m sure there are aid workers with the Red Cross that are gone for long periods. You can do this.”

But she wasn’t so sure. “You’re right. It’s what he needs to do.”

“No.” Lauren crossed her arms. “He’ll never go for that. He’ll never leave her for six months. People are stupid when they’re in love.”

No one in the room could argue with that.

“And this is his first time,” Lauren went on. “He has years of pent-up stupidity that’s all going to come spilling out now.

“Okay then.” Phoebe sat in the chair across from Adrianne. “Then she’ll go with him.”

Adrianne felt like she was moving in slow motion as she turned her head toward her friend. “Are you insane?”

“You would go with him?” Lauren asked over the top of Adrianne’s question.

“Of course she would.” Phoebe grabbed Adrianne’s hand. “You’re in love with him.”

“Alex would have never even thought of that,” Lauren muttered. “Okay,” she said to Adrianne. “Then we’ve got a lot to do really fast. Do you have a passport?”

“No.” Adrianne felt like she had to push her voice out of her throat.

“I can probably speed that process up. We also have to get you a physical and a background check. I’ll need to call Ben and see what else—”

“No,” Adrianne said with more force. “I’m not going to Haiti.”

Phoebe squeezed her hand. Hard. “You can do this, Ad,” she said. “This is awesome. What a cool opportunity to see what Mason does up close and personal, to help out in a big way in Haiti. Talk about a departure from your life in Chicago.”

Adrianne didn’t even try to return Phoebe’s smile. “I’m scared to eat French fries,” she told her friend. “I gave up a four-day trip to a posh resort in Hawaii last year. And you think I’m going to go to Haiti for six months?”

“With Mason,” Phoebe said, her tone stern. “It’s a big adventure, yes, but you’ll be with Mason. You’ll be fine.”

“It’s Haiti,” Adrianne said, feeling just short of panic. She could feel her chest tightening and her voice getting higher and louder. “They barely have clean water. Most of the people are homeless. There’s a cholera epidemic, for God’s sake.”

“They have ways of cleaning the water that prevents cholera,” Lauren said. Then she turned to Phoebe. “What the hell is going on?”

“I have a bad heart.” Adrianne pulled her hand from Phoebe’s before her friend crushed her fingers. “I can’t be gone that long, away from my doctor and my pharmacy and…home.”

“Oh, for the love of…” Phoebe muttered, slumping back in her chair.