скачать книгу бесплатно
His father shook his head, negating the idea. “I need you here.”
“It’s only a week, and then I’ll be back. Surely the firm can live without me for a few days.”
“We probably can,” his father conceded. Then he laid his hands flat against the smooth surface of his desk and leveled his steely gaze on his son. “The point is you’ve been…distracted lately. I put up with it after Melanie left, because every man is entitled to some time to get over a thing like that.”
“A thing like that?We were married nineteen years.”
“But then,” his father went on, ignoring Cade’s words, “you didn’t snap out of it. You’ve been about as useful around here as a puppy.”
“I’ve always given you my best, Dad, you know that.” The best years of his life, the best weekends, the best nights. Cade had nearly killed himself, putting in long hours, always trying to please his father, to achieve some impossible standard.
And for what? Cade still didn’t measure up and never would. Pleasing Jonathon Matthews was like trying to fill an endless, empty well.
“Have you?” his father asked. “Because there have been rumors. That you’re talking to Bill Hendrickson about leaving.”
Cade blinked in surprise. “Yes, that’s true.”
“When were you going to tell me?” A flicker of hurt ran through Jonathon’s blue eyes, then disappeared. For a moment, Cade wanted to relent. He knew his father had always thought his son would step into the role of heading the firm, but Cade didn’t want this life. Didn’t want to sit in this office at sixty because his house was emptier than his heart.
“I just wanted to look at my options,” Cade said.
“Options other than working for me.”
“Yes.”
Jonathon Matthews gave one short, brisk nod.
“Fine. Then you might as well leave now. Save me from wondering when you’re going to drop the ax.”
This was what frustrated Cade the most about his father. His inflexibility. Either you measured up or you didn’t, and if you didn’t, Jonathon was quick to sever the ties. “Dad—”
“You’ve disappointed me, Cade,” Jonathon said, rising and pushing his chair back into perfect alignment with the desk. “I expected much more from my own flesh and blood.”
“You’ve expected everything from me!” Cade shot back. “I’ve given you nineteen years, Dad. Nineteen years in a job I never really loved.” “You could have told me that before I paid for law school. Saved me the money,” Jonathon said. “And now you’re leaving me, just like she did.”
“I’m not her, Dad. And the sooner you stop taking out her sins on me and Carter, the better off we’ll all be. Hell, we might even be happy.” When his father buried his head in his work again, refusing to open that door of vulnerability again, Cade turned and strode out of the room, unemployed—and wondering if the mess his life had become was beyond salvageable.
CHAPTER EIGHT (#ulink_41e4c172-43e9-5301-b793-460a3b7cb325)
ON MONDAY MORNING, Melanie opened the shop a few minutes before the usual 6:00 a.m. start. Emmie, never an early riser, rarely worked the morning shift. Usually Melanie was here alone until about ten. Between the busy bursts, she liked the moments of quiet in the shop, the regulars who stopped in before work.
The bell jingled and Melanie turned, expecting to see Max, the owner of the bakery on Fourth Street. He provided the more complicated baked goods—bagels, doughnuts and cheesecakes—that rounded out her food case.
But it wasn’t Max. And it sure as heck wasn’t a bagel.
It was Cade, looking too handsome for a man who was at work before the sun finished breaking over the horizon. Today, he wore a light blue golf shirt that set off the color of his eyes and a pair of neatly pressed khakis.
Who had ironed them? Cade? The dry cleaner? Or someone else?
The thought of another woman doing what she had done for more than half her life, for the man she had once loved, slammed into her with a power Melanie hadn’t expected.
She’d walked out the door of their house a year ago, intent on starting a life that wasn’t defined by being Mrs. Cade Matthews.
She just hadn’t thought he’d do the same thing.
Melanie shook off the thought. If Cade dated someone else, or married again, it was none of her business. And it shouldn’t bother her one bit.
But it did. Oh boy, did it.
She put on a “I’m not affected by you one bit” smile, but suspected it was as see-through as lace. “What are you doing here?”
“Working,” he said, grinning. “Wasn’t that the plan?”
“I’d say that plan fell by the wayside yesterday.” To be honest, after she’d broken off their kiss and turned down his invitation to dinner, she hadn’t expected him to come back.
He put his hands up. “That won’t happen again. No more kisses.”
“Good.” A twinge of disappointment ran through her, but Melanie ignored it. “The morning rush will start pretty soon, so put this on,” she tossed an apron to him, the white fabric unfurling as it crossed the distance, “and be ready to latte.”
Cade gave her a grin. “Sounds kinda kinky.”
She laughed, then sobered when she realized that once again, she’d be in close quarters with Cade. Considering how well that had gone yesterday, and how much willpower she’d had, she might as well drop her head into a trough of chocolate. The calories from the sweets would be far easier to deal with than what kissing Cade could lead to.
Before she could tell Cade to stay or go—or even more, kiss her again—Max was there with his baked goods, followed by a trio of customers. The morning flood made both of them too busy for the next two hours to think about anything that didn’t involve caffeine. Cooter wandered in, got his cup of coffee, then headed for his favorite armchair with his paper and mug.
When the last customer had been served, she turned to Cade. All morning, she’d been aware of him, brushed against him more than once, igniting the same rush of hormones as before. There was no way she could tolerate a week of this.
She shook off the attraction. It was simply that she had been alone for an entire year. The lack of male company made her more vulnerable. It certainly wasn’t the way Cade looked, the sound of his laughter as he joked with the customers, or the repartee that had flowed between him and Melanie as easily as milk.
“I know you thought we needed this time together before the reunion,” she said, “but really, Cade, I’m sure we can pull off being married for a couple of hours without any additional ‘practice.’”
“Oh, yeah?” He quirked a brow at her. “How about we try it for ten minutes?”
“What do you mean?”
He gestured toward the front door of the shop.
“Because Jeanie Jenkins is just getting out of her car and coming into the shop.”
“This damned place is busier than a garbage truck full of flies,” Cooter muttered, shuffling his paper to the next section.
“Jeannie?” Melanie wheeled around. An older version of the Jeannie that Melanie remembered was indeed, getting out of an illegally parked silver Benz, striding up the walkway and toward the shop. She was as thin as she had been in her cheerleading days, and still sported the same long, curly hair. Even her clothes were more fitting a twenty-year-old than a near forty-year-old. If Melanie hadn’t seen her face, she’d have thought Jeannie hadn’t aged a minute since high school.
“Melanie!” Jeannie exclaimed, bursting through the door with outstretched arms, as if spying Melanie was like stumbling upon an oasis. She hurried across the shop and grabbed Melanie from across the counter, gathering her into a tight hug.
“Jeannie,” Melanie said, pulling back to inhale after that octopus grab. “What are you doing here?”
“Why seeing your little coffee shop, of course! I just couldn’t stay away once you told me about it.” A gossip finding mission, more than anything else, Melanie suspected. Jeannie toodled a wave Cade’s way. He gave her a hello back.
Melanie had thought she’d have a week to prepare for appearing in public with Cade—not to mention a killer dress to boost her confidence. But standing here in jeans, a T-shirt emblazoned with the shop’s logo and an apron that had a chocolate syrup stain on the front did little to boost her self-confidence. Or make her feel like half of Westvale High’s equivalent of Romeo and Juliet.
Melanie put a smile on her face, then grabbed a mug from the clean ones on the shelf behind her. “Can I get you something?”
“Sure. Something non-fat, decaf and sugar-free.” Jeanie waved a hand vaguely. “Whatever you have that does all that and tastes good.”
A tall order, but Melanie did her best, combining skim milk, sugar-free caramel and almond syrups with a couple shots of decaf espresso to make a nicely flavored latte. Jeannie dumped in three packets of artificial sweetener, then took a sip. “This is great. Who knew you could do all that with a few beans?”
“Lawford’s a couple hours fromWestvale. I’m surprised you drove that far for a cup of coffee, Jeannie,” Melanie said, doing a little fishing of her own.
“Oh, it wasn’t just the coffee. I’m also here for a Stickly.” She took another petite sip.
“A what?”
“Stickly table,” Jeannie explained. “There’s this little antique shop in Mercy, which is, like, really near here. Wait…Mel, don’t your grandparents own an antique shop?” Jeannie grinned. “Maybe they’d consider beating the Mercy shop’s price.”
“They used to own one. Right in this space, actually. But when they passed away, I turned the space into Cuppa Life.”
“Oh,” Jeannie said, clearly disappointed all she was getting out of the visit was some free coffee.
“Too bad. I’m totally, like, wild about Stickly. I’ve been looking for ages for a table to finish off my house and then wham, there was one, in this month’s issue of Antiques. I was up for a road trip, and then I remembered you had this shop here, and then before I knew it, like, here I was!”
“It was nice of you to stop in,” Melanie said, wondering how long Jeannie planned to stay, because having Cade standing right next to her had Melanie’s pulse skittering. If she inhaled, she knew she’d catch the notes of his cologne—a woodsy scent that had played its music in her heart for years.
“Quite the surprise.”
“I agree.” Cade slipped an arm around Melanie’s waist, drawing her inches closer. He pressed a kiss to her hair, soft, gentle. The wall around Melanie began to crumble. She found herself leaning into him, wanting more, wanting to believe this was real—
And not an act for Jeannie.
“Aw, you guys are still so sweet.” Jeannie sighed.
“I swear, all the good guys are taken.”
Melanie didn’t answer, just smiled back. Cade clutched her tighter, but as the reality of Jeannie’s words hit her, she quit believing this was real. This was, after all, their trial run.
In the end, she’d have her building and Cade would have his job in Chicago. A win-win, he’d called it. Even if right now, it felt like one of them was losing.
“That reminds me.” Jeannie grinned at them over the rim of her cup. “I didn’t just drive out here for a table and a java. I have another ulterior motive. I’m killing three pigeons with one, like, tree.”
“An ulterior motive?” Melanie echoed.
“Susan and I were talking the other day and we thought how cool it would be to bring back everything we loved about high school. Like, definitely not the teachers or that awful Algebra torture, but the good stuff.” Jeannie grinned, then sipped at her coffee before continuing. “Especially prom night. I mean, everyone’s going to be in fancy dresses and suits anyway, so we thought we’d recreate that whole, like, prom thing.”
Prom night had been the night Melanie had lost her virginity to Cade. The night they’d made love, and in their youthful rashness of forgotten protection, ended up with Emmie. It was the night that had turned the tide of her life, and though she would never want to give back Emmie, she would have loved to change the way that night had turned out.
“I’m not so sure that’s a good idea, Jeannie,” Melanie said. “Not everyone had a great experience at prom.”
“Well, that’s where you guys come in.” She leaned forward, eyes glittering with excitement. “You’re going to be prom king and queen. Get the crowd all revved up for the whole thing.”
“Us? But—”
“Oh, but you have to,” Jeannie said, laying a hand over Melanie’s. “You two are the only ones who are still together, at least of the couples who met in high school.”
“What about Jerry Mitchell? Wasn’t he with Danielle?” Cade asked.
Jeannie waved a hand. “They broke up ages ago. Something about Danielle having a backup plan.”
“Most people have backup plans.” Cade sent a glance Melanie’s way.
“Yeah, but Danielle’s backup plan was to wait for a better offer.” Jeannie arched a brow. “From a younger man. A waiter at that. I mean, if you’re going to toss a husband aside, at least trade up.”
Melanie shook her head, thinking of the kid who had sat behind her in sophomore English and complained his way through diagramming sentences. “Poor Jerry.”
“It’s okay. He’s been hitched to someone else for, like, two whole years now. Beat my record already.” Jeannie took another tiny sip, so small it would take her an hour to finish the coffee. No wonder Jeannie was so thin. She ate more like a bird than a human. “So anyway,” Jeannie went on, “we were thinking you and Cade could be the reunion king and queen. Lead us in the first dance, the toast. All that stuff.”
Dance with Cade? This was going way beyond a speech. It meant taking their happily married act to a whole other level. Melanie had intended to go in, help Cade with Bill, make the speech, then leave. Not hang around for a reenactment of The Finest Moments of Cade and Melanie. “Jeannie, I don’t—”
“We’d be glad to,” Cade said, his arm around her waist feeling so familiar, so warm…
And way too easy to fall into.
“We really can’t—” Melanie cut in.
“Oh, please,” Jeannie said, hands clasped, eyes as wide as a baby beagle’s. “You have to do it. Like, everyone is counting on you.”
Guilt—the kind that seemed to come attached to every woman’s psyche—forced a reluctant agreement past Melanie’s lips. “Okay, but—”
“That is so awesome!” Jeannie blasted, her words riding roughshod over Melanie’s. “You two will be, like, the whole reunion.” She took one last sip, then rose and sent a two-finger wave at Melanie and Cade. “See you all on Friday night. I need to get my Stickly home!”
Then she was gone, hustling out the door as quickly as she’d come in, her nearly full coffee sending up a final curl of steam.
“Well,” Cooter said, rising out of the armchair and plopping his hat on his head, “wasn’t that a little bit of vinegar in your honey?”
With that, Cooter left the shop—leaving Melanie and Cade alone. Cade’s arm still lingered around her waist, as if he’d forgotten he’d put it there—or fallen into old habits. She wheeled around, causing his touch to drop away. “What were you thinking? We can’t play the happy couple all night. We were supposed to meet with Bill, make a speech and get out of there.”
He scowled. “It’s a dance, Melanie, not a lifetime commitment.”
“Is it, Cade? Because it sure seems to me that everything you’re doing is designed to get us back together.” She shook her head, thinking of how many times she’d come close to doing exactly that this week. How easy it would have been to believe that a few days of making lattes together could solve everything. “It’s not going to happen.”
“And why is that, Melanie? Don’t tell me it’s because you don’t love me anymore.” He took a step closer, his hand going to her jaw.
“I don’t.” But she couldn’t meet his gaze.
“So when you kissed me, you didn’t feel anything at all?”
She didn’t deny or agree. Melanie might be strong enough to stick to her guns on the divorce, but she wasn’t strong enough to deny she hadn’t felt a thing in that kiss. “You can’t build a marriage on a kiss, Cade.”
“No, we can’t.” His jaw hardened, his frustration clear as he released her. “But we can sure as hell try instead of giving up.”
