Marrying The Wedding Crasher
Marrying The Wedding Crasher
Melinda Curtis
This bachelor's pretend girlfriend just made a shocking discovery – She's pregnant!Although they only dated for a month, Harley O'Hannigan just agreed to be Vince Messina's plus-one at a Harmony Valley wedding. Big mistake, given her deepening feelings for the tall, dark, unavailable bachelor. And what about Vince's long-buried family history? Then there's the growing secret that could transform this pretend relationship into the real thing…
This bachelor’s pretend girlfriend just made a shocking discovery—
She’s pregnant!
Although they dated for only a month, Harley O’Hannigan just agreed to be Vince Messina’s plus-one at a Harmony Valley wedding. Big mistake, given her deepening feelings for the tall, dark, unavailable bachelor. And what about Vince’s long-buried family history? Then there’s the growing secret that could transform this pretend relationship into the real thing...
Award-winning USA TODAY bestselling author MELINDA CURTIS is an empty nester married to her college sweetheart. She’s lived in three states in the United States—California, Georgia and Texas—and plans to move to a fourth when Mr. Curtis retires (because all their children live in Oregon). She and her husband are constantly remodelling something—their house, their parents’ homes, the abodes of their children. Check out social media for before/after pictures.
Melinda writes sweet contemporary romances as Melinda Curtis (Brenda Novak says Season of Change “found a place on my keeper shelf”) and fun, sexy reads as Mel Curtis (Jayne Ann Krentz says Fool for Love is “wonderfully entertaining”).
Also By Melinda Curtis (#u997cc1ae-8b72-5849-a261-c339932b624b)
Dandelion Wishes
Summer Kisses
Season of Change
A Perfect Year
Time for Love
A Memory Away
Marrying the Single Dad
Love, Special Delivery
Support Your Local Sheriff
Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Marrying the Wedding Crasher
Melinda Curtis
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ISBN: 978-1-474-08292-1
MARRYING THE WEDDING CRASHER
© 2018 Melinda Wooten
Published in Great Britain 2018
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.
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www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
One moment, Vince and Harley were joking. The next, they weren’t. And after that? Her lips were pressed to his.
His eyes widened and then slowly drifted closed as he deepened the kiss.
Only to have her pull away and announce, “Time.”
He blinked. Disoriented. The willing woman in his arms was gone. Walking away from him. A swing to her step.
“Hang on.” He jogged to Harley’s side. “What just happened there?”
Harley wouldn’t look at him. She reached the crosswalk and looked both ways, more careful crossing the road than she was with her affections. “I got carried away in my role as your plus-one and you got a freebie.”
Vince wanted to haul Harley back into his arms and kiss her as senseless as she made him.
Not the wisest thought I’ve had today.
But certainly one of the best.
If only they weren’t in Harmony Valley...
Dear Reader (#u997cc1ae-8b72-5849-a261-c339932b624b),
Welcome to Harmony Valley!
Just a few short years ago, Harmony Valley was on the brink of extinction, with only those over the age of sixty in residence. Now the influx of a younger generation is making life in Harmony Valley more fun and definitely more interesting for its gray-haired residents.
I hope you enjoy Vince and Harley’s touching journey to a happily-ever-after—which begins with a harmless invite to a family wedding—as well as the other romances in the Harmony Valley series. I love to hear from readers. Check my website to learn more about upcoming books, sign up for email book announcements (and I’ll send you a free sweet romance read) or chat with me on Facebook (MelindaCurtisAuthor (https://www.facebook.com/MelindaCurtisAuthor/)) to hear about my latest giveaways.
Melinda Curtis
MelindaCurtis.com (http://www.MelindaCurtis.com)
To Anna J. Stewart and Cari Lynn Webb.
Thanks for understanding, making me laugh and keeping me strong.
Contents
Cover (#u2ad1d1ec-f634-5d62-a1ab-9a3049422c40)
Back Cover Text (#ua73e964f-ebe5-5e1b-93fa-8aa15f07c3b1)
About the Author (#ue470a2fc-7b6d-552d-845f-303ed62a14be)
Booklist (#u3fe13713-512c-5183-9bce-658952331563)
Title Page (#u1cef569f-f938-586a-a547-8df968579980)
Copyright (#ubbc22625-9bf3-508d-a956-0160ac4a7c19)
Introduction (#u32cc2715-1290-5b5e-8ca0-230a24c06378)
Dear Reader (#ub1deb260-ca2f-54da-8b56-7ea560082eb2)
Dedication (#u0cd6edd8-2580-5306-beb6-f545571b1c4e)
CHAPTER ONE (#u6abf5988-673c-5440-b02c-1121645b0fee)
CHAPTER TWO (#ue6965bf3-caef-5665-8409-fb6852881bf6)
CHAPTER THREE (#u88b2270e-351f-505c-b69c-e0dc7c9cf1cf)
CHAPTER FOUR (#uff386782-76b3-5259-8d96-965abd805490)
CHAPTER FIVE (#u32f97cb9-942f-525a-81e2-67b3ddb118a2)
CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FIFTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIXTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINETEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE (#litres_trial_promo)
EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE (#u997cc1ae-8b72-5849-a261-c339932b624b)
VINCE MESSINA CONSIDERED himself a survivor.
He didn’t think he’d survive his little brother’s wedding back home in Harmony Valley.
Bittersweet memories. Long-kept secrets. Family he hadn’t seen in years. It had all the makings of a serious crash-and-burn.
The Texas summer sun beat down on Vince, nearly as hot as an oil-fueled ball of flame.
“You’re going to come to my wedding.” His younger brother Joe wasn’t asking. “And you’re going to bring that girlfriend of yours. It’s long past time we met her.”
Ah, the girlfriend.
His brothers pestered him less when they thought he was in a relationship. Hence his make-believe girlfriend, the latest of which hadn’t been make-believe a month ago.
Vince’s gaze drifted across the job site to the blonde working the tile saw. Harley O’Hannigan wasn’t likely to go away with him again. “She’s not sure she can get off work.” Besides, Harley would think he was a jerk if he asked her. But she was just the kind of woman who could hold her own against his siblings.
“What’s her name?” His older brother Gabe was nearly silenced by the whir of the tile saw and the punch-punch-punch of a nail gun. “And what’s that noise? Where are you?”
“They’re remodeling my local Starbucks.” Lying, Vince pulled his focus away from Harley. He was part of a crew working on a huge remodel in a fancy neighborhood outside of Houston. “And, no, I won’t tell you her name. The last time I introduced you to my girlfriend, you stole her, Gabe.”
Mandy Zapien, a girl with a heart of gold. He hoped she was married to somebody stable and had three kids by now.
“That was high school,” Gabe scoffed. “There is no girlfriend, admit it. All the more reason Vince needs to come home so we can straighten out his life.”
Vince’s life was fine as long as his brothers stayed out of it. Not that he didn’t love them. He just didn’t want to answer for every decision he’d made, every confidence he’d kept.
“The fake girlfriend is your tell.” Joe sounded disappointed. “The last time you bluffed about one, you’d been clipped by a stray bullet in a bar fight.”
“I wasn’t actually in the bar fight.” He’d been collateral damage, which seemed to be the story of his life. Vince set his jaw. “I’m not bluffing. There’s a girl.”
Correction. A woman. Wearing worn blue jeans, a burgundy T-shirt with the construction company’s logo and scuffed work boots. She wiped a tile dry with a towel, examining the cut she’d made in the white marble.
“Send us a picture,” Joe prodded. “We’ll compare her to Sarah Whitfield. Did I tell you she was back in town? And still single?”
“Guys...” Vince squeezed the tail end of his patience.
“There is no girlfriend.” Gabe pounced once more. “Which means you’re in trouble. Do you need me to spot you some cash?”
“No!” Money was the last thing Vince was worried about.
Harley spared Vince a glance. She was what Texans called a tall drink of water. Long, elegant lines, delicate bone structure, straight blond hair that she kept in a long braid down her back. Everything about her appearance was at odds with her being a construction worker. That contradiction was the reason he’d asked her out. Her gentle humor and sly wit had kept him asking.
“If it’s not money, how’s that truck of yours running?” Joe jumped in on Gabe’s fun. “I could re-bore those heads again and you’d get another fifty thousand miles.”
Vince drove their father’s red-and-white 1976 pickup truck. It had a weak air conditioner, cloth seats and unreliable headlights. Dad had been a mechanic who’d struggled with mental illness, made harder on the family when Mom had left them. Despite challenges, Dad had taught his three boys his trade. Only Joe had followed in Dad’s footsteps. Gabe was a lifer in the military, currently on leave for Joe’s wedding. And Vince—
“Messina! Break time’s over.”
Vince’s boss rounded the far corner of the house they were remodeling. Jerry wore a frown and a sunburn from a weekend spent bass fishing. “That deck’s got to be finished today.”
Vince held up a hand, acknowledging the older man. “I’m fine,” Vince said into the phone. “The truck is fine. My bank account is fine. Harley is fine.” This last came out like a backfire through a rust-ridden muffler.
His brothers crowed over his slip.
“Retire Dad’s truck,” Gabe said when he stopped laughing. “I’ll reserve you a room at the Lambridge Bed and Breakfast where I’m staying.”
“Bring me some of that oil you dredge up on that rig of yours,” Joe said, gasping for breath. “Gas in California is expensive. And a girlfriend? Sarah is going to be so disappointed.”
Vince wasn’t working on an oil rig, hadn’t been for over a year since it’d exploded.
He wasn’t retiring Dad’s truck. Other than the faulty headlight wiring, it ran like a champ.
He wasn’t dating Harley, not since she’d broken up with him.
And he had no idea if he was going to go to his brother’s wedding.
* * *
HARLEY O’HANNIGAN FINISHED wiping the grout from the shower tile in the master bathroom and sat back to admire her effort.
Carrera marble countertops. Chrome fixtures. White and black glass accents. It was luxury at its finest, not to mention it was bigger than the bedroom she’d had growing up and reminded her of the condo she used to rent in a high-rise downtown. That was six months and another lifetime ago.
“Harley!” The male voice, deep and angry, reverberated off the walls in the empty house and shook Harley’s stomach.
She moved into the master bedroom. Most of the construction crew had left for the day, except for Vince, who was sanding the deck outside the bedroom’s French doors. She wished he’d left, too.
There’s a mistake I won’t repeat.
“Harley!” Dan’s voice was as hard as his footsteps on the wood floor. “I know you’re here.”
“I’m in the back.”
And then so was her former boss, standing in the bedroom doorway.
On first glance, Dan looked like any other young, hipster architect, the kind of man her brother would roll his eyes at—close-cropped blond hair, neatly trimmed goatee, pink cotton, button-down and tight, white cigarette pants. He looked like the worst damage he could do was post a bad review online. But take a second look and you’d register cold gray eyes, an openmouthed sneer, and fingers flexing into fists. You’d recognize a desperate snake ready to strike.
Fear stuck in Harley’s throat. Why hadn’t she seen Dan’s reptilian side when he’d hired her, a fledgling architect, a year ago? Suddenly she was glad Vince was still around.
“Your design can’t be done,” Dan said in an ominous voice that conjured images of cop dramas and crimes about to be committed. “You knew this would happen.”
“Yes,” she choked out, hating that she sounded scared. “And so did you. I told you not to do it.” Not to steal her unfinished sketch. Not to present it to high-profile clients. Not to promise it could be built.
He’d stolen more than her architectural plans. He’d stolen her joy in the work and her confidence in her abilities.
Dan’s brows dropped to the locked-and-loaded position. “The structural engineers are demanding to see the plans from you. I put them off another two weeks, but that’s it.”
“Give the money back, Dan.” He’d won an international design award with her conceptual drawings of a playhouse with balconies that seemed to float in the sky. And then the city of Houston had agreed to pay Dan millions to build it.
“Give it back?” He choked on the words and then seemed angered to have done so. His face reddened. “I spent the advance on things like salaries and tuition reimbursement.” For her.
“And on cars and a new house.” An over-the-top place some other architect had designed. Dan had little talent of his own. He was drunk on new business and higher fees.
As usual, her arguments fell on deaf ears. Dan made a guttural hiss.
The fear in Harley’s throat plummeted to her legs, weakening them. He’d never confronted her alone in an isolated place before. Every instinct she had urged her to run, to get out of the house and away from Dan.
Before Harley had a chance to move, Dan did. He closed the distance between them and shoved her, hard.
As she fell, Harley’s vision tunneled until all she saw were angry eyes.
She couldn’t catch her breath. She was from a good home, a stable family. People in her world didn’t get in physical fights.
Her legs gave out and she felt cold from her head to her toes.
She became aware of a scuffling noise. Someone might have shouted. Someone who sounded vaguely like Dan.
“Harley?” Definitely not Dan’s voice.
She was incredibly thankful for whoever Not-Dan was.
Warm hands engulfed hers, not the slightest bit vengeful.
“Harley?” A gentle voice, one she should be able to identify if her head didn’t feel like someone had stuffed it with thick insulation. “You’re safe. He’s gone.”
She opened her eyes on a shuddering breath. A familiar face greeted her.
Vince. They both worked for Jerry, remodeling houses.
Vince. Friendly black eyes, a sturdy nose and black hair. That black hair. It had required a second glance when they’d first met. He had fantastic hair. The kind of hair Disney gave its princes.
Her heart was racing for the exit and her hands had started to tremble in his.
Vince’s hands, not Dan’s.
Vince. He drove an old truck, not a new Ferrari. He’d offered her carrots once when he’d heard she’d forgotten her lunch on a remote job site. He’d bought her a drink after work one day, which had led to him buying her dinner—more than once—and then the infamous weekend away where he’d learned she’d quit being an architect. Not that he’d understood Harley and her inability to pick herself up after one undisclosed setback. He may have been seven years older than her, but that didn’t mean he could be judgmental about her career choices.
Note to self... I’m not safe with Vince, either.
“Hey.” Vince gave her hands a gentle squeeze. “Are you with me?”
With him? She would’ve followed him anywhere a few weeks ago, before the let-me-tell-you-what-to-do-with-your-life debacle.
Something crashed outside.
Vince muttered what might have been an oath or a psalm. She couldn’t hear over the pounding of her heart.
He moved to sit next to Harley, tucking her beneath his arm, next to his bulky tool belt. “Breathe in. Breathe out.”
Sounded easy enough, but that heart of hers was hammering against her lungs, making her pant. Vince holding her wasn’t helping her recovery.
Not that she moved away from him. Not one inch.
“Like this.” Vince took Harley’s hand and placed her palm on his sturdy chest.
She could feel his heart beat nearly as fast as hers, but she could also feel him fill his lungs with air.
“Breathe in. Breathe out.” Vince was big and warm and calm, and completely different than Dan. He’d never be a slave to fashion. He’d never take credit for someone else’s work. He’d never put his hands on a woman with intent to do damage.
In a distant part of her brain, somewhere where things weren’t pounding, Harley’s mother recited one of her Southern lectures. Life is hard, baby girl. You need to find yourself a big, strong man to lean on when times get tough.
Finding big, strong men was something of a specialty of Harley’s. It was finding the ones she could lean on forever that eluded her.
“That’s it,” Vince reassured her.
Vince was strong, too. He looked like he could play tight end for the Houston Texans. He smelled of fresh-cut wood and hard work. And he sounded the way Disney princes should—reliable, honorable, understanding.
Two out of three...
“Your hair lies,” she murmured. It promised empathy and happily-ever-afters.
She should never have broken the no coworker rule in her dating handbook. But Vince had that hair and that smile and that self-confidence slightly older men with their act together seemed to have.
“Are you dizzy? Nauseous? Bleeding?” His fingers explored the back of her head and found—
“Ouch.” She held her breath until the pain passed. “Give...me...a...minute.” And then she’d ask Vince to stop touching her.
“Take as long as you need.”
She was afraid she’d take as long as he let her, which just wouldn’t do. She was Harley O’Hannigan. She was tough, independent and wasn’t the kind of woman who expected flowers or pretty words or who waited for men to open the door.
Harley sighed and put some space between them. “Thanks.”
“My pleasure.”
She shot him with a sideways scowl.
“I meant...” Vince held up his hands, revealing scraped and bloodied knuckles. “I haven’t had a good fight in a while.” He grinned. It was lopsided and devilish, and made her girlish fantasies flutter foolishly inside her chest.
Mr. Carrots was a fighter? How had she not known this?
I didn’t know him at all.
“You should press charges.”
A new sensation banged around her chest. Embarrassment. “I can’t afford the time off from work to fill out police reports or show up in court.” What a flimsy fib. “Which makes me sound—”
“Practical.”
There he went, being nice again. This time it sent tears to her eyes. She didn’t want his pity or his kind words. That would destroy the carefully constructed image she had of herself as The Woman Who Could Do Anything.
Which in hindsight was a lie, too.
“How about we call it a day?” Vince stood and offered a hand to help her up, flashing that grin that’d gotten her into trouble a few weeks ago. “Pack your tools and let’s get out of here. First beer’s on me.”
Harley shook her throbbing head, pushing to her feet with the aid of the wall. “Thanks for the offer, but we both know that’s not happening.”
“No worries.” The grin disappeared and, just for a moment, she thought he looked disappointed. “But we are getting out of here. Pack up your tools. I’ll lock up.”
Agreeing with Vince that she’d finished for the day, Harley loaded her tools into a bucket and headed for the driveway where she’d left her tile saw. It’d been hot inside the house, but it was hotter outside in the sun. It beat down on her head as if its goal was to melt her out of existence.
Speaking of existence, the table she’d clamped the tile saw to had been upended. And dragged. And shoved half into the bushes.
“No. Oh, no.” Harley’s stomach fell and fell and fell, all the way to the pavement. Her bucket clattered next to it. She needed that saw to make a living.
She righted the saw, which was still plugged in, and turned it on. It ka-clunked a bunch of times and began smoking. She shut it off and stared at it, unable to move.
“That doesn’t sound good.” Vince approached her, carrying a bulky black tool bag. His eyes narrowed. “I wondered what all that racket was when he left.”
“Dan... He smashed it.” The same way he’d sort of smashed her.
“There are two things a man needs,” Vince said. “Pride and honor. This Dan has too much of one and none of the other.”
Harley nodded miserably.
Vince peered at the saw. “This is totaled. You sure you don’t want to press charges against your boyfriend?”
A weight dropped on Harley’s shoulders so hard and heavy she didn’t correct his presumption about Dan. “I... Can’t you fix it?” By tomorrow when she had to tile the outdoor kitchen? Vince was always fixing something for Jerry, their boss.
Vince set down his tool bag and examined her saw. “See those dents in the casing? When it collapses like that, parts inside get damaged.”
“I can’t afford a new one.” She’d gone from a starting architect’s salary to a tiler’s paycheck. And she’d just put a new truck transmission on her credit card.
“You can take it to that shop on Polk. They’ll give you money for whatever parts they can salvage and apply it toward the purchase of a new one.”
She couldn’t afford that, either, not without a second job. Until then, she’d be cutting tile with a low-tech manual saw and nippers. “Thanks for the advice.”
Demoralized, Harley released the base from the table and carried the dead saw to her truck, returning for her tool bucket and the worktable.
If only she could figure out how to make playhouse balconies float on air.
Vince was still loading his stuff into his truck’s lockbox when Harley opened the creaky door to her hot cab and climbed in. She missed her Lexus. She missed auto-start and powerful air-conditioning. She turned the key in the ignition.
Nothing. Not so much as a tick of the starter.
She missed reliability.
“Not today,” she muttered. The truck was finicky. It didn’t like to run when the temperature dropped to the thirties or in thunderstorms, but the day had been hot, the skies clear. “Come on, baby,” she chided the old vehicle.
Don’t leave me stranded with Mr. Carrots and that grin.
Vince locked up his tools and leaned on his truck, staring at hers.
Still nothing. Her backside was growing damp with sweat.
Vince came forward. He walked with the swagger of a man who knew what his purpose was in life. And, right now, that purpose was to rescue a damsel in distress.
“Pop the hood.”
She did, hopping out and joining him at the grille. Not that she knew anything about engines. Her mechanical ability stopped at turning power tools off and on.
Vince tsked and gave Harley a look that disapproved and teased at the same time.
“Hey, don’t judge,” she said. “It runs.”
“It’s not running now.” He drew a blue rag from his back pocket. It was the kind of scrap mechanics used to wipe their hands and touch hot engines. “You might want to spray your engine off every once in a while.” He used the rag to check battery connections, hose connections and to prod the engine compartment as if he knew what he was doing.
“I barely clean my apartment. Why would I clean my engine?”
“So a mechanic can see if you’ve got leaks anywhere, for one thing,” Vince said straight-faced. “Why don’t you try it again?”
She hurried back behind the wheel. The truck started right up.
“Traitor,” she accused under her breath.
Vince shut the hood and came around to her window, wiping his hands.
“Thanks.” Harley gave him her polite smile, the one she reserved for helpful salesclerks and the receptionist who squeezed her in at the doctor’s office. “I owe you.”
“Yeeeaah.” He wound out the word and ran his fingers through that thatch of midnight hair. “About that. I need a favor.” Those kind black eyes lifted to her face.
Don’t believe in fairy tales... Don’t believe in fairy tales...
Despite their history, despite knowing better, silly fantasies about princely rescues and Mr. Right fluttered about her chest like happy butterflies on a warm spring day.
She should go. Instead she lingered and asked, “So what’s the favor?”
The devilish grin returned, making the butterflies ecstatic. “I need a date to my brother’s wedding.”
CHAPTER TWO (#u997cc1ae-8b72-5849-a261-c339932b624b)
WHEN HAD A man ever asked Harley to be his wedding date?
When was the last time she’d felt like going to a wedding?
She couldn’t remember on either count.
Harley had turned Vince down, of course. The wedding was in California the weekend after next, but he’d wanted her to fly out with him this Saturday.
Take to the skies with Vince?
Thunderclouds lined the southern horizon.
There was a time when Harley O’Hannigan thought the sky was the limit. A time when everything she’d touched had turned to gold.
Daughter of a couple who owned a tile and granite outlet in Birmingham, she’d been the girl most likely to succeed in high school, valedictorian of her college class, the young architect hired to design beautiful structures for a boutique agency in Houston.
And then reality struck. The balconies she’d dreamed up for a uniquely modern theater couldn’t be built with today’s construction techniques. She’d only shared the drawing with Dan because unbuildable designs could be entered in architectural theory competitions. Winning those awards brought agencies and architects prestige. But Dan had done the unthinkable. He’d presented her design to a client as doable. And they’d bought it.
She’d begged Dan to back out of the deal. But the press he’d received from the sale was amazing, and had led to more architectural business and more requests for impossible, pie-in-the-sky ideas. Instead of admitting the balconies couldn’t be done, Dan had found a contractor willing to begin construction with the interior still up in the air. Literally.
Backed into a corner where all she could do was put Fail on her résumé, Harley had quit, only to be told she’d signed a non-compete clause when she’d been hired. Oh, and since her employment package included the firm paying her college debt, she couldn’t work as an architect if she didn’t work for Dan. Not for four more years. He’d told her he’d reconsider the four-year limitation if she came up with a solution that didn’t compromise the design. Her mind was a blank slate.
She wasn’t qualified for any other job that could support her former lifestyle. She’d moved out of her high-rise condo. She’d sold her Lexus SUV. She’d let go of dreams of greatness in the clouds.
And she couldn’t tell anyone why. There was a nondisclosure clause, too.
Clause-clause-clause. Harley wanted to go back to a time when the only clause she knew was Santa. For the girl most likely to change the world, it was humiliating.
Her parents told their neighbors Harley was discovering herself. Privately, they’d counseled her to find a lawyer, not that she or her parents could afford one. Harley’s friends thought she’d finally cracked under the pressure of perfectionism. They’d offered platitudes and shoulders to cry on. Harley had rejected them all. Taylor, Harley’s older brother, had just shaken his head and told her she should have known buildings always came back to straight lines and right angles. That’s how he and their parents approached tile work and life—eyes on the task in front of them—unlike Harley, who was always dreaming.
Without any professional avenues open, Harley had taken a job as a tile installer, a trade her father had taught her growing up. She’d rented a small studio apartment in an almost up-and-coming neighborhood. She kept her head down, away from the clouds. But her eye occasionally drifted toward the architectural elegance of the Houston skyline. And she wondered what she’d do in four years when her non-compete restriction expired. Straightforward lines or curvature that challenged?
In the meantime she lived day-to-day, job-to-job, paycheck-to-paycheck. But the only way she could do that was to have a functioning tile saw.
She stopped at the tool repair shop Vince had mentioned. It was open late because it catered to construction companies. She carried the saw inside.
“Were you in a traffic accident?” Bart, the owner, looked like he’d forsaken years of trips to the barber and opened a running tab at the tattoo parlor next door. He had long brown hair, a haystack beard and line upon line of ink on his arms. “You need to secure your equipment when you drive.”
Harley didn’t care about Bart’s body art, his hair style or his sad attempts at humor. She cared that his hands were nicked and greasy. It meant he was busy making tools go again. “This happened at a job site. Some idiot trashed it.” Because some idiot couldn’t figure out how to make balconies float like clouds. “Can you fix it?”
“Give me two weeks.” Bart stood back, possibly because he’d given customers bad news like this before. Possibly because construction workers could be as volatile as stiffed loan sharks.
Harley fought shoulders that wanted to hunch in defeat and reminded herself that nothing was ever set in stone. There was always another card to play. “How about two days?”
“It’ll cost ya.” Bart’s mouth rolled around before he admitted, “And I might not be able to fix it.”
Harley felt sick. Her hand drifted to her waist. “And when would I know that?”
“When I’m done.” Bart curled his scarred fingers around the handle of her saw, as if preparing to claim it. “No matter what happens, you’d owe me a hundred dollars just for taking it apart. Fixin’ costs extra.”
One hundred dollars and days of uncertainty. Her eye caught on a used tile saw in the corner with a six-hundred-dollar price tag. “What if I sold it to you for parts?”
“I’d give you sixty bucks.”
That’s all? He must have sensed she was desperate.
Harley tried to look like she wasn’t. “How about a hundred?”
Bart shook his head. “I can come up as high as seventy. And even then, I don’t think I’m gonna get seventy dollars’ worth of parts out of it.”
A good, new tile saw would cost around a thousand dollars. Seventy wasn’t going to get her close. And she hated the idea of taking out more credit. What would she do if the truck broke down again?
Harley thanked Bart for his time and lugged the saw back outside.
Her head was pounding. All she wanted was a cold shower and someone to make her dinner.
She thought of Vince and his talent at the grill, of his invitation to his brother’s wedding, of the tenderness of his kiss.
That cold shower. Sadly, it was the only one of her fantasies going to come true tonight.
Tomorrow, however, she might have one more card to play.
* * *
VINCE SAT ON a corner of the deck he’d built yesterday and wondered if he could parlay Harley being unable to go to the wedding into him not going to the wedding, too.
It wasn’t as if he was a beloved favorite son in Harmony Valley. His return might make it hard on his younger brother Joe, the bridegroom, who’d only just begun to earn acceptance in town. He and his brothers had been hellions as teenagers—cutting class, speeding through streets on deafening motorcycles, wearing black leather jackets instead of the school colors. Vince could use his misspent youth and consideration toward Joe’s tentative standing in town as a excuses not to go. But they would only be excuses.
His real motivation for not wanting to go to the wedding? There were things he hadn’t told his brothers. Secrets he’d kept for years about their mother leaving. Those secrets. They sat on his chest when he couldn’t sleep at night, clambering to be free.
Sleep-deprived, Vince blinked at the blazing sun. He had the case of Jerry’s auger motor open and was cleaning the spark plug because the hunk of junk wouldn’t start. Pretty soon, Jerry was going to be wondering why Vince wasn’t setting fence posts. Soon after that, Vince might lose his patience and tell him his equipment sucked. If Jerry took offense to that Vince might admit why he’d applied for a job with Jerry in the first place. After that revelation, it was a toss-up as to whether he’d quit or be fired.
Secrets. They were dangerous to his family’s happiness. Nothing had turned out the way he’d once hoped it would.
He’d left Harmony Valley sixteen years ago, fresh out of high school, determined to find his mother. She’d had a three-year head start, but he recalled she had family somewhere in Texas. He’d needed to know if she was okay and if the decisions he’d made the day she’d left had been the right ones. He’d located her in Sugar Land, Texas, outside of Houston. He’d located her, but he’d never contacted her. Not directly. Though he kept tabs on her all the same...thanks in part to Jerry.
Out front, a truck door creaked and slammed. Harley.
She was trouble. She still saw stars when she gazed at the night sky. She’d earned a degree in architecture, only to give up after what she’d called a colossal failure.
She’d failed once? Boohoo. She needed to learn that life required a strong backbone and the ability to pick yourself up after you got knocked down, no matter how many times it happened.
And yet, looking back, he’d enjoyed his time with her. They’d clicked. After a few weeks of dating, he’d asked her to go to Waco for a weekend. They’d taken the home tour and visited the showrooms of that famous designer. They’d eaten great Tex-Mex. They’d walked along the river and he’d kissed her beneath a rambling oak. And then they’d driven by Baylor University. One conversation thread had led to another and Harley had confessed she’d graduated from Rice in Houston. She was an architect!
She was an architect working as a laborer?
Vince had gotten mad on her behalf. He’d lectured her about how privileged she was to have the opportunity to go to college. He would’ve liked to have been a mechanical engineer, but his high school grades hadn’t been that hot. And Harley had just thrown her chance away? It made no sense.
She’d told Vince he’d never had to stare down the face of ruin, forced to admit defeat. She’d told him to take her home.
And that had been the end of dating Harley O’Hannigan.
Vince shoved the spark plug home. The heat was rising even though it was only midmorning. Digging post holes and setting them in concrete was going to make for a shirt-drenching day. Vince had heard one of the big airlines was hiring aviation techs and mechanics at the airport. Better pay. Better working conditions. But no—
“Vince.” Harley appeared as she always did for a job site—jeans, T-shirt, braid. She carried a bucket with her tiling tools and a manual tile cutter. She set everything down near the outdoor kitchen on the deck, frowning at her next project.
He’d been relieved she’d turned him down for the wedding. After the way things had ended between them, he never should’ve asked her in the first place. “How’s that bump?”
She reached up to touch the back of her head. “Better.”
He resisted the impulse to see for himself. “And how goes the tile saw repair?”
“Worse.” Harley came to sit nearby, a light sheen of sweat on her forehead. “I’ve been thinking about your brother’s wedding.”
The humidity in the air pressed in on Vince.
“Is it a formal affair?” she asked.
“It’s outdoors and I’ll have to wear a suit. Does that qualify as formal?” Whatever the answer was, he hoped she hadn’t reconsidered being his date.
“That’s not too formal.” She smiled the way a woman does just before she says yes to something she isn’t exactly thrilled about agreeing to.
Reflexively, Vince smiled back. And then he remembered he’d changed his mind about taking her.
“Since you’re in a bind—”
“A bind?” Normally, Vince was slow to anger. Not today. Today anger shot through him like nitrous oxide, making him talk faster, grip the auger harder. “I’m a grown man, not some kid looking for a prom date. I can walk into a wedding alone.” Or, even better, not go at all.
She tucked stray strands of golden hair behind her ears and avoided looking at him. “But you did ask me.”
“And you turned me down!” There was no reason that should poke at his pride, but it did, the same as her assuming he was in a dateless bind.
“And now...” Her gaze wound around to meet his and her lips made a slow turn upward. “I want to propose a new deal for us.”
The muggy morning air suddenly became too thick to inhale. Vince was a man, after all, and Harley was a beautiful woman proposing something.
“Go on,” he rasped when he should have said, “No go.”
“I’ll...I’ll be your plus-one—” Harley couldn’t hide the desperation in her voice “—if you fix my tile saw.”
Air moved freely in and out of Vince’s lungs again. This wasn’t a personal proposition. “Couldn’t find anyone to fix it?”
“Not for anything less than the price of my firstborn.”
She was as boxed in as he was.
A part of Vince was intrigued, the way he was always captivated by things not working how they should. The saw wouldn’t be easy to fix. No telling what kind of damage was inside until he took off the outer casing.
Another part of Vince was reminded that he enjoyed Harley’s company, their quick banter, their obvious chemistry. The bargain wasn’t completely out of the question.
He ran a hand through his hair, wondering what their relationship would be like today if they’d never talked about higher education and college degrees.
“Well,” he said gruffly, “we can’t have you selling off your firstborn.”
Harley’s cheeks pinkened from more than the sun and she looked away. “I’d need the saw before we leave on Saturday.”
“That might be a stretch.” It was Tuesday. “What if I need to order parts?”
She considered this with the same deliberation with which she ordered from a menu. “Could they arrive while we’re gone, so you could fix it first thing when we return?”
Again, the feeling that he shouldn’t take her to Joe’s wedding gripped him. Vince fiddled with the screw on the auger motor hood, not looking at her. “Can you really afford to miss a week of work?” That seemed unlikely given she couldn’t afford to repair or replace her saw.
“Jerry owes me a couple days off and I’ve lined up some side jobs.” She’d put thought into this. She hadn’t asked him on a whim.
Unless he had a good reason to retract his offer, he felt honor-bound to take her.
Vince held out his hand for her to shake because he had to keep this on a platonic footing. “I’m paying for transportation, the hotel and food.”
“Okay, but...” Harley hesitated, offering a question in those blue eyes, not a handshake. “Why do you want a wedding date?”
He returned his hand to the auger, unwilling to tell her the truth and latching on to the first idea that came to mind. “There’s this girl, Sarah, from high school—”
“And you broke her heart.” Harley tsked.
He let her assumption stand. “Having a beautiful woman on my arm will keep my visit simple.” On so many levels.
Harley leaned back and surveyed him as if he was a blouse she was considering from the bargain rack. “And you’ll fix my saw?”
“I’ll do my best.”
“Fair enough.” Harley stood and sealed the deal with a businesslike handshake.
Her going complicated things for him.
He just knew it. So it made no sense that he felt like smiling.
CHAPTER THREE (#u997cc1ae-8b72-5849-a261-c339932b624b)
VINCE BOUGHT HARLEY a plane ticket.
He packed a bag that included a dark blue suit, matching socks and tie, dress shoes, and an overly starched white shirt.
He took apart Harley’s tile saw.
Like his head, it was a mess. Bushings. Armature. Casing. All ruined. He spent a lot of time searching online for parts and thinking about the week ahead.
But a little voice kept whispering that this trip was as disastrous as Harley’s tile saw. He didn’t just want her to sell the idea that they were dating. He wanted her to sell the idea that they’d been dating for months. And that would require more than a businesslike handshake. That would require more fence-mending between them. That would require answers to questions she hadn’t asked and hadn’t thought of; ones he didn’t want to deal with.
Intending to get her on board with his plan before they left, Vince picked Harley up at her apartment complex on the east side of Houston. She was waiting out front in a yellow tank top and blue jeans, a small duffel bag and a backpack at her feet. Her hair was in its usual long, blond braid and her blue eyes were covered by sunglasses.
She hopped into the truck with a simple, “Hi,” setting her things on the floorboard and making herself comfortable.
He’d expected at least one suitcase, if not two. And maybe a dress or something a bit more feminine for the trip. It was her day off. Usually on her day off or nights out when she had time to change, Harley wore bright colors, interesting patterns, and often skirts and flouncy dresses. They were on their way to a wedding. It was early, but it was already nearly eighty degrees outside and with the humidity, it felt hotter. Why were her legs covered up? And why was she acting as if they were going to a job site?
“Is there a problem?” Harley asked when he didn’t immediately drive away.
“I was thinking how weird this is.” And he didn’t mean his thoughts dwelling on her legs.
“I don’t have to go.” Her voice was very small and very un-Harley like.
It tugged at him, that voice. She didn’t want to go and he didn’t want to take her. He should offer to buy her a saw and leave her in Houston. He drew a deep breath. “I should have told you I asked you to go to this thing because of my family, who are—”
“Nuts,” she finished for him, shrugging.
Vince’s jaw dropped. An image of his dad leapt to mind.
“Isn’t that what everyone says?” Harley shrugged again and turned her gaze toward the Houston skyline, visible through the smoggy haze.
“I suppose.” Although he never said it. Not even in jest.
“It’ll be fine. I’ll be fine.” She said the words forcefully, as if trying to convince herself.
Vince let the truck idle, his plan stuck in neutral. He felt obligated to let her know what she was walking into. “Before we go, I need to tell you something.”
“If you want to get back together, I’m going to stay here.” She drew herself up and glared at him.
There. That was more like the Harley he knew.
“You’ve been friend-zoned,” she continued. “I don’t think about you that way anymore.”
Ouch. He hadn’t expected that statement to sting. Not even if it was a good thing. “I’m not looking for a commitment with you or anyone else.”
Down the block, a motorcycle accelerated, winding through the gears quickly, as if there was fun to be had ahead.
Vince held on to the truck’s steering wheel with both hands. He hadn’t ridden a bike in ages. “In fact, I’m not the marrying kind.”
His brother Joe was the Messina intent upon promising “till death do we part.”
“Interesting.” Harley crossed her arms over her chest, her gaze cutting from Vince to the skyline once more. “Are we going to the airport or not?”
The motorcycle revved, calling all listeners to the freedom of the open road.
Vince couldn’t remember a time free of responsibilities, even when he was a kid. “Before we go, I need one thing to be clear. My family will expect us—”
“We’re not sleeping together.” Harley moved her hand to the door, as if preparing to jump out.
Ouch. Vince hadn’t expected that to hurt, either.
“The friend-zone isn’t a deal-breaker, so be it.” Her eyes were glued to the skyscrapers downtown, as if she longed to return to her former life as an architect, where everything had been rosy until she’d encountered one bump in the road.
If she thought being an architect was hard, she was learning that construction could be just as demoralizing. There was a price to be paid for every decision you made in life. Best if she learned that now, before she hit thirty.
The motorcycle came into view. One of those colorful Japanese models young guys rode to pop wheelies and do spin-outs and cheat death.
“It’s not a deal-breaker. But this might be.” Vince waited until Harley met his gaze, waited an extra few moments for the feeling that he shouldn’t take her to materialize, but it didn’t. “I was expected to bring a plus-one to the wedding.”
“You say that as if you told your family who to expect.” Her eyes narrowed. “Who was supposed to go with you?”
He couldn’t tell if there was resentment or jealousy in her voice. “They’re expecting the woman I’ve been dating...or, rather the woman who broke up with me last month.”
“I broke up with you last month.” The corner of her mouth twitched up and then just as quickly turned down. “And you never told me you weren’t interested in marriage.”
“It never came up.” And it had never come to mind. They’d had fun together, seemingly without strings. She’d made no mention of settling down. “I like women, but I’m not going to have kids, which means most women either don’t want to date me or date me with the hopes of changing my mind. And when they realize my mind’s made up, they tend to leave. Promptly.”
“It’s a moot point now.” Her words had an impersonal quality, which gave everything away—her desire for a picket fence, her longing for children, her expectation that he might have shared either dream.
But she didn’t get out of the truck.
So far, so good. “Unfortunately my brothers don’t agree with my decision to stay single and childless.”
“Ah, here’s where the nutty part comes in,” she surmised.
“There’s no nutty. Forget the nutty!” Vince took a deep breath and forced himself to speak calmly. “Over the years, I’ve told my brothers I was too busy to come home, citing long hours on the job or an intense relationship” To keep them from delving too deeply into why he stayed in Texas and to discourage them from coming to visit. “Each time they press, I fend them off, this time with a relationship.”
Her slender brows drew together. “Are you telling me you aren’t man enough to confess to your brothers you don’t have a girlfriend?”
She made it sound so cowardly.
He rejected cowardice in favor of practicality and shook his head. “I’m telling you...” His tongue slowed and tried to spin her a lie. “I’m telling you...” Usually, he never stumbled over words, or anything, for that matter. This whole trip was like looking under the hood of a foreign, high-end electric car and not recognizing anything. “I’m telling you that I don’t want my brothers to know I’m single. Everyone is happy with how things are. Your job is to help me keep it that way.”
“You’re such a girl, Messina.” She grinned and slugged his shoulder.
It took Vince a moment for the meaning of her words to sink in. Even then, he wasn’t sure and had to ask, “So you’ll go?”
“I’ll go.” She stretched her legs and put her elbow on the windowsill. “This should be fun.”
Fun? Not hardly. This was survival.
Vince put the truck in gear and headed toward the airport and the wedding, which he was now convinced was as disaster-laden as the combustible oil rig he’d once worked on.
* * *
HARLEY WANTED TO make sure a week spent with Vince would not be fun.
For one thing, she’d packed clothes that were practical, ones she could dress up or dress down. Today, she wore jeans and a tank top because she wanted to reinforce a boundary with Vince—this was a deal, not a date. She shouldn’t have worried. He didn’t talk to Harley much on the flight to California.
She took some of the blame for that. She’d had several restless nights leading up to the trip, worried about bills, her career, and Dan. She’d slept nearly the entire plane ride, as if the farther she went from her old boss and her old life, the more relaxed she became. And when they landed, she’d been in awe. She’d never been out of the South. And California wasn’t the South. Not by a long shot.
In Houston, the buildings were tall and spaced far enough apart you could appreciate their architecture. In San Francisco, the buildings were crammed together and the roads were narrow. She had to crane her neck to see anything.
In the South, you’d leave the city and see miles of rolling hills, towering pines, scrub oak and wide, muddy rivers. In California, you’d barely leave one city, catch a glimpse of a narrow river, a random sheep pasture, or a field of wild grass, and then reach another city.
There were mountains in California and big rolling hills covered with brown grass or green vineyards. Billboards proclaimed wine tasting at the next exit. And the next. And the next. They could have tasted wine all the way to his hometown.
And they might have if they’d been a real couple. If she hadn’t bragged that she had two degrees, they might still be dating. Or not, if Vince had told her he wasn’t interested in having kids. Harley would have considered that as much of a red flag as him assuming a lack of maturity on her part for quitting her profession.
They’d separated before their relationship had had a chance to blossom. It’d been a disappointment to let Vince go and it’d been awkward a time or two at work, but her heart hadn’t broken.
Unfortunately it hadn’t moved on completely, either. This pretense was ridiculous, but it would bring home the fact that she and Vince weren’t destined to be together. Their everyday lives would diverge, just as soon as Harley figured out an acceptable fix to delicate balconies or her four-year clause lapsed. Whichever came first.
They reached Cloverdale and stopped to top off the tank before they drove to Harmony Valley, or what Vince kept calling the middle of nowhere.
“I’ll be right back.” Harley hurried inside the gas station and returned a short time later waving a lottery ticket. “My mother always says you never know when luck is going to find you.” She’d scrounged change from beneath the seat of her truck before they’d left Houston for just such a chance at fortune.
Vince looked as if he thought she should have put her spare change in a bank account. “What does your father say to that?”
“That he got lucky when he found Mom.” Her father may be balding, but he was a true prince. “Do your parents have any funny sayings?”
“Not that I remember.” He steered the rented SUV toward a two-lane road lined with tall eucalyptus. “My dad died when I was in high school.”
“I’m so sorry.” Why hadn’t she known this? The answer lay somewhere between she’d been too busy being flattered that he was interested in her and she hadn’t been curious about his past while she was in his arms. “That must have been hard on everyone. How did your mom take it?”
Vince spared her a hooded glance. “My mom left us before that.”
“Oh, Vince. That’s sad.” She couldn’t imagine her mom leaving the family. “Did she remarry? Did you ever see her again?”
“I found her a couple of years ago.” His voice was flat, as if he was imparting driving directions to the local morgue. “She lives outside Houston. She seems happy.”
Harley angled her knees toward him, prepared to hear all the details. “What did she say when you faced her?”
“I didn’t pursue it. I just found out where she’d been all those years and that was enough.” If Harley had expected him to express hurt or anger with that statement, she’d have been disappointed. There was nothing, not so much as a too rapid eye-blink to indicate his mother’s leaving or location or lack of contact bothered him.
“But...weren’t you curious about why she left? Or why she never looked back?”
“No.” He fell silent, leaving Harley to wonder about his past, his brothers, and what kind of greeting she’d receive as Vince’s girlfriend.
“I’ve been thinking about our relationship,” Harley said. At Vince’s blank look, she added, “You know, our pretend relationship and how we’re going to act in front of others. I say, you can hold my hand every once in a while.”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” Vince took his foot off the gas. “I need more than handholding to throw my brothers a curve ball when they try to get too personal. Besides, no one’s going to believe we’re a couple if there’s no PDA.”
“Why do we need public displays of affection?” Harley crossed her arms over her chest, refusing to be distracted by the cumulus clouds above a hundred-year-old, two-story farmhouse in the middle of a vineyard, or the contrast of straight lines and flowing curves. “People who date have personal boundaries.”
“We didn’t.” He blinked at the road and then at her. “We walked with my arm around you. I kissed you when I wanted to.”
She practically convulsed with shock. “There will be no kissing!” Because, like everything else, Vince was good at it.
“Nobody’s going to believe that we’re a couple if I don’t kiss you.”
“Why?” The butterflies were fluttering in her chest, practically flying in formation to spell Kiss Him. “Butterflies are stupid,” she murmured.
“What?”
Harley gave herself a mental head thunk. She’d have to be on her toes with Vince or she’d be right back to Waco. “Do you have a reputation for kissing girlfriends in public or something?”
“No!” He gave the SUV more gas. “Where do you get your ideas?”
“From you and your prepubescent statements about PDAs.” She needed to find something else to talk about. “Besides, you said you wanted me to come because of the ex-girlfriend.”
“And then I said I needed you because of my brothers.”
Butterflies and memories of kisses aside, teasing Vince was kind of fun. She’d never gotten under his skin when they were dating, except when they’d argued over her quitting architecture. “Why do you think they worry about you?”
“They don’t worry. They have too much time on their hands,” he grumbled, slowing to make a left turn. “They give me grief about every little thing, so I make it a practice to tell them nothing.”
“Giving grief is what brothers do,” she said smartly. “Take that away and they’re like dogs without a bone. Besides, maybe they should worry about you. I bet they didn’t travel halfway across the United States to find a woman and then not make contact with her.”
“You want to talk about questionable decisions?” He raised his dark brows. “I’m not the one who got roughed up by a boyfriend who also broke her means of employment.”
“If Dan hadn’t busted my saw, I wouldn’t be here helping you.” She needed to correct Vince’s assumption about Dan being her boyfriend. “And he—”
“Helping me?” Vince grumbled louder. “That would require kisses.”
She bit her lower lip to keep from smiling. “I’ll tell you what. I’ll kiss your cheek when you fix my saw.”
“Lot of good a chaste peck on the cheek will do me when we’re back in Texas.” He’d turned on a side road and slowed to a crawl. “I ordered the parts. It’s a delicate piece of equipment and I might not be able to resuscitate it.”
They approached a dead-end street to the right. A sign with an arrow pointed toward the Messina Family Garage, which was a two-story, two service-bay building several hundred feet down the road. It looked to have been built in the fifties: straight lines, no gables, a box turned upside down. Behind it was a small, equally boring ranch home.
Across the road from the repair shop was a field with about a dozen cars half hidden by tall grass. A handful of people were poking around. Beyond that was a mowed strip of grass near a bridge. On it sat an odd cluster of things. A Volkswagen made of stacked stone, a rusted swing set and an old yellow tractor with what appeared to be a mermaid made of metal riding a bicycle behind it.
A woman in the field waved to them.
“Is that your family?”
“Yes.” The SUV inched forward as if Vince was having second thoughts. “I could loan you money for the saw in exchange for a well-timed kiss or two.”
“You?” A shout of laughter escaped her lips. “Loan me money?”
“What’s so funny?” He braked and faced her, scowling.
“You’re cheap.”
“How can you say that?” His black eyes flashed and he choked the steering wheel. “I took you to Waco. I’m taking you to California. All expenses paid.”
“You’re cheap.” She’d known he was nice, but she hadn’t realized his ego could be so easily bruised. She couldn’t stop smiling. “The first time we went out, we went to a bar and left when happy hour was over.”
“We went after work.” His expression darkened, brows dropping thunderously low. “And first dates aren’t supposed to last more than a few hours.”
“You never brought me flowers. I thought guys your age always brought flowers and wine when a woman cooked for them.” She wasn’t pulling any punches in defense of her No Kissing policy. “And we went places like the art gallery on free entry day and the farmers market, also free. Plus, in Waco, we stayed in one of those budget motels out by the highway.”
“That was the only hotel that had rooms available!” He was practically howling with anger. “And sue me for wanting to go places where we could talk. Maybe that’s more important to someone my age than paying to have someone sit next to me during a movie without learning anything about them.”
“I’m not saying I didn’t like going places and talking to you.” Her smile threatened to slip, because apparently she’d been yakking about herself the entire time they were together without paying attention to him. “I’m just saying—”
“And I decided not to buy you flowers the one time I came to your place for dinner because there was an accident on the interstate and I was running late!” He huffed like a winded bull unsure if he was done seeing red.
She reached over and pressed a hand to his arm, as if to say she understood. They hadn’t exchanged enough words between them in the past, at least, not about his past or a vision of his future. “I see where you’re coming from now. Thank you for offering to buy me a saw, but I can’t accept.” She’d get through this rough patch, even if it took her four years of tile work to do so.
All eyes in the field were pointed their way. Thankfully, with the windows rolled up and the air conditioner on, his family probably hadn’t heard a word of their conversation.
Vince sighed. “I could turn around and put you on a plane home.”
“I’d be willing to bet when we get to the airport you’d hop on the plane with me.” Whatever was bothering Vince about coming home, he needed to face it, just as she needed to continue to try to solve the balcony conundrum.
“You picked a bad time to be right.” Vince parked in a space at the garage. Three tables and several chairs were set up, as if there’d been a lot of outdoor eating going on. “Since you’re a city girl, be prepared for questions about you and about us, and not just from my family.”
She’d forgotten she was touching him. Her hand dropped away. “If not your family, then who?”
“Only the entire town.” He gave her a stern look. “And don’t go telling them I’m cheap.”
“You’re such a girl, Messina.” It needed to be said.
“You won’t think it’s so funny when reality hits.” He glanced over his shoulder toward the field. “They’ll want to know everything about you... About us.”
“I’ll stick to the truth as much as possible.” What was he so worried about? Impulsively she stroked his thick, silky hair from crown to neck, the way she used to when they’d been dating. “It’ll be okay.”
He didn’t look so sure.
“Let’s have a code word,” she said, still feeling protective. “You know, if things start to get out of control, let’s say something like ‘It’s getting hot in here.’ And that’s our cue to make our excuses and leave.”
“Good idea.”
Someone in the field shouted his name.
Harley twisted around. “What are they doing over there?”
“Hauling junkers away, preparing the space for the ceremony. They’ll expect us to help.”
“It’s getting hot in here.”
Vince laughed.
She’d missed his laughter. It was deep and hearty and settled stray butterflies.
“Here they come.” Vince got out of the SUV, as somber and stoic as if they were going to face a zombie apocalypse.
Harley smiled. For the first time since agreeing to be Vince’s date, Harley thought she might actually have fun at this wedding.
CHAPTER FOUR (#u997cc1ae-8b72-5849-a261-c339932b624b)
THE CLOSER VINCE had come to Harmony Valley, the more he’d wanted to turn around.
Harley’s joking banter had helped, but she couldn’t keep him from falling into the past, not when he stood on the property he’d grown up on.
He’d learned to ride a bike on that driveway, with Mom running beside him. He’d learned to throw a football in that field, with Mom cheering him from the sidelines. And then there’d been the milestones she’d missed. His driver’s test. Prom. Graduation.
It’d been worse for Joe, who’d been younger, the baby of the family Mom had doted on. If Joe knew where Mom was, he’d be thrown off-kilter. He might try to contact Mom. Both of them might be hurt. The Messina family was in a safe place. Why rock the boat? Mama drama was the last thing Joe needed just days before his wedding.
“Gosh, the Messina boys are big,” Harley said, standing next to Vince.
His brothers sprinted across the field toward Vince, whooping and hollering as if they were in their teens not their thirties.
Gabe slammed into him first, wrapping his arms around Vince and lifting him a couple inches off the ground. He was a mountain of a man with the strength and rigid posture gained from years in the military. But not even the Marines could wipe away the mischievous gleam in his eyes. “Vince!” He dropped Vince back on his feet. “How many years has it been?”
“Almost six.” That’s when they’d gathered for Joe’s first wife’s funeral in Los Angeles.
Joe hugged Vince with a set of hearty backslaps. He was clearly the runt of the family. He’d never filled out the way Vince and Gabe had. “It’s been too long, brother.”
“It has been,” Vince agreed, feeling some of his misgivings evaporate. He attributed it to the lack of humidity in the air, and two family members happy to see him.
“And who have we here?” Gabe claimed Harley’s hand and kissed it.
She laughed and Vince felt a stab of something he didn’t recognize in his chest.
He made the introductions, saving Harley’s hand from Gabe’s because she’d said she didn’t like PDA and probably wouldn’t like it from his come-on-too-strong brother. “Watch out for Gabe. He used to steal my clothes and my girlfriends.”
Harley’s cheeks turned a soft shade of pink.
Vince didn’t let go of her hand. Totally because of appearances.
A pint-size girl wearing dirt-stained coveralls crashed into Vince’s chest next. “Uncle Vince!” His niece Samantha grinned up at him. Her hair was dark brown and just as short as the last time he’d seen her. But instead of looking as if Joe had hacked it with sheep shearers, it was stylishly cut and straightened.
If she was styling her hair, the next step was wearing makeup, talking to boys, and refusing to do oil changes because it wrecked her manicure. “Sam, don’t grow anymore.”
Samantha shushed him. Her cheeks turned a brighter shade of pink than Harley’s. “You’re embarrassing me.” She glanced furtively at a dark-haired teenage boy, who looked to be about thirteen and was staring at Sam the way Sam had once stared at the stuffed beagle Vince had given her when her mother died.
Vince exchanged a quick what-the-heck glance with Joe, who gave him a subtle calm-down gesture.
“And here’s the other love of my life.” Joe introduced his fiancée. “Brittany.”
Vince’s soon-to-be sister-in-law had a thick mane of brown hair with golden highlights, a wide smile that sparkled, and natural makeup. Like Sam, she also wore smudged coveralls. This was no high-maintenance female, even though she ran the town’s beauty salon.
Vince liked Brittany immediately. “Welcome to the family.” He hugged her warmly.
“Call me Brit.” Joe’s bride-to-be inched out of Vince’s hug. “Joe, why do all your brothers have such gorgeous manes?” She ran her fingers through Vince’s hair.
Vince jolted backward until Brit’s hands fell away. “It’s getting hot in here.”
Harley laughed, no help at all.
“Hey, honey, your hands should only be in my hair.” But Joe laughed and added, “And that of your paying clients, of course.”
Harley was still chuckling, ignoring Vince’s SOS, which he decided to excuse when she reclaimed his hand. “Their hair is unreal, isn’t it, Brit?”
“Times three.” Brit ignored Joe’s warning and ruffled Gabe’s hair. “I’m a hairdresser. It’s hard not to touch it.”
“I don’t see what all the fuss is about,” Vince said, meaning it. They all had thick, black hair. So what? Joe’s hair was a bit too long for a man about to be married and Gabe’s was military short. Vince’s was somewhere in between.
“Who cares?” Gabe leaned over to give Brit better access to his scalp. “I could get used to this.”
“Don’t,” Joe said firmly, tugging Brit away from his oldest brother. “I draw the line at making Gabe happy. He teased me mercilessly when we were kids.”
“Oh, Shaggy Joe.” Brit snuggled close to Joe the way Harley had snuggled close to Vince when they were in Waco. “I love your hair best.”
Vince glanced down at Harley, which wasn’t far considering how tall she was. “I think you should limit your hands to my hair, too.” His words came out low and intimate. He might just as well have been saying, You should limit your lips to mine, too.
Harley got the message. She tried to ease away, but Vince held on. To her hand. To her gaze.
“Dear brothers, stop with the googly eyes.” Gabe turned toward the field, looking like he was on duty. “Come on, Sam. When Brit calls your dad Shaggy Joe, it’s time to vacate the premises.”
“Googly eyes are disgusting.” Sam pulled a face.
“Gabe’s complaining about googly eyes?” Vince taunted good-naturedly. “He’s lucky Harley and I don’t make out right now.”
Harley made a disapproving noise. “You’re impossible.”
For show, Vince smiled fondly at Harley. No kisses? Yeah, he’d make her pay a little for that.
His wedding date huffed and crossed her arms over her chest.
“Brad.” Gabe shook his finger at the teenage boy. “If I ever catch you looking with googly eyes at my niece, I’m going to drop you off that bridge.”
Sam gasped and glared at Gabe.
“Why would you say that?” She hissed like an angry cat. “Why?”
“Because I’m your uncle and I love you.” Gabe gave her a devilish grin cut from the same cloth as Vince’s.
“I will never.” Sam raised her hands heavenward. “Look at anyone. Like. That.”
Vince had a feeling Sam would eat those words someday.
Still grumbling, Vince’s teenage niece took off running. Sam’s admirer joined her as she raced past him. Gabe plodded behind them at his own pace.
“Joe, don’t give that boy an inch with Sam.” Vince nodded toward the young pair. “She’s too young to be interested in boys.”
“Brad knows what the rules are and respects them, unlike Gabe at that age.” Joe grinned and it was like looking in a mirror, except for his eyes. Joe was the only Messina who had their mother’s blue eyes. “I hope those are clothes you can get dirty, because we could use an extra pair of hands.”
Vince took stock of his blue jeans and polo shirt, as well as Harley’s similarly casual attire. “We’re good. Are you hooking cars up to the tow truck and taking them somewhere?”
“One at a time?” Joe shook his head. “That would cost a fortune in gas. We found a scrap hauler willing to take the rest away with a double-decker semi-trailer. He comes tomorrow.”
“The rest?” Harley shaded her eyes for a better view. “How many cars are there?”
“Joe already got some running and sold them.” Brit started walking, beckoning Harley to join her. Next to Brit, Harley looked like a beanpole, as if she lacked curves.
So not true.
Harley’s curves were subtle, like her personality.
“We just need to clear the debris between the cars and the road,” Brit was saying. “And then tow them into a line them up on the edge of the pavement for the hauler to take them away.”
“That sounds easy,” Harley said without having any clue how labor intensive it really was.
Vince and Joe fell into step behind the women.
“It would go so much faster if my soon-to-be wife wouldn’t have to look at every piece of debris.” Joe wasn’t fooling anyone with his complaint. His tone was indulgent.
“I’m an upcycle artist.” Brit sniffed and tossed her head. “When I’m not doing hair, junk sculpture is my life.”
“You did the mermaids?” Harley pointed to a sculpture of a mermaid on a bicycle above the service bays.
Vince followed the direction of Harley’s finger.
Designed in metal and painted bright green, the mermaid rode on a red, white and blue surfboard above the service bay doors. There was another mermaid on the grass near the bridge.
“Yep,” Brit said cheerfully. “Mermaids are my thing. You should see the one in my beauty salon. Kiera is my masterpiece.”
Vince couldn’t stop staring at the repair shop. He couldn’t look away. His steps slowed. The sun disappeared behind a cloud.
It should run! It should run! Dad’s freaked-out voice. His silhouette seemed to move through the empty service bay, pacing.
It’ll be all right. Mom’s shadow was close at his heels. Let’s try it again, Vince.
“The place is different now,” Joe said quietly, having stopped beside Vince. “We’ve made changes. It doesn’t feel as if it was ever his.”
His. Their father’s. A man plagued by voices in his head.
“And there’s no trace of her here, either,” Joe said resentfully.
Her. Their mother. A woman who’d spent years trying to make peace with her husband’s many moods to shelter her children from instability, until she became unstable herself.
Vince acknowledged Joe’s comment with a grunt, the only sound he was capable of making.
They moved even with the house. This time it wasn’t a gloomy shadow Vince felt but the icy hand of guilt. His actions had left their family without a reliable parent.
“We’re remodeling the house.” Joe’s words rang with pride. “We tore down interior walls, ripped out all the flooring and removed everything in the bathrooms. You wouldn’t recognize it.”
Oh, Vince bet he would.
He bet he could mark an X on the spot where Dad had his after-work meltdowns. Or stand in the kitchen where Mom would smoke with the window open, hoping Dad didn’t notice the tinge of nicotine in the air.
Vince walked faster.
“Sam and I are living in the apartment above the garage until the house is done.” Joe stopped Vince with a hand on his arm. “I’m saving to buy you out.”
They stood in front of Vince’s old bedroom window. There was a reason nothing had ever grown beneath that sill. After dark, he and Gabe had used it as their own personal entrance.
“You don’t have to pay me.” The three brothers had inherited the property. Vince didn’t want anything from Harmony Valley.
“I can’t give you top dollar.” Joe set his chin the way he had when he was a kid and Vince had told him to go away. “This place was a wreck when we got here. Any value in it is coming directly from my pocket.”
“Keep your money. I don’t need it.”
“Say what you want. There’s a check coming your way.” Joe walked on, back stiff with all his honorable intentions.
If Joe had gone to Texas, he’d have done things differently. He’d have showed up at their mother’s door, introduced himself and told her off.
Vince lingered behind, taking in the property, the small house, the modest business, the cluttered field. Joe might believe things looked different now.
To Vince, things looked exactly the same.
* * *
“HOW ARE YOU holding up?” Vince asked Harley hours after they’d started.
He crossed the trampled paths they’d created to get the cars out, looking attractively scruffy.
Harley’s butterflies threatened to return.
Vince was eye candy. Not checkout-stand eye candy. Nothing that low quality. No. Vince was like the big Easter eggs Harley’s mother bought once a year from the gourmet chocolate shop. When Harley was a kid, she’d thought the fist-size eggs would be filled with more chocolate or thick cream. But, no, they’d been hollow. And so was Vince, carrots aside.
He wanted to project an image that wasn’t real to the people he should have been closest to. That was something she shouldn’t forget.
“Let’s take a break,” he said.
Vince stopped in front of Harley and peered at her face the way a doctor once had after she’d gotten a concussion trying to play basketball. That concussion had her sitting the rest of the season. Not that Harley considered that a failure. Being on the team had made her well-rounded on her college applications. She didn’t need or want playing time. She’d learned her lesson. Playing was dangerous.
Vince, with his thought-stealing kissing talent, supreme good looks and thought-stealing kissing talent—yes, it needed to be said twice—was dangerous. Harley knew about head-spinning danger. She was staying on the bench.
Vince took Harley’s hand and led her toward the garage, dragging her along like a small anchor behind a big boat. “We’ll check in.”
“I’ll go with you.” Gabe fell into step next to Harley, as energetic as an over-sugared fifth-grader.
“Gabe, it’s five. Harley’s tired and she’s a guest of ours.” It was Vince who sounded tired, no doubt worn out by his emotional homecoming.
Harley had seen how Vince’s gaze shadowed sometimes when he looked at his family’s garage. “I’m fine, but we can go if you like.”
“Harley?” Vince quirked an eyebrow. “You just told me you’re tired, didn’t you?”
She’d forgotten their scam, having been too busy thinking about his thought-stealing kissing talent. “Yeah. Sure.”
“I’m feeling a bit weary, too,” Gabe said, still his happy-go-lucky self.
“I just want to spend some time alone with my girlfriend,” Vince snapped. “Is that too much to ask?”
“Well, now I feel selfish.” Brit stopped inspecting an old car nearby and frowned at them. “I’m a bridezilla without realizing it. There’s just so much to do around here for the wedding and the house.”
“It’s okay,” Harley said. “I don’t mind helping.” That was no lie.
The Messinas were fun to be around. Brad and Sam danced about like puppies who didn’t understand exactly why they liked each other. Gabe wielded verbal volleys, taking shots at everyone, including Harley. The bride and groom snuck sweet kisses when they thought no one was looking. And through it all, they treated Harley as if she was one of their own.
“I think you guys should get going,” Gabe said unexpectedly. “In fact, I’ll make reservations at El Rosal for you. My treat.” He tugged a cell phone out of his pocket. “And while you eat, I can make sure your reservation is ready at the B and B.”
Vince tried to topple Gabe with a suspicious stare, but his brother didn’t fold.
“That’s very thoughtful of you.” Harley moved into peace-keeping mode.
“Gabe isn’t thoughtful,” Vince grumbled.
“Maybe I was selfish when I was younger and you outshone me with your huge talent underneath the hood.” An angel would have believed Gabe’s sincerity. He looked that earnest. “But I’m a changed man today.”
Vince scoffed.
“What do you do for a living, Harley?” Again, Gabe’s tone was innocuous. His smile that of an angel.
“She’s an architect,” Vince said before Harley could tell Gabe she was a tile installer. Vince gave Harley a look that telegraphed Let me handle this.
“How did you meet an architect working on an oil rig?” Gone was the angel. Gabe looked and sounded more like a hound dog on the trail of a fox.
“Vince doesn’t work on an oil rig anymore.” Harley pretended she was unable to translate Vince’s Morse code. Stick to the truth. Wasn’t that what they’d agreed? “I met him on a job site.”
They’d reached the parking lot.
“I’m working as a carpenter now,” Vince said through stiff lips.
Harley couldn’t fathom why he wouldn’t want his family to know about his job change or why he hadn’t told her his occupation was on a need-to-know basis. This was about his status quo, not hers.
They reached the door to the repair garage’s office.
“Brother, why don’t you use the shop sink to wash up?” Gabe opened the door and pointed to the stairs. “I’ll show Harley the second-floor facilities.”
Vince’s eyes narrowed.
“Sounds good,” Harley said, moving upstairs. Part of her role here was to stop Vince’s brothers from pestering him. A little distance between the siblings was called for.
The door at the top of the stairs led to a small, homey apartment with a galley kitchen. The kitchen table and living room furniture weren’t stylish retro, they were just old, yet well cared for. Three doors faced her. Two were closed. The open door revealed the bathroom. Harley went in and cleaned up.
When she emerged, Gabe was standing in front of the TV stand that didn’t have a TV. Instead family photos graced the top. He set one back down.
“I don’t want you to take this wrong.” Gabe sounded a lot like Harley’s protective older brother Taylor—overly confident and a tad self-important. Both characteristics were softened by Gabe’s unabashedly friendly smile. “I like you, but I know you aren’t dating my brother.”
Harley’s shoulders pinched in a near flinch at his assessment. She didn’t like lying, but she’d made an agreement with Vince to pretend they were dating. And there was just something about Gabe’s accusation that raised her competitive hackles. She’d never liked losing to Taylor, not in checkers and not in verbal chess.
“Really?” Harley forced out a chuckle and crossed the room to study the framed photo Gabe had been looking at. “Present your case, counselor.”
Gabe rubbed his hands together, clearly pleased that Harley hadn’t taken offense.
“First off, there’s your age difference. How old are you?” Not only did Gabe have no filter, he had no sense of boundaries. If it wasn’t for his good-natured demeanor, he would’ve been annoying. “I’m guessing twenty-four?”
“I’m almost twenty-seven.” Harley bent for a closer look. The photo Gabe had set down was of the three teenage Messina boys straddling motorcycles. An older man stood behind them with the same thick, dark hair and lady-killer grin as the boys. Their father? Harley leaned closer, taking in Vince’s multicolored striped shirt that seemed too short, blue jeans that seemed too long, and a grin that seemed too wide.
“When I was twenty-three, I dated a girl who said she was eighteen.” Gabe watched Harley closely, a spider patiently studying the fly. “Her daddy came after me with a shotgun.”
“Well, if we’re challenging each other’s relationships, I’d like to see the scars on your backside.” Harley straightened and laughed, more genuinely this time. “Are you implying I’m too young for Vince?”
“I think I’m spinning it the other way around.” He waggled his dark brows.
Harley shook her head. “Nice try, but seven years isn’t that big of a deal.”
“Sweetheart, it’s nearly eight years.” Gabe flashed a troublemaking grin. “More in dog years.”
“Clearly, it makes no difference to us.” Harley rolled her eyes. Gabe could have been cloned from the same genes as her brother.
“Clearly, there’s no zing between you two.” Gabe’s grin didn’t dim. “I’m only challenging your claim because we had a rough childhood and I feel responsible for my younger brother. You know, protective.”
“Pfft.” Gabe was more transparent than a new window in an old house. “You and Joe have a bet.”
Gabe’s eyes widened and then he began to laugh and nod. “Yep. Joe and I have a bet. Joe says you’re legit.”
Harley wanted to put Gabe in his place. And the only way she could think of doing it was to mention something personal about Vince, something he’d only tell a girlfriend, not an acquaintance. “Was this photo taken after your mother left for Texas?”
His smile disappearing faster than a cockroach on a midnight raid in the kitchen. “What did you say?”
Too late, Harley realized Vince must not have told his brothers about his mother’s location.
Vince opened the door, not looking like a man happy to see his girlfriend. No doubt, his expression would turn thunderous if Gabe asked about their mother.
The smart move would be to smile and make her escape, nose in the air. But then, nothing Harley had done this summer had been smart.
Instead she crossed the room, latched onto the collar of Vince’s polo shirt and kissed him hard.
CHAPTER FIVE (#u997cc1ae-8b72-5849-a261-c339932b624b)
“I THOUGHT YOU said you wanted a kiss.” Harley’s nose was out of joint. She pushed through the door to El Rosal, Harmony Valley’s Mexican restaurant, without waiting for Vince to open it. “I gave you one. End of discussion.”
Vince followed Harley inside, past a chalkboard posting early bird specials. He glanced over his shoulder to watch Gabe walking across the town square toward the Lambridge Bed and Breakfast. What was his fun-loving, meddlesome brother up to now?
Something had happened between his brother and Harley upstairs. Gabe’s good-humored bluster had been deflated. He’d ridden in the back of Vince’s rented SUV to the restaurant in near silence. Gabe was never silent. And with his brother’s mouth on mute, Vince couldn’t fully enjoy Harley’s kiss.
She’d claimed him with that kiss, branding his lips in a way that still burned.
Oh, something had happened between Gabe and Harley, all right. And good or bad, Vince had benefitted from it.
Harley had grabbed him, then released him and marched out of the apartment. Vince had followed in the same stilted way a mummy followed its master.
The shock was wearing off. Or maybe it was the loud, bustling atmosphere in El Rosal.
The restaurant’s walls, tables and chairs were painted in primary colors: bright reds, yellows, blues and greens. The flat-screen television mounted above the bar was tuned to a muted baseball game. Pop music sung in Spanish filled the air. It wasn’t even five thirty, but the restaurant was packed, primarily with white-haired patrons, many of them having conversations at a volume that indicated their hearing aids might not be switched on.
Over a decade ago, the grain mill in town had exploded and the company subsequently shut down. Being Harmony Valley’s primary employer, jobs had dried up and with it businesses had closed their doors. Younger families had moved to find jobs and new opportunities. Older residents had hunkered down and stayed in their homes.
Now there was a new local employer, a small but growing winery. According to Joe, the bulk of the population was still over the age of sixty. And here was the proof. White-haired patrons dining on early bird specials.
A waitress led Harley to a table by the plate-glass window looking out on the town square and its lone oak tree.
She dropped into a yellow chair and hid behind the menu.
Vince sat across from Harley, studying the long, limp hair hooked behind her ears. She hadn’t looked this tired when she’d gone upstairs to clean up. “What did Gabe say that upset you? Whatever it was, I’ll talk to him.” Which was polite brother speak for an exchange of punches.
“Nothing.” Her blue eyes flashed over the top of the menu. “I let him get under my skin. The jet lag is catching up to me.”
He wasn’t sure he believed her, but something, almost like relief, allowed Vince to draw a deep breath, to pick up the menu, to realize he was hungry.
“You’ll want the mole chicken tacos.” An elderly woman who could stand-in for Mrs. Claus sat at the next table. She had thick, round glasses and thick, round curls.
She seemed vaguely familiar, but so did over half the restaurant patrons.
Across from her, an elderly Japanese man shook his finger at Vince in a friendly way. “I know you. You’re one of the Messina boys.”
“Yes. I’m Vince.” Vince braced himself for a chilly reception, having left town with a less-than-stellar reputation.
Mrs. Claus gasped and adjusted her glasses, squinting at him. “I should have known from all that black hair.” She reached across the aisle and gripped Vince’s hand as if she was happy to see him. “I used to admire how you handled a motorcycle.”
Vince didn’t know what to say. The compliment was unexpected.
“Not me,” the old man said, not at all embarrassed to admit it. “Don’t you remember how they’d speed through town, Mildred? Motors so loud it hurt your ears.”
Mildred tsked. “I suppose you don’t remember how I used to speed through town and up Parish Hill, either.” Mildred released Vince with a sigh. “The worst thing about getting old has been losing my eyesight and giving up driving. I miss burning rubber coming out of second gear.”
“Mildred Parsons?” The name suddenly clicked. She’d been a race car driver in her youth, one of the few adults to earn the respect of the Messina boys.
“Yes.” When Mildred smiled, the resemblance to the mythical Mrs. Claus increased. “And this is my beau, Hero Takata.”
Vince aimed a good-natured finger back at the man. “Old Man Takata?” The man who used to own the cemetery? The man who’d buried Dad?
“Some still call me by that name.” Hero smiled, bringing wrinkles to an otherwise ageless-looking face. “I’m older today than I was when I yelled at kids like you for running across my grass.”
Old Man Takata had lived on a corner down the street from the town square, a house located between the school and the ice cream parlor. Of course, kids wanted to cut the corner.
“Is this your wife?” Mildred blinked at Harley, but in a way that created doubt as to whether or not she actually saw her. “Do you have children? A little cousin for Sam to play with?”
“No,” Vince blurted. “No on all counts.”
Harley slanted a gaze at him that disapproved, folded her menu, and said, “I’m his date for the wedding.”
The boundaries that came along with her tone riled something inside Vince, and made him want to refute her statement. Which only went to prove that Harmony Valley was getting under his skin exactly like Gabe had gotten under Harley’s.
“Spoken like a woman who doesn’t need a man.” Mildred did a sort of snuffle-chuckle. “Bravo. What’s your name, my dear?”
Harley introduced herself.
The waitress brought Hero’s change and Mildred’s walker, which she unfolded and set between their two tables.
“Vince,” Hero said, dropping his change into his wallet. “Don’t take this personally, but I’ll report you if I see you speeding.”
Joe had mentioned how hard it was to be accepted by the town, but Vince hadn’t believed people would be so blatant about it. He felt the beginnings of a headache.
“Hero will only see you if you speed down Main.” Mildred stood, staring in the general direction of Vince’s face. “I’ll see Harley at the bridal shower, and we’ll see you two at the Couples Dinner.” And then her gaze swiveled toward Harley. “We’ll beat you, of course.”
Harley smiled in polite confusion. The subtleties of her expression probably went unnoticed by Mildred.
The server was waiting for her order, smiling patiently at her elderly guests as if Hero had given her a good tip.
Hero got to his feet with the aid of a cane. “They’ll have the mole chicken tacos, Leti.”
The couple moved slowly toward the door.
Leti disappeared into the kitchen.
“I think we’re having the mole chicken tacos,” Vince said, realizing their menus were gone. “Welcome to Harmony Valley.”
“I think we should talk about the Couples Dinner.” A grin twitched one corner of Harley’s cheek. “It’s a competition?”
“We can assume it won’t be a dancing one,” Vince said, nodding toward the elderly couple moving slowly down the sidewalk.
“Or a mudder.” Harley seemed to notice there was chips and salsa on the table, and dove in. “What is a Couples Dinner?”
“This is the first I’ve heard of it.” Vince managed to insert a chip into the salsa bowl she was hoarding. “The good news is Gabe won’t be there, seeing as how he doesn’t have a date for the wedding.”
“I heard the Messina boys were back in town.” An elderly man with shoulders bowed forward leaned on their table with gnarled, age-spotted hands. He wore a wrinkled burgundy-checked flannel shirt, sleeves buttoned at his wrists, and smelled like he could use a shower or his clothes a washing. “Are you right in the head?”
Vince choked on his bite of chip. The rest of it crumpled to the table.
“If not, we don’t want you here.” The old man pushed off and wobbled backward. “Had enough of that with your father. He jumped me in a bar fight once. No warning. Just pow.”
Because of the shock, Vince couldn’t speak. He couldn’t move. He could only watch the old man shuffle away.
“Are you okay?” Harley switched chairs so that she sat next to him. She slid her hand to the nape of his neck. “Breathe in, breath out, remember? What was that about?”
Vince drank half the water in his glass before he attempted to speak. “My dad...” His voice sounded like sandpaper on metal. “My dad...”
He didn’t want to tell her.
“Drink some more.” Her hand shifted lower, rubbing across his shoulder blades. “But don’t rush it.” A minute passed, maybe longer.
He wanted to lean into her touch. He wanted to get up and run away without explaining.
One thought coalesced: it was a mistake to have brought her here.
With every greeting, with every event, his past was catching up to him. And Harley, as witness, was curious and wanting answers.
On some level, he supposed he owed her some.
“My dad had schizophrenia.” His words came out drenched in emotion and vulnerability, when he wanted to be detached and strong. He couldn’t meet her gaze, but he couldn’t stop speaking, either. “And depression. He was diagnosed late in life. That man...” Whoever he was. “He could have been referencing a time before Dad was diagnosed.” Or not. There was no magic solution for mental health challenges.
“I’m sorry.”
“I don’t want your pity.” There was the strong, detached tone he’d been looking for. Inappropriate now.
“I wasn’t offering pity.” Harley’s hand dropped away. She moved back into her chair. “I’m sorry your dad had mental health issues. And I’m sorry that man was rude to you.”
Harley was compassionate. Genuine. And the first to give the benefit of the doubt.
“That was...rude of me,” Vince said, struggling to find words when he was unaccustomed to explaining himself. “I didn’t have my guard up and he got to me. I took it out on you. I’m the one who should apologize.” And he did.
She stared at him a little too long, not smiling. Earlier in the summer, he would have held her gaze with a hint of a smile and then coaxed a smile out of her. He would have reached for her hand and drawn her close. He’d always felt better when she was near.
“I understand,” Harley said.
Vince wasn’t sure she did.
* * *
THE LAMBRIDGE BED AND BREAKFAST was a large, beautiful, Queen Anne Victorian home painted green with cream colored shutters.
Harley took in the large front porch, dominant Dutch gables, and asymmetrical façade. The kind of straight-lined architecture built to endure generations of family disagreements, brutal storms and intense heat.
Vince had endured much the same. He’d weathered family gales and ill winds from the community. Given his mom had left her family and his father had braved mental illness, was it any wonder he had no interest in getting married and having children?
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Melinda Curtis
This bachelor's pretend girlfriend just made a shocking discovery – She's pregnant!Although they only dated for a month, Harley O'Hannigan just agreed to be Vince Messina's plus-one at a Harmony Valley wedding. Big mistake, given her deepening feelings for the tall, dark, unavailable bachelor. And what about Vince's long-buried family history? Then there's the growing secret that could transform this pretend relationship into the real thing…
This bachelor’s pretend girlfriend just made a shocking discovery—
She’s pregnant!
Although they dated for only a month, Harley O’Hannigan just agreed to be Vince Messina’s plus-one at a Harmony Valley wedding. Big mistake, given her deepening feelings for the tall, dark, unavailable bachelor. And what about Vince’s long-buried family history? Then there’s the growing secret that could transform this pretend relationship into the real thing...
Award-winning USA TODAY bestselling author MELINDA CURTIS is an empty nester married to her college sweetheart. She’s lived in three states in the United States—California, Georgia and Texas—and plans to move to a fourth when Mr. Curtis retires (because all their children live in Oregon). She and her husband are constantly remodelling something—their house, their parents’ homes, the abodes of their children. Check out social media for before/after pictures.
Melinda writes sweet contemporary romances as Melinda Curtis (Brenda Novak says Season of Change “found a place on my keeper shelf”) and fun, sexy reads as Mel Curtis (Jayne Ann Krentz says Fool for Love is “wonderfully entertaining”).
Also By Melinda Curtis (#u997cc1ae-8b72-5849-a261-c339932b624b)
Dandelion Wishes
Summer Kisses
Season of Change
A Perfect Year
Time for Love
A Memory Away
Marrying the Single Dad
Love, Special Delivery
Support Your Local Sheriff
Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Marrying the Wedding Crasher
Melinda Curtis
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ISBN: 978-1-474-08292-1
MARRYING THE WEDDING CRASHER
© 2018 Melinda Wooten
Published in Great Britain 2018
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.
® and ™ are trademarks owned and used by the trademark owner and/or its licensee. Trademarks marked with ® are registered with the United Kingdom Patent Office and/or the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market and in other countries.
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
One moment, Vince and Harley were joking. The next, they weren’t. And after that? Her lips were pressed to his.
His eyes widened and then slowly drifted closed as he deepened the kiss.
Only to have her pull away and announce, “Time.”
He blinked. Disoriented. The willing woman in his arms was gone. Walking away from him. A swing to her step.
“Hang on.” He jogged to Harley’s side. “What just happened there?”
Harley wouldn’t look at him. She reached the crosswalk and looked both ways, more careful crossing the road than she was with her affections. “I got carried away in my role as your plus-one and you got a freebie.”
Vince wanted to haul Harley back into his arms and kiss her as senseless as she made him.
Not the wisest thought I’ve had today.
But certainly one of the best.
If only they weren’t in Harmony Valley...
Dear Reader (#u997cc1ae-8b72-5849-a261-c339932b624b),
Welcome to Harmony Valley!
Just a few short years ago, Harmony Valley was on the brink of extinction, with only those over the age of sixty in residence. Now the influx of a younger generation is making life in Harmony Valley more fun and definitely more interesting for its gray-haired residents.
I hope you enjoy Vince and Harley’s touching journey to a happily-ever-after—which begins with a harmless invite to a family wedding—as well as the other romances in the Harmony Valley series. I love to hear from readers. Check my website to learn more about upcoming books, sign up for email book announcements (and I’ll send you a free sweet romance read) or chat with me on Facebook (MelindaCurtisAuthor (https://www.facebook.com/MelindaCurtisAuthor/)) to hear about my latest giveaways.
Melinda Curtis
MelindaCurtis.com (http://www.MelindaCurtis.com)
To Anna J. Stewart and Cari Lynn Webb.
Thanks for understanding, making me laugh and keeping me strong.
Contents
Cover (#u2ad1d1ec-f634-5d62-a1ab-9a3049422c40)
Back Cover Text (#ua73e964f-ebe5-5e1b-93fa-8aa15f07c3b1)
About the Author (#ue470a2fc-7b6d-552d-845f-303ed62a14be)
Booklist (#u3fe13713-512c-5183-9bce-658952331563)
Title Page (#u1cef569f-f938-586a-a547-8df968579980)
Copyright (#ubbc22625-9bf3-508d-a956-0160ac4a7c19)
Introduction (#u32cc2715-1290-5b5e-8ca0-230a24c06378)
Dear Reader (#ub1deb260-ca2f-54da-8b56-7ea560082eb2)
Dedication (#u0cd6edd8-2580-5306-beb6-f545571b1c4e)
CHAPTER ONE (#u6abf5988-673c-5440-b02c-1121645b0fee)
CHAPTER TWO (#ue6965bf3-caef-5665-8409-fb6852881bf6)
CHAPTER THREE (#u88b2270e-351f-505c-b69c-e0dc7c9cf1cf)
CHAPTER FOUR (#uff386782-76b3-5259-8d96-965abd805490)
CHAPTER FIVE (#u32f97cb9-942f-525a-81e2-67b3ddb118a2)
CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FIFTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIXTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINETEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE (#litres_trial_promo)
EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE (#u997cc1ae-8b72-5849-a261-c339932b624b)
VINCE MESSINA CONSIDERED himself a survivor.
He didn’t think he’d survive his little brother’s wedding back home in Harmony Valley.
Bittersweet memories. Long-kept secrets. Family he hadn’t seen in years. It had all the makings of a serious crash-and-burn.
The Texas summer sun beat down on Vince, nearly as hot as an oil-fueled ball of flame.
“You’re going to come to my wedding.” His younger brother Joe wasn’t asking. “And you’re going to bring that girlfriend of yours. It’s long past time we met her.”
Ah, the girlfriend.
His brothers pestered him less when they thought he was in a relationship. Hence his make-believe girlfriend, the latest of which hadn’t been make-believe a month ago.
Vince’s gaze drifted across the job site to the blonde working the tile saw. Harley O’Hannigan wasn’t likely to go away with him again. “She’s not sure she can get off work.” Besides, Harley would think he was a jerk if he asked her. But she was just the kind of woman who could hold her own against his siblings.
“What’s her name?” His older brother Gabe was nearly silenced by the whir of the tile saw and the punch-punch-punch of a nail gun. “And what’s that noise? Where are you?”
“They’re remodeling my local Starbucks.” Lying, Vince pulled his focus away from Harley. He was part of a crew working on a huge remodel in a fancy neighborhood outside of Houston. “And, no, I won’t tell you her name. The last time I introduced you to my girlfriend, you stole her, Gabe.”
Mandy Zapien, a girl with a heart of gold. He hoped she was married to somebody stable and had three kids by now.
“That was high school,” Gabe scoffed. “There is no girlfriend, admit it. All the more reason Vince needs to come home so we can straighten out his life.”
Vince’s life was fine as long as his brothers stayed out of it. Not that he didn’t love them. He just didn’t want to answer for every decision he’d made, every confidence he’d kept.
“The fake girlfriend is your tell.” Joe sounded disappointed. “The last time you bluffed about one, you’d been clipped by a stray bullet in a bar fight.”
“I wasn’t actually in the bar fight.” He’d been collateral damage, which seemed to be the story of his life. Vince set his jaw. “I’m not bluffing. There’s a girl.”
Correction. A woman. Wearing worn blue jeans, a burgundy T-shirt with the construction company’s logo and scuffed work boots. She wiped a tile dry with a towel, examining the cut she’d made in the white marble.
“Send us a picture,” Joe prodded. “We’ll compare her to Sarah Whitfield. Did I tell you she was back in town? And still single?”
“Guys...” Vince squeezed the tail end of his patience.
“There is no girlfriend.” Gabe pounced once more. “Which means you’re in trouble. Do you need me to spot you some cash?”
“No!” Money was the last thing Vince was worried about.
Harley spared Vince a glance. She was what Texans called a tall drink of water. Long, elegant lines, delicate bone structure, straight blond hair that she kept in a long braid down her back. Everything about her appearance was at odds with her being a construction worker. That contradiction was the reason he’d asked her out. Her gentle humor and sly wit had kept him asking.
“If it’s not money, how’s that truck of yours running?” Joe jumped in on Gabe’s fun. “I could re-bore those heads again and you’d get another fifty thousand miles.”
Vince drove their father’s red-and-white 1976 pickup truck. It had a weak air conditioner, cloth seats and unreliable headlights. Dad had been a mechanic who’d struggled with mental illness, made harder on the family when Mom had left them. Despite challenges, Dad had taught his three boys his trade. Only Joe had followed in Dad’s footsteps. Gabe was a lifer in the military, currently on leave for Joe’s wedding. And Vince—
“Messina! Break time’s over.”
Vince’s boss rounded the far corner of the house they were remodeling. Jerry wore a frown and a sunburn from a weekend spent bass fishing. “That deck’s got to be finished today.”
Vince held up a hand, acknowledging the older man. “I’m fine,” Vince said into the phone. “The truck is fine. My bank account is fine. Harley is fine.” This last came out like a backfire through a rust-ridden muffler.
His brothers crowed over his slip.
“Retire Dad’s truck,” Gabe said when he stopped laughing. “I’ll reserve you a room at the Lambridge Bed and Breakfast where I’m staying.”
“Bring me some of that oil you dredge up on that rig of yours,” Joe said, gasping for breath. “Gas in California is expensive. And a girlfriend? Sarah is going to be so disappointed.”
Vince wasn’t working on an oil rig, hadn’t been for over a year since it’d exploded.
He wasn’t retiring Dad’s truck. Other than the faulty headlight wiring, it ran like a champ.
He wasn’t dating Harley, not since she’d broken up with him.
And he had no idea if he was going to go to his brother’s wedding.
* * *
HARLEY O’HANNIGAN FINISHED wiping the grout from the shower tile in the master bathroom and sat back to admire her effort.
Carrera marble countertops. Chrome fixtures. White and black glass accents. It was luxury at its finest, not to mention it was bigger than the bedroom she’d had growing up and reminded her of the condo she used to rent in a high-rise downtown. That was six months and another lifetime ago.
“Harley!” The male voice, deep and angry, reverberated off the walls in the empty house and shook Harley’s stomach.
She moved into the master bedroom. Most of the construction crew had left for the day, except for Vince, who was sanding the deck outside the bedroom’s French doors. She wished he’d left, too.
There’s a mistake I won’t repeat.
“Harley!” Dan’s voice was as hard as his footsteps on the wood floor. “I know you’re here.”
“I’m in the back.”
And then so was her former boss, standing in the bedroom doorway.
On first glance, Dan looked like any other young, hipster architect, the kind of man her brother would roll his eyes at—close-cropped blond hair, neatly trimmed goatee, pink cotton, button-down and tight, white cigarette pants. He looked like the worst damage he could do was post a bad review online. But take a second look and you’d register cold gray eyes, an openmouthed sneer, and fingers flexing into fists. You’d recognize a desperate snake ready to strike.
Fear stuck in Harley’s throat. Why hadn’t she seen Dan’s reptilian side when he’d hired her, a fledgling architect, a year ago? Suddenly she was glad Vince was still around.
“Your design can’t be done,” Dan said in an ominous voice that conjured images of cop dramas and crimes about to be committed. “You knew this would happen.”
“Yes,” she choked out, hating that she sounded scared. “And so did you. I told you not to do it.” Not to steal her unfinished sketch. Not to present it to high-profile clients. Not to promise it could be built.
He’d stolen more than her architectural plans. He’d stolen her joy in the work and her confidence in her abilities.
Dan’s brows dropped to the locked-and-loaded position. “The structural engineers are demanding to see the plans from you. I put them off another two weeks, but that’s it.”
“Give the money back, Dan.” He’d won an international design award with her conceptual drawings of a playhouse with balconies that seemed to float in the sky. And then the city of Houston had agreed to pay Dan millions to build it.
“Give it back?” He choked on the words and then seemed angered to have done so. His face reddened. “I spent the advance on things like salaries and tuition reimbursement.” For her.
“And on cars and a new house.” An over-the-top place some other architect had designed. Dan had little talent of his own. He was drunk on new business and higher fees.
As usual, her arguments fell on deaf ears. Dan made a guttural hiss.
The fear in Harley’s throat plummeted to her legs, weakening them. He’d never confronted her alone in an isolated place before. Every instinct she had urged her to run, to get out of the house and away from Dan.
Before Harley had a chance to move, Dan did. He closed the distance between them and shoved her, hard.
As she fell, Harley’s vision tunneled until all she saw were angry eyes.
She couldn’t catch her breath. She was from a good home, a stable family. People in her world didn’t get in physical fights.
Her legs gave out and she felt cold from her head to her toes.
She became aware of a scuffling noise. Someone might have shouted. Someone who sounded vaguely like Dan.
“Harley?” Definitely not Dan’s voice.
She was incredibly thankful for whoever Not-Dan was.
Warm hands engulfed hers, not the slightest bit vengeful.
“Harley?” A gentle voice, one she should be able to identify if her head didn’t feel like someone had stuffed it with thick insulation. “You’re safe. He’s gone.”
She opened her eyes on a shuddering breath. A familiar face greeted her.
Vince. They both worked for Jerry, remodeling houses.
Vince. Friendly black eyes, a sturdy nose and black hair. That black hair. It had required a second glance when they’d first met. He had fantastic hair. The kind of hair Disney gave its princes.
Her heart was racing for the exit and her hands had started to tremble in his.
Vince’s hands, not Dan’s.
Vince. He drove an old truck, not a new Ferrari. He’d offered her carrots once when he’d heard she’d forgotten her lunch on a remote job site. He’d bought her a drink after work one day, which had led to him buying her dinner—more than once—and then the infamous weekend away where he’d learned she’d quit being an architect. Not that he’d understood Harley and her inability to pick herself up after one undisclosed setback. He may have been seven years older than her, but that didn’t mean he could be judgmental about her career choices.
Note to self... I’m not safe with Vince, either.
“Hey.” Vince gave her hands a gentle squeeze. “Are you with me?”
With him? She would’ve followed him anywhere a few weeks ago, before the let-me-tell-you-what-to-do-with-your-life debacle.
Something crashed outside.
Vince muttered what might have been an oath or a psalm. She couldn’t hear over the pounding of her heart.
He moved to sit next to Harley, tucking her beneath his arm, next to his bulky tool belt. “Breathe in. Breathe out.”
Sounded easy enough, but that heart of hers was hammering against her lungs, making her pant. Vince holding her wasn’t helping her recovery.
Not that she moved away from him. Not one inch.
“Like this.” Vince took Harley’s hand and placed her palm on his sturdy chest.
She could feel his heart beat nearly as fast as hers, but she could also feel him fill his lungs with air.
“Breathe in. Breathe out.” Vince was big and warm and calm, and completely different than Dan. He’d never be a slave to fashion. He’d never take credit for someone else’s work. He’d never put his hands on a woman with intent to do damage.
In a distant part of her brain, somewhere where things weren’t pounding, Harley’s mother recited one of her Southern lectures. Life is hard, baby girl. You need to find yourself a big, strong man to lean on when times get tough.
Finding big, strong men was something of a specialty of Harley’s. It was finding the ones she could lean on forever that eluded her.
“That’s it,” Vince reassured her.
Vince was strong, too. He looked like he could play tight end for the Houston Texans. He smelled of fresh-cut wood and hard work. And he sounded the way Disney princes should—reliable, honorable, understanding.
Two out of three...
“Your hair lies,” she murmured. It promised empathy and happily-ever-afters.
She should never have broken the no coworker rule in her dating handbook. But Vince had that hair and that smile and that self-confidence slightly older men with their act together seemed to have.
“Are you dizzy? Nauseous? Bleeding?” His fingers explored the back of her head and found—
“Ouch.” She held her breath until the pain passed. “Give...me...a...minute.” And then she’d ask Vince to stop touching her.
“Take as long as you need.”
She was afraid she’d take as long as he let her, which just wouldn’t do. She was Harley O’Hannigan. She was tough, independent and wasn’t the kind of woman who expected flowers or pretty words or who waited for men to open the door.
Harley sighed and put some space between them. “Thanks.”
“My pleasure.”
She shot him with a sideways scowl.
“I meant...” Vince held up his hands, revealing scraped and bloodied knuckles. “I haven’t had a good fight in a while.” He grinned. It was lopsided and devilish, and made her girlish fantasies flutter foolishly inside her chest.
Mr. Carrots was a fighter? How had she not known this?
I didn’t know him at all.
“You should press charges.”
A new sensation banged around her chest. Embarrassment. “I can’t afford the time off from work to fill out police reports or show up in court.” What a flimsy fib. “Which makes me sound—”
“Practical.”
There he went, being nice again. This time it sent tears to her eyes. She didn’t want his pity or his kind words. That would destroy the carefully constructed image she had of herself as The Woman Who Could Do Anything.
Which in hindsight was a lie, too.
“How about we call it a day?” Vince stood and offered a hand to help her up, flashing that grin that’d gotten her into trouble a few weeks ago. “Pack your tools and let’s get out of here. First beer’s on me.”
Harley shook her throbbing head, pushing to her feet with the aid of the wall. “Thanks for the offer, but we both know that’s not happening.”
“No worries.” The grin disappeared and, just for a moment, she thought he looked disappointed. “But we are getting out of here. Pack up your tools. I’ll lock up.”
Agreeing with Vince that she’d finished for the day, Harley loaded her tools into a bucket and headed for the driveway where she’d left her tile saw. It’d been hot inside the house, but it was hotter outside in the sun. It beat down on her head as if its goal was to melt her out of existence.
Speaking of existence, the table she’d clamped the tile saw to had been upended. And dragged. And shoved half into the bushes.
“No. Oh, no.” Harley’s stomach fell and fell and fell, all the way to the pavement. Her bucket clattered next to it. She needed that saw to make a living.
She righted the saw, which was still plugged in, and turned it on. It ka-clunked a bunch of times and began smoking. She shut it off and stared at it, unable to move.
“That doesn’t sound good.” Vince approached her, carrying a bulky black tool bag. His eyes narrowed. “I wondered what all that racket was when he left.”
“Dan... He smashed it.” The same way he’d sort of smashed her.
“There are two things a man needs,” Vince said. “Pride and honor. This Dan has too much of one and none of the other.”
Harley nodded miserably.
Vince peered at the saw. “This is totaled. You sure you don’t want to press charges against your boyfriend?”
A weight dropped on Harley’s shoulders so hard and heavy she didn’t correct his presumption about Dan. “I... Can’t you fix it?” By tomorrow when she had to tile the outdoor kitchen? Vince was always fixing something for Jerry, their boss.
Vince set down his tool bag and examined her saw. “See those dents in the casing? When it collapses like that, parts inside get damaged.”
“I can’t afford a new one.” She’d gone from a starting architect’s salary to a tiler’s paycheck. And she’d just put a new truck transmission on her credit card.
“You can take it to that shop on Polk. They’ll give you money for whatever parts they can salvage and apply it toward the purchase of a new one.”
She couldn’t afford that, either, not without a second job. Until then, she’d be cutting tile with a low-tech manual saw and nippers. “Thanks for the advice.”
Demoralized, Harley released the base from the table and carried the dead saw to her truck, returning for her tool bucket and the worktable.
If only she could figure out how to make playhouse balconies float on air.
Vince was still loading his stuff into his truck’s lockbox when Harley opened the creaky door to her hot cab and climbed in. She missed her Lexus. She missed auto-start and powerful air-conditioning. She turned the key in the ignition.
Nothing. Not so much as a tick of the starter.
She missed reliability.
“Not today,” she muttered. The truck was finicky. It didn’t like to run when the temperature dropped to the thirties or in thunderstorms, but the day had been hot, the skies clear. “Come on, baby,” she chided the old vehicle.
Don’t leave me stranded with Mr. Carrots and that grin.
Vince locked up his tools and leaned on his truck, staring at hers.
Still nothing. Her backside was growing damp with sweat.
Vince came forward. He walked with the swagger of a man who knew what his purpose was in life. And, right now, that purpose was to rescue a damsel in distress.
“Pop the hood.”
She did, hopping out and joining him at the grille. Not that she knew anything about engines. Her mechanical ability stopped at turning power tools off and on.
Vince tsked and gave Harley a look that disapproved and teased at the same time.
“Hey, don’t judge,” she said. “It runs.”
“It’s not running now.” He drew a blue rag from his back pocket. It was the kind of scrap mechanics used to wipe their hands and touch hot engines. “You might want to spray your engine off every once in a while.” He used the rag to check battery connections, hose connections and to prod the engine compartment as if he knew what he was doing.
“I barely clean my apartment. Why would I clean my engine?”
“So a mechanic can see if you’ve got leaks anywhere, for one thing,” Vince said straight-faced. “Why don’t you try it again?”
She hurried back behind the wheel. The truck started right up.
“Traitor,” she accused under her breath.
Vince shut the hood and came around to her window, wiping his hands.
“Thanks.” Harley gave him her polite smile, the one she reserved for helpful salesclerks and the receptionist who squeezed her in at the doctor’s office. “I owe you.”
“Yeeeaah.” He wound out the word and ran his fingers through that thatch of midnight hair. “About that. I need a favor.” Those kind black eyes lifted to her face.
Don’t believe in fairy tales... Don’t believe in fairy tales...
Despite their history, despite knowing better, silly fantasies about princely rescues and Mr. Right fluttered about her chest like happy butterflies on a warm spring day.
She should go. Instead she lingered and asked, “So what’s the favor?”
The devilish grin returned, making the butterflies ecstatic. “I need a date to my brother’s wedding.”
CHAPTER TWO (#u997cc1ae-8b72-5849-a261-c339932b624b)
WHEN HAD A man ever asked Harley to be his wedding date?
When was the last time she’d felt like going to a wedding?
She couldn’t remember on either count.
Harley had turned Vince down, of course. The wedding was in California the weekend after next, but he’d wanted her to fly out with him this Saturday.
Take to the skies with Vince?
Thunderclouds lined the southern horizon.
There was a time when Harley O’Hannigan thought the sky was the limit. A time when everything she’d touched had turned to gold.
Daughter of a couple who owned a tile and granite outlet in Birmingham, she’d been the girl most likely to succeed in high school, valedictorian of her college class, the young architect hired to design beautiful structures for a boutique agency in Houston.
And then reality struck. The balconies she’d dreamed up for a uniquely modern theater couldn’t be built with today’s construction techniques. She’d only shared the drawing with Dan because unbuildable designs could be entered in architectural theory competitions. Winning those awards brought agencies and architects prestige. But Dan had done the unthinkable. He’d presented her design to a client as doable. And they’d bought it.
She’d begged Dan to back out of the deal. But the press he’d received from the sale was amazing, and had led to more architectural business and more requests for impossible, pie-in-the-sky ideas. Instead of admitting the balconies couldn’t be done, Dan had found a contractor willing to begin construction with the interior still up in the air. Literally.
Backed into a corner where all she could do was put Fail on her résumé, Harley had quit, only to be told she’d signed a non-compete clause when she’d been hired. Oh, and since her employment package included the firm paying her college debt, she couldn’t work as an architect if she didn’t work for Dan. Not for four more years. He’d told her he’d reconsider the four-year limitation if she came up with a solution that didn’t compromise the design. Her mind was a blank slate.
She wasn’t qualified for any other job that could support her former lifestyle. She’d moved out of her high-rise condo. She’d sold her Lexus SUV. She’d let go of dreams of greatness in the clouds.
And she couldn’t tell anyone why. There was a nondisclosure clause, too.
Clause-clause-clause. Harley wanted to go back to a time when the only clause she knew was Santa. For the girl most likely to change the world, it was humiliating.
Her parents told their neighbors Harley was discovering herself. Privately, they’d counseled her to find a lawyer, not that she or her parents could afford one. Harley’s friends thought she’d finally cracked under the pressure of perfectionism. They’d offered platitudes and shoulders to cry on. Harley had rejected them all. Taylor, Harley’s older brother, had just shaken his head and told her she should have known buildings always came back to straight lines and right angles. That’s how he and their parents approached tile work and life—eyes on the task in front of them—unlike Harley, who was always dreaming.
Without any professional avenues open, Harley had taken a job as a tile installer, a trade her father had taught her growing up. She’d rented a small studio apartment in an almost up-and-coming neighborhood. She kept her head down, away from the clouds. But her eye occasionally drifted toward the architectural elegance of the Houston skyline. And she wondered what she’d do in four years when her non-compete restriction expired. Straightforward lines or curvature that challenged?
In the meantime she lived day-to-day, job-to-job, paycheck-to-paycheck. But the only way she could do that was to have a functioning tile saw.
She stopped at the tool repair shop Vince had mentioned. It was open late because it catered to construction companies. She carried the saw inside.
“Were you in a traffic accident?” Bart, the owner, looked like he’d forsaken years of trips to the barber and opened a running tab at the tattoo parlor next door. He had long brown hair, a haystack beard and line upon line of ink on his arms. “You need to secure your equipment when you drive.”
Harley didn’t care about Bart’s body art, his hair style or his sad attempts at humor. She cared that his hands were nicked and greasy. It meant he was busy making tools go again. “This happened at a job site. Some idiot trashed it.” Because some idiot couldn’t figure out how to make balconies float like clouds. “Can you fix it?”
“Give me two weeks.” Bart stood back, possibly because he’d given customers bad news like this before. Possibly because construction workers could be as volatile as stiffed loan sharks.
Harley fought shoulders that wanted to hunch in defeat and reminded herself that nothing was ever set in stone. There was always another card to play. “How about two days?”
“It’ll cost ya.” Bart’s mouth rolled around before he admitted, “And I might not be able to fix it.”
Harley felt sick. Her hand drifted to her waist. “And when would I know that?”
“When I’m done.” Bart curled his scarred fingers around the handle of her saw, as if preparing to claim it. “No matter what happens, you’d owe me a hundred dollars just for taking it apart. Fixin’ costs extra.”
One hundred dollars and days of uncertainty. Her eye caught on a used tile saw in the corner with a six-hundred-dollar price tag. “What if I sold it to you for parts?”
“I’d give you sixty bucks.”
That’s all? He must have sensed she was desperate.
Harley tried to look like she wasn’t. “How about a hundred?”
Bart shook his head. “I can come up as high as seventy. And even then, I don’t think I’m gonna get seventy dollars’ worth of parts out of it.”
A good, new tile saw would cost around a thousand dollars. Seventy wasn’t going to get her close. And she hated the idea of taking out more credit. What would she do if the truck broke down again?
Harley thanked Bart for his time and lugged the saw back outside.
Her head was pounding. All she wanted was a cold shower and someone to make her dinner.
She thought of Vince and his talent at the grill, of his invitation to his brother’s wedding, of the tenderness of his kiss.
That cold shower. Sadly, it was the only one of her fantasies going to come true tonight.
Tomorrow, however, she might have one more card to play.
* * *
VINCE SAT ON a corner of the deck he’d built yesterday and wondered if he could parlay Harley being unable to go to the wedding into him not going to the wedding, too.
It wasn’t as if he was a beloved favorite son in Harmony Valley. His return might make it hard on his younger brother Joe, the bridegroom, who’d only just begun to earn acceptance in town. He and his brothers had been hellions as teenagers—cutting class, speeding through streets on deafening motorcycles, wearing black leather jackets instead of the school colors. Vince could use his misspent youth and consideration toward Joe’s tentative standing in town as a excuses not to go. But they would only be excuses.
His real motivation for not wanting to go to the wedding? There were things he hadn’t told his brothers. Secrets he’d kept for years about their mother leaving. Those secrets. They sat on his chest when he couldn’t sleep at night, clambering to be free.
Sleep-deprived, Vince blinked at the blazing sun. He had the case of Jerry’s auger motor open and was cleaning the spark plug because the hunk of junk wouldn’t start. Pretty soon, Jerry was going to be wondering why Vince wasn’t setting fence posts. Soon after that, Vince might lose his patience and tell him his equipment sucked. If Jerry took offense to that Vince might admit why he’d applied for a job with Jerry in the first place. After that revelation, it was a toss-up as to whether he’d quit or be fired.
Secrets. They were dangerous to his family’s happiness. Nothing had turned out the way he’d once hoped it would.
He’d left Harmony Valley sixteen years ago, fresh out of high school, determined to find his mother. She’d had a three-year head start, but he recalled she had family somewhere in Texas. He’d needed to know if she was okay and if the decisions he’d made the day she’d left had been the right ones. He’d located her in Sugar Land, Texas, outside of Houston. He’d located her, but he’d never contacted her. Not directly. Though he kept tabs on her all the same...thanks in part to Jerry.
Out front, a truck door creaked and slammed. Harley.
She was trouble. She still saw stars when she gazed at the night sky. She’d earned a degree in architecture, only to give up after what she’d called a colossal failure.
She’d failed once? Boohoo. She needed to learn that life required a strong backbone and the ability to pick yourself up after you got knocked down, no matter how many times it happened.
And yet, looking back, he’d enjoyed his time with her. They’d clicked. After a few weeks of dating, he’d asked her to go to Waco for a weekend. They’d taken the home tour and visited the showrooms of that famous designer. They’d eaten great Tex-Mex. They’d walked along the river and he’d kissed her beneath a rambling oak. And then they’d driven by Baylor University. One conversation thread had led to another and Harley had confessed she’d graduated from Rice in Houston. She was an architect!
She was an architect working as a laborer?
Vince had gotten mad on her behalf. He’d lectured her about how privileged she was to have the opportunity to go to college. He would’ve liked to have been a mechanical engineer, but his high school grades hadn’t been that hot. And Harley had just thrown her chance away? It made no sense.
She’d told Vince he’d never had to stare down the face of ruin, forced to admit defeat. She’d told him to take her home.
And that had been the end of dating Harley O’Hannigan.
Vince shoved the spark plug home. The heat was rising even though it was only midmorning. Digging post holes and setting them in concrete was going to make for a shirt-drenching day. Vince had heard one of the big airlines was hiring aviation techs and mechanics at the airport. Better pay. Better working conditions. But no—
“Vince.” Harley appeared as she always did for a job site—jeans, T-shirt, braid. She carried a bucket with her tiling tools and a manual tile cutter. She set everything down near the outdoor kitchen on the deck, frowning at her next project.
He’d been relieved she’d turned him down for the wedding. After the way things had ended between them, he never should’ve asked her in the first place. “How’s that bump?”
She reached up to touch the back of her head. “Better.”
He resisted the impulse to see for himself. “And how goes the tile saw repair?”
“Worse.” Harley came to sit nearby, a light sheen of sweat on her forehead. “I’ve been thinking about your brother’s wedding.”
The humidity in the air pressed in on Vince.
“Is it a formal affair?” she asked.
“It’s outdoors and I’ll have to wear a suit. Does that qualify as formal?” Whatever the answer was, he hoped she hadn’t reconsidered being his date.
“That’s not too formal.” She smiled the way a woman does just before she says yes to something she isn’t exactly thrilled about agreeing to.
Reflexively, Vince smiled back. And then he remembered he’d changed his mind about taking her.
“Since you’re in a bind—”
“A bind?” Normally, Vince was slow to anger. Not today. Today anger shot through him like nitrous oxide, making him talk faster, grip the auger harder. “I’m a grown man, not some kid looking for a prom date. I can walk into a wedding alone.” Or, even better, not go at all.
She tucked stray strands of golden hair behind her ears and avoided looking at him. “But you did ask me.”
“And you turned me down!” There was no reason that should poke at his pride, but it did, the same as her assuming he was in a dateless bind.
“And now...” Her gaze wound around to meet his and her lips made a slow turn upward. “I want to propose a new deal for us.”
The muggy morning air suddenly became too thick to inhale. Vince was a man, after all, and Harley was a beautiful woman proposing something.
“Go on,” he rasped when he should have said, “No go.”
“I’ll...I’ll be your plus-one—” Harley couldn’t hide the desperation in her voice “—if you fix my tile saw.”
Air moved freely in and out of Vince’s lungs again. This wasn’t a personal proposition. “Couldn’t find anyone to fix it?”
“Not for anything less than the price of my firstborn.”
She was as boxed in as he was.
A part of Vince was intrigued, the way he was always captivated by things not working how they should. The saw wouldn’t be easy to fix. No telling what kind of damage was inside until he took off the outer casing.
Another part of Vince was reminded that he enjoyed Harley’s company, their quick banter, their obvious chemistry. The bargain wasn’t completely out of the question.
He ran a hand through his hair, wondering what their relationship would be like today if they’d never talked about higher education and college degrees.
“Well,” he said gruffly, “we can’t have you selling off your firstborn.”
Harley’s cheeks pinkened from more than the sun and she looked away. “I’d need the saw before we leave on Saturday.”
“That might be a stretch.” It was Tuesday. “What if I need to order parts?”
She considered this with the same deliberation with which she ordered from a menu. “Could they arrive while we’re gone, so you could fix it first thing when we return?”
Again, the feeling that he shouldn’t take her to Joe’s wedding gripped him. Vince fiddled with the screw on the auger motor hood, not looking at her. “Can you really afford to miss a week of work?” That seemed unlikely given she couldn’t afford to repair or replace her saw.
“Jerry owes me a couple days off and I’ve lined up some side jobs.” She’d put thought into this. She hadn’t asked him on a whim.
Unless he had a good reason to retract his offer, he felt honor-bound to take her.
Vince held out his hand for her to shake because he had to keep this on a platonic footing. “I’m paying for transportation, the hotel and food.”
“Okay, but...” Harley hesitated, offering a question in those blue eyes, not a handshake. “Why do you want a wedding date?”
He returned his hand to the auger, unwilling to tell her the truth and latching on to the first idea that came to mind. “There’s this girl, Sarah, from high school—”
“And you broke her heart.” Harley tsked.
He let her assumption stand. “Having a beautiful woman on my arm will keep my visit simple.” On so many levels.
Harley leaned back and surveyed him as if he was a blouse she was considering from the bargain rack. “And you’ll fix my saw?”
“I’ll do my best.”
“Fair enough.” Harley stood and sealed the deal with a businesslike handshake.
Her going complicated things for him.
He just knew it. So it made no sense that he felt like smiling.
CHAPTER THREE (#u997cc1ae-8b72-5849-a261-c339932b624b)
VINCE BOUGHT HARLEY a plane ticket.
He packed a bag that included a dark blue suit, matching socks and tie, dress shoes, and an overly starched white shirt.
He took apart Harley’s tile saw.
Like his head, it was a mess. Bushings. Armature. Casing. All ruined. He spent a lot of time searching online for parts and thinking about the week ahead.
But a little voice kept whispering that this trip was as disastrous as Harley’s tile saw. He didn’t just want her to sell the idea that they were dating. He wanted her to sell the idea that they’d been dating for months. And that would require more than a businesslike handshake. That would require more fence-mending between them. That would require answers to questions she hadn’t asked and hadn’t thought of; ones he didn’t want to deal with.
Intending to get her on board with his plan before they left, Vince picked Harley up at her apartment complex on the east side of Houston. She was waiting out front in a yellow tank top and blue jeans, a small duffel bag and a backpack at her feet. Her hair was in its usual long, blond braid and her blue eyes were covered by sunglasses.
She hopped into the truck with a simple, “Hi,” setting her things on the floorboard and making herself comfortable.
He’d expected at least one suitcase, if not two. And maybe a dress or something a bit more feminine for the trip. It was her day off. Usually on her day off or nights out when she had time to change, Harley wore bright colors, interesting patterns, and often skirts and flouncy dresses. They were on their way to a wedding. It was early, but it was already nearly eighty degrees outside and with the humidity, it felt hotter. Why were her legs covered up? And why was she acting as if they were going to a job site?
“Is there a problem?” Harley asked when he didn’t immediately drive away.
“I was thinking how weird this is.” And he didn’t mean his thoughts dwelling on her legs.
“I don’t have to go.” Her voice was very small and very un-Harley like.
It tugged at him, that voice. She didn’t want to go and he didn’t want to take her. He should offer to buy her a saw and leave her in Houston. He drew a deep breath. “I should have told you I asked you to go to this thing because of my family, who are—”
“Nuts,” she finished for him, shrugging.
Vince’s jaw dropped. An image of his dad leapt to mind.
“Isn’t that what everyone says?” Harley shrugged again and turned her gaze toward the Houston skyline, visible through the smoggy haze.
“I suppose.” Although he never said it. Not even in jest.
“It’ll be fine. I’ll be fine.” She said the words forcefully, as if trying to convince herself.
Vince let the truck idle, his plan stuck in neutral. He felt obligated to let her know what she was walking into. “Before we go, I need to tell you something.”
“If you want to get back together, I’m going to stay here.” She drew herself up and glared at him.
There. That was more like the Harley he knew.
“You’ve been friend-zoned,” she continued. “I don’t think about you that way anymore.”
Ouch. He hadn’t expected that statement to sting. Not even if it was a good thing. “I’m not looking for a commitment with you or anyone else.”
Down the block, a motorcycle accelerated, winding through the gears quickly, as if there was fun to be had ahead.
Vince held on to the truck’s steering wheel with both hands. He hadn’t ridden a bike in ages. “In fact, I’m not the marrying kind.”
His brother Joe was the Messina intent upon promising “till death do we part.”
“Interesting.” Harley crossed her arms over her chest, her gaze cutting from Vince to the skyline once more. “Are we going to the airport or not?”
The motorcycle revved, calling all listeners to the freedom of the open road.
Vince couldn’t remember a time free of responsibilities, even when he was a kid. “Before we go, I need one thing to be clear. My family will expect us—”
“We’re not sleeping together.” Harley moved her hand to the door, as if preparing to jump out.
Ouch. Vince hadn’t expected that to hurt, either.
“The friend-zone isn’t a deal-breaker, so be it.” Her eyes were glued to the skyscrapers downtown, as if she longed to return to her former life as an architect, where everything had been rosy until she’d encountered one bump in the road.
If she thought being an architect was hard, she was learning that construction could be just as demoralizing. There was a price to be paid for every decision you made in life. Best if she learned that now, before she hit thirty.
The motorcycle came into view. One of those colorful Japanese models young guys rode to pop wheelies and do spin-outs and cheat death.
“It’s not a deal-breaker. But this might be.” Vince waited until Harley met his gaze, waited an extra few moments for the feeling that he shouldn’t take her to materialize, but it didn’t. “I was expected to bring a plus-one to the wedding.”
“You say that as if you told your family who to expect.” Her eyes narrowed. “Who was supposed to go with you?”
He couldn’t tell if there was resentment or jealousy in her voice. “They’re expecting the woman I’ve been dating...or, rather the woman who broke up with me last month.”
“I broke up with you last month.” The corner of her mouth twitched up and then just as quickly turned down. “And you never told me you weren’t interested in marriage.”
“It never came up.” And it had never come to mind. They’d had fun together, seemingly without strings. She’d made no mention of settling down. “I like women, but I’m not going to have kids, which means most women either don’t want to date me or date me with the hopes of changing my mind. And when they realize my mind’s made up, they tend to leave. Promptly.”
“It’s a moot point now.” Her words had an impersonal quality, which gave everything away—her desire for a picket fence, her longing for children, her expectation that he might have shared either dream.
But she didn’t get out of the truck.
So far, so good. “Unfortunately my brothers don’t agree with my decision to stay single and childless.”
“Ah, here’s where the nutty part comes in,” she surmised.
“There’s no nutty. Forget the nutty!” Vince took a deep breath and forced himself to speak calmly. “Over the years, I’ve told my brothers I was too busy to come home, citing long hours on the job or an intense relationship” To keep them from delving too deeply into why he stayed in Texas and to discourage them from coming to visit. “Each time they press, I fend them off, this time with a relationship.”
Her slender brows drew together. “Are you telling me you aren’t man enough to confess to your brothers you don’t have a girlfriend?”
She made it sound so cowardly.
He rejected cowardice in favor of practicality and shook his head. “I’m telling you...” His tongue slowed and tried to spin her a lie. “I’m telling you...” Usually, he never stumbled over words, or anything, for that matter. This whole trip was like looking under the hood of a foreign, high-end electric car and not recognizing anything. “I’m telling you that I don’t want my brothers to know I’m single. Everyone is happy with how things are. Your job is to help me keep it that way.”
“You’re such a girl, Messina.” She grinned and slugged his shoulder.
It took Vince a moment for the meaning of her words to sink in. Even then, he wasn’t sure and had to ask, “So you’ll go?”
“I’ll go.” She stretched her legs and put her elbow on the windowsill. “This should be fun.”
Fun? Not hardly. This was survival.
Vince put the truck in gear and headed toward the airport and the wedding, which he was now convinced was as disaster-laden as the combustible oil rig he’d once worked on.
* * *
HARLEY WANTED TO make sure a week spent with Vince would not be fun.
For one thing, she’d packed clothes that were practical, ones she could dress up or dress down. Today, she wore jeans and a tank top because she wanted to reinforce a boundary with Vince—this was a deal, not a date. She shouldn’t have worried. He didn’t talk to Harley much on the flight to California.
She took some of the blame for that. She’d had several restless nights leading up to the trip, worried about bills, her career, and Dan. She’d slept nearly the entire plane ride, as if the farther she went from her old boss and her old life, the more relaxed she became. And when they landed, she’d been in awe. She’d never been out of the South. And California wasn’t the South. Not by a long shot.
In Houston, the buildings were tall and spaced far enough apart you could appreciate their architecture. In San Francisco, the buildings were crammed together and the roads were narrow. She had to crane her neck to see anything.
In the South, you’d leave the city and see miles of rolling hills, towering pines, scrub oak and wide, muddy rivers. In California, you’d barely leave one city, catch a glimpse of a narrow river, a random sheep pasture, or a field of wild grass, and then reach another city.
There were mountains in California and big rolling hills covered with brown grass or green vineyards. Billboards proclaimed wine tasting at the next exit. And the next. And the next. They could have tasted wine all the way to his hometown.
And they might have if they’d been a real couple. If she hadn’t bragged that she had two degrees, they might still be dating. Or not, if Vince had told her he wasn’t interested in having kids. Harley would have considered that as much of a red flag as him assuming a lack of maturity on her part for quitting her profession.
They’d separated before their relationship had had a chance to blossom. It’d been a disappointment to let Vince go and it’d been awkward a time or two at work, but her heart hadn’t broken.
Unfortunately it hadn’t moved on completely, either. This pretense was ridiculous, but it would bring home the fact that she and Vince weren’t destined to be together. Their everyday lives would diverge, just as soon as Harley figured out an acceptable fix to delicate balconies or her four-year clause lapsed. Whichever came first.
They reached Cloverdale and stopped to top off the tank before they drove to Harmony Valley, or what Vince kept calling the middle of nowhere.
“I’ll be right back.” Harley hurried inside the gas station and returned a short time later waving a lottery ticket. “My mother always says you never know when luck is going to find you.” She’d scrounged change from beneath the seat of her truck before they’d left Houston for just such a chance at fortune.
Vince looked as if he thought she should have put her spare change in a bank account. “What does your father say to that?”
“That he got lucky when he found Mom.” Her father may be balding, but he was a true prince. “Do your parents have any funny sayings?”
“Not that I remember.” He steered the rented SUV toward a two-lane road lined with tall eucalyptus. “My dad died when I was in high school.”
“I’m so sorry.” Why hadn’t she known this? The answer lay somewhere between she’d been too busy being flattered that he was interested in her and she hadn’t been curious about his past while she was in his arms. “That must have been hard on everyone. How did your mom take it?”
Vince spared her a hooded glance. “My mom left us before that.”
“Oh, Vince. That’s sad.” She couldn’t imagine her mom leaving the family. “Did she remarry? Did you ever see her again?”
“I found her a couple of years ago.” His voice was flat, as if he was imparting driving directions to the local morgue. “She lives outside Houston. She seems happy.”
Harley angled her knees toward him, prepared to hear all the details. “What did she say when you faced her?”
“I didn’t pursue it. I just found out where she’d been all those years and that was enough.” If Harley had expected him to express hurt or anger with that statement, she’d have been disappointed. There was nothing, not so much as a too rapid eye-blink to indicate his mother’s leaving or location or lack of contact bothered him.
“But...weren’t you curious about why she left? Or why she never looked back?”
“No.” He fell silent, leaving Harley to wonder about his past, his brothers, and what kind of greeting she’d receive as Vince’s girlfriend.
“I’ve been thinking about our relationship,” Harley said. At Vince’s blank look, she added, “You know, our pretend relationship and how we’re going to act in front of others. I say, you can hold my hand every once in a while.”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” Vince took his foot off the gas. “I need more than handholding to throw my brothers a curve ball when they try to get too personal. Besides, no one’s going to believe we’re a couple if there’s no PDA.”
“Why do we need public displays of affection?” Harley crossed her arms over her chest, refusing to be distracted by the cumulus clouds above a hundred-year-old, two-story farmhouse in the middle of a vineyard, or the contrast of straight lines and flowing curves. “People who date have personal boundaries.”
“We didn’t.” He blinked at the road and then at her. “We walked with my arm around you. I kissed you when I wanted to.”
She practically convulsed with shock. “There will be no kissing!” Because, like everything else, Vince was good at it.
“Nobody’s going to believe that we’re a couple if I don’t kiss you.”
“Why?” The butterflies were fluttering in her chest, practically flying in formation to spell Kiss Him. “Butterflies are stupid,” she murmured.
“What?”
Harley gave herself a mental head thunk. She’d have to be on her toes with Vince or she’d be right back to Waco. “Do you have a reputation for kissing girlfriends in public or something?”
“No!” He gave the SUV more gas. “Where do you get your ideas?”
“From you and your prepubescent statements about PDAs.” She needed to find something else to talk about. “Besides, you said you wanted me to come because of the ex-girlfriend.”
“And then I said I needed you because of my brothers.”
Butterflies and memories of kisses aside, teasing Vince was kind of fun. She’d never gotten under his skin when they were dating, except when they’d argued over her quitting architecture. “Why do you think they worry about you?”
“They don’t worry. They have too much time on their hands,” he grumbled, slowing to make a left turn. “They give me grief about every little thing, so I make it a practice to tell them nothing.”
“Giving grief is what brothers do,” she said smartly. “Take that away and they’re like dogs without a bone. Besides, maybe they should worry about you. I bet they didn’t travel halfway across the United States to find a woman and then not make contact with her.”
“You want to talk about questionable decisions?” He raised his dark brows. “I’m not the one who got roughed up by a boyfriend who also broke her means of employment.”
“If Dan hadn’t busted my saw, I wouldn’t be here helping you.” She needed to correct Vince’s assumption about Dan being her boyfriend. “And he—”
“Helping me?” Vince grumbled louder. “That would require kisses.”
She bit her lower lip to keep from smiling. “I’ll tell you what. I’ll kiss your cheek when you fix my saw.”
“Lot of good a chaste peck on the cheek will do me when we’re back in Texas.” He’d turned on a side road and slowed to a crawl. “I ordered the parts. It’s a delicate piece of equipment and I might not be able to resuscitate it.”
They approached a dead-end street to the right. A sign with an arrow pointed toward the Messina Family Garage, which was a two-story, two service-bay building several hundred feet down the road. It looked to have been built in the fifties: straight lines, no gables, a box turned upside down. Behind it was a small, equally boring ranch home.
Across the road from the repair shop was a field with about a dozen cars half hidden by tall grass. A handful of people were poking around. Beyond that was a mowed strip of grass near a bridge. On it sat an odd cluster of things. A Volkswagen made of stacked stone, a rusted swing set and an old yellow tractor with what appeared to be a mermaid made of metal riding a bicycle behind it.
A woman in the field waved to them.
“Is that your family?”
“Yes.” The SUV inched forward as if Vince was having second thoughts. “I could loan you money for the saw in exchange for a well-timed kiss or two.”
“You?” A shout of laughter escaped her lips. “Loan me money?”
“What’s so funny?” He braked and faced her, scowling.
“You’re cheap.”
“How can you say that?” His black eyes flashed and he choked the steering wheel. “I took you to Waco. I’m taking you to California. All expenses paid.”
“You’re cheap.” She’d known he was nice, but she hadn’t realized his ego could be so easily bruised. She couldn’t stop smiling. “The first time we went out, we went to a bar and left when happy hour was over.”
“We went after work.” His expression darkened, brows dropping thunderously low. “And first dates aren’t supposed to last more than a few hours.”
“You never brought me flowers. I thought guys your age always brought flowers and wine when a woman cooked for them.” She wasn’t pulling any punches in defense of her No Kissing policy. “And we went places like the art gallery on free entry day and the farmers market, also free. Plus, in Waco, we stayed in one of those budget motels out by the highway.”
“That was the only hotel that had rooms available!” He was practically howling with anger. “And sue me for wanting to go places where we could talk. Maybe that’s more important to someone my age than paying to have someone sit next to me during a movie without learning anything about them.”
“I’m not saying I didn’t like going places and talking to you.” Her smile threatened to slip, because apparently she’d been yakking about herself the entire time they were together without paying attention to him. “I’m just saying—”
“And I decided not to buy you flowers the one time I came to your place for dinner because there was an accident on the interstate and I was running late!” He huffed like a winded bull unsure if he was done seeing red.
She reached over and pressed a hand to his arm, as if to say she understood. They hadn’t exchanged enough words between them in the past, at least, not about his past or a vision of his future. “I see where you’re coming from now. Thank you for offering to buy me a saw, but I can’t accept.” She’d get through this rough patch, even if it took her four years of tile work to do so.
All eyes in the field were pointed their way. Thankfully, with the windows rolled up and the air conditioner on, his family probably hadn’t heard a word of their conversation.
Vince sighed. “I could turn around and put you on a plane home.”
“I’d be willing to bet when we get to the airport you’d hop on the plane with me.” Whatever was bothering Vince about coming home, he needed to face it, just as she needed to continue to try to solve the balcony conundrum.
“You picked a bad time to be right.” Vince parked in a space at the garage. Three tables and several chairs were set up, as if there’d been a lot of outdoor eating going on. “Since you’re a city girl, be prepared for questions about you and about us, and not just from my family.”
She’d forgotten she was touching him. Her hand dropped away. “If not your family, then who?”
“Only the entire town.” He gave her a stern look. “And don’t go telling them I’m cheap.”
“You’re such a girl, Messina.” It needed to be said.
“You won’t think it’s so funny when reality hits.” He glanced over his shoulder toward the field. “They’ll want to know everything about you... About us.”
“I’ll stick to the truth as much as possible.” What was he so worried about? Impulsively she stroked his thick, silky hair from crown to neck, the way she used to when they’d been dating. “It’ll be okay.”
He didn’t look so sure.
“Let’s have a code word,” she said, still feeling protective. “You know, if things start to get out of control, let’s say something like ‘It’s getting hot in here.’ And that’s our cue to make our excuses and leave.”
“Good idea.”
Someone in the field shouted his name.
Harley twisted around. “What are they doing over there?”
“Hauling junkers away, preparing the space for the ceremony. They’ll expect us to help.”
“It’s getting hot in here.”
Vince laughed.
She’d missed his laughter. It was deep and hearty and settled stray butterflies.
“Here they come.” Vince got out of the SUV, as somber and stoic as if they were going to face a zombie apocalypse.
Harley smiled. For the first time since agreeing to be Vince’s date, Harley thought she might actually have fun at this wedding.
CHAPTER FOUR (#u997cc1ae-8b72-5849-a261-c339932b624b)
THE CLOSER VINCE had come to Harmony Valley, the more he’d wanted to turn around.
Harley’s joking banter had helped, but she couldn’t keep him from falling into the past, not when he stood on the property he’d grown up on.
He’d learned to ride a bike on that driveway, with Mom running beside him. He’d learned to throw a football in that field, with Mom cheering him from the sidelines. And then there’d been the milestones she’d missed. His driver’s test. Prom. Graduation.
It’d been worse for Joe, who’d been younger, the baby of the family Mom had doted on. If Joe knew where Mom was, he’d be thrown off-kilter. He might try to contact Mom. Both of them might be hurt. The Messina family was in a safe place. Why rock the boat? Mama drama was the last thing Joe needed just days before his wedding.
“Gosh, the Messina boys are big,” Harley said, standing next to Vince.
His brothers sprinted across the field toward Vince, whooping and hollering as if they were in their teens not their thirties.
Gabe slammed into him first, wrapping his arms around Vince and lifting him a couple inches off the ground. He was a mountain of a man with the strength and rigid posture gained from years in the military. But not even the Marines could wipe away the mischievous gleam in his eyes. “Vince!” He dropped Vince back on his feet. “How many years has it been?”
“Almost six.” That’s when they’d gathered for Joe’s first wife’s funeral in Los Angeles.
Joe hugged Vince with a set of hearty backslaps. He was clearly the runt of the family. He’d never filled out the way Vince and Gabe had. “It’s been too long, brother.”
“It has been,” Vince agreed, feeling some of his misgivings evaporate. He attributed it to the lack of humidity in the air, and two family members happy to see him.
“And who have we here?” Gabe claimed Harley’s hand and kissed it.
She laughed and Vince felt a stab of something he didn’t recognize in his chest.
He made the introductions, saving Harley’s hand from Gabe’s because she’d said she didn’t like PDA and probably wouldn’t like it from his come-on-too-strong brother. “Watch out for Gabe. He used to steal my clothes and my girlfriends.”
Harley’s cheeks turned a soft shade of pink.
Vince didn’t let go of her hand. Totally because of appearances.
A pint-size girl wearing dirt-stained coveralls crashed into Vince’s chest next. “Uncle Vince!” His niece Samantha grinned up at him. Her hair was dark brown and just as short as the last time he’d seen her. But instead of looking as if Joe had hacked it with sheep shearers, it was stylishly cut and straightened.
If she was styling her hair, the next step was wearing makeup, talking to boys, and refusing to do oil changes because it wrecked her manicure. “Sam, don’t grow anymore.”
Samantha shushed him. Her cheeks turned a brighter shade of pink than Harley’s. “You’re embarrassing me.” She glanced furtively at a dark-haired teenage boy, who looked to be about thirteen and was staring at Sam the way Sam had once stared at the stuffed beagle Vince had given her when her mother died.
Vince exchanged a quick what-the-heck glance with Joe, who gave him a subtle calm-down gesture.
“And here’s the other love of my life.” Joe introduced his fiancée. “Brittany.”
Vince’s soon-to-be sister-in-law had a thick mane of brown hair with golden highlights, a wide smile that sparkled, and natural makeup. Like Sam, she also wore smudged coveralls. This was no high-maintenance female, even though she ran the town’s beauty salon.
Vince liked Brittany immediately. “Welcome to the family.” He hugged her warmly.
“Call me Brit.” Joe’s bride-to-be inched out of Vince’s hug. “Joe, why do all your brothers have such gorgeous manes?” She ran her fingers through Vince’s hair.
Vince jolted backward until Brit’s hands fell away. “It’s getting hot in here.”
Harley laughed, no help at all.
“Hey, honey, your hands should only be in my hair.” But Joe laughed and added, “And that of your paying clients, of course.”
Harley was still chuckling, ignoring Vince’s SOS, which he decided to excuse when she reclaimed his hand. “Their hair is unreal, isn’t it, Brit?”
“Times three.” Brit ignored Joe’s warning and ruffled Gabe’s hair. “I’m a hairdresser. It’s hard not to touch it.”
“I don’t see what all the fuss is about,” Vince said, meaning it. They all had thick, black hair. So what? Joe’s hair was a bit too long for a man about to be married and Gabe’s was military short. Vince’s was somewhere in between.
“Who cares?” Gabe leaned over to give Brit better access to his scalp. “I could get used to this.”
“Don’t,” Joe said firmly, tugging Brit away from his oldest brother. “I draw the line at making Gabe happy. He teased me mercilessly when we were kids.”
“Oh, Shaggy Joe.” Brit snuggled close to Joe the way Harley had snuggled close to Vince when they were in Waco. “I love your hair best.”
Vince glanced down at Harley, which wasn’t far considering how tall she was. “I think you should limit your hands to my hair, too.” His words came out low and intimate. He might just as well have been saying, You should limit your lips to mine, too.
Harley got the message. She tried to ease away, but Vince held on. To her hand. To her gaze.
“Dear brothers, stop with the googly eyes.” Gabe turned toward the field, looking like he was on duty. “Come on, Sam. When Brit calls your dad Shaggy Joe, it’s time to vacate the premises.”
“Googly eyes are disgusting.” Sam pulled a face.
“Gabe’s complaining about googly eyes?” Vince taunted good-naturedly. “He’s lucky Harley and I don’t make out right now.”
Harley made a disapproving noise. “You’re impossible.”
For show, Vince smiled fondly at Harley. No kisses? Yeah, he’d make her pay a little for that.
His wedding date huffed and crossed her arms over her chest.
“Brad.” Gabe shook his finger at the teenage boy. “If I ever catch you looking with googly eyes at my niece, I’m going to drop you off that bridge.”
Sam gasped and glared at Gabe.
“Why would you say that?” She hissed like an angry cat. “Why?”
“Because I’m your uncle and I love you.” Gabe gave her a devilish grin cut from the same cloth as Vince’s.
“I will never.” Sam raised her hands heavenward. “Look at anyone. Like. That.”
Vince had a feeling Sam would eat those words someday.
Still grumbling, Vince’s teenage niece took off running. Sam’s admirer joined her as she raced past him. Gabe plodded behind them at his own pace.
“Joe, don’t give that boy an inch with Sam.” Vince nodded toward the young pair. “She’s too young to be interested in boys.”
“Brad knows what the rules are and respects them, unlike Gabe at that age.” Joe grinned and it was like looking in a mirror, except for his eyes. Joe was the only Messina who had their mother’s blue eyes. “I hope those are clothes you can get dirty, because we could use an extra pair of hands.”
Vince took stock of his blue jeans and polo shirt, as well as Harley’s similarly casual attire. “We’re good. Are you hooking cars up to the tow truck and taking them somewhere?”
“One at a time?” Joe shook his head. “That would cost a fortune in gas. We found a scrap hauler willing to take the rest away with a double-decker semi-trailer. He comes tomorrow.”
“The rest?” Harley shaded her eyes for a better view. “How many cars are there?”
“Joe already got some running and sold them.” Brit started walking, beckoning Harley to join her. Next to Brit, Harley looked like a beanpole, as if she lacked curves.
So not true.
Harley’s curves were subtle, like her personality.
“We just need to clear the debris between the cars and the road,” Brit was saying. “And then tow them into a line them up on the edge of the pavement for the hauler to take them away.”
“That sounds easy,” Harley said without having any clue how labor intensive it really was.
Vince and Joe fell into step behind the women.
“It would go so much faster if my soon-to-be wife wouldn’t have to look at every piece of debris.” Joe wasn’t fooling anyone with his complaint. His tone was indulgent.
“I’m an upcycle artist.” Brit sniffed and tossed her head. “When I’m not doing hair, junk sculpture is my life.”
“You did the mermaids?” Harley pointed to a sculpture of a mermaid on a bicycle above the service bays.
Vince followed the direction of Harley’s finger.
Designed in metal and painted bright green, the mermaid rode on a red, white and blue surfboard above the service bay doors. There was another mermaid on the grass near the bridge.
“Yep,” Brit said cheerfully. “Mermaids are my thing. You should see the one in my beauty salon. Kiera is my masterpiece.”
Vince couldn’t stop staring at the repair shop. He couldn’t look away. His steps slowed. The sun disappeared behind a cloud.
It should run! It should run! Dad’s freaked-out voice. His silhouette seemed to move through the empty service bay, pacing.
It’ll be all right. Mom’s shadow was close at his heels. Let’s try it again, Vince.
“The place is different now,” Joe said quietly, having stopped beside Vince. “We’ve made changes. It doesn’t feel as if it was ever his.”
His. Their father’s. A man plagued by voices in his head.
“And there’s no trace of her here, either,” Joe said resentfully.
Her. Their mother. A woman who’d spent years trying to make peace with her husband’s many moods to shelter her children from instability, until she became unstable herself.
Vince acknowledged Joe’s comment with a grunt, the only sound he was capable of making.
They moved even with the house. This time it wasn’t a gloomy shadow Vince felt but the icy hand of guilt. His actions had left their family without a reliable parent.
“We’re remodeling the house.” Joe’s words rang with pride. “We tore down interior walls, ripped out all the flooring and removed everything in the bathrooms. You wouldn’t recognize it.”
Oh, Vince bet he would.
He bet he could mark an X on the spot where Dad had his after-work meltdowns. Or stand in the kitchen where Mom would smoke with the window open, hoping Dad didn’t notice the tinge of nicotine in the air.
Vince walked faster.
“Sam and I are living in the apartment above the garage until the house is done.” Joe stopped Vince with a hand on his arm. “I’m saving to buy you out.”
They stood in front of Vince’s old bedroom window. There was a reason nothing had ever grown beneath that sill. After dark, he and Gabe had used it as their own personal entrance.
“You don’t have to pay me.” The three brothers had inherited the property. Vince didn’t want anything from Harmony Valley.
“I can’t give you top dollar.” Joe set his chin the way he had when he was a kid and Vince had told him to go away. “This place was a wreck when we got here. Any value in it is coming directly from my pocket.”
“Keep your money. I don’t need it.”
“Say what you want. There’s a check coming your way.” Joe walked on, back stiff with all his honorable intentions.
If Joe had gone to Texas, he’d have done things differently. He’d have showed up at their mother’s door, introduced himself and told her off.
Vince lingered behind, taking in the property, the small house, the modest business, the cluttered field. Joe might believe things looked different now.
To Vince, things looked exactly the same.
* * *
“HOW ARE YOU holding up?” Vince asked Harley hours after they’d started.
He crossed the trampled paths they’d created to get the cars out, looking attractively scruffy.
Harley’s butterflies threatened to return.
Vince was eye candy. Not checkout-stand eye candy. Nothing that low quality. No. Vince was like the big Easter eggs Harley’s mother bought once a year from the gourmet chocolate shop. When Harley was a kid, she’d thought the fist-size eggs would be filled with more chocolate or thick cream. But, no, they’d been hollow. And so was Vince, carrots aside.
He wanted to project an image that wasn’t real to the people he should have been closest to. That was something she shouldn’t forget.
“Let’s take a break,” he said.
Vince stopped in front of Harley and peered at her face the way a doctor once had after she’d gotten a concussion trying to play basketball. That concussion had her sitting the rest of the season. Not that Harley considered that a failure. Being on the team had made her well-rounded on her college applications. She didn’t need or want playing time. She’d learned her lesson. Playing was dangerous.
Vince, with his thought-stealing kissing talent, supreme good looks and thought-stealing kissing talent—yes, it needed to be said twice—was dangerous. Harley knew about head-spinning danger. She was staying on the bench.
Vince took Harley’s hand and led her toward the garage, dragging her along like a small anchor behind a big boat. “We’ll check in.”
“I’ll go with you.” Gabe fell into step next to Harley, as energetic as an over-sugared fifth-grader.
“Gabe, it’s five. Harley’s tired and she’s a guest of ours.” It was Vince who sounded tired, no doubt worn out by his emotional homecoming.
Harley had seen how Vince’s gaze shadowed sometimes when he looked at his family’s garage. “I’m fine, but we can go if you like.”
“Harley?” Vince quirked an eyebrow. “You just told me you’re tired, didn’t you?”
She’d forgotten their scam, having been too busy thinking about his thought-stealing kissing talent. “Yeah. Sure.”
“I’m feeling a bit weary, too,” Gabe said, still his happy-go-lucky self.
“I just want to spend some time alone with my girlfriend,” Vince snapped. “Is that too much to ask?”
“Well, now I feel selfish.” Brit stopped inspecting an old car nearby and frowned at them. “I’m a bridezilla without realizing it. There’s just so much to do around here for the wedding and the house.”
“It’s okay,” Harley said. “I don’t mind helping.” That was no lie.
The Messinas were fun to be around. Brad and Sam danced about like puppies who didn’t understand exactly why they liked each other. Gabe wielded verbal volleys, taking shots at everyone, including Harley. The bride and groom snuck sweet kisses when they thought no one was looking. And through it all, they treated Harley as if she was one of their own.
“I think you guys should get going,” Gabe said unexpectedly. “In fact, I’ll make reservations at El Rosal for you. My treat.” He tugged a cell phone out of his pocket. “And while you eat, I can make sure your reservation is ready at the B and B.”
Vince tried to topple Gabe with a suspicious stare, but his brother didn’t fold.
“That’s very thoughtful of you.” Harley moved into peace-keeping mode.
“Gabe isn’t thoughtful,” Vince grumbled.
“Maybe I was selfish when I was younger and you outshone me with your huge talent underneath the hood.” An angel would have believed Gabe’s sincerity. He looked that earnest. “But I’m a changed man today.”
Vince scoffed.
“What do you do for a living, Harley?” Again, Gabe’s tone was innocuous. His smile that of an angel.
“She’s an architect,” Vince said before Harley could tell Gabe she was a tile installer. Vince gave Harley a look that telegraphed Let me handle this.
“How did you meet an architect working on an oil rig?” Gone was the angel. Gabe looked and sounded more like a hound dog on the trail of a fox.
“Vince doesn’t work on an oil rig anymore.” Harley pretended she was unable to translate Vince’s Morse code. Stick to the truth. Wasn’t that what they’d agreed? “I met him on a job site.”
They’d reached the parking lot.
“I’m working as a carpenter now,” Vince said through stiff lips.
Harley couldn’t fathom why he wouldn’t want his family to know about his job change or why he hadn’t told her his occupation was on a need-to-know basis. This was about his status quo, not hers.
They reached the door to the repair garage’s office.
“Brother, why don’t you use the shop sink to wash up?” Gabe opened the door and pointed to the stairs. “I’ll show Harley the second-floor facilities.”
Vince’s eyes narrowed.
“Sounds good,” Harley said, moving upstairs. Part of her role here was to stop Vince’s brothers from pestering him. A little distance between the siblings was called for.
The door at the top of the stairs led to a small, homey apartment with a galley kitchen. The kitchen table and living room furniture weren’t stylish retro, they were just old, yet well cared for. Three doors faced her. Two were closed. The open door revealed the bathroom. Harley went in and cleaned up.
When she emerged, Gabe was standing in front of the TV stand that didn’t have a TV. Instead family photos graced the top. He set one back down.
“I don’t want you to take this wrong.” Gabe sounded a lot like Harley’s protective older brother Taylor—overly confident and a tad self-important. Both characteristics were softened by Gabe’s unabashedly friendly smile. “I like you, but I know you aren’t dating my brother.”
Harley’s shoulders pinched in a near flinch at his assessment. She didn’t like lying, but she’d made an agreement with Vince to pretend they were dating. And there was just something about Gabe’s accusation that raised her competitive hackles. She’d never liked losing to Taylor, not in checkers and not in verbal chess.
“Really?” Harley forced out a chuckle and crossed the room to study the framed photo Gabe had been looking at. “Present your case, counselor.”
Gabe rubbed his hands together, clearly pleased that Harley hadn’t taken offense.
“First off, there’s your age difference. How old are you?” Not only did Gabe have no filter, he had no sense of boundaries. If it wasn’t for his good-natured demeanor, he would’ve been annoying. “I’m guessing twenty-four?”
“I’m almost twenty-seven.” Harley bent for a closer look. The photo Gabe had set down was of the three teenage Messina boys straddling motorcycles. An older man stood behind them with the same thick, dark hair and lady-killer grin as the boys. Their father? Harley leaned closer, taking in Vince’s multicolored striped shirt that seemed too short, blue jeans that seemed too long, and a grin that seemed too wide.
“When I was twenty-three, I dated a girl who said she was eighteen.” Gabe watched Harley closely, a spider patiently studying the fly. “Her daddy came after me with a shotgun.”
“Well, if we’re challenging each other’s relationships, I’d like to see the scars on your backside.” Harley straightened and laughed, more genuinely this time. “Are you implying I’m too young for Vince?”
“I think I’m spinning it the other way around.” He waggled his dark brows.
Harley shook her head. “Nice try, but seven years isn’t that big of a deal.”
“Sweetheart, it’s nearly eight years.” Gabe flashed a troublemaking grin. “More in dog years.”
“Clearly, it makes no difference to us.” Harley rolled her eyes. Gabe could have been cloned from the same genes as her brother.
“Clearly, there’s no zing between you two.” Gabe’s grin didn’t dim. “I’m only challenging your claim because we had a rough childhood and I feel responsible for my younger brother. You know, protective.”
“Pfft.” Gabe was more transparent than a new window in an old house. “You and Joe have a bet.”
Gabe’s eyes widened and then he began to laugh and nod. “Yep. Joe and I have a bet. Joe says you’re legit.”
Harley wanted to put Gabe in his place. And the only way she could think of doing it was to mention something personal about Vince, something he’d only tell a girlfriend, not an acquaintance. “Was this photo taken after your mother left for Texas?”
His smile disappearing faster than a cockroach on a midnight raid in the kitchen. “What did you say?”
Too late, Harley realized Vince must not have told his brothers about his mother’s location.
Vince opened the door, not looking like a man happy to see his girlfriend. No doubt, his expression would turn thunderous if Gabe asked about their mother.
The smart move would be to smile and make her escape, nose in the air. But then, nothing Harley had done this summer had been smart.
Instead she crossed the room, latched onto the collar of Vince’s polo shirt and kissed him hard.
CHAPTER FIVE (#u997cc1ae-8b72-5849-a261-c339932b624b)
“I THOUGHT YOU said you wanted a kiss.” Harley’s nose was out of joint. She pushed through the door to El Rosal, Harmony Valley’s Mexican restaurant, without waiting for Vince to open it. “I gave you one. End of discussion.”
Vince followed Harley inside, past a chalkboard posting early bird specials. He glanced over his shoulder to watch Gabe walking across the town square toward the Lambridge Bed and Breakfast. What was his fun-loving, meddlesome brother up to now?
Something had happened between his brother and Harley upstairs. Gabe’s good-humored bluster had been deflated. He’d ridden in the back of Vince’s rented SUV to the restaurant in near silence. Gabe was never silent. And with his brother’s mouth on mute, Vince couldn’t fully enjoy Harley’s kiss.
She’d claimed him with that kiss, branding his lips in a way that still burned.
Oh, something had happened between Gabe and Harley, all right. And good or bad, Vince had benefitted from it.
Harley had grabbed him, then released him and marched out of the apartment. Vince had followed in the same stilted way a mummy followed its master.
The shock was wearing off. Or maybe it was the loud, bustling atmosphere in El Rosal.
The restaurant’s walls, tables and chairs were painted in primary colors: bright reds, yellows, blues and greens. The flat-screen television mounted above the bar was tuned to a muted baseball game. Pop music sung in Spanish filled the air. It wasn’t even five thirty, but the restaurant was packed, primarily with white-haired patrons, many of them having conversations at a volume that indicated their hearing aids might not be switched on.
Over a decade ago, the grain mill in town had exploded and the company subsequently shut down. Being Harmony Valley’s primary employer, jobs had dried up and with it businesses had closed their doors. Younger families had moved to find jobs and new opportunities. Older residents had hunkered down and stayed in their homes.
Now there was a new local employer, a small but growing winery. According to Joe, the bulk of the population was still over the age of sixty. And here was the proof. White-haired patrons dining on early bird specials.
A waitress led Harley to a table by the plate-glass window looking out on the town square and its lone oak tree.
She dropped into a yellow chair and hid behind the menu.
Vince sat across from Harley, studying the long, limp hair hooked behind her ears. She hadn’t looked this tired when she’d gone upstairs to clean up. “What did Gabe say that upset you? Whatever it was, I’ll talk to him.” Which was polite brother speak for an exchange of punches.
“Nothing.” Her blue eyes flashed over the top of the menu. “I let him get under my skin. The jet lag is catching up to me.”
He wasn’t sure he believed her, but something, almost like relief, allowed Vince to draw a deep breath, to pick up the menu, to realize he was hungry.
“You’ll want the mole chicken tacos.” An elderly woman who could stand-in for Mrs. Claus sat at the next table. She had thick, round glasses and thick, round curls.
She seemed vaguely familiar, but so did over half the restaurant patrons.
Across from her, an elderly Japanese man shook his finger at Vince in a friendly way. “I know you. You’re one of the Messina boys.”
“Yes. I’m Vince.” Vince braced himself for a chilly reception, having left town with a less-than-stellar reputation.
Mrs. Claus gasped and adjusted her glasses, squinting at him. “I should have known from all that black hair.” She reached across the aisle and gripped Vince’s hand as if she was happy to see him. “I used to admire how you handled a motorcycle.”
Vince didn’t know what to say. The compliment was unexpected.
“Not me,” the old man said, not at all embarrassed to admit it. “Don’t you remember how they’d speed through town, Mildred? Motors so loud it hurt your ears.”
Mildred tsked. “I suppose you don’t remember how I used to speed through town and up Parish Hill, either.” Mildred released Vince with a sigh. “The worst thing about getting old has been losing my eyesight and giving up driving. I miss burning rubber coming out of second gear.”
“Mildred Parsons?” The name suddenly clicked. She’d been a race car driver in her youth, one of the few adults to earn the respect of the Messina boys.
“Yes.” When Mildred smiled, the resemblance to the mythical Mrs. Claus increased. “And this is my beau, Hero Takata.”
Vince aimed a good-natured finger back at the man. “Old Man Takata?” The man who used to own the cemetery? The man who’d buried Dad?
“Some still call me by that name.” Hero smiled, bringing wrinkles to an otherwise ageless-looking face. “I’m older today than I was when I yelled at kids like you for running across my grass.”
Old Man Takata had lived on a corner down the street from the town square, a house located between the school and the ice cream parlor. Of course, kids wanted to cut the corner.
“Is this your wife?” Mildred blinked at Harley, but in a way that created doubt as to whether or not she actually saw her. “Do you have children? A little cousin for Sam to play with?”
“No,” Vince blurted. “No on all counts.”
Harley slanted a gaze at him that disapproved, folded her menu, and said, “I’m his date for the wedding.”
The boundaries that came along with her tone riled something inside Vince, and made him want to refute her statement. Which only went to prove that Harmony Valley was getting under his skin exactly like Gabe had gotten under Harley’s.
“Spoken like a woman who doesn’t need a man.” Mildred did a sort of snuffle-chuckle. “Bravo. What’s your name, my dear?”
Harley introduced herself.
The waitress brought Hero’s change and Mildred’s walker, which she unfolded and set between their two tables.
“Vince,” Hero said, dropping his change into his wallet. “Don’t take this personally, but I’ll report you if I see you speeding.”
Joe had mentioned how hard it was to be accepted by the town, but Vince hadn’t believed people would be so blatant about it. He felt the beginnings of a headache.
“Hero will only see you if you speed down Main.” Mildred stood, staring in the general direction of Vince’s face. “I’ll see Harley at the bridal shower, and we’ll see you two at the Couples Dinner.” And then her gaze swiveled toward Harley. “We’ll beat you, of course.”
Harley smiled in polite confusion. The subtleties of her expression probably went unnoticed by Mildred.
The server was waiting for her order, smiling patiently at her elderly guests as if Hero had given her a good tip.
Hero got to his feet with the aid of a cane. “They’ll have the mole chicken tacos, Leti.”
The couple moved slowly toward the door.
Leti disappeared into the kitchen.
“I think we’re having the mole chicken tacos,” Vince said, realizing their menus were gone. “Welcome to Harmony Valley.”
“I think we should talk about the Couples Dinner.” A grin twitched one corner of Harley’s cheek. “It’s a competition?”
“We can assume it won’t be a dancing one,” Vince said, nodding toward the elderly couple moving slowly down the sidewalk.
“Or a mudder.” Harley seemed to notice there was chips and salsa on the table, and dove in. “What is a Couples Dinner?”
“This is the first I’ve heard of it.” Vince managed to insert a chip into the salsa bowl she was hoarding. “The good news is Gabe won’t be there, seeing as how he doesn’t have a date for the wedding.”
“I heard the Messina boys were back in town.” An elderly man with shoulders bowed forward leaned on their table with gnarled, age-spotted hands. He wore a wrinkled burgundy-checked flannel shirt, sleeves buttoned at his wrists, and smelled like he could use a shower or his clothes a washing. “Are you right in the head?”
Vince choked on his bite of chip. The rest of it crumpled to the table.
“If not, we don’t want you here.” The old man pushed off and wobbled backward. “Had enough of that with your father. He jumped me in a bar fight once. No warning. Just pow.”
Because of the shock, Vince couldn’t speak. He couldn’t move. He could only watch the old man shuffle away.
“Are you okay?” Harley switched chairs so that she sat next to him. She slid her hand to the nape of his neck. “Breathe in, breath out, remember? What was that about?”
Vince drank half the water in his glass before he attempted to speak. “My dad...” His voice sounded like sandpaper on metal. “My dad...”
He didn’t want to tell her.
“Drink some more.” Her hand shifted lower, rubbing across his shoulder blades. “But don’t rush it.” A minute passed, maybe longer.
He wanted to lean into her touch. He wanted to get up and run away without explaining.
One thought coalesced: it was a mistake to have brought her here.
With every greeting, with every event, his past was catching up to him. And Harley, as witness, was curious and wanting answers.
On some level, he supposed he owed her some.
“My dad had schizophrenia.” His words came out drenched in emotion and vulnerability, when he wanted to be detached and strong. He couldn’t meet her gaze, but he couldn’t stop speaking, either. “And depression. He was diagnosed late in life. That man...” Whoever he was. “He could have been referencing a time before Dad was diagnosed.” Or not. There was no magic solution for mental health challenges.
“I’m sorry.”
“I don’t want your pity.” There was the strong, detached tone he’d been looking for. Inappropriate now.
“I wasn’t offering pity.” Harley’s hand dropped away. She moved back into her chair. “I’m sorry your dad had mental health issues. And I’m sorry that man was rude to you.”
Harley was compassionate. Genuine. And the first to give the benefit of the doubt.
“That was...rude of me,” Vince said, struggling to find words when he was unaccustomed to explaining himself. “I didn’t have my guard up and he got to me. I took it out on you. I’m the one who should apologize.” And he did.
She stared at him a little too long, not smiling. Earlier in the summer, he would have held her gaze with a hint of a smile and then coaxed a smile out of her. He would have reached for her hand and drawn her close. He’d always felt better when she was near.
“I understand,” Harley said.
Vince wasn’t sure she did.
* * *
THE LAMBRIDGE BED AND BREAKFAST was a large, beautiful, Queen Anne Victorian home painted green with cream colored shutters.
Harley took in the large front porch, dominant Dutch gables, and asymmetrical façade. The kind of straight-lined architecture built to endure generations of family disagreements, brutal storms and intense heat.
Vince had endured much the same. He’d weathered family gales and ill winds from the community. Given his mom had left her family and his father had braved mental illness, was it any wonder he had no interest in getting married and having children?
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Melinda Curtis
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современные любовные романы
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: This bachelor′s pretend girlfriend just made a shocking discovery – She′s pregnant!Although they only dated for a month, Harley O′Hannigan just agreed to be Vince Messina′s plus-one at a Harmony Valley wedding. Big mistake, given her deepening feelings for the tall, dark, unavailable bachelor. And what about Vince′s long-buried family history? Then there′s the growing secret that could transform this pretend relationship into the real thing…