Page 25 of Save the Last Dance (Take the Backroads #1)

Chapter Ten

“ Y ou sure you don’t want a hand?” Mack looked back and forth between his niece and her classmate.

The two girls had politely accepted the wagon full of spray paint cans and twine to mark off their maze, but they seemed more than ready to be left alone to do their work.

“Won’t you have to do a lot of measuring to be sure you don’t get off track with the dimensions?

” Nina studied the image of the proposed maze on Rachel’s tablet.

She’d dropped by the fairgrounds to meet with the Harvest Fest committee earlier about the food and had stayed through the afternoon to help out with an assortment of chores that needed to be taken care of before the festival began on Friday. “It seems like this will take forever.”

Ally shook her head while the other girl, Rachel, stepped forward.

“I’m texting the final layout to a bunch of our friends.” She held up her phone for proof. “I superimposed a grid on the image and we’ll each take a section to work on. It should come together pretty quickly that way since all the measurements are on each portion of the image.”

“Cool.” Ally leaned closer to the girl’s phone to check it out. “What friends?”

Did Ally sound nervous, or was Mack just paranoid after the girl’s episode at work? He’d watched his mother for signs of mood shifts for so long that it was second nature. He glanced toward Nina, looking to see if she was thinking along the same lines.

And since when had he fallen right back in synch with her?

“Anyone from math class with a car.” Rachel shrugged, scrolling through screens on her phone. “You know, Brad, Davy, Ethan?—”

“He’s in your phone, too?” Ally asked.

Definitely nervous. Nina glanced his way, her look telling him she’d heard the tension, too.

“Girls, the maze is going to be spectacular.” Nina passed the tablet back to Rachel. “Ally, can I talk to you for just one quick second before we go?

When Ally appeared unsure, Mack asked Rachel about the maze design to distract her.

But the girl came to life, firing off references to European labyrinths and math formulas he’d forgotten as soon as he finished college.

His head hurt by the time Nina and Ally were done with their private chat.

Rachel Wagoner finished her lesson by telling him to look up the Hollywood Stone because of his family’s Irish connections.

As he and Nina walked away from the girls, he heard Ally asking Rachel which piece of the grid she should take so they could begin painting. His niece seemed okay today. Grounded.

He wished he could say the same about himself. He turned his attention to the woman beside him, a woman who was still tying him up in knots half the time.

He and Nina continued along the perimeter of the fairgrounds toward the manmade pond where there would be cardboard boat races over the weekend.

“You have time for me to give you a rowboat tour?” Mack pointed to the assortment of vessels along the shore of the pond.

There were two pedal boats and two rowboats.

“You can fill me in on the finalized food service plans. And you can tell me what Ally said in that secret conversation you just had with her.”

“Of course.” Nina glanced over her shoulder toward the girls. “I feel guilty I haven’t made it a point to visit Ally before now. Bethany had asked me to, but I didn’t realize how much the girl needed a friend or I would have made it my top priority.”

“Was Ally upset just now? I got the sense she didn’t want Rachel to have anything to do with Ethan Brady.” He halted as they reached the water’s edge, hoping like hell Ally was going to be okay.

How did parents cope with that kind of stress? He had no idea how Scott dealt with all the pressures of being a parent plus the knowledge that his daughter would face some of the same battles their mother had.

“Me, too.” Nina slipped out of her low heeled leather boots while Mack checked the boat over.

She climbed in while he pushed it into the water.

He smiled to himself, enjoying the simple ways they still worked in harmony.

Conversations might be awkward. And the dance they were doing around the sensual chemistry was definitely a cautious interaction, but he’d be an idiot to deny the connection between them.

They’d shared all their hopes and dreams at one time.

You didn’t just forget that experience. He’d never opened his heart to anyone as much as he had to her.

No matter how much he’d loved Jenny, he’d already been burned.

He’d been more defensive. Less apt to share the same kind of stuff about himself that he’d shared with Nina because she’d been his best friend before she was his girlfriend.

“So what did you say to Ally? Do you think she’s…okay?”

“I just gave her a heads-up that she was wearing her heart on her sleeve as far as Ethan was concerned. I wanted to let her know because I didn’t think he and Rachel were an official couple.

” Nina put a hand in the water, letting her fingertips glide along the surface while he stepped into the boat.

“Also, I reminded her I’d love to get together any time she wanted to talk or bake or just hang out…

” She shrugged. “I doubt she’ll take me up on it, but I wanted to at least put it out there. ”

“That was nice of you.” Mack dipped the oars in the water and powered them forward, appreciating the workout since he hadn’t found enough time for physical activity since coming back to Heartache.

“I’m worried about her and I think Scott’s got a lot of other things on his mind between Mom and Bethany. ”

“Gram says half of parenting is worrying.” Nina winked. “So maybe you’re a natural father after all.”

Mack focused on each pull of the oars through the water.

“What?” she asked. “It’s probably some giant taboo for single people to talk about kids—” She paused. Straightened. “You really don’t want to have a family, do you?”

“I’ve always been honest about that.” He’d felt the same since he was a teen. It was a decision he’d never questioned, not even when Jenny had begged him to .

“I remember.” She bit her lip. “I guess I thought you’d change your mind. Plenty of teenage guys think they’ll never want to have children.”

“I discussed it with Jenny before we married and she said she didn’t want kids, either.

But she changed her mind two years after the wedding.

It became a sticking point for her.” He wanted to keep the explanation simple.

Uncomplicated. “I just know what I went through as a kid—what all my siblings went through—dealing with my mother. I don’t want to give any child of mine the same experience. ”

He kept rowing, focusing on the rhythmic sound of the oars knifing down into the water and pushing them across the pond.

“Medicines are much better now, you know,” Nina offered quietly, tipping her head back to the sun. “Plus, maybe you’d parent for it better considering you’d be aware of what to look for.”

“I’ve spent too many years already watching for the next mood swing.” Waiting for the next emotional crisis. “Besides, just because I know what to look for doesn’t mean other people in the kid’s life would.”

“Ally probably inherited some issues, though. And look at what a bright, high-achieving kid she is.” Nina pointed to a fish jumping out of the water.

“That’s true. But she’s also so stressed she’s hurting herself, Nina. That’s serious.”

Mack lifted the oars out of the water and let the rowboat drift as they reached the center of the pond.

Nina watched him with a steady gaze, the sun finding all the lightest shades in her hair and bringing out a few freckles along her nose.

He dreamed about her at night and woke up wanting her.

It was becoming tougher and tougher to see her around town and not act on that.

For a moment, he wondered what this reunion might have been like if he was just a regular guy who shared her dreams of a family. Was there a chance they might have picked up where they left off?

“I know plenty of people live happy lives without children, so I won’t say that you should change your mind,” she said quietly. “I’m just questioning your reasons. As a kid, I always envied your family, so the Finleys must have done something right.”

“Scott and my father worked hard to keep things together.” He didn’t elaborate.

Didn’t feel like sharing the details of all the weeks his mother had shut herself in a room and wouldn’t come out, or else talked for hours without pause, hardly sleeping.

He had distance now. Perspective. And his mother’s issues weren’t the kind of genetic gift he was willing to pass along.

The subject was closed in his book, and he’d been up front about that with Nina.

She sighed, apparently realizing the same thing.

“I got a registered letter from my runaway partner.” She propped her elbows on her knees and leaning closer. “She apologized and said she’s returning the funds she took from the business account.”

Mack’s brain scrambled to compute what that meant for her. For him.

“Does that change your plans to stay in Heartache?”

“No.” She shifted her feet closer to his to escape a trail of water that had dripped off the oars. “I need to be here.”

Eight years ago, he would have given anything to hear her say those words.

Now, he knew it wouldn’t matter for them.

Whether she was here or in New York, she’d always want more from him than he would be able to give.

Still, he didn’t want her to suppress her dreams the way she’d suppressed her spirit.

“What about your business?” They were far enough from the shore that they couldn’t be overheard, but he still kept an eye on the fairgrounds as trucks pulled in with more hay bales for the straw maze.

“You’ve just been given the break you need to really make it a success.

Won’t you always wonder if you could have turned it around? ”