Page 31 of Second Chance Fate (Hope Falls: Brewed Awakenings #5)

The front door was open, and Taylor followed Viv as she led the way to the kitchen in the back of the house.

Twenty or so women were gathered around an enormous island with a terrazzo countertop featuring waterfall edges.

It was covered in multiple charcuterie boards, artfully displayed fruit, a variety of cheeses, and Taylor counted at least seven different kinds of crackers.

When they entered, Viv announced, “Found her!”

Taylor felt her cheeks heat as all eyes turned her way.

Audrey, who was at the other end of the island, smiled and began typing on her phone. “Oh, good. I’ll let Josh know.”

“Why would she tell Josh?” Taylor whispered to Viv.

“Because he’s playing basketball with Caleb, and Audrey was tasked with texting Josh the second you arrived so Caleb would, and I quote, ‘remove his head from his ass and get it in the game,’ end quote.” Viv smiled widely, then popped a cracker in her mouth and wagged her eyebrows.

“I’m so glad you made it!” Aurora, Kyle’s wife and hostess of the book club, held up two bottles of wine, one white and the other red. “Can I get you a glass? Or we have mineral water, lemonade, kombucha, soda?—”

"Water would be great," Taylor cut her off.

Aurora handed Taylor a water, and within five minutes the group migrated to the living room, much to Taylor’s relief.

She’d been on her feet all day at the coffee shop, and now, she just wanted to be off of them.

The seating options consisted of an L-shaped sectional, several armchairs, a bench, and two oversized ottomans.

Taylor managed to snag the cloud-soft armchair tucked in the corner, half in shadow, making herself nearly invisible even without Owen’s ‘cloak of invisibility.’

When the women started discussing the book, Taylor got a text and grabbed her phone from her purse. It was from Caleb. He’d taken a short video of Owen playing basketball with Jonah and a few other teens. She ‘loved’ the message and put her phone away and settled back into the chair.

Watching Owen and Caleb together the past ten days was a masterclass on nature vs.

nurture. They had so many more similarities beyond the dimples and Owen looking like Caleb’s clone when he was his age.

They had the same laugh, sense of humor, and even the same cadence when they talked.

They were both right-handed but always ate with their left hand.

When they concentrated, they both tilted their heads back and looked up at the ceiling.

And they both cracked their middle finger knuckle with their thumbs.

It was a habit she’d tried and failed to break Owen from doing multiple times.

There were at least a dozen more tiny, seemingly insignificant idiosyncrasies that you’d miss if you weren’t looking for them.

They’d bonded so quickly. Owen was already attached to Caleb. He talked about him nonstop. She couldn’t imagine a world where he would be upset that Caleb was his dad. So why was she nervous to tell him?

Taylor was only half listening as the book discussion segued into a more personal discussion.

First on the agenda seemed to be celebrity gossip, which she had to admit was much hotter tea than what was on the covers of tabloids or on entertainment sites, thanks to Oscar and Emmy winner Shane Fox and Grammy winner Karina Black being in attendance.

They had some hot and juicy inside scoops.

Inevitably, though, the convo shifted to more local targets, specifically who was dating whom.

That was when Taylor wished she actually had Owen’s cloak of invisibility.

“Gabe mentioned Caleb has been hanging out with you and Owen a lot.” Nikki Maguire-Gowan cupped the base of her wine glass as she swirled the merlot.

Taylor met Nikki at the coffee shop on her first day. She was her second customer. Over the past week and a half, she’d gotten to know her a little bit because she came in every day. She ran a nonprofit with her husband, Mike, who used to be a senator. She also happened to be Gabe Maguire’s cousin.

That was the thing about small towns; it seemed everyone had a connection to someone. Unlike Kevin Bacon, who needed six degrees of separation, Hope Falls residents could do it in half that amount.

Taylor responded with a casual nod as she took a sip of water. Nikki hadn’t asked her a question, so there was no reason for her to answer verbally.

“Most women fall all over themselves around him; I’ve noticed you don’t do that,” five-time Grammy Award winner Karina Black pointed out as she joined the conversation about Taylor.

Karina Black noticed something about Taylo r?!

The situation felt totally surreal. She felt like she was looking at it from above, like she was detached and floating away from her body.

“Oh, um…” Once again, she had no clue how to respond.

“I see you.” Karina raised her glass in a toast with a Cheshire cat smile on her face. “Well played, Taylor. Well played.”

Taylor felt her cheeks and chest heat. Which meant that she’d probably get hives.

She actually felt a little clammy as well.

Her neck felt hot, too. "Oh no, it’s not.

He’s just…I mean, I’m not…He’s a good guy.

" She stumbled over her words, and as she tried to put sentences together in her brain, they didn’t sound right. "We’re friends. Just friends."

“Gotcha.” Karina winked as a half dozen or so women within earshot all exchanged knowing looks.

Taylor could see that none of the women believed her, but she didn’t care, as long as the conversation moved away from her, which, thankfully, it did.

Her heart was racing from embarrassment.

She was shy and didn’t like attention, and she broke out in hives when she got overwhelmed, but she’d never felt her heartbeat get this erratic.

As the women around her talked and laughed, Taylor felt her head start spinning.

She tried to stand, thinking she needed some fresh air.

When she did, she heard someone ask if she was okay, but it sounded muffled, like they were in another room and she was listening with her ear against the wall.

Then everything began to close in on her.

The chatter around Taylor faded into a distant, echoey hum, like a radio tuned to the wrong station in another room.

She managed a weak smile as she focused on the colorful cover of the book, which was on the coffee table.

Taylor’s vision tunneled to black in the center, with strobing flashes of white light in her periphery.

“Tay? Can you hear me?”

She recognized Viv’s voice, but it was weirdly flat, the words stretching out and folding in on each other as if Taylor were underwater and the whole world was pressing down, squeezing her chest.

Her first instinct was to excuse herself.

Just a quick breath of fresh air, she thought, and she’d be fine.

She pushed herself up from the armchair, but her legs felt like gelatin, wobbly and insufficient for the job.

A hand reached for her elbow—maybe Aurora’s, maybe Karina’s, maybe Viv’s; it was hard to tell—and she felt fingers tighten on her arm.

Someone called for water, and another voice shouted to open a window. All of it was distant, and blurry, and her head felt like it was floating away.

Taylor tried to say she’d be okay, but her tongue wouldn’t work. The next thing she was aware of was her knees buckling. There was a brief, weightless second, like the drop on a roller coaster, before the darkness closed in and she didn’t feel anything at all.