Page 6 of The Last Call Home (The Timberbridge Brothers #5)

Chapter Four

Delilah

Talk about hot dreams and sexy?—

What the fuck was that?

The man who just walked in wasn’t real. Couldn’t be. He felt more like a phenomenon, a force of nature with swagger and a sinful smirk. A goddamn tornado wrapped in worn denim, cracked leather, and something that smelled suspiciously like recklessness and orgasms.

He was probably just a dream. One of those infuriating ones—right when I’m about to kiss Malerick, beg him to pin me against the wall and fuck me senseless, and bam. I wake up because, apparently, my alarm has no respect for dream orgasms.

I blink. Twice.

Nope, still there. Still that face. That body. That don’t-fuck-with-me energy that made every woman and maybe man in the room suck in their breath—and maybe their gut too, depending on how much they want him.

Me? I’d do him. Obviously. What warm-blooded, sex-loving human wouldn’t?

I’d let him wreck me and thank him for it.

Especially since Malerick Timberbridge—resident brooder, jaw-clenching, an emotionally unavailable slice of temptation—seems entirely uninterested in my very clear and generous “please climb me like a tree” proposition.

It’s infuriating.

I’m thirty-six years old and nine months into knowing exactly what I want. My skincare routine is working overtime, and I’ve earned the right to skip the middle school bullshit. I don’t have time for smirks that say “maybe” and ghosted text threads.

I don’t want promises. I want orgasms.

Consistency. Chemistry.

A little post-coital cuddling wouldn’t kill him, either.

I just want a no-strings-attached arrangement with someone who has more game than my goddamn vibrator. Is that so unreasonable?

Apparently, yes.

Because Malerick—who smells like pine and penance and looks like sin carved in shadows—won’t take the fucking hint. Not even when I practically pitch him a slideshow: Ways We Could Mutually Benefit from Casual Sex Without Wrecking Our Lives.

He just looks at me like I’m something between a temptation and a disaster.

Maybe I am. But aren’t we all, in some form or another?

Still, I’m not asking for forever. Just a night or two. Maybe five. Definitely one in the shower. One against the door. Maybe one of those mornings where I wear nothing but his shirt and . . . shit.

I need to get a grip. A literal grip. Preferably on him.

But I’ll settle for my vibrator and a tub of cookie dough ice cream until the universe stops playing hard to get.

Or . . . and this is an innovative idea, I’ll go and see what kind of thirst this Cassian character will quench.

I’m all for exchanging espresso and liquor if we’re also going to be using mouths and hands during the exchange.

Obviously, it’ll be a very delicate balance between the guy I want to fuck and the one who I just met but seems like really wants to fuck me and . . .

Honestly, I think Cassian wanted to fuck Malerick too.

Or fight him—or both.

It was hard to tell with all that jaw clenching and not-blinking and that weird moment of . . . was that longing?

Maybe I’m projecting. Perhaps it was just two emotionally constipated men staring each other down like cowboys in a showdown.

But if that showdown ended with ripped shirts and accidental moaning—I wouldn’t be shocked. I would just hope they’d include me.

Frankly, I’m not sure which fantasy is more plausible.

This entire situation feels like one long, drawn-out “what the hell are we doing?” scenes without a script. Were they ever together? Are we heading there? Is this some angsty three-way standoff where I’m the accidental prize?

I’m game as long as orgasms are involved.

Too soon to ask?

Definitely. Especially when Malerick’s got that homicidal calm that makes me wonder if I should bolt for the fire exit.

The second he mutters, “I’m gonna need a stronger coffee,” I look up from the cake display and study him like he’s a crime scene I’ve been assigned to solve.

“Okay, seriously. What the fuck was that?”

He doesn’t respond. Just narrows his eyes at the door like he’s trying to kill it with telepathy.

“You’re glaring so hard you’re gonna scorch a hole through the glass,” I say, grabbing a rag and wiping down the espresso machine for the third time.

It’s already clean. Sterile, even. But scrubbing gives me something to do besides throwing a croissant at his face.

“Which would be tragic, by the way. That glass cost more than my student loans.”

Still nothing. His jaw ticks once. Twice. His knuckles whiten around the coffee cup—his coffee cup—the one Cassian took a sip from like it belonged to him—just like Malerick.

“That man waltzes in here like he owns the fucking town, steals your mocha, flirts with both of us—yes, I saw that wink—and drops a line worthy of a comic villain before walking out,” I say, spinning toward him. “And you’re just going to stand there? And brood?”

Malerick exhales through his nose. “It’s complicated.”

I laugh. Actually, laugh. “‘Complicated’ is doing your taxes while your ex calls to say she’s pregnant and your dog eats the paperwork. That was sexual tension, resentment, and probably some unresolved boyhood trauma with a jawline.”

His stare cuts to me. Not quite a glare—more of a warning. But I’m not afraid of Malerick Timberbridge. I’ve seen him hold a kitten with oven mitts because it was ‘too tiny to handle.’ His poker face has nothing on mine.

“I’m not dropping this,” I tell him, folding my arms like armor. “You’re too composed. And ‘composed’ is not your vibe. You’re broody, not Buddhist.”

A long pause.

His lips part like he’s about to confess or maybe lie—but before I get either, the bell over the door chimes again.

And just like that, I’m doomed because I know it’s her.

“Buenos días, mi chiquita,” my mother sings, gliding into the café like a woman on a telenovela runway.

Her lipstick is too red for ten in the morning.

Her perfume announces her presence before she even finishes pushing the door open.

It trails behind her like a designer warning label: Caution—this woman meddles.

She fucking meddles.

“You didn’t answer my text,” she accuses, already halfway to the counter.

“I have the bad habit of not having my phone with me while working, Mom,” I reply, keeping my voice as calm as possible. “You should try it.”

And she should. Honestly. Just once. Perhaps stop showing customers photos of her prize roses or the new lemon tree, as they requested a slideshow.

Worse, when tourists walk in, she shows them my picture.

As if she’s auditioning future sons-in-law.

She loves me, sure, but she could tone down the matchmaking.

Or at least improve the lighting on the photos.

She kisses both my cheeks with a dramatic sigh. “Working, working—always working. You should be on a beach with someone named Rafael, drinking something with a fruit garnish and making me grandchildren.”

Malerick chokes on his coffee. Actually chokes.

I shoot him a look that promises retribution. Possibly arsenic in his next cinnamon scone.

“Mami, I told you. I’m focusing on the café.”

“Mal, mijito,” she coos, turning to Malerick like he’s her favorite nephew and not a living, breathing reason I’ve had to reevaluate my vibrator’s capabilities.

“You’re always here, protecting the town.

I remember when you were little, causing trouble, and now .

. .” Her eyes scan him like a hawk locking onto prey.

“He’s grown into a very handsome man. Isn’t he, Lilah. Why not him?”

“He’s the sheriff,” I say flatly. As if that makes him sexually unappealing instead of emotionally constipated.

There’s no way I’m telling my mother that I’ve tried to have a little friendly rendezvous with him and he just doesn’t want to take the hint.

“Ah, law and order. Very stable.” Mom grins as if that should seal the deal. Damn, this woman is relentless.

Malerick chokes on his drink. Good.

“Mami, stop trying to fix me up, or I swear . . .”

I trail off because there’s no real threat. She doesn’t scare. Not easily. Not even when I told her I wanted to be single by choice. She just smiled and said, “You’ll grow out of it.”

Sometimes she asks why I didn’t marry someone back in France while I was studying there. The French are beautiful. I could’ve had chic, trilingual babies. But no, I came back. Same thing in Italy. Spain. Mexico. Hell, even Wisconsin had options if you squint.

Why can’t I just meet a man?

She introduced me to her cousin’s friends in Guadalajara. They offered me property and mentioned knowing a jeweler. She’s always looking for someone to match me with—always.

“Why don’t you get your apron and start working?” I ask, already turning toward the cake station. “I have a cake to focus on.”

You’d think that would shut her down, right?

Nope, nothing will stop Rosalinda Isabel Mora Pineda. Not even her daughter.

Mom shrugs, unbothered, and plucks a biscotti from the display without asking.

“Then maybe that new guy across the street.” She waves vaguely in the direction of the bar.

“Cassian. I just met him. Es un cuero de hombre. If I were your age, I’d take him some cookies, a coffee, and a marriage proposal. ”

“Mami.”

Malerick raises a brow. “What did she say?”

I shrug. “She agrees with you. He’s very handsome?—”

“No, no,” he interrupts. “She didn’t say guapo.”

“She said, and I quote, ‘es un cuero de hombre.’” I shrug again. “It a coloquial term that translates a little like . . . he’s fucking hot.”

Mom glares at Malerick, undeterred. “You need to learn to speak Spanish, mijo. That’s why she’s never going to marry you.” She points in the direction of the bar like it’s a game show prize. “He might get her hand in marriage.”

“She’s not marrying Cassian,” Malerick snaps—too quickly, too loud, like his chest just lit on fire and no one told him how to stop it. There’s a glint in his eyes. Possessiveness or panic, I can’t tell. Or maybe both. Maybe that’s what he is. A mix of want and don’t-touch.

I glance at him, but he won’t look back.

That’s the problem with the Timberbridge men.

They don’t let you in, not really. They wrap themselves in silence, in tragedy, and call it survival. They touch you as if they mean it, but speak as if it never happened.

And I’ve had enough of that.

“You’re wrong. Cassian is a good candidate.” Mom hums, eyes still on Malerick like she’s weighing his soul. “He has a strong name. A strong jaw. I could work with that.”

Of course she could.

She might create a life from stubbornness and fantasies. Meanwhile, I’m attempting to hold my sanity together with espresso shots and sarcasm.

And the man across from me? The one my mother thinks is future son-in-law material?

He still hasn’t said what he wanted to say before she walked in.

I groan and grab a tray of croissants to restock. This conversation is over, and Mal will have to leave without his sandwich. I don’t care if he doesn’t pay for the coffee. I just don’t want to deal with him today.

“And don’t get me started on your abuela,” she calls. “If she were alive, she’d light a candle at the church for your ovaries. I should do that. I’ll ask your aunts in Mexico to do it, too.”

Malerick coughs again, harder this time.

“Great,” I mutter. “So I’ve got divine intervention and family shame in stereo.”

“We’re just worried about you,” she says, finally softening. “You work too hard, smile too little, and don’t bring home any boys.”

I glance at Malerick.

He’s still scowling, but there’s something under it—an itch in his bones like his skin doesn’t fit quite right. Like he wants to crawl out of this moment and into a world where none of this exists. Where Cassian didn’t sip his mocha. Where my mother didn’t suggest marriage.

He looks like he’d rather be buried alive than endure another minute of this conversation.

“Go,” I tell him, voice soft but firm. “Before she starts planning our wedding. I think she’s already picking color swatches and flowers.”

He doesn’t argue. Mal just tosses back the last of his coffee like it’s whiskey, mutters something about paperwork, and escapes as if the building might implode.

The moment the bell above the door jingles behind him, my mom lets out a sigh so theatrical she could win a Premios TVyNovelas for best emotional performance.

“Mamá,” I start, but she waves her hand to cut me off as if I’m a rerun she’s already seen.

“You know,” she says, licking sugar from her thumb as if the biscotti just revealed the secrets of the universe, “that Cassian has a look.”

I blink. “What look?”

She tilts her head, smiling in that way that always spells trouble. “The one that says he’s either going to break your heart or save your life.”

I freeze. Because I know exactly what she means.

It’s the look that pulls you in before you even realize you’re drowning. The look that makes you forget caution exists. That makes you hope—dangerously, stupidly—that maybe, just maybe, this time will be different.

Maybe you won’t be the one left to pick up the pieces.

“Or maybe both,” she adds, tossing her napkin like a mic drop before strolling toward the kitchen as if she didn’t just drop a truth bomb straight into my chest. “He might be the man of your dreams.”

“Really, a heartbreaker?” I stare at her confused.

“Just think about it, chiquita,” she calls over her shoulder. “Life’s too short for lukewarm coffee and men who don’t fight for you.”

And damn it, I do think about it.

Not just Cassian. Not just Malerick. But what I’m doing.

Who I’m becoming.

Who I’m letting in—and who’s already inside, rearranging the furniture of my heart as if they have a lease.

I swipe at the counter, pretending I’m cleaning, but really, I’m just trying to steady myself.

Because the truth is, I don’t want to be broken again.

But I’m beginning to think that I already am.