Page 29 of This Time Around (The Can’t Have Hearts Club #3)

Allie blinked, alarmed that he might have read her mind. But that was ridiculous. “She is. She works with this amazing producer, Kate Geary. They’re the ones we met with about that other project—the one about women in prison?”

“The one good ol’ Wade put a stop to?”

“Quit it.” She gave him a good-natured whack on the chest. “Wade is a very good friend. And he happens to be on a date with Skye tonight.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yep. They’re having a great time eating Moroccan food and texting me how grateful they are I introduced them.”

“No kidding.” Jack made a face. “I wish I’d shown you a great time, too. Sorry the reunion was such a bust.”

“No, I’m the one who’s sorry. I’m thinking it might have gone better if I hadn’t joined you.”

“Definitely not true. The building could have caught on fire and it still would have been better with you than without you.”

She felt a smile tug the corners of her lips and lifted her glass to hide it. She took another sip of wine and glanced around the kitchen.

“Did all the cats run and hide after you got out that pill rocket?”

“Yes, but they came right back after I busted out a can of tuna.”

“Smart man,” she said. “So everyone’s been dosed with the necessary heart medicine or kitty Prozac or whatever the hell that was?”

“Yep. Smart of Skye to have to have a whole binder complete with cat photos and recommended dosages. There was even something that looked like a feline family tree.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Nope. I found it in the cupboard right next to the pills. Some of the handwriting looked different, so maybe your grandma was the one who put it together.”

“I’ll have to check it out sometime.” She took another sip of wine. “It really went okay?”

“Yep.” Jack held out his right arm and Allie studied the ripple of muscle and the whorls of dark hair she knew would feel deliciously soft under her fingertips. It took her a few seconds to realize she was supposed to be checking out the web of scratches on his forearm.

“Yikes.” She grimaced and looked up at him, relieved to see he didn’t look too upset about it. “Sorry about that.”

“It’s okay. I think I started to get the hang of it after the third cat. The trick is apparently to do it fast before they can start plotting an exit strategy.”

Allie laughed and went over to the pantry. Back when Rosewood operated as a B&B, her grandma kept the place well stocked with all kinds of gourmet eats. Most of what was in there now belonged to Skye, though Allie had brought some things over in the last few days.

“Sorry, I don’t have much to nibble on,” she said.

“We should have grabbed a to-go box at the reunion.”

“How do you feel about Ritz Crackers?”

“I feel good about them. I’d feel better if we took this little wine and cracker party into the parlor.”

“Deal. You take the wine, and I’ll throw some of these on a plate with some Laughing Cow cheese wedges I brought over yesterday.”

“Perfect.”

He turned and walked toward the parlor while Allie got the snacks together.

She was glad he’d picked the parlor, since it offered the most privacy.

Skye’s room was up on the third floor, but the parlor on the main floor had always been Allie’s favorite space in the house.

It backed up to the Laurelwood room, which was the one she’d claimed for herself during the last round of cleanup.

It was cozy with a big rosebush right outside a window that streamed rivers of natural sunlight.

Sleeping there reminded her of her grandmother.

Scooping up the plate of crackers, Allie headed into the next room.

Jack had already seated himself on the sofa and was holding a photo in an ornate silver frame.

She couldn’t see the photo itself, but knew from the frame which one it was.

An image snapped more than twenty years ago in the outdoor courtyard of the B&B.

She was sitting at a table draped with a white-linen tablecloth, her parents beaming from either side of her as her grandma set a plate of tea sandwiches on the table.

Jack looked up and smiled. “I forgot you were such a cute kid.”

“Thanks. I was pretty close to Paige’s age in that one.”

“Oh yeah?” He looked at the photo again, his expression a little faraway this time.

“I heard from her, by the way,” Allie said. “Paige, I mean. You must’ve given her my number?”

“Yeah, sorry—I meant to tell you. I hope that’s okay?”

“No problem. She’s a sweet kid.”

“She’s pretty excited about the bra shopping.”

“I could tell.” Allie tucked one bare foot up under her on the sofa. “So,” she said, taking a small sip of wine. “Is your sister-in-law always like that?”

Jack sighed and picked up his own wineglass. He spun it around by the stem, but didn’t take a sip. “She’s struggled a lot since Caroline died, but nothing like that.”

“Are she and Paige pretty close?”

“Not really. They live in Chicago, and Caroline’s parents are in Florida, so Paige isn’t super tight with anyone on her mom’s side of the family.”

“Seems kind of funny that Missy would have such a problem with you dating another woman.”

He shook his head. “That’s not it exactly. She doesn’t want to see me with you .”

“Me?” Allie frowned. “But I’ve never even met her.”

“Caroline may have mentioned you once or twice.” Jack cleared his throat and used his thumbnail to rub a spot on his dress slacks. “Sisters talk, I guess.”

“How do you mean?”

“It always bothered Caroline that I was engaged before. I guess when Missy heard you were there, she sort of flipped her lid.”

“How do you know all this?”

He picked up a cracker and smeared it with cheese. “I heard from Gary—her husband—when you were in the shower. Apparently Missy started sobering up on the way back to the hotel. She wanted your address so she could send flowers and an apology note.”

Allie fought the urge to grimace. “Please tell me you didn’t give that woman my address.”

Jack laughed, though it was a sad little laugh. “No. I told her it was the thought that counted, and I’d pass along her apology.”

Allie picked up a cracker and nibbled on the edge. Part of her wanted to know more about Jack’s marriage and family and everything that had happened the last sixteen years. Part of her wanted to bury her head in the sand.

But she’d done plenty of that lately, so she took a deep breath. “How did you meet your wife, anyway?”

He looked at her a moment, assessing. Allie ordered herself not to blink, not to flinch, not to do anything that would prompt him to gloss over the story or give her a half-baked version of it. Jack set his wineglass down.

“You really want to know?”

“Yeah.” Allie held his gaze. “I think I do. You and I were so close for so many years. It seems weird not to know such a big thing about you.”

He nodded, then picked up his glass again. “I wasn’t in a great place after you and I split up,” he said slowly. “Screwed around for a couple years, generally being an asshole.”

“Screwed around, like ... with your life, or you mean sexually?”

“Yes.”

“Got it.” She gave a tight nod, pleased with herself for not reacting. This was his history, after all. She had no claim to him beyond their engagement sixteen years ago.

“Anyway, I met Caroline in a sandwich shop in Tigard when I tried to pick her up. She totally shot me down.”

Allie grinned and took a sip of wine. “I think I like her already.”

Jack gave a small smile and shoved the whole cracker into his mouth, cheese and all. “Yeah, you probably would have liked her. She didn’t put up with shit from anyone, especially me.”

“So you convinced her to go out with you?”

“Not right away. Actually, I didn’t see her again for three months after that. I went back to the sandwich place every week hoping to bump into her again, and eventually I did.”

Allie nodded and took another tiny drink.

At this rate it would take her five hours to finish a single glass of wine, but she didn’t want to be tipsy for this conversation.

Didn’t want to blurt something stupid or ask questions she wasn’t ready to have him answer.

“Did Caroline ask why you were stalking her?”

“Nah,” he said. “But I did tell her it was fate that we’d run into each other again, so she should probably go out with me or risk angering the gods.”

“Not a bad pickup line.”

Jack grinned. “It worked. She gave me her number and we went out later that week.”

“And she fell instantly, madly in love with you and the rest is history?” She was careful to keep any trace of snark from her tone, but he looked up anyway. She gave him a small smile, an unspoken reassurance he seemed to understand. He nodded and kept going.

“No, she called me a loser and told me to call her when I had my life together.” He gave her a shamefaced grin. “I may have had too much to drink at dinner.”

“Nice.” She laughed. “So then what?”

“I took her advice. Went back to school. Got serious about the video game I’d been trying to develop. Moved out of my mom’s basement. A year later, I called her again.”

Allie felt something twist deep in her gut, but she forced herself to keep breathing.

So what if he wasn’t willing to get his shit together for her, but he did it for another woman after pursuing her with such dogged determination?

It wasn’t a reflection on her. It was a sweet, romantic story about the mother of his child. Nothing more.

“Was she happy to hear from you?” she asked.

“Not at first. But I convinced her to go out with me, and I think she could see right away that I was different. We started dating for real after that. I was still going to school, and she was in her first year of grad studies for architecture. We ended up moving in together during my last term of college.”

“And then you got married?”

“And then she got pregnant,” Jack said. “The marriage came pretty quickly after that.”