LITMIR.BIZ

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she went on. “When she was a little girl, we had some of our best mother/daughter conversations in those odd moments. Like riding in the car or folding laundry.”

      “You and she always had that closeness,” Cade said, turning to his wife. “It made me feel like an outsider sometimes.”

      Melanie blinked in surprise. “It did?”

      “When I came home, I always felt as if I’d walked in after the punch line of the joke,” he said, his gaze on some distant point in the past. “You and Emmie are like two peas in a pod.”

      “She was an only child, Cade. That meant all she had was me.” Melanie realized what she’d just said and hurried to make it up. “I meant, you weren’t home that much and—”

      “I know what you mean.” His attention swiveled back toward her, and in that second, a memory slipped between them, written in that unspoken mental language of longtime spouses. “It almost wasn’t that way, though, was it?”

      “Cade—”

      “Are we ever going to talk about it, Melanie? Or just pretend that it never happened?”

      She waved toward the back of the shop. “Emmie will be out any second now.”

      “Fine,” Cade said. “But we have to talk about it sometime.”

      “Sure,” Melanie said, intending no such thing. That day had been painful enough. Cade’s absence, her guilt. There was enough fodder there for a soap opera.

      “Mel, didn’t you want the baby, too?” Cade asked, his voice just above a whisper.

      She turned away, straightening mugs, aligning the handles until they were like little circular soldiers marching along the shelf. “I can’t talk about this.”

      “Can’t or won’t? It takes two to kill a marriage, you know. And two to bring it back to life.”

      “I don’t want to bring it back to life,” Melanie said, wheeling around. “I don’t want to go back to being Suzy Homemaker.”

      “When did I ever say you had to do that?”

      “Last year,” Melanie said, “standing in this very space. I said I wanted to run my own shop and you asked me how I could possibly do that if I had another baby. You just assumed I wanted to try again. Assumed I wanted to go back to being a housewife and a mom. Assumed I wanted to put my dreams on hold one more time.”

      The rest room door squeaked as Emmie opened it and both Cade and Melanie let the subject drop. A couple of students wandered in, followed by two men in suits who took a corner table and flipped out their laptops.

      Cooter ambled in next. He tipped his cap Melanie’s way and ordered his usual. His light blue gaze flicked between Cade and Melanie. “That old dog, he’s still whining from what I can hear,” Cooter said, taking his mug. “And there ain’t nobody happy when the dog’s not happy.”

      Cade gestured toward Cooter as the old man headed to the back of the shop. “What’d he mean by that?”

      “He told me a story about some dog that got sick eating mulch or something.” She shrugged. “I don’t know, it’s supposed to have meaning for my life.”

      “Mulch? And a dog?” Cade chuckled. “Jeez, if I’d known the secret to life was that easy, I’d have brought home a golden retriever and landscaped the front beds.”

      Melanie laughed, glad for the break from the tension of their earlier conversation. Emmie joined them, looking from one parent to the other. She smiled. “Good to see you guys getting along so well.”

      “Oh, we’re just—”

      “Sharing a joke,” Cade intercepted. “Nothing more.”

      “Uh-huh,” Emmie said, clearly not believing them. “Either way, you two better get out of here. Don’t you have a meeting?”

      “I almost forgot!” Melanie slipped off her apron, grabbed her coat and purse off the hook inside the kitchen. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Em.”

      Emmie smiled, her gaze again split between Melanie and Cade. “Have a good time tonight.”

      Hidden meaning—work those marital problems out on the dance floor.

      “Thanks for taking my shift, honey,” Melanie said, ignoring the hint to get back together with Cade and instead laying a quick kiss on her daughter’s forehead. Emmie gave her mother another eye-roll, but didn’t move away. Despite her being well past the age when kisses were dispensed with the abandon of confetti throwers, Melanie was convinced Emmie still secretly liked the occasional tender touch. Even if it was from her mother.

      The shop door jingled and Liam entered, his attention more on Emmie than Cuppa Life’s offerings. “Hi, Liam,” Emmie said, a soft, private smile curving across her face.

      “Hi, Em.” He slipped onto a stool and returned her smile.

      “I think that’s our cue to go,” Cade whispered in Melanie’s ear.

      A thrill charged through her at the feel of his warm breath along her neck. She closed her eyes for a half a second, giving up to that feeling, before dismissing it. The bank loan, the reunion, it was all part of a business deal. Not a date. There wasn’t going to be some miraculous happily ever after created while the band played “Always and Forever.”

      Even if a tiny part of her was starting to hope otherwise.

      Cade stood in his kitchen, wrestling with the black bowtie that went with his tux. Carter leaned against the wall, watching his twin with clear amusement. “Need some help?” he asked.

      “No. I can get it.”

      Carter arched a brow, then glanced around the messy kitchen. “This place is really starting to scream bachelor. You gotta do something.”

      Why was everyone telling him that? He was doing something—it just wasn’t working. He’d thought, after the meeting with the bank this afternoon, that things might change. That the minute the loan officer said, “Congratulations,” Melanie would have turned to him, and called this whole divorce thing off. But she hadn’t. Instead she’d thanked him as politely as she had the bank manager, then told him she’d see him tonight.

      It couldn’t have been more businesslike if they’d been standing in a boardroom.

      “Did you come over just to complain about my decor?” Cade said to his twin.

      “Nah. I was hungry, too. You have anything to eat around here?” Carter opened a cabinet, rifled through it for a second, then turned back to his brother. “Are you sure you don’t want some help with that tie? It’s a mess.”

      Cade threw his brother a glare.

      Carter just laughed. “All right, but don’t blame me if you end up looking like a guy who wrapped his own Christmas present.” He moved some cans of green beans, found nothing behind them, then shut the cabinet door. “This is sad. Old Mother Hubbard had more than you do, Cade.”

      Cade hadn’t eaten at home in so long, he couldn’t remember what he had on hand—if anything. “Check the fridge. There might be some leftover Thai food.”

      Carter rose, opened the Whirlpool and withdrew one of the paper takeout boxes. He took one whiff, then shoved it back inside the refrigerator and slammed the door. “You need to fix things with Melanie, man, before you die of e-Coli or typhoid or something.”

      “My vaccinations are up-to-date,” Cade said with a grin. “And I’m making progress with Mel.”

      “How so?”

      “I worked with her at the coffee shop all week.”

      “Five days serving up lattes? Should have been enough time to solve your problems, the world’s problems and have some time leftover.” Carter

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