Page 49 of The Only Heart that Matters

Dad hands Sawyer to me and then hugs us both to him. “I love you, little girl.”

“Love you too, Daddy.”

They head for the door, Sawyer and I following. We watch them walk down the porch steps, get in their rental car and we wave when they drive away on the snow-covered road that leads to Sharon’s and their new life.

Chapter Twenty-One

Mia

“Damn, girl. How do you keep it all straight? That rush was insane,” Daisy says from her favorite corner booth. She and her laptop are a staple here at the cafe where I wait tables five days a week. She works and we chat when things are slow. She’ll never know how much it means to me that she makes this effort to spend time with me. Our friendship is one of the many things that changed when I became a single mom. Luckily for me, we’ve only gotten closer. “I couldn’t focus on my project, because I was too dazed by you zipping around this place like a damn athlete. I’m exhausted just from watching you in action.”

“It is what it is.” I shrug. “Especially when we’re down a person. The bright side is that a busy shift makes the day go by faster. Oh, and there’s always my one true love... coffee.”

Daisy lifts her Grace’s Crooked River Cafe mug in agreement. “Cheers to that.”

My hip rests against the other side of the booth. I don’t dare sit down and rest my feet. They’ll only hurt worse when I get back up. “So, how’s it going with the architect?”

She flashes me a devious smile.

“Come on! You know I have to live vicariously through your dating life. Tell me something!”

It’s been less than a week since I slept with Angus, and keeping that night from her is the worst sort of torture, yet simultaneously the easiest thing I’ve ever kept from her. She’s clueless to the fact that I’ve been in love with her brother, well... forever. And she would lose her shit if she knew what went on between us. But to have had the experience I shared with Angus and not tell her is killing me.

Except for my love for her brother and the identity of Sawyer’s father, she knows everything there is to know about me. Sure, those are pretty big secrets, but as long as she never finds out, she won’t hate me.

She closes her laptop and holds her hands out in front of her, her smile growing as her hands move further apart, one eyebrow lifted.

I gasp. “Wait, are you telling me what I think you’re telling me?”

“The architect is huge. Is that what you were thinking?”

I glance over my shoulder to make sure nobody is in earshot. “Good huge, or too huge?”

“Oh, we make it work, don’t you worry.”

“So, I’m guessing by your smile, you like him.”

“For now. He’s notthe oneor anything, but it’s fun for the time being.”

“You sure about that?”

“Besides the fact that he’s only here on business and he’ll be gone by next month, he isn’t much fun outside of the bedroom.”

“No?”

“He’s nice enough, but he’ssoserious. I’m not sure if that man has had a silly moment in his life.”

“Well, that's too bad.”

If a man doesn’t know how to have fun, it will never work between them. Daisy can be serious when the moment calls for it, but she also loves to be silly.

“Nah, it’s all good. Charlie and I are busy getting the new business up and running. I don’t really have time for anything more serious than the occasional hook-up.”

Daisy certainly doesn’t need a man to take care of her, but she gets lonely. Try as she may to hide it, I see through her. She can tell me all day long she doesn’t have time for more than a casual fling, but if she metthe one,she would find the time.

Daisy and Charlie are a lot alike that way. Both already established and successful on their own. Only Charlie found Cal and let him in. My hope is that Daisy doesn’t meetthe oneonly to let him pass her by because she’s too busy working and proving she doesn’t need a man.

My phone vibrates in my apron pocket and when I see Dr. Gibbons’ name on the screen, my heart skips a beat and I break out into a sweat. I hold my phone up for Daisy to show her who’s calling.

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