Page 1 of Every Little Kiss
CHAPTER 1
After ten years of working graveyards in the ER, there wasn’t much Olivia Preston couldn’t handle. She was skilled, calm under pressure, and knew how to take charge in even the most life-threatening of situations. Yet, as Liv walked around to the back of her car and saw Superdog Stan crumpled near her bumper, lying in a puddle of his own stuffing, a button eye hanging on by a thread, panic bubbled up until she could barely breathe.
With her heart thundering in her chest, she scooped up the patient and raced across the parking lot, bursting through the doors of the closest shop she found open. The sun had just risen, the day had barely begun, and already she had a code red on her hands.
“I need a twelve-gauge needle, the thickest thread you have, sanitary wipes, and something to pack wounds,” she called out to Mavis, who stood by the checkout counter flipping through a stack of gossip magazines.
Mavis Bates was the owner of the fastest senior scooter in town and Pins and Needles, Sequoia Lake’s one-stop shop for all things quilting and crafty. When riled, she had all the softness of a knitting needle.
“The needles are on aisle five. Thread, aisle six,” Mavis said without looking up from the centerfold of the magazine—clearly not catching the urgency in Liv’s voice. “I’ve got an appliqué class starting in ten minutes, so just leave your total by the—Oh my.” Mavis practically purred, her eyes wide in appreciation. “I can see how Beckham was nominated the sexiest man alive, but I still think it should have gone to Channing Tatum.”
“Mavis,” Liv snapped, burying the panic and taking charge. Story of her ever-loving life. But for Paxton, she’d buck up and do it. Her kid wasn’t going to suffer. “I need you focused.”
Mavis looked up and, when she saw the patient, gasped. “Good heavens. Is that Stan?” She dropped the magazine and rushed around the counter. Her face showed all the worry and desperation that Liv knew better than to give in to. “What happened to him?”
“I don’t know,” Liv admitted, hating those simple words that had somehow managed to define the past two years of her life.
The same words she’d recently vowed never to fall victim to again.
“I was next door at the Bear Claw Bakery having breakfast with Paxton,” she said, her voice cracking on her son’s name. “We’d just gotten served when he realized Stan was missing. I went out to look for him and found him in the parking lot. Lying there, crumpled next to my back bumper.”
“Poor thing looks like he was run over.” Mavis ran a hand over Superdog’s torn ear with a seriousness that Liv felt to her core. “Does Paxton know?”
Liv’s palms went sweaty at the thought of Paxton’s crooked smile disappearing, the one they’d worked so hard to find—the one so much like his father’s. Her heart tripped when she imagined that newfound light in his eyes going dull again.
“No,” she said, breathless. “He’s still in the café eating his big-boy breakfast. Smiley-face pancakes with the works to get him through his first day of summer camp. You know, a fun morning to ease him into a new routine.”
“Poor thing, his morning needed to go smoothly,” Mavis said quietly.
Paxton had a hard time with change, and he’d had enough heartache in his six-year-old life that he deserved some fun. They both did. It was the main reason she’d agreed to superhero summer camp. Her brave guy wasn’t a social butterfly by any means, but he loved comic books—and pretending to be invincible for a few weeks wouldn’t hurt.
But thinking about leaving him at that camp was nauseating. And part of her considered taking this as a sign from the universe, a good enough reason to march next door and admit to Paxton that his sidekick, Superdog, was down for the count and camp was canceled.
That was the old Liv. The tragic widow and single mother whose life had forever been changed with one wrong turn. Which was why the new and transformed Liv was stepping into the driver’s seat this time.
She wouldn’t let Paxton’s fresh start or favorite stuffed toy be reduced to nothing but tattered roadkill. Not when she was one meeting away from securing them a safe future.
“It still can,” Liv said, as if it were suddenly that simple. After a difficult two years, including a disastrous year of preschool, her family was desperate for a perfect start to what she’d hoped was going to be a perfect summer.
“There isn’t a seam I can’t stitch or a fabric you can’t clean,” Liv said, channeling her inner nurse. She’d made a career out of fixing life-threatening problems. Surely a stuffed dog wouldn’t take her out at the knees. “A little extra padding and some TLC, and all will be good as new.”
Maybe it was that simple,Liv thought as clumps of stuffing floated to the floor.
She knew firsthand that once broken, things could never be the same. But for Paxton, she let herself believe, because Stan wasn’t just a stuffed animal—sadly, he was her son’s best friend. And the last present he’d received from his dad.
“I need a needle, stat,” Liv ordered, sticking out her hand as if she were in the OR, prepping a patient. Or donning her Supermom cape to save her son’s world.
Mavis pulled a sewing kit out from beneath the counter. “I’ve got a variety of needles and thread inside here. Cotton balls are on aisle three, and I’ll go find my special cleaner so we can get the dirt off him.”
Liv had selected her tool and got the thread through the needle when she felt Mavis pause at the end of the counter. “You okay?”
She met the older woman’s concerned gaze head-on. “I’m going to be.”
“Thank God,” Mavis mumbled. “This whole ‘Kumbaya’ moment was weighing on me. My heart can’t take it.”
Good thing Liv’s heart was strong enough to take on the world if need be. Because thirty-seven balls of cotton, nineteen of the best vertical mattress sutures Liv had administered since nursing school, and a few silent prayers later, Superdog Stan was one knot away from resembling a toy dog instead of a dog’s toy.
And Liv was one step closer to being the Supermom she knew she could be. So when Mavis approached the counter from behind, she said, “I need your finger on this spot. Push, and push hard.”
