Page 18 of Love is Grand

I shook my head where it lay against his chest. “No. I need the tips. It’s important I do this my way. Don’t worry about me.”

“Your dad wants you to work with him full-time. Adam told me when we had lunch yesterday. Sam’s putting pressure on Ad to talk with Rylan about it.”

“Grrr,” I said, sitting up and looking at Cal as I held the sheet to my chin, shielding my breasts from his gaze.

“Did you just growl?” His mouth formed a smirk, and I resisted the temptation to smack it off ... or maybe kiss it off.

“No, I didn’t growl. I said grrr. It’s an expression.”

“Is it now?”

The humorous moment made me pause as I took in beautifully handsome Cal. Soul-crushing Cal. Man-of-my-dreams Cal. He was a million fantasies and dreams wrapped up in one man.

His disheveled dark blond hair, eyes the shade of hazelnuts, long eyelashes any woman would die for, and small creases around his fortyish-year-old eyes spoke of life experiences I’d never have or even imagine.

“He wants you to have the time with Weez in the evenings, and thinks you deserve to work days. You’re too old to work nights,” Cal said, bringing us back to the conversation we’d been having.

We’d joked before about our sizable age difference—my twenty-six to his forty-one. It was only in these moments that I was hyperaware of how outlandish the two of us being together was, beyond the difference in our skin color.

“I wish you’d stay out of this with Adam,” I said, trying to sound bossy.

Cal’s palm came to my cheek and settled there. “He talks and I listen, babe. He said your dad wants it. It’s the only reason your dad is letting Adam front the money for this project for him, so you can make a future with the shop. I can’t help being involved.”

“It’s charity, Adam doing this with my dad. Then you get involved, and it cheapens what we have.”

I blew out a long breath and lay back onto the pillow, the cool cotton enveloping me.

“I need to save for Weez. She’s going to go to college and be something one day. That’s up to me, not my dad or you or Adam. My parents don’t get the part about my wanting her to leave the island someday. What would she do here ... take over the family coffee shop? I don’t want that for her. I want her to enjoy life, explore, live somewhere else.”

This newfound independence and boldness I felt was deep in my gut. I needed to support my daughter, to encourage her to be better than me, and no one was going to stop me.

“Why?” Cal asked. “Her roots are here. And, by the way, this doesn’t cheapen what we have.”

He swallowed, and I shut my eyes for a beat.

“Cal,” I said, placing my palm over his wrist, catching a quick glimpse of the contrast of our skin side by side. His golden-tanned white skin and my own was an unlikely blend. “We’re having fun. I like this. I didn’t want to admit it, but I do really like it. But let’s be honest ... this is nothing when it comes to the larger world.”

“When I visit, it is what it is. But my life is in New York,” Cal said, starting down his winding road of excuses.

I knew what the score was. We didn’t need to speak it aloud.

“Shhh. It’s enough. This is supposed to be my time away from all of those people and difficult decisions. We’re the good-time crew,” I said, letting Cal off easy because it was my turn to redraw the boundaries Cal had set.

He came to town, we had a good time, and then he left. We didn’t get serious or worry about each other, and I didn’t contact him in between.

And this worked. No one knew about us except Adam, who had kept his word to be discreet. Our time together was like this tiny island of privacy and excitement I held close, just for myself.

“Come sit outside on the patio. No one is going to walk by. It’s seven in the morning,” Cal said when he came back to bed with the coffee tray. “It’s gorgeous out,” he added while tilting his head toward the window.

The one thing the Grand Escape prided itself on was privacy. Flowers and shrubs surrounded the patios of the villas, giving guests privacy, while the sounds of the ocean filled the air around them.

I nodded, snatching a robe off the floor and slipping it on, then cinching it tightly around my waist as Cal poured two coffees, adding half-and-half to his and leaving mine black.

Like a couple who did this often, I held the door open to the patio and he walked past, coffees in hand.

“Your witch’s brew,” he said, handing me mine.

“A mom needs all the strength she can get.”

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