Page 86 of Challenged by the Single Dad

“You’re back?” Renée asked in surprise as she passed Dom on the way to a table, her arms loaded with plates of food. “What’s up?”

“Just picking up pizza. Silas requested it.”

She nodded in understanding, then disappeared into the thick of the noisy pub.

Noise meant money, so Dom wasn’t complaining.

The Sewing Circle sat in their regular booth, all of them now with a Chloe Caesar Special in front of them as they cross-stitched. That was new to their rotation.

He wanted her to see him just as much as he didn’t want her to see him, and when she finally spotted him, his heart did a stupid littlethump-thumpin his chest. Her gaze narrowed on his. “Something wrong?” she asked, not missing a beat and grabbing the next ticket off the machine. She reached for a pint glass and put it under the tap for Clint’s winter wheat ale, then pulled the lever.

“No, no.” He shook his head. Now he felt like a total tool. He really should have just gone in and gone out through the back. “Just picking up pizza for Silas for dinner.”

She nodded, but it was easy enough to see in her eyes that she didn’t believe him.

“I’m not checking up on you, I swear,” he said quickly. “I’m just here to get pizza.”

All she did was shrug. “Okay.”

He heaved a big sigh and pushed open the swinging door into the kitchen. Burke gave him a confused look when he emerged through that door. Yeah, Dom was as confused as the rest of them.

His brain was not in the equation here at all.

“Pizza’s just warming over there. Dairy-free one for Si is marked,” Burke said, pointing to where they left to-go food to warm. “Jagger texted and made me make three more. Said you’ll grab them.”

That’s why there were four boxes stacked together that said “Dom.” Another thing about Jagger was that the man had an appetite like a bear after hibernation. The man was never full. And he was also ripped, and strong as fuck. He worked out like crazy, which was probably why he was always hungry.

“Thanks,” Dom said, grabbing the stack of pizzas.

“Hey, man,” Burke said, flipping a steak on the grill, “I heard about Silas at school yesterday and I just want to say I’m sorry. He’s the sweetest kid and doesn’t deserve that shit. Let me know if there’s anything I can do to help. I was bullied when I was his age because I was on the smaller side too. It sucks. But at least he’s got his cousins there to have his back. I had nobody.”

Dom’s smile was crooked. “Thanks, man. Appreciate it.” Then he listened to his brain for a change and exited through the rear of the kitchen, dropping his beer bottle into one of the recycling bins at the back before he left.

Even though he knew she wasn’t there, she was working in the bar, he took a long look down the row of cabins to her little sedan parked there. He’d fucked up so badly with Chloe, it was beyond repair at this point. Could they even salvage things and be friends? Or was he destined to pine after a woman he couldn’t have and make every encounter they had from here on out awkward as fuck?

Maybe this was a sign that he wasn’t ready to date again.

Or, he’d just been out of the game so long, he didn’t know the rules anymore.

Either way, he was forfeiting this round until he grabbed the handbook and studied it from cover to cover. That, or, he’d chat with a dating expert—luckily, he was about to have dinner with one.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Eventhoughshe’dpickedthe most pleasant ringtone she could find to act as her morning alarm, Chloe still growled when it penetrated her lovely dream.

She’d just gone to bed, right?

At least it felt that way.

She’d been working at the pub for eight weeks now, and at the hostel for about five. And even though she liked both jobs, it felt like she was burning the candle at both ends. She couldn’t remember the last time she was this perpetually tired. Wasn’t Hawke supposed to find somebody else to work at the hostel? She was only meant to be there temporarily. Was he even looking?

Business at the hostel was still slow, which worried Hawke—and Chloe. She didn’t want him to have to close down his business. The news about what happened to her with Orrin and Joey was probably deterring people from applying for the front desk job. As much as she knew none of it was her fault, guilt still clung to every cell of her body like a parasite. Did she overreact to the whole thing? Or perhaps she could have kept things quieter? Hawke didn’t deserve the boycott. Joey duped him, and everybody else, into thinking he was an upstanding guy.

As far as jobs went, the hostel was easy. She sat around a lot reading spicy romance on her phone and occasionally changed bedding, or helped a guest with some directions or book a tour. It was the bartending that ran her off her feet. People headed in droves to their local, warm watering hole when the weather turned nasty. And right now, Mother Nature had an endangered bee in her bonnet and was pummeling the entire West Coast with icy rain and gale force winds. You couldn’t drive down the road without having to swerve around fallen branches.

The first terrible storm of the year—according to Clint—was on Thanksgiving. The restaurant was set to host a turkey dinner with all the trimmings—a tradition apparently—but they had to cancel because no ferries with freight were able to cross to the island due to the tumultuous water. Wyatt, of course, made do with what he had, and whipped up a giant pot of chili, another one of chowder, and a vegetarian soup. Then, he invited any islanders that could make it, but a lot chose to stay home in case a tree decided to give up the good fight and fall across the road. So chili, soup, and chowder were on the menu the entire following week.

It was Saturday morning, the first week of December, and rather than peel her ass out of bed, Chloe grabbed the spare pillow on the bed and covered her face with it, willing the clock to turn back even just an hour so she could get a bit more shut-eye. Last night’s weather was particularly ugly, with the power going out for about thirty minutes around nine o’clock. That didn’t deter people from staying at the pub though. They were non-stop until last call.

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