Page 12 of Fierce Family

“I’m happy to recommend it to our guests if he wants me to,” I offer.

“I can ask, but I think he likes mainly serving locals. And he’s already fully booked every evening. But thanks for the offer.” Josh’s eyes light up when he smiles at me. I could look at these eyes all day long.

We eat in silence aside from the occasional “this is so good” or a moaning sound. I didn’t think I could eat everything but I just can’t stop until the last morsel of meat is gone.

“I’m going to explode,” I announce, making Josh laugh. He wipes his mouth with a napkin and leans back patting his stomach.

“Guess we wait a bit before we have dessert.”

“I don’t think I can eat dessert,” I protest.

“We’ll see. So how come I don’t remember you growing up in Fellside?”

“I went to school in Windermere,” I smirk. There’s been an age-old rivalry between the school football teams from Fellside, Keswick, and Windermere to such a degree that you wouldn’t hang out with people from rival schools. “We lived halfway between Windermere and Fellside and my mum worked in Windermere, so it was easier for us to go to school there. All my friends were from there as well.”

“But now you live in Fellside?” he asks, twirling his half empty pint glass in his hand.

“After I chose a career in tourism I always wanted to work for the Greenview Manor and never more than after Tommy took over. He’s made it the best hotel in the area. He hired me as an Operations Manager four years ago and so I moved the boys to Fellside. They actually prefer school here.”

“Because Fellside is better than Windermere,” he chuckles.

“You tell yourself that,” I retort with a grin. “I take it you have always lived here?”

“Born and bred. I did a short stint with the fire service in Carlisle when I was going through some further training but otherwise Fellside has always been my home. Much to the dismay of my ex-wife.”

“She didn’t like Fellside?” I ask and drain the rest of the wine from my glass. I know I shouldn’t judge, being divorced myself, but I immediately wonder what went wrong between them.

“Want another one?” he asks.

“Sure, please.” Josh raises his hand and waves at someone at the bar. I shouldn’t really, but I don’t have the boys tonight and no work tomorrow. It’s not like a second glass will get me drunk. Maybe a tiny bit tipsy.

“No, my ex wanted city life,” he answers my earlier question.

“Is that what caused the divorce?” I ask tentatively. Josh goes silent. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t wantto.” I assure him even if I’m dying to find out what has happened.

“No, it’s fine,” he takes a sip of his beer, “She took a job in Manchester and we saw each other less and less. In the end I found out she was cheating on me. To be honest I think we’d grown apart before that so it didn’t hurt as much as I thought it would,” he shrugs.

“My divorce hurt a lot. Even if I wasn’t angry with Nico. I mean, he realised he was gay. How could I be angry about that? And he has become a great friend. But the divorce caught me off guard.” I admit and it feels like our past experiences is bringing us closer together.

“So, I know you are a fantastic mother and a hard-working General Manager. Tell me something else about you?” He clearly doesn’t want to dwell on his divorce and neither do I, so I’m glad when he changes the subject.

“Like what?”

“Something nobody knows.” He leans closer and I can smell his cologne.Uh, there are the butterflies again.

“I don’t—”

“Should I go first?” His eyes are fixed on me.

“Okay,” I swallow hard.

“My deepest darkest secret is that I have two Bourbon biscuits and a pint of milk before bed almost every day.”

He looks serious before the corners of his lips lift into the biggest grin and I can’t help but laugh.

“Living the dangerous life there, Watch Manager,” I tease, and he winks at me.

“Now it’s your turn,” he challenges.

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