Page 7 of Loving You

APRIL

“He’s back?” Janie asked, eyes wide as she stood with her clenched fists resting on her hips at the foot of my bed.

I gave the youngest Carrigan sister a short nod. She really was the sweetest of us all, and I hated to see her in that protective posture with such a worried expression. Janie—short for January, which shehated—shouldn’t be looking at me like she was about to run off and choke someone.

Guilt poured through me. I never should have told my sisters what happened with Cliff, and I never should have moved into the B&B to hide from him after he showed up for the third time at Christmas.

I was bringing trouble right to their doors.

“Stop it, April,” my eldest sister, June, snapped. “I see you wishing you’d never told us about that asshole, and I’m not having it. We’re your sisters. Of course you should have told us.”

June had eyes bigger than her mouth, which was saying something. She seemed to know what we were all thinking before we finished processing it ourselves, and even though it annoyed me that she’d gotten all bossy on me, it was comforting to know she felt that way. It didn’t ease the guilt all the way… but it was enough.

“Sorry,” I mumbled, staring down at my hands.

I didn’t have to look up to know June, Janie, and our so-far-silent middle sister, May—yes, I know, our parents suck—were having some sort of telepathic conversation about me. About what to do, who to call, how to help.

It was all so much. But I wasn’t stupid enough to think that I could handle it on my own, so whenever they were ready to start saying out loud what they were puzzling out, I’d do whatever they thought was best.

“You need to call the cops,” June announced.

Except that.

“No.” I shook my head and rose from the bed. “I can’t do that.”

“Of course you can. The guy is stalking you.”

Janie’s voice was so painfully gentle that I wanted to hug her and tell her to go eat a cookie or something. She was our B&B’s resident baker, and she always said cookies fixed everything. I should really get her together with Kate.

They’d met briefly, but since I didn’t want my sisters blabbing to my friends about the big secret, I hadn’t wanted them to get too close. And that was kind of a shame, because Janie and Kate would have a lot of fun swapping cupcake recipes.

Okay, wait, scratch that.

I didn’t want to lose one of my best friends to my way sweeter sister with her way more appropriate sense of humor. My gentle friend would throw me over in a heartbeat for Janie.

“He’s not stalking me,” I finally said with a huff. “It’s a free country. The man is well within his rights to drink coffee in a public place.”

At this, May finally spoke up. “Right, but… why is he back in town?”

I shrugged. I had no answer to that, and I sure as hell hadn’t stuck around the shop to find out.

“Guys, I wouldn’t have even known Cliff was back if it weren’t for that meeting with Eric, so maybe it had nothing to do with me,” I said.

The dark churning in my belly begged to differ, but I told it to STFU.

“Speaking of Eric, does he know you used him to make Cliff go away last time he was in town?” Janie asked.

This time, her voice was filled with something close to delight. The girl probably fought the urge to clap her hands like a giddy teenager.

“No.”

June waved her hand. “April, this is getting ridiculous. First, he comes here and threatens you, then disappears for months. Then, he shows up at Christmas, and when you tell him your ‘hot, black-belt-wielding boyfriend’ will kick his ass if he doesn’t leave, he threatens you again. Now, you see him sitting in the same coffee shop as Eric and you don’t think it has anything to do with you? The man doesn’t even live in Granite Springs. Why the hellwouldn’tit?”

That lie was so damned stupid. But he’d caught me leaving a Christmas party at Walker’s after I’d had way too many cups of spiked eggnog, and blurting out that Eric was inside—and yes, that he was my hot, black-belt-wielding boyfriend—was the only thing I could think of to get him to go away.

It’d worked, thank god, but yeah. Stupid.

My cheeks went hot at the reminder.

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