2. Noah
Chapter 2
Noah
V ictoria Randolph.
Wow. It had been years.
I hadn’t thought of her in a while, but in my mind, I pictured her as the smiling captain of the soccer team. She had a bouncy ponytail and was always wearing athletic shorts.
The pretty, sporty girl. The girl everyone liked.
The woman currently scowling at me and clinging to my forearm?
She was different.
Mature. Beautiful. Intimidating.
And furious.
“Who are you? Where is the fire department?”
Before I could respond, Raeanna pushed past me and gripped her by the upper arms.
“Oh my God, Vic. Are you okay?” She pulled her into a hug. “That door is probably a million years old. I’m so sorry.”
“I’m okay,” Victoria said slowly, staring at me as I took a step back, then another.
Raeanna hummed, unconvinced. “Thank God Noah was here and had an axe in his truck.”
“Noah Hebert?” Victoria’s eyes widened as if she’d only now realized who I was.
“At your service,” I replied with a smirk.
We assessed one another for what seemed like an eternity while my mind spun wildly, cataloging every detail I knew about her.
Her glossy dark hair fell past her shoulders, and she was dressed in black. Dressy black. Businesslike.
Her lips were glossy and a deep red.
She looked completely different and yet somehow the same as she had in high school.
I was still memorizing her features when she looked away, her cheeks going pink.
“I’m so sorry,” she said to Rae. “I’ll pay for the damage. But I’ve got to run to this meeting.” She checked her watch, ignoring me completely.
“That door has been a pain in my ass since I opened the shop. No need to pay for damages. Where are you headed?”
“Across the square. I have a meeting with Huxley.”
I didn’t know who Huxley was, but by the way Rae herded her down the hall, it was clear she understood the gravity.
“You better run. We’ll clean up here. When your meeting is over, come back for lunch. It’s on me, okay?”
With a nod, Victoria shuffled for the exit. Frozen to the spot, I watched her as she weaved her way through the crowd of gawking townsfolk and out the door before taking off at a sprint down the sidewalk.
Rae put a hand on my arm, breaking the spell.
“Thank you,” she said, her tone sincere. “I can’t believe that happened.”
I smiled down at her. She was a tiny woman in her forties with curly auburn hair tied back with a bandanna. I’d only met her a few days ago, but Tess and I had been here every day since, so we’d become friendly.
Her kids were school-aged, but she’d already brought over a few toys and board books for Tess. She was one of the most thoughtful people I’d encountered in a long time.
“Let me clean up and help you fix it,” I said.
“No, no. I’ll do it. I’ll call Mark and have him hit the hardware store after the field trip. He’s chaperoning the fourth-grade visit to Baxter State Park. It’s days like this I’m glad I married someone handy.”
She was already picking up scraps of wood, and one of the staff members, a young guy with spiked blue hair and a nose ring, produced a large black trash bag.
I ignored her refusal of help and took the broom the guy brought with him as well.
Once the big pieces had been disposed of and I’d swept up the shards of wood, she blocked off the door.
After we put everything away, I headed back to the bay window where my mother was entertaining my daughter, who was currently mouthing on a chocolate chip cookie the size of her face.
“Seriously? It’s nine a.m.”
With a casual shrug, my mother brought her maple latte to her lips. “I did what I had to do to keep her calm while you went off to be a hero. Who could resist this face?”
She squeezed Tess’s cheek, making her giggle.
“Yeah, yeah.” I slid into my seat and sipped my now cold coffee. “You enjoy spoiling her.”
Smiling wide, she bounced Tess on her knee. “Of course I do. I did my time parenting you six hooligans. Now I get to spoil the grandbabies and do what I want.”
She loved being a grandma, and when I arrived with Tess in tow, she jumped right in to help. My niece Merry had been the only grandchild for more than a decade, but these days there was a Hebert baby boom. Finn’s son Thor was only a month older than Tess and Gus’s daughter Simone had arrived two weeks ago. Debbie Hebert had definitely found her purpose in spoiling her grandkids.
“Now, I want to—”
“Mom.” I held up a hand. “I love you, but no.”
“I have so much room.” She pleaded.
“Our apartment is great. We’ve got everything we need. I appreciate all your help, but I’m doing this myself.”
Despite what I kept telling her, the apartment wasn’t actually all that great. Or particularly spacious. But it was good enough for now. My older brother Finn had lived there for a while after he was discharged from the Navy, so he’d helped connect me with the landlord.
Tess and I were still getting settled, but we’d be comfortable. I loved my mom, but I hadn’t lived with her since high school, and being back in this town was hard enough without sleeping in my childhood bedroom.
My world had imploded last year, upending every single part of my life. And while I was scared shitless, I was determined to figure it out.
So space was necessary.
“And you’re sure you’re okay?”
I nodded, patting her hand.
“Please know that you’re always welcome. It’s still your home. Hell, I only got Cole out six months ago.”
My chest pinched at the affection in her teasing tone. In addition to mothering her five sons, my mom had also let my half brother move in after he was injured and his pro hockey career ended.
Cole was the product of an affair between my father and his assistant. When Tammi got pregnant, my dad left us to marry her. Yet my mom had been more of a parent to Cole than either of his biological parents ever were.
That was the essence of Debbie Hebert right there. Total saint.
And one of the many reasons why, after the legal custody stuff was finalized in California, I headed east. For more than a decade, I’d wanted nothing to do with this town, but I was a dad now, and I knew Tess would be surrounded by love here.
Given what she’d been through, all the trauma and the loss of her parents, the least I could do was give her as much love as I could find.
Eager to move on to a topic that did not include our living situation, I cleared my throat.
“Mom, that woman in the bathroom. Victoria Randolph?”
She nodded, her smile bright, while Tess smeared cookie drool on the table. Good thing I never left the house without wipes. It was one of those dad lessons I’d learned the hard way.
I took advantage of her distraction and took the rest of the giant cookie away.
My girl was sharp, though, and immediately shrieked while violently pushing her fingertips together, the sign for“more.”
I shook my hands out, responding with a sign of my own. “All done.”
“ No .” Her little face went red as she furiously signed “more, more, more.”
“One more bite.” I broke off a small piece. “Then all done.” I waved my hands to add some finality.
She snatched the hunk of cookie from my hand and shoved it into her mouth.
“The baby sign language is adorable,” my mom crooned while offering Tess another piece of the cookie I’d just risked my life to remove from her clutches. Great, exactly what I needed: a ten-month-old on a sugar high. “She is such a little smarty pants.”
I took the rest of the cookie from her and shoved it into my mouth. It was soggy, but at this point, I might as well stress eat while my mother tried to guilt me into moving back in with her.
“Victoria came back to town…” She tapped her chin. “A couple of years ago.” She peered over her shoulder, then angled in close and lowered her voice. “Terrible divorce. So bad she left Boston and came up here.”
I nodded, my stomach twisting with shame. I shouldn’t have asked. It was none of my business. She’d never seemed like the type to stick around Lovewell.
“She’s a superhero. Took over as director of the food pantry from her Aunt Lou, serves on multiple town committees, and is always pitching in to help.”
My heart sank. “What happened to Lou?” She’d been a fixture in this town since my childhood, always organizing canned food drives for the holidays at our school.
“She has MS,” my mother said, her lips turned down. “She’s healthy, but she can’t keep up with it anymore. Victoria is a force of nature. Did some fancy corporate thing in the city, so she’s got a good head for business.”
I nodded, forearms on the table. As my mother spoke, my brain rapidly integrated this new information. Random memories popped into my head—Jude mentioning that Vic had gotten married, and even visits to the food pantry to volunteer when I was in high school.
“Noah,” my mom said, snapping me back to the present.
I disappeared mentally like that from time to time. My brain got going, drawing connections and pulling up memories. When it did, I’d fall into it. Jude had always been patient with me, but many people in my life were not.
“Sorry. Just thinking. Tell me more about Simone.”
She pulled out her phone and scrolled through photos. Because she’d been born early, it was not yet safe to visit with Tess, who could bring along lots of germs. So I let my mother delightedly fill me in and chatter while I ruminated over all I’d learned in the last ten minutes.
Victoria Randolph. She’d been a grade above me in school. We hadn’t interacted much, but in a small town, everyone knew everyone.
Her parents had moved up in social status after her dad had invented something big, and they moved away. I think, like me, she headed off to college and never looked back.
While my mom chattered on, several townsfolk gawked at me. I couldn’t imagine what the rumor mill was saying, not that I had the attention span to care. Others came to say hello and smile at Tess, who was now scrunching up her face.
With her brows raised and her eyes on me, she stacked her hands and separated them. The sign for pooping.
“Oh boy.” I took her from her grandma and snagged the diaper bag from the booth. “Something’s brewing.”
“Come to dinner tonight.”
I bent down to kiss my mom on the cheek, then picked up our trash with my free hand.
“We’re still getting into a routine,” I said, catching a whiff of a very dirty diaper. “I think it’s best I try to get her to sleep in her crib.”
My mother didn’t put up an argument. She gave me a sweet smile and nodded. I couldn’t escape her invitations forever, and I wouldn’t try, but I needed a minute to catch my breath. Tess wasn’t sleeping, and doing anything to make that situation worse was asking for trouble. I wished I could blame the cross-country move, but in reality, she’d never been a good sleeper.
It was entirely my fault. According to a couple of the books I’d read and one pediatrician, I was supposed to sleep train her.
What I discovered as I read was that “sleep train” was the polite way of saying I should leave her in bed to scream.
There was no way I could do it. She was too precious and had been through too much. If my Tessie girl needed snuggles, then I would give them.
I would rock her and hold her until my back gave out. The last thing I’d ever do was leave her feeling scared and alone. And if she was spoiled as a result, so be it. There were a lot worse things in life than having an overprotective dad.
At my truck in the parking lot, I opened the back door, pulled my supplies out of the diaper bag, and got to work. Not to brag, but I was fantastic at handling diapers. Treating each blowout like an emergency that should be handled with precision, strategy, and a thorough risk assessment was the key.
After she was clean and buttoned back up, I picked her up.
Immediately, she threw her tiny arms around my neck and buried her face in the crook there.
“Love you, Tessie.”
When she’d loosened her hold so she could check out our surroundings, I spun her, holding her close, and surveyed Main Street. This town had changed a lot. In addition to the coffee shop, there was now a salon and a hardware store. Rumor had it a pizzeria was opening in the vacant storefront at the corner too.
The most significant difference had little to do with the new businesses or the newly planted trees lining the sidewalk. For me, the biggest change was in the energy of the place.
As I held my sweet baby girl, I couldn’t help but hope that Tess and I could start fresh here. I’d never replace what she’d lost, but hopefully, I could give her a future.