Chapter 6
Six
Brax’s meeting with an attorney in Johnson City didn’t take too long. Since he wasn’t fighting for a piece of whatever she’d built in the last decade, it was clear-cut enough. With ten years of separation and no kids, the court wouldn’t fight the petition. There was no sense in him filing in New York since she was willing, so he’d let her know, and they’d get the divorce process officially started. Properly this time.
He’d expected to feel some measure of relief at that fact, but he was restless. Probably he’d stay that way until everything was finalized in a couple of months. In the meantime, he had bigger decisions to make.
Jonah and Holt were in the living room when he got back, both peering at some kind of paperwork.
“She’s talented. I’ll give her that.” Holt’s tone held respect, something Brax knew took effort to earn.
Twisting open the beer he’d snagged from the fridge on his way inside, he dropped into a chair. “Who’s talented?”
“Mia. She dropped by copies of the proposal while you were gone.” Jonah held one out. “How’d it go?”
“It went.” He took the folder and flipped through.
She’d put together multiple elevations of the building, giving several options for changing the face of it. The interior drawings considered everything they’d discussed, and then some. Detailed estimates and timelines were included with each variation. The whole package was slick and professional.
“Wow.”
“I gather you didn’t know she could do this?” Holt asked.
“She used to draw. Protected those sketch pads like Fort Knox. I didn’t know she’d turned it into this.” He traced the lines of one of the interior options. The one that resembled the bakery she’d loved in Spokane. She’d captured the feel of it perfectly, down to the hazy suggestion of customers at half the tables, an assortment of pastries, breads, and cakes on their plates.
Jonah tossed down his folder. “Okay, so let’s get down to brass tacks. The numbers she’s given are within the budget we all discussed, provided we’re all three in. But the money isn’t the only important thing here. We need to talk about whether we’re really gonna do this. I, for one, believe we can make it work. I’ve worked up a business plan?—”
“When did you find time to do that?” Brax asked.
“Rachel helped. We had a couple calls about it. She had a lot of good suggestions for how we can phase things in without overwhelming ourselves.”
“Uh huh.” Holt’s lips twitched.
Jonah scowled. “What?”
“Nothing. Consulting with our teacher is perfectly sensible. The fact that she’s single, age-appropriate, gorgeous, and you basically couldn’t take your eyes off her for the past year is beside the point.”
“Shut up, asshole. She’s widowed and not looking.”
Which, Brax reflected, wasn’t at all the same thing as Jonah not being interested. But saying so would just put him in a pisser of a mood, so Brax kept his mouth shut on that point. “What exactly did she say?”
They discussed numbers. Expenditures. Income projections. Basic operational budget. Legal costs of acquiring the business license and setting up an LLC.
“At the end of the day, the numbers work,” Jonah declared. “That first year is liable to be a little lean while we get established, but since we’d own the building outright, once we pay off renovation and other startup costs, we’re free and clear. The more of those we pay out-of-pocket up front, the less we’ll owe.”
“And the less we have in reserve if something goes wrong,” Holt pointed out. “What are our options for a business loan?”
“I can get an appointment down at the bank to discuss that later this week. I didn’t see the sense in crossing that bridge unless we were serious. So where do you two fall? Yay or nay?”
Holt sat back, sipping at his beer. “At the risk of adding additional pressure to Brax, I’m in. I’d much rather work with you two than take my chances with total strangers somewhere else. I like the town, and I think we can build something good here.” He shifted his attention to Brax. “But I know it’s not that simple for you. This isn’t just a business decision.”
“I haven’t made any decisions with Mia in mind for nearly ten years. The fact that she’s here, that we’re still married for a couple of months while the legalities get sorted, really shouldn’t play into this.” And if he kept saying it, maybe he’d believe it.
“Really think about what you’re saying, man,” Jonah urged. “Can you live in a town this size with the possibility of running into your ex-wife at the grocery store or the diner? Because whatever you’re telling yourself, you’ve still got unresolved feelings for her.”
Brax narrowed his eyes. “They were perfectly resolved until I found out the divorce hadn’t gone through. They’ll settle once the paperwork is finalized.”
“Will they?” Holt asked. “Is a piece of paper going to magically make all the questions go away? Or are you going to finally take advantage of the fact that you’re both in the same place for the first time in ten years so you can finally get some answers? Because you need answers, my brother. No matter how much you deny it. I don’t think there’s gonna be any moving on without that.”
Sometimes Holt’s keen observational skills really pissed Brax off. He’d been fine without answers all this time. Maybe they’d come naturally out of being around each other again. But he wouldn’t force them. He didn’t want that confrontation. Didn’t want to spew all the frustration and betrayal all over her like some kind of acid. That, in itself, was progress he didn’t want to undo.
“Maybe you should talk to Dr. Graham about all this,” Jonah suggested.
“I don’t need to talk to a therapist about it. What’s going on with Mia is unusual and complicated. That doesn’t mean I’m somehow unclear on what I want. And what I want is to take this leap with both of you.” The certainty of it settled in his bones as he spoke the words. “I want this business. I want the community ties that we can build here.”
“Good to hear. But I have to play devil’s advocate,” Holt admitted. “What happens if it turns out you can’t handle living in the same town as your ex?”
Brax tamped down his frustration and really considered the question. They weren’t asking to give him grief. “If worse comes to worst, based on these projected numbers, you could buy me out within two years. I stayed in crap deployments a lot longer than that. But I don’t think it’ll come to that. Mia and I are adults. We can figure out our situation without it affecting the business.”
Jonah and Holt exchanged a long look, then Jonah extended his beer. “Okay then. Let’s do it!”
They toasted to the decision, and Brax felt lighter for it. This was the right move. Everything else would sort itself out.
“Now, how about we discuss living arrangements?” he prompted. “Because I’ve drawn the short straw more than either of you two assholes, and I would really like a proper bed.”
The last thing Mia expected to see when she arrived at the bar for demo day was a sheriff’s cruiser out front.
“That can’t be good.”
Throwing her truck into park and wishing she’d taken the time to drink the coffee in her travel mug, she headed for the building. The heavy black door was open, and she could see signs of the lock having been jimmied.
Shit.
The guys were inside with Xander, standing around the bar. Her gaze moved unerringly to Brax, standing shoulder to shoulder with his friends, arms crossed, glowering like a bouncer as the sheriff scribbled notes on a pad.
“What’s going on?”
Jonah scowled. “Somebody broke in last night.”
“Did they take anything?”
He stretched out his arms. “What the hell was there to take? We already got rid of the tables and chairs, and the VFW hauled off the pool table the other day.”
She automatically glanced around, looking for other signs of vandalism, but the place was bare and clean-ish. At least compared to how it had looked on her first visit.
“Maybe somebody thought there’d be booze left and bailed when they didn’t find anything,” Holt suggested.
“We’ll get the locks replaced ASAP.” Mia turned to Xander. “We’re scheduled to do demo today. Do I need to hold off my crew for you to finish whatever investigating you’re gonna do?”
“I’ll check the doors for prints, but with nothing missing or damaged other than the door itself, I don’t expect to find much. I mean, it’s a bar. There will be all kinds of prints around here.”
Jonah scrubbed a hand over his head. “That doesn’t seem necessary. I didn’t expect you to be able to do anything. Just wanted to file the report, cross all the T’s and what not.”
“You’ll let me know if anything else pops up?”
“Sure will. I’ll walk you out.”
As the two men headed outside, Mia wiped damp hands on her jeans and turned to Brax. “Talk to you a minute?”
Holt jerked a thumb toward the door. “I’ll just?—”
They both watched him go, Mia noting the faintest of limps in his stride.
Not knowing what else to do with her hands, she shoved them in the back pockets of her jeans, rocking back on her heels. “I wanted to let you know I filed the paperwork yesterday, like we discussed.”
He blinked those unreadable gray eyes. “I appreciate that.”
“I’m told that so long as we sort out our terms over the next couple of months and have them properly drafted, once the sixty days are up, we can file the agreement and be done with it.”
“Okay. Sounds good.”
Sounds good.
The ease of the statement hit her like a fresh knife to the gut. Nothing about this was good. Not the circumstances or the lies he’d believed or his maddening neutrality. Couldn’t he betray just a flicker of regret at ending things?
“Let us know where you want us.” Jonah’s voice pulled Mia out of the dark spiral of her thoughts.
“Excuse me?”
“It’s our building, and we want to help. Consider us part of your crew.”
That was an absolutely terrible idea.
“Except you’re not part of my crew, and we’d be liable if you get injured on my job site.”
He shrugged. “We’ll sign waivers. Fact is, we’ve got time and nothing else to do. We can follow orders.”
She raised a brow. “From a woman?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Mia had to hand it to him. He didn’t smirk or come off as condescending. She shifted to Brax. “You’re okay with this? Working with me?”
He jerked a nod, no hesitancy or discomfort in his expression. Did she mean so little now that this wasn’t a big deal to him?
Locking away that fresh hurt, she looked at his companions. They were formidable. Both over six feet, and well-muscled, despite however long they’d been out of the military. They certainly had the brawn to manage what she’d throw at them.
“I know Brax has done construction before. Have you?”
Holt’s lips twitched. “Enough.”
“I don’t figure demolition is any harder than rebuilding infrastructure in war-torn countries,” Jonah added.
She could tell them no. Cite liability reasons. Porter would back her up. But somehow, that felt like the coward’s way out. She had to find a way to be around Brax without her heart bleeding fresh. Maybe exposure therapy was the way to go. And God willing, the job would be over before their marriage was.
“Fine. This goes against my better judgement, but it can’t hurt to have extra hands. You’ll all sign waivers; you do what I say, when I say it, without argument. And if I deem you’re more harm than help, you’re out.”
“Seems fair,” Jonah agreed.
She shifted her attention back to Brax. “We also have to decide what we’re telling the crew about who you are.”
He arched a brow. “Do we have to tell them anything?”
“Please, they gossip worse than a bunch of middle school girls.”
“What do they know about… us?”
She swallowed. “Nothing. I’ve kept my relationship status quiet. Porter knows, obviously. And one other guy on the crew, who I worked with in Washington.”
“Then let’s keep it that way.”
Oh, he was utterly delusional if he thought the secret of their connection was going to stay secret for longer than two point five seconds after Luca laid eyes on him. But fine. If that was the way he wanted to play it, it was his funeral. He might be a military badass, but her crew was loyal to her, and they outnumbered him. If anybody thought he was disrespecting her, they’d hand him his ass and boot him out the door.
By the time the ass-covering paperwork was signed, the dumpster had been delivered, and her crew had arrived. Luca showed up with a chip on his shoulder the size of Tennessee. She could see it in his posture the moment he slid out of his truck and stalked in her direction. He scanned the group, obviously looking for Brax. She’d have to head him off and have a word before the start of the workday. The last thing she needed was some kind of over-protective display of male dominance.
“Who pissed in your Fruit Loops this morning?” she asked.
A flicker of humor lit Luca’s eyes before he continued his scan. “That him?” He jerked his chin toward where Brax stood in conversation with Holt.
Mia wrapped her hand around Luca’s arm, propelling him away from listening ears. “Yes. And you will damned well remember that this is my job site, my crew, and your role here is not as my guard dog. Right now, I’m not your best friend. I’m your boss. Be the professional I know you are. They’re clients. So be polite.”
“I can be civil.” His credibility was undermined by the fact that he growled it.
“Can you? Because I will bench your ass from this job if you don’t behave. Keep your attitude to yourself.”
Luca blew out a breath and relaxed his aggressive posture. “Sorry. I just don’t want to see you hurt any more than you already have been.”
“I appreciate that. But this is about my business, not my personal life. Don’t cross the line. Okay?”
He saluted, and Mia chose not to call him out on the sarcasm of the gesture. She hadn’t had enough coffee to deal with this.
Retrieving her travel mug from the truck, she let loose a whistle and called her crew together. “Let’s get this show on the road!”