Chapter Thirteen
Seth
“C AN YOU PASS ME THAT paint?” Jorja asked, gesturing to the poster paint on the table beside me.
“Sure,” I replied, handing it over to her. Mia sniffed it as it crossed the table in front of her, and Jorja whisked it away from her quickly.
“No way,” she warned her cat. “I’d be picking this out of your fur for weeks. Keep clear, okay?”
I couldn’t help but grin. It was nice to hear her having a little fun, given how stressed she had been the last few hours. We were putting the finishing touches on everything for the book fair tomorrow, making sure everything was exactly where it needed to be, and she had been rushing around like a crazy person no matter how many times I tried to tell her that everything was going to be okay.
Right now, we were putting the finishing touches on the large posters that would adorn the windows of the store tomorrow, announcing a Christmas book fair. It turned out that the blizzard was only going to be catching Mastin Falls on Wednesday evening, after the fair had taken place, and I had fit that into the marketing for this event, sticking up a few notices on social media for people to come in and pick up some books so they could relax at home, all cozy, with something new to read. Jorja had mentioned that she’d already had a few people mentioning it to her when she had been at the grocery store that morning, and I knew it was starting to get some serious buzz going.
We might just do it—we might just make enough to save the store.
“There,” Jorja remarked, as she held out the poster in front of her. “What do you think?”
She turned it to face me, and I nodded in approval. In large letters, it announced the date and time of the book fair, with each capital letter adorned with a Santa hat.
“I love it,” I replied, and she grinned.
“Really?” she remarked, turning it around to take another look at it. “I don’t know, I thought maybe I could add—”
“It’s perfect, Jorja,” I assured her, and she stopped in her tracks, closing her eyes and taking a deep breath. She had been a nervous wreck all day, and, no matter how much I tried to convince her that everything was going to go well tomorrow, she had been acting like she was waiting for a meteor to strike Mastin Falls and wipe it off the face of the map.
“You’re right,” she replied. “I guess we should get something to eat, right? I don’t have much in the house.”
“There’s a diner that’s open twenty-four hours, isn’t there?” I asked, as Mia climbed into my lap and bumped her head insistently against my hand. “We could go there for dinner, if you want.”
“Mmm, that sounds perfect,” she replied, stifling a yawn. “I’m too tired to cook anything.”
“Let’s get out of here, then,” I suggested, grabbing my coat. “We can bring this all down to the store tomorrow morning.”
The two of us headed to my car, and I glanced at her out of the corner of my eye as she gazed out of the window. Even though it was clear she was nervous about how everything was going to go tomorrow, she seemed relaxed, too. Like she was starting to believe it might really be possible to pull this thing off. I was sure it was going to be a long shot, but I would do everything in my power to make it happen.
The diner was lit up like a Christmas tree against the dark on the outskirts of town, and we headed in to grab a booth, one of the blue plastic tables separating us as we looked over the laminated menus. She ordered waffles, and I picked some toast and bacon and eggs.
“You a breakfast-for-dinner kind of guy, then?” she asked, as she took a sip of the orange juice she had ordered with her food.
“Oh, yeah, always,” I replied. Well, not always. My line of work had required me to be careful about what I ate most of the time, but these days, now I didn’t have to worry about it anymore, I was always happy to tuck into something breakfast-y for dinner.
“So,” she remarked, pointing her fork at me once her food had arrived. “What exactly was it you did back on the West Coast?”
I laughed. “What is this, an interrogation?”
“No,” she replied, raising her eyebrows at me. “I just realized after our first... after the first time we went out together that I had hardly asked you anything about yourself. And I want to put that right.”
I leaned back in my seat. I needed to be careful about how I handled this. I didn’t want to give anything away that I wasn’t ready to.
“I was an event planner,” I replied. Which was, of course, the truth. There had just been other things I’d done to pay the bills, too.
“That sounds like a lot,” she commented. “I don’t think I could deal with wrangling all those people all the time. I’d go crazy.”
I chuckled. “Yeah, it can be a little crazy-making sometimes,” I replied. “But it’s worth it. When you see an event come together like you wanted it to, it’s the most satisfying thing in the world.”
We chatted a little about my event planning days, and I watched her face as she spoke, scanning her for any hint of doubt that might have eluded to the fact that she knew what I had really done as my side-hustle back in LA. Truth be told, I had worked as the cover model for a romance book brand. Nothing too huge, but I had done enough that I occasionally saw myself turn up in book stores and on the covers of new releases. Most of the time, I could hardly recognize myself, given how they dressed me to match the hero of whatever book I was representing, but I didn’t want her to know about it. Not yet.
I didn’t know how she hadn’t figured out who I was yet, but perhaps she just didn’t pay that much attention to the models on the covers of her books. I had noticed how her eyes seemed to skim over the ones in the romance section, much to my relief. I didn’t know how she would feel about me if she discovered that I had done that for work for such a long time. I knew how people thought of models, as these vapid, self-centered narcissists who were always looking for people to admire them, but that had never been me. It had just been a way to make a little extra money, and that was how I had wanted to keep it.
Especially with her.
“You’ve done an amazing job with the book fair,” she gushed, as she finished up her meal. “I don’t know what I would have done without you, honestly. It’s crazy, I would have given up as soon as I had heard about the blizzard, but...”
She smiled at me across the table.
“Well, I’m glad I didn’t,” she finished up softly. “And I’m glad you ended up in Mastin Falls, of all places. I know it’s not what you’re used to.”
“That’s exactly why I came here,” I reminded her. “I wanted something completely different. Something unlike anything I had experienced before.”
“You’re so brave,” she murmured, shaking her head. “I don’t think I could ever have done something like that. You know, just giving up my life and starting over somewhere new.”
“I think there’s bravery in putting down roots somewhere, too,” I remarked to her.
She raised her eyebrows at me. “Really?”
“Really,” I replied. “There’s bravery in being willing to stay in one place, let people really get to know you, make a reputation for yourself there. I don’t know many people who could do what you had done, especially after everyone you’ve lost. You’re amazing, Jorja. Really.”
Her face softened into a smile. “You’re going to make me cry into my waffles,” she teased me lightly, shifting the tone to something a little brighter.
Soon enough, we had finished up, and I drove her back to her place to drop her off before the book fair the next day. I could tell that she was still seriously nervous, already slotting back into overthinking mode, and I walked her to her door. With how forgetful and distracted she had been today, it wouldn’t have surprised me if she had just missed it entirely and spent the night wandering around town.
“You going to be okay?” I asked her, and she nodded.
“I’ll be fine,” she replied. “I mean, it’s just the future of my grandmother’s store on the line, right? No big deal.”
I chuckled slightly, and our fingers brushed together for a moment. The way she was looking at me, it was so... soft. Open. I felt almost bad for keeping the truth of my past from her, but honestly, I didn’t want her to get distracted right now.
And I didn’t want anything to come between us in this moment.
Slowly, I leaned forward and planted my lips against her cheek. Her skin was soft, her sweet perfume filling my senses. She leaned in to me, her fingers wrapping around mine for a moment. I could hear her drawing in a sharp breath, like this was the last thing she had expected, but the first thing she had wanted.
When I pulled back, I ran my hand along her arm lightly. “You get some sleep,” I ordered her kindly. “And I’ll see you at the store first thing tomorrow.”
“I’ll see you then,” she replied. I could see the pink tinge to her cheeks again, and I was sure it was from more than just the cold. She lingered for another moment, like there was more she wanted to do before she left, but then, finally, she turned and headed inside the house. I waited until I heard the door lock behind her, and then headed back to my car.
The feel of her skin still fresh on my mouth and the glow of her living room window into my rearview mirror.