Every Bit As Perfect (Sage Ridge #2)

Chapter 1

Sanctimonious

“Sanctimonious arse,” Noelle snorted with laughter. “What does that even mean?”

I rolled onto my side and grinned at my best friend.

Between us on the wide bed she now shared with my eldest brother Hawk, cushioned by their plush, buffalo plaid comforter, lay their six-week-old son.

With his sleepy face turned to the side, and his tiny arms thrown up beside his head, he slept, fully trusting the world he’d been so recently thrust into to hold him.

My first and only nephew.

Named after my dead brother.

I shoved that thought from my mind and focused on what I had, not what I’d lost.

Her face soft, Noelle caressed Hunter’s satiny cheek with her finger before returning her attention to me. “Why did you call him that again?”

I traced a line in the comforter with the tip of my finger. “Remember before Christmas when we had drinks at your brother’s house?”

“Max’s house?”

I looked at her incredulously. “Do you have any other brothers?”

She laughed. “Don’t give me a hard time! I’ve still got pregnancy brain!”

I nodded wisely. “Which is why I’m not having kids. Anyway, someone brought up Paul.”

Paul, who I’d lived with for five years, who at that time was not yet my ex-boyfriend.

“Ew.”

I sighed. “I know.”

There was no love lost between Paul and Noelle. Or Paul and Hawkley, Paul and Max, or Paul and my mom. I snorted to myself. There was never any love between Paul and my dad. By the end, there was no love lost between Paul and anyone.

Including myself.

“Hawkley and Daire took it upon themselves to tell me I should want more for myself.”

“Ouch.”

“Yes, ouch. I expect that from my brother, but from Daire? I hardly knew the guy back then. And the fact that I crushed so hard on him as a teen made it so much worse.”

“He is easy on the eyes.”

“This is true,” I admitted. “He said I needed to find someone who appreciated me and that I shouldn’t hang onto some schmuck who didn’t know his ass from his elbow. So, I told him to shove his nosy elbow up his sanctimonious arse.”

Noelle laughed. “He still talks about that.”

“Yeah?” I paused, unsure how I felt about them talking about me. “When did you see him?”

“He came over last week with Max to see Hunter.” She wagged her eyebrows. “He asked about you.”

A tiny butterfly took flight in my stomach.

I squashed it.

“I saw him at The Beaver Dam a couple of weeks ago. He was with the queen bitch bee of the Brady Bunch,” I informed her.

That fact sat like an infected splinter under my metaphorical skin. And not just because I thought he deserved better than to be gaslit by the chief bitch bimbo.

The ‘Brady Bunch’ was the trio of tall, blond, mean girls at school who never seemed amenable to giving me a break.

They left Noelle alone for the most part. Even when they didn’t, it didn’t faze her. Noelle only ever gave a shit about me, her brother Max, and my brothers, Hunter and Hawkley.

Especially Hawkley.

Besides, Noelle got so much male attention in high school, what did it matter if the Brady Bunch made snide comments every now and then?

She wrinkled her nose. “Ugh. If his taste was in his mouth, he’d be poisoned.”

“He deserves better.” I rolled my lips together. “Even if he is a sanctimonious arse at times.”

“He’s a really good guy,” she agreed softly.

Baby Hunter stretched, his tiny mouth turning down at the corners.

“Look, he takes after my brother!” I teased.

Blinking, he searched out his mom, a gurgle of happiness escaping his tiny mouth when he found her.

“Maybe he takes after you,” I murmured, my heart softening.

So much had changed in the past ten months.

Noelle moved home.

Hawkley found closure with Hunter’s death and returned to the land of the living. He’d even been known to smile occasionally now.

Hawkley and Noelle got married and had Hunter.

I broke up with Paul.

And found me again.

In some ways, after a decade apart, the original gang was back together. Except for Hunter. But even he was there in the shape of the gaping hole he left in my life.

My life was full.

But I felt lonelier than ever.

I tucked my baby finger into Hunter’s little fist. “Isn’t it amazing how tightly he grips?”

“It’s a survival instinct.”

“The first of many,” I murmured. “He’s going to wreak havoc with your sex life.”

“Cute little cock-blocker,” she whispered back.

“You did not just swear in front of my baby nephew.”

Noelle stared back at me; her lips twisted to the side. “Literally the first word he heard me say outside of the womb was motherfucker.”

I barked out a laugh. “I know. That story is legend now.”

“My boobs are leaking.”

I glanced at the expanding twin wet spots on her chest. “They are. What does it feel like?”

On the outside, I’d never been the girl to obsess over marriage and babies and happily ever afters. In fact, I worked hard to dispel any thought to the contrary.

But inside? I wanted it.

I wanted it all.

The floofy dress. The ugly bridesmaids’ dresses. The flowers, the fancy place settings, the candles, the wedding favors. The church. The rose-petal-strewn aisle. The vows. The forever.

The babies.

God, how I wanted the babies.

My hands itched to cradle the rounding of my womb as they grew inside me, to feel their tiny knees, feet, and elbows pressing against my walls. My empty arms yearned to hold them. My breasts ached to feed them.

It was my dream, a dream I was beginning to suspect I would have to live vicariously through my best friend.

“Wet. It feels wet.”

“Speaking of wet…have you gotten back into the saddle yet?”

“You did not just say that,” she groaned before answering. “This weekend. Hopefully things down there have retracted close enough to normal that he won’t feel like he’s dipping his dick inside a paint can. I’m not sure if my circumference is still the size of Hunter’s head.”

I snorted out a laugh as I stroked Hunter’s velvety scalp. “He doesn’t have a big head; he didn’t get the big-headed-Bennett baby gene.”

“He takes after me,” she preened. Her voice softened. “Are you seeing anybody?”

My eyebrows flew up. “Noelle, seriously?” I threw out my hands. “There’s like no new stock here in Sage Ridge!”

“Oh, please, Harley. Tell me you haven’t worked your way through the entire single male population of Sage Ridge.”

I scoffed. “The entire male population…you make it sound like there is one.”

“It can’t be that bad.”

I smirked. “It’s not great.”

“What do you want, Shrimpy?”

There was no way I would reveal my deepest desires. I didn’t want her pity. “I want you to come back to work and take over Bridezillaville,” I grumbled.

After only six weeks, I’d already had enough of filling in for Noelle. When she moved back to Sage Ridge, she accepted the position of Wedding coordinator at The Sage Ridge Resort, which my family owned and operated.

She was more than familiar with the business.

All five of us kids grew up in and around the resort.

Our mothers were best friends, connecting when Hawkley and Max were in diapers.

We celebrated every holiday and milestone together.

Christmas, Thanksgiving, Halloween, oh how we celebrated Halloween, summer vacations, birthdays, and graduations.

Our two families became one big happy family. And we remained so for years.

Then Hunter died.

My parents fell apart.

Hawkley became a shell of his former self.

Noelle left town.

A few years later, Noelle’s mom Christine got sick, and we lost her, too.

Max worked. And worked. And worked.

And while my parents and Noelle’s dad stayed tight, the rest of us drifted.

When Noelle returned, we got Hawkley back, too. Now Max was coming around more, not working so hard.

And Daire. Max’s friend from university, was a new addition since he decided to accept a teaching position at Sage Ridge Elementary.

I looked down at my precious nephew.

The beginning of the next of us.

A faint ray of hope brightened one of the cracks in my heart. Maybe, just maybe, we were healing.

“What about love? Marriage? Kids? Do you want those things?”

An unwarranted picture of Daire laughing at something I said last Christmas flitted through my mind.

Tall. Handsome. Broad shoulders, wide smile, long hair he wore pulled back from his face in a low ponytail or a man-bun. I loved it when he pulled his hair back into that bun. And why wouldn’t he with those cheekbones, those eyes, and that beautiful mouth?

When he entered the room, panties melted. But when women found out he taught kindergarten? Wombs opened and ovaries exploded.

He could have his pick of the entirety of Sage Ridge’s single woman population. If he was into the Brady Bunch, he was drinking from the bottom of the barrel.

I couldn’t judge him too harshly. He didn’t grow up with them. Hadn’t witnessed their unique brand of cruelty over the years.

Anyone who grew up here knew them well. Everyone knew everybody well here. That was part and parcel of living in a small town.

There were times I wished I could start over somewhere else, but they were few and far between. Mostly when I got sick of myself.

Accepting a job offer in a new town and packing up my entire life to move the way Daire did? I couldn’t imagine doing that. How was it so easy for him? What, or who, did he leave behind?

How Noelle survived for a decade without her friends and family around her was a mystery to me.

Not that any one of us had been functioning all that well.

When Hunter died, I fell apart. In the months and years that followed, with nobody left to help me, I picked up my pieces as best I could and carried on.

Hopefully the cracks of my shattered heart only showed on the inside where no one could see them.

“I wouldn’t rule out marriage and kids. But I’m not willing to settle next time.”

“What about Daire?”

“Ha,” I scoffed, the memory of him smiling at the queen bitch bee at The Beaver Dam engraved on my brain. “I hardly think I’m his type.”