Chapter Three – Elliott
When he arrived at the restaurant, he had only meant to say hello, eat something, and go home to sleep.
He had been traveling for too long, grabbing rest where he could, living out of bags and airport lounges, and borrowed kitchens. All the way back to Bear Creek, he had told himself that what he wanted most was his own bed, in his own house, without having to think about his next destination.
Then Rachel walked through the door, and the whole idea fell apart.
So he stayed.
At first, it was easy enough to justify.
Lunchtime was building, and Thornbergs did not stand around in the middle of service when there was work to be done.
Caleb handed him a crate without missing a beat.
Matt pointed with his chin toward a stack of glasses that needed drying.
Eleanor asked if he had eaten, then answered herself by telling him to grab something from the kitchen when he got a minute.
It was home. Busy enough, noisy enough, familiar in all the old ways.
And then there was Rachel.
Over the next half hour, Elliott found himself watching her more than he meant to.
Not in any obvious way. He was still working, still carrying plates and wiping down tables and fetching things from the back. But every time she crossed the room, some part of him tracked her without permission.
And the more he watched, the more he saw it.
Rachel was at ease with the others in a way she was not with him.
She answered Caleb with a dry look and a quicker reply when he teased her about stealing his pen. She passed Matt a stack of order slips before he even had to ask, and barely broke stride doing it. When Eleanor called for more menus, Rachel had them in her hand before the sentence was finished.
There was no hesitation in any of it. No awkwardness. Just the air of someone who had found her place.
With Elliott, there was none of that.
She was polite. Professional. Careful.
Never rude. Never stiff enough that anyone else would notice. But the difference was there all the same, and once he saw it, he could not stop seeing it.
It got under his skin faster than it should have.
He told himself it was natural. They had only just met. She did not owe him warmth simply because the ground had shifted under his feet the moment he looked at her.
Still, it stung.
Because he had felt what had happened between them. He knew she had felt it too. And now she was moving around him as though she were drawing invisible lines and hoping he had the sense not to cross them.
But we need to cross them, his bear said. We can’t spend the rest of our lives dancing around her.
I don’t think we’re even close to dancing, Elliott replied. I think we’re more like stumbling around her.
He sensed her now by the service station with Matt, both of them bent over the bookings book while Matt tried to make sense of Eleanor’s handwriting.
“No, not Thursday,” Rachel said, and there was laughter tucked into her voice. “That says Tuesday. If it was Thursday, he’d have underlined it two times.”
Matt snorted. “You’ve cracked the code faster than I ever did.”
“That’s because I pay attention,” Rachel said.
Matt looked at her over the page. “You’re saying I don’t?”
“I’m saying you pretend not to and then blame the handwriting.”
Matt laughed, and Rachel laughed too, quiet and unguarded, and the sound of it went straight through Elliott.
There it was again.
Not flirting. Nothing even close. Just familiarity. The kind that came from working beside people long enough to know how they thought and moved, and spoke.
She had that with Matt.
With him, she barely seemed able to breathe.
His bear, restless under his skin since the moment he had seen her, stirred again.
She’s guarding herself, it said.
I can see that, Elliott replied.
Not from everyone.
No. Not from everyone.
That was the point.
He dried another glass and set it on the shelf a little harder than he meant to. Caleb glanced over, one eyebrow lifting, but said nothing.
Rachel was at the far end of the room now, crouching slightly beside an older couple while she talked them through the specials. She smiled when the woman asked a question, tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, then straightened and wrote something on the pad in her hand.
Nothing remarkable.
And still he could not seem to stop looking at her.
By the time the worst of the lunch rush had eased and the restaurant had settled into that quieter stretch before evening prep, Elliott was still there.
He had told himself more than once that he should go home. He was tired enough that his thoughts had begun to feel blurry around the edges, and yet every time he thought of a reason to leave, Rachel crossed the room and gave him a reason to stay.
Eleanor came up beside him with a basket of cutlery and said, “I thought you’d have gone home by now. We’ll still be here tomorrow.”
Elliott took the basket from her automatically. “I know.”
“You look exhausted.”
“I’m okay, just still stuck in another time zone. If I go to sleep now, I’ll feel worse.”
“You know best,” Eleanor said, giving him a fond look. “But you’re making me feel tired.”
He looked past her to where Rachel was clearing table seven, quick and composed, her face giving nothing away now.
She was looking at us, his bear said.
I believe she was, Elliott replied, which gave him a glimmer of hope.
She’s curious about us, his bear said happily. Just like when you’re curious about exploring a new local cuisine.
Elliott’s mood lifted despite himself. Curious was a start.
Then Eleanor turned as the back door opened. “Oh, that’ll be Tessa with the girls.”
Tessa came in first, holding the door, and behind her came Lucy and Aria with school bags, flushed cheeks, and all the bottled-up energy of children freshly let loose from a classroom.
Rachel looked up at once.
And everything in her changed.
The careful reserve he had watched her hold on to all afternoon fell away. Her whole face softened. Her shoulders did too. She smiled, her expression full of love, as the younger girl hurried ahead and the older one followed more calmly beside Tessa.
“There you are,” Rachel said, crossing the floor at once. “This is a surprise.”
The girls rushed over and hugged her, and she hugged them right back. It was the most unprofessional he had seen her all shift, and the most natural. As if the version of Rachel he had been trying to understand all afternoon had finally stepped fully into the room.
Elliott stayed where he was.
His bear, which had been restless under his skin all afternoon, went suddenly and unexpectedly still.
She has children.
When Rachel turned with them and saw Elliott looking, something tightened in her expression again—not fear, not exactly, but caution.
Then it hit him hard.
Because seeing his mate with her children made everything make sense.
Rachel was not putting a barrier between them because she was shy or because she did not understand what had happened when he looked at her. Or even because she did not want him.
She was keeping him at a distance because these girls were part of every thought she had, every choice she made, every risk she measured.
Rachel would sacrifice everything for her children. Even her heart.
“Elliott,” Matt said, coming toward him, Tessa beside him. “This is Tessa. Tessa, the wanderer, has returned at last. This is Elliott.”
“Hi, Tessa,” Elliott said, stepping forward. There was an awkward moment when neither of them seemed sure whether to hug or not.
“It’s good to finally meet you,” Tessa said, leaning in to kiss his cheek lightly and solving the problem. “Matt is always telling me about your trip. And the recipes you share.”
“Are you the Elliott who went to Thailand?” one of the girls asked.
“I did,” Elliott said, and then looked toward Rachel before he could stop himself, as if asking permission to do what? Speak to her daughter? He did not want his mate to think he was trying to get to her through her children.
For a moment, she locked eyes with him, and he felt as if he were being assessed. He held his breath, not sure whether he would pass. Then she came over to join them.
“Girls,” Rachel said, one hand still resting lightly on Lucy’s shoulder, “this is Elliott. Elliott, these are my daughters, Lucy and Aria.”
“Hi, Lucy,” he said, keeping his voice easy. “Hi, Aria.”
Lucy looked at him curiously. “Did you really go to Thailand?”
“I did,” Elliott said. “For a while, actually.”
“Was it very far?” she asked.
“Very far,” he said. “Long enough on a plane that by the end of it I felt as if I’d been folded into the seat.”
That made Lucy smile.
“Did you fly the whole way?” she asked.
“Not all in one go. I changed planes, and I had to sleep in an airport once, which sounds more exciting than it really was.”
Lucy laughed at that.
“Did they have strange food?” she asked.
Elliott smiled. “Some of it was new to me, yes. But that was half the fun. You’d walk through a market and smell five different things at once—chili, lime, grilled meat, coconut, and herbs I didn’t know the names of yet.
Some of it looked strange at first, but then you’d taste it and wish you could eat it every day. ”
Aria, who had been quieter up to now, asked, “Did you ever get lost?”
“Once or twice,” Elliott admitted. “Mostly because I thought I knew where I was going and then found out I didn’t.”
Lucy’s eyes widened. “Really?”
“Really. But getting lost isn’t always bad. Sometimes that’s how you find the best food.”
Lucy looked impressed by that. Aria looked as though she was turning it over carefully in her mind.
When Elliott glanced up, he found Rachel watching.
She did not look away at once.
There was still caution in her face. He could see that plainly enough. But there was something else there too, something more complicated than distance.
His bear stirred.
Now we understand.
Yes.
They did.
If he wanted any place in Rachel’s life, he could not think only about her.
The girls were part of everything. Every choice. Every risk. Every hope.
He looked at Rachel again and felt the truth of it settle more firmly inside him.
Whatever happened next, he would have to earn her trust.
And not only hers.