The One Who Saw Her: Boone (Callahan Legacy #1)

Chapter 1

Vivian Calder always thought rock bottom would feel louder—like a dramatic crash, or at least a satisfying cinematic thud.

Instead, it was quiet. Just her, her mother's guest room, and the faint hum of an air conditioner that sounded suspiciously like judgment, all surrounded by half-packed boxes that weren't going to finish themselves.

She had thirty days to make serious life decisions. Thirty days before her life packed up and moved on whether she was ready or not. And if she wasn't careful, she'd end up right back in this room—where dreams went to suffocate slowly under floral bedspreads.

She stared at the to-do list she'd typed into her phone's planner—the one that had started with "Get it together" and somehow branched into an entire ecosystem of impossible expectations.

Find a place to live. Pay off credit cards.

Figure out who you are. The last one had three question marks after it, which felt ambitious and wildly optimistic.

Her mother had called this Vivi's "phoenix era," but Vivi suspected she was more like a pigeon—stubbornly circling the block hoping someone would drop a french fry.

She was trying, though. She'd stopped doom-scrolling her not-quite-an-ex-boyfriend's Instagram and had only cried twice this week—once over an overdraft fee and once over a sad puppy video.

She'd even bought a self-help app with an aggressively positive title: Project Glow Up.

Now she stood in front of a coffee shop in a one-stoplight town, far away from the bright lights of New York, wondering how her life had come to this. How her entire world had boiled down to one hastily made decision.

Vivi hadn't so much as reached the door of Espresso Yourself before her life detonated before her very eyes.

One second she was gliding toward the entrance—head high, latte order rehearsed, pretending she wasn't a woman whose life had just gone up in flames—and the next, the suitcase her mother gave her for her high school graduation, which was held together by a bungy cord and a prayer, caught the doorframe.

The case teetered when the cord gave and the whole ancient baggage gave up and burst open like an emotional pinata.

Lacy bras, travel-size shampoos, and one rogue pair of yoga pants shot across the floor, scattering under tables like confetti at her own humiliation party.

How had she ended up in a one-stoplight town?

Her life-coach app had challenged her to do something terrifying.

Instead of adulting and facing her problems head-on, she'd hopped on a plane—then a bus—then walked to the nearest open shop.

Which was how she, a woman staring down thirty without an exit strategy, ended up in Bridlewood, Montana instead of Singapore with her not-quite-an-ex-boyfriend.

"Well," she muttered, crouching to gather her life off the tile. "Nothing says 'fresh start' like flashing your underwear before caffeine." She stood and gave a self-conscious wiggle of the fingers, like Elvis himself had entered the building. "Am I right?"

The patrons sat in utter silence. Even worse, the place appeared to be a gathering spot for locals because it was bustling with after-work patrons.

Maybe she should just call an Uber and go directly to the Airbnb, where she could crawl into bed, throw the covers over her head and pretend this entire day never happened.

Between the last-minute decision to come, the layover in Dallas and the time difference she was spent anyway.

"Everyone, mind your own business," a barista said and the chatter resumed.

Vivi dragged her suitcase to the Order Here line.

"Thank you," she said to the barista.

The barista was tall and willowy like a model but carried herself like someone who broke up bar fights for fun and moved like someone who wasn't afraid to jump into a rushing river. Her black hair was pulled into a messy ponytail that peeked out from beneath a Rule #1: Don’t annoy me ball cap.

Her long black sleeves were rolled up just enough to reveal an intricate black-and-white tattoo of a peony covering her entire forearm and a smaller one on the inside of her wrist that looked unfinished.

"Name's Joanna Blue, but you can call me Jo," she said. "I have zero tolerance for bullshit, zero fucks to give, and zero time to act like your therapist."

"My phone is my therapist." Vivi held up her trusted companion and the app that was supposed to change her life, Glow. Or at least change her enough to get her life in order and have her own Eat, Pray, Love moment.

"Then we're on the same page. Now, what can I get you?"

"An iced pumpkin-spice latte, half-caf, nonfat, with a whipped cream topper. Today is special so I'm going big."

Jo didn't seem even slightly interested. "Black it is. Cream? No. Sugar? No? Great."

"But—"

Vivi stopped talking because Jo was already headed toward the back counter.

Sitting on a nearby barstool, a man with Einstein hair, Scorsese brows, and biceps like Paul Bunyan pointed to a sign hung beside the menu which listed coffees by region.

House Rules

Don't waste even a drop.

Pumpkin spice is a four-letter word.

Whipped cream is for pies.

You want fast, soulless coffee? Go to Starbucks.

Don't want your barista to judge your life choices? Good luck.

Vivi turned from the sign as a woman glided past her.

"She's the Grounds Guru in these parts," said the woman in her seventies who didn't look a day over forty.

Her accent sounded so similar to Queen Elizabeth's that Vivi half-expected her to gently wave at the peasants.

She carried herself with the confidence of someone who no longer had anything to prove.

Silver threaded through her hair like soft strokes of light, and her impeccable clothing seemed to belong to another era.

"So does that mean I'm boring and bland and predictable?" Vivi asked, embarrassment thick in her voice.

"Darling, authenticity suits you far better than embellishment. You're strong, daring, and entirely capable on your own."

Vivi's breath caught and her eyes stung. It was just a silly comparison to coffee, but it was the nicest thing anyone had said to her in a long time.

"Thank you," she whispered. "I needed to hear that right now."

Before she could say more, Jo was back.

"Black, neat, for New York,” the barista said, sliding the cup across the bar with a crooked grin that dared Vivi to say something.

"The accent's that bad?"

"It's making my ears bleed."

Vivi picked up the cup, took a deep breath of the steam, and groaned. "This smells incredible. What is it?"

She took a sip. The hot liquid stung deliciously as it slid down her throat, warming her from the inside out.

"Black Ivory coffee," Jo said, a devil’s smile slashing across her face. "The beans are predigested by Thai elephants and then pooped out."

Vivi nearly spit it across the bar. Jo pointed to the sign. Right, rule number one, Don't waste even a drop. She forced herself to swallow, gagging only slightly in the process.

"Welcome to Bridlewood," Jo said, and then, with a salute, disappeared to help someone at the other end of the counter.

Vivi turned to thank the older woman, who had all but vanished, like a fairy godmother in Prada.

With no excuse left, she took a seat at the bar overlooking Main Street. The sun was setting, casting shadows that mimicked the forest of ponderosa pines lining the mountains surrounding the small, rustic town.

She pulled out her phone. "Glow, what's today's Glow Up exercise?" she asked her AI self-help coach—the one she'd purchased on Instagram late one night after her boyfriend confessed he'd taken an overseas job. And sold his flat. Their flat. Well, he owned it. But they'd shared it for three years.

They'd shared the mortgage, the utilities, the broken dishwasher, the broken toilet, the remodel, and so much more. Stupidly, she'd never added her name to the title. Never insisted, because she'd never wanted to make a fuss.

A chipper AI voice came back with: "Glow & Tell Daily Challenge. You have fifteen minutes to confess three secrets to three strangers. Singing along with Adele in the shower doesn't count."

Okay, Vivi. Just three secrets to three strangers. How hard can that be?

She had to get it right. There were only twenty-nine of her thirty days left to find a place to live and get her life in order.

At least the outline of a plan would be nice or she'd have to admit defeat and move back in with her mother.

And if her mother's guest room filled up first, she'd have no choice but to follow the human embodiment of every bad decision she'd ever made: Lewis.

Sure, Singapore sounded exotic and tropical but it would feel like one more pound added to the albatross that had been wrapped around her neck for most of her adult life.

Talking to people in real life wasn't her strong suit. Give her a computer, a stack of dating bios, and access to the internet, and she was downright eloquent. Poetic, she'd been called. But right now, she couldn't form a single word.

Maybe if she wrote it down first.

She opened her notes app and began swiping this way and that, her fingers flying over the screen with hyper-speed from pure muscle memory.

Three secrets I've never told a soul.

1. I've never had an orgasm with someone else in the room.

While true, it was too embarrassing to say aloud. Plus, the trick to successful admissions—like dating bios—was to say just enough to get a visceral reaction without trauma dumping. That confession was strictly diary material.

Vivi went to delete it and accidentally hit the speech button.

"Shit. Shit, shitty, shit, shit!"

Oh God. Abort. Delete. Undo!

Too late.

"I've never had an orgasm with someone else in the room," Glow announced as if the leading authority on self-made orgasms.

Vivi's eyes went wide.

The coffee shop went still.