Jill Shalvis - The Sweetest Thing

“Yes,” Mia said. “It’s what happens when a stupid guy dumps me.”

Still holding the case of juice, he grimaced in misery.

Tara pulled Carlos the rest of the way into the kitchen. “Could you load that into the pantry?” She turned to Mia. “He’ll need your help.”

Mia looked surprised. “But the other day you said I couldn’t be alone with him in the pantry except over your dead body.”

“You have three minutes,” Tara told her. “And if you don’t emerge exactly as you are, there will be a dead body-just not mine. Take it or leave it.”

Mia was staring at Carlos. “Take it,” she said softly.

Tara watched Carlos wait for Mia to go ahead of him before he looked back at Tara.

“There’s always a way to make things work,” she told him quietly. “If you want it bad enough.”

He nodded and followed Mia into the pantry.

Tara looked around at the empty but chaotic kitchen and for once realized she didn’t feel an ounce of the usual panic and anxiety over the mess. Instead, she felt…

Utterly at home.

She stepped out the back door and drew a deep breath of the salty air. She bent and picked a pesky weed out of the flower bed. Then she looked at her watch. Their three minutes were up. Back inside, she moved to the pantry and knocked.

No answer. Dammit. Give teenagers an inch, and they’d take a mile. She should know; she’d taken hundreds of miles when she’d been a teen. Thousands . “Hey,” she said, knocking harder, “I wasn’t kidding about the dead body.”

“It’s okay, Mom.”

Tara whirled around, her throat locked at the word “Mom.” Mia and Carlos stood there, holding hands. “Oh,” she breathed, scarcely able to talk. “You called me Mom.”

“Yes. Is that okay?”

“ So okay,” Tara managed. “Did you two work it out?”

“No,” Mia said softly, looking at Carlos.

He looked at her right back, not smiling, but with a world of warmth in his eyes.

“We’ve decided to enjoy the rest of the summer,” Mia said, never taking her eyes off of him. “Take it as it comes. When I leave and then come back…” She lifted a shoulder. “We’ll see.”

“Sounds very grown up,” Tara managed, nearly losing it at the look on Carlos’s face as he watched Mia. He was doing his best to be cool. Calm. Collected. She recognized the technique.

But he was hurting, and her heart ached for him. He’d wanted to rip the Band-Aid off as much for him as he had for Mia. But he’d agreed to wait, knowing the painful sting was coming eventually. Very likely, he didn’t believe in good outcomes for himself. That was okay. She had a feeling that Mia believed enough for all of them. “How about helping me out in here?” she asked them.

They chopped. Sautéed. Stirred. Tasted. By the time the food was finished, Tara was red-faced and sweaty, which she knew because Mia forced her to view her own reflection in a spoon.

Mia was grinning. “You look…”

Tara stared at herself. “Like a mess. A complete mess.”

“I think you’re beautiful,” Mia said.

That afternoon, Tara had her first real success right there in the kitchen, both with the meal and her time with her daughter, and she realized it was because of love.

If she cooked with love, things came out right.

So maybe if she lived with love… same thing? With love maybe she could be a real chef, a mom, a sister, a lover.

She could be anything she wanted.

She could have anything she wanted.

God, she really could. She looked at Mia. “I have to go for a few minutes. Can you man the phone?”

“Of course. Maddie and Chloe are here, too.”

Tara grabbed her keys and ran outside. She had to go to Ford, had to tell him all she’d realized, but there he was in the yard, struggling out of the passenger seat of Sawyer’s truck.

As Ford stepped clumsily out of the truck, concern and worry choked Tara, and she ran forward.

He stopped her with a single, violent shake of his head.

“Yeah, don’t bother,” Sawyer said over the hood. “He gets all PMS-y if you try to help.”

Tara took a good look at Ford. He was pale and sweaty, and unstable on his feet. Dammit. “You need to be inside. Off your leg.”

“In a minute,” he said.

“Ford, please,” she said. “Just wait, let me-”

“Actually,” he said. “I’m done waiting. Done doing things the easy way and letting things happen as they will.”

Her heart caught. “What does that mean?”

“It means this is too important to let slip away again. You’re too important.” He leaned back against the truck with a low grunt of effort, eyes dark, jaw clenched. “I love you too, Tara.”

She stopped breathing, and he went still. “You did say that you love me, right? Oh, Christ, don’t tell me that was the drugs.”

She choked out a half-laugh, half-sob and shook her head.

He stared at her. “Okay, for the poor drugged man-is that no it wasn’t the drugs, or no you didn’t say it?”

She swallowed hard past the lump of emotion and gave him the words that she’d previously only managed to whisper when she’d thought he’d been sleeping. “I said it.”

“Good. Because I love you, too. I think I always have. I always will.” One of the crutches clattered to the ground. He started to bend for it and stopped short, going from pale to green.

“ Ford .” Tara was at his side in two seconds, slipping an arm around him as Sawyer came around the other side.

“No,” Ford said, resisting them both. “Just give me a damn minute. I think… Fuck. I think I’m going to pass out now.”

“Okay, that’s it,” Tara said and nodded at Sawyer. “Inside. Now.”

“Love it when you’re bossy,” Ford murmured. “Especially in bed. Can we do that again soon?”

“You don’t listen to me when I boss you,” she said, holding onto him.

“If you get naked, I’ll try. I swear.”

Sawyer looked deeply pained. “Hello, I’m right here.” When he tried to steer Ford toward the inn, Ford dug in his heels.

Or heel.

“Don’t,” Ford grated out. “Not yet. Sawyer-”

“Let me guess. You need a minute.”

“Yeah.”

“Ford, you’re hurting,” Tara said, and just sighed when Sawyer gave in and backed away, heading to the porch.

“My pain meds wore off,” Ford announced.

“I know, which is why-”

“I need to do this, Tara. I came here to do this.”

“You’re trying to tell me something,” she said.

“Yes. Actually, I’m trying to ask you something. The last time I asked, you didn’t take me seriously because I was high as a kite. I’m not high as a kite this time, Tara.” His eyes held pain, but also warmth and affection and love.

“I know this because I’ve been watching the clock,” he said. “Waiting.”

Before she could say a word to that, her sisters and Mia, along with Carlos, came out of the inn. So did their two guests with their picnic basket. Everyone crowded onto the porch with Sawyer.

Ford looked at them and let out one low oath.

“Oh, no,” Tara said, ignoring their audience as she gripped his shirt. “No more waiting. You said so. Now ask me, dammit.”

He seemed surprised that she’d managed to follow his rambling logic. “Now?”

“ Now .”

“I ask you to marry me when we’re alone, and you assume I’m out of my mind and don’t respond. And now you want me to ask you while we’re being stared at by…” He paused to look at all the people on the porch.