Once in a Lifetime (2 page)

The Book & Bean had been unofficially open for a week now, so it could start bringing in some desperately needed income, and in a month—after some renovations—she had plans to celebrate with a big grand opening party.

She was working on that.

And maybe she should be working on other things as well, such as her karma. That was heavy on her mind now after the AA meeting. Hearing people’s problems and how they were trying to change things up for themselves had been extremely intimate and extremely uncomfortable—and yet somehow inspiring at the same time. She wasn’t an alcoholic, but she had to admit the whole step eight thing had really intrigued her.

Could it be as easy as that, as making a list? Checking it twice? Trying to find out if she could pass on naughty and move on to nice?

Skipping the front entrance of the bookstore, she walked around to the back of the building and let herself in without turning on any lights. Inside, she headed up the narrow stairs to the loft.

Meow
.

She flipped on a light and eyed Gus, an old, overweight gray cat who thought he was king of the mountain. She’d inherited him with the store. She knew nothing about cats, and in return, he acted like he knew nothing about humans, so they were even. “Hey,” she said. “How was your evening?”

Gus turned around and presented her with his back.

“You know,” she said, “I understand that some cats actually greet their people when they come home.”

They’d had this talk before, and as always, this prompted no response from Gus.

“A dog would greet me,” she said. “Maybe I should get a dog.”

At this threat, Gus yawned.

Aubrey dropped her purse, hung up her coat, and took her first real breath in the past few hours. The place was tiny but cozy, and it was all hers ever since she’d filled it with an assortment of vintage—a.k.a. garage-sale and thrift-store—furniture. Her favorite part was the dartboard she’d gotten for a buck. It was a great stress reliever, especially when she pictured Ted’s smug face as the bull’s-eye.

Her kitchen table was covered with the drawings she’d made—her ideas for changing the layout of the store below.

Now that the other two storefronts in this building held flourishing businesses—a flower shop and a bakery—she had high hopes her bookstore would do well, too. A pipe dream. She was working against the odds, she knew. After all, this was the age of Kindle, Nook, and Kobo. Most people thought she was crazy for facing off against the digital world. But Aubrey had made a lifelong habit of facing off against the world, so why stop now, right? Besides, there was still a place for print books; she believed that with all her heart. And it was a statement of fact that sales in indie bookstores were up about 8 percent this year.

She was going to take heart in that. She pulled the pamphlet from her pocket and thought about her karma, which undoubtedly could use a little boost. Grabbing the small notepad she used for list making, she began a new list—of people she’d wronged.

Meow,
Gus said, bumping her arm.

Reaching down, she stroked his soft fur, which he tolerated even though they both knew he just wanted dinner. She poured him a small cup of the low-calorie dry food the vet had insisted she switch to.

Gus stared at her balefully.

“I promised the doc,” she said.

Huffing out a sigh, Gus heaved himself off to bed.

Aubrey went back to her list. It took her a while, and when she was done, she eyeballed the length of it. Surely it would’ve been a lot easier to simply stand tall and face Ben tonight rather than run into Pastor Mike.

But though Aubrey had a lot of faults, being lazy wasn’t one of them. She was doing this, making amends, come hell or high water.

And there was a good chance she’d face both before this was over.

Kicking off her boots, she leaned back, staring at the list. Specifically at one item in particular.

Ben.

And he wasn’t on it because she’d tossed her drink in his face.

I
t was early when Ben walked out of Lucky Harbor’s deliciously warm bakery and into the icy morning. His breath crystallized in front of his face as he took a bite from his fresh bear claw.

As close to heaven as he was going to get.

He glanced back inside the big picture window to wave his thanks, but pastry chef Leah currently had her arms and lips entangled with her fiancé, who happened to be Ben’s cousin Jack.

Jack looked to be pretty busy himself, with his tongue down Leah’s throat. Turning his back to the window, Ben watched the morning instead as he ate his bear claw. Tendrils of fog had glided in off the water, lingering in long, silvery fingers.

After a few minutes, the bakery door opened behind him, and then Jack was standing at his side. He was in uniform for work, which meant that every woman driving down the street slowed down to get a look at him in his firefighter gear.

“Why are you dressed?” Ben asked.

“Because when I’m naked, I actually cause riots,” Jack said, sliding on his sunglasses.

“You know what I mean.” Not too long ago, Jack had made the change from firefighting to being the fire marshal, and he no longer suited up to respond to calls.

Jack shrugged. “I’m working a shift today for Ian, who’s down with the flu.” He pulled his own breakfast choice out of a bakery bag.

Ben took one look at the cheese croissant and shook his head. “Pussy breakfast.”

Unperturbed by this, Jack stuffed it into his mouth. “You’re just still grumpy because a pretty lady tossed her drink in your face last night.”

Ben didn’t react to this, because Jack was watching him carefully, and Jack, unlike anyone else, could read Ben like a book. But yeah, Aubrey had nailed him—and not in a good way.

Not that he wanted the sexy-as-hell blonde to nail him. Well, okay, maybe she’d occasionally done just that in a few of his late-night fantasies, but that was it. Fantasy. Because the reality was that he and Aubrey wouldn’t mix well. He liked quiet, serene, calm. Aubrey didn’t know the meaning of any of those things.

“It was an accident,” he finally said.

“Oh, I know that,” Jack said. “Just checking to see if you know it, too.”

Ben looked at his watch. “Luke’s late.”

The three of them had been tight since age twelve, when Ben’s mom, unable to take care of him any longer, had dropped him on her sister’s doorstep—Jack’s mom, Dee Harper. Luke had lived next door. The three boys had spent their teen years terrorizing the neighborhood and giving Ben’s aunt Dee lots of gray hair.

“Luke’s not late,” Jack said. “He’s here. He’s in the flower shop trying to get into Ali’s back pocket. Guess that’s what you do when you’re engaged.”

Ben didn’t say anything to this, and Jack blew out a breath. “Sorry.”

Ben shook his head. “Been a long time.”

“Yeah,” Jack said. “But some things never stop hurting.”

Maybe not. But it really had been forever ago that Ben had been engaged and then married. He and Hannah had had a solid marriage.

Until she’d died five years ago.

Ben went after his second bear claw while Jack looked down at his vibrating phone. “Shit. I’ve gotta go. Tell Luke he’s an asshole.”

“Will do.” When he was alone again, Ben washed down his breakfast with icy cold chocolate milk.
You drink too much caffeine
, Leah had told him, all bossy and sweet at the same time, handing him the milk instead of a mug of coffee.

He planned to stop at the convenience store next for that coffee, and she’d never know. It was early, not close to seven yet, but Ben liked early. Fewer people. Quiet air. Or maybe that was just Lucky Harbor. Either way, he found he was nearly content—coffee would probably tip the scales
all the way
to content. The feeling felt…odd, like he was wearing an ill-fitting coat, so, as he did with all uncomfortable emotions, he shoved it aside.

A few snowflakes floated lazily out of the low, dense clouds. One block over, the Pacific Ocean carved into the harbor, which was surrounded by rugged, three-story-high bluffs teeming with the untouched forestland that was the Olympic Mountains. Around him, the oak-lined streets were strung with white lights, shining brightly through the morning gloom. Peaceful. Still.

A month ago, he’d been in the Middle East, elbows deep in a project to rebuild a water system for a war-torn land. Before that, he’d been in Haiti. And before that, Africa. And before that…Indonesia? Hell, it might have been another planet for all he remembered. It was all rolling together.

He went to places after disaster hit, whether man-made or natural, and he saw people at their very worst moments. Sometimes he changed lives, sometimes he improved them, but at some point over the past five years he’d become numb to it. So much so that when he’d gone to check out a new job site at the wrong place, only to have the right place blown to bits by a suicide bomber just before he got there, he’d finally realized something.

He didn’t always have to be the guy on the front line. He could design and plan water systems for devastated countries from anywhere. Hell, he could become a consultant instead. Five years of wading knee deep in crap, both figuratively and literally, was enough for anyone. He didn’t want to be in the
right
hellhole next time.

So he’d come home, with no idea what was next.

Polishing off his second bear claw, Ben sucked the sugar off his thumb. Turning to head toward his truck, he stopped short at the realization that someone stood watching him.

Aubrey. When he caught her eye, she said, “It
is
you,” and dropped the things in her hands.

Her tone of voice had suggested she’d just stepped in dog shit with her fancy high-heeled boots. This didn’t surprise Ben. She’d been two years behind him in school. In those years, he’d either been on the basketball court, trouble-seeking with Jack, or spending time with Hannah.

Aubrey had been the Hot Girl. He didn’t know why, but there’d always been an instinctive mistrust between them, as if they both recognized that they were two kindred souls—
troubled
souls. He remembered that when she’d first entered high school she’d had more than a few run-ins with the mean girls. Then she became a mean girl. Crouching down, he reached to help her with the stuff she’d dropped.

“I’ve got it,” she snapped, squatting next to him, pushing his hands away. “I’m fine.”

She certainly looked the part of fine. Her long blonde hair was loose and shiny, held back from her face by a pale blue knit cap. A matching scarf was wrapped around her neck and tucked into a white wool coat that covered her from her chin to a few inches above her knees. Leather boots met those knees, leaving some bare skin below the hem of her coat. She looked sophisticated and hot as hell. Certainly perfectly put together. In fact, she was always purposefully put together.

It made him want to ruffle her up. A crazy thought.

Even crazier, she smelled so good he wanted to just sniff her for about five days. Also, he wanted to know what she was wearing beneath that coat. “Where did you come from?” he asked, as no car had pulled up.

“The building.”

There were three storefronts in the building, one of the oldest in town—the flower shop, the bakery, and the bookstore. She hadn’t come out of the flower shop or the bakery, he knew that much. He glanced at the bookstore. “It’s not open yet.”

The windows were no longer boarded up, he realized, and through the glass panes, he could see that the old bookstore was now a new bookstore, as shiny and clean and pretty as the woman before him.

She scooped up a pen and a lipstick, and he grabbed a fallen notebook.

“That’s mine,” she said.

“I wasn’t going to take it, Aubrey,” he said, and then, with no idea of what came over him—maybe her flashing eyes—he held the notebook just out of her reach as he looked at it. It was small and, like Aubrey herself, neat and tidy. Just a regular pad of paper, spiral bound, opened to a page she’d written on.

“Give it to me, Ben.”

The notebook was nothing special, but clearly his holding on to it was making her uncomfortable. If it had been any other woman on the planet, he’d have handed it right over. But he didn’t.

She narrowed her sharp, hazel eyes at him as she waggled impatient fingers. “It’s just my grocery list.”

Grocery list his ass. It was a list of names, and there was a Ben on it. “Is this me?”

“Wow,” she said. “Egocentric much?”

“It says Ben.”

“No, it doesn’t.” She tried to snatch at it again, but if there was one thing that living in Third World countries did for you it was give you quick instincts.

“Look here,” he said, pointing to item number four. “
Ben.
”

“It’s Ben and Jerry’s.
Ice cream
,” she informed him. “Shorthand. Give me the damn notepad.”

Hmm. He might’ve been inclined to believe her, except there was that slight panic in her gaze, the one she hadn’t been able to hide quickly enough. Straightening, he skimmed the names and realized he recognized a few. “Cathy Wheaton,” he said, frowning. “Why do I remember that name?”

“You don’t.” Straightening as well, Aubrey tried to crawl up his body to reach the pad.

Ben wasn’t too ashamed to admit he liked that. A lot.

His jacket was open. Frustrated, she fisted a hand in the material of his shirt, right over his heart. “Damn it, Ben—”

“Wait…I remember,” he said, wincing, since she now had a few chest hairs in a tight grip. “Cathy…she was the grade in between us, right? A little skinny? Okay, a
lot
skinny. Nice girl.”

Keeping her hold of him, Aubrey went still as stone, and Ben watched her carefully. Yeah, he was right about Cathy, and he went back to the list. “Mrs. Cappernackle.” He looked at her again. “The librarian?”

With her free hand, Aubrey pulled her phone from her pocket and looked pointedly at the time.

He ignored this, because once his curiosity was piqued, he was like a dog with a bone, and his curiosity was definitely tweaked. “Sue Henderson.” He paused, thinking. Remembering. “Wasn’t she your neighbor when you were growing up? That bitchy DA who had you arrested when you put food coloring in her pool and turned it green?”

Aubrey’s eyes were fascinating. Hazel fire. “Give. Me. My. List.”

Oh, hell, no, this was just getting good—“Ouch!”

She’d twisted the grip she’d had on his shirt, yanking out the few hairs she’d fisted. She also got a better grip on the pad so that now they were tug-o-warring over it. “You could just tell me what this is about,” he said.

“It’s none of your business,” she said, fighting him. “That’s what it is.”

“But it
is
my business when you’re carrying around a list with my name on it.”

“You know what? Google the name Ben and see how many there are. Now let go!” she demanded, just as the door to the flower shop opened and a uniformed officer walked out.

Luke, with his impeccable timing, as always. Eyeing the tussle before him, he raised a brow. “What’s up, kids?”

“Officer,” Aubrey said, voice cool, eyes cooler, as she jerked the pad from Ben’s fingers. She shoved it into her purse, zipped it, and tugged it higher up on her shoulder. “This man”—she broke off to stab a finger in Ben’s direction, as if there were any question about which man she meant—“is bothering me.”

“Lucky Harbor’s beloved troublemaker Ben McDaniel is bothering you?” Luke grinned. “I could arrest him for you.”

“Could you maybe just shoot him?” she asked hopefully.

Luke’s grin widened as he gave Ben a speculative glance. “Sure, but there’d be a bunch of paperwork, and I hate paperwork. How about I just beat him up a little bit?”

Aubrey looked as though this idea worked for her.

Ben gave her a long, steely look, and she rolled her eyes. “Oh, never mind.” Still hugging her purse to herself, she turned, unlocked the bookstore, and vanished back inside it, slamming the door behind her.

“I thought the store was closed,” Ben said, absently rubbing his chest where he was missing those few hairs.

“It was,” Luke said. “Mr. Lyons is her uncle, and she rented the place from him and reopened the store. She’s gone with a soft opening for now because she needs the income from the store, but she’s wants to have a grand opening when the renovations are finished.”

“How do you know so much?” Ben asked.

“Because I know all. And because Mr. Lyons called. He needs a carpenter, so I gave him your number.”

“Mine?” Ben asked.

Luke shrugged. “Everyone in town knows you’re good with a hammer.”

“Yeah.” Ben’s phone rang, and he looked at the unfamiliar local number.

Luke looked, too. “That’s him,” he said. “Mr. Lyons.”

Ben resisted the urge to do his usual and hit
IGNORE
. “McDaniel,” he answered.

“Don’t say no yet,” Mr. Lyons immediately said. “I need a carpenter.”

Ben slid Luke a look. “So I’ve heard. I’m not a carpenter. I’m an engineer.”

“You know damn well before you got all dark and mysterious and broody that you were also handy with a set of tools,” Mr. Lyons said.

Luke, who could hear Mr. Lyons’s booming voice, grinned like the Cheshire cat and nodded, pointing at Ben.

Ben flipped him off. An older woman driving down the street rolled down her window and tsked at him. He waved at her in apology but she just waggled her bony finger at him. “Why not hire Jax?” he asked Lyons. “He’s the best carpenter in town.”

“He’s got a line of customers from Lucky Harbor to Seattle, and I don’t want to wait. My niece Aubrey needs help renovating the bookstore, and she needs someone good. That’s you. Now I know damn well she can’t afford you, so I’m paying, in my sweet Gwen’s memory.”

Well, shit.

“Oh, and don’t give Aubrey the bill,” Mr. Lyons said. “I don’t want her worrying about it. She’s going through some stuff, and I want to do this for her. For both my girls.”

Ah, hell, Ben thought, feeling himself soften. He was such a sucker. “You should be asking me for a bid,” he said.

“I trust you.”

Jesus. “You shouldn’t,” Ben said firmly. “You—”