Sable Peak (The Edens)

Birds chirped beyond my bedroom windows, drawing me from sleep. I stretched my arms wide, and buried my face in a pillow, smelling Vera’s sweet scent on the sheets.

I reached for her but the other side of the bed was empty. As I pushed up on an elbow, a sunbeam hit me right in the eyes. Damn, that was a bright sun. Last night’s storm must have passed.

What time was it? I twisted to look at the clock on my nightstand. Eight o’clock. I’d slept two hours longer than normal. Allie rarely let me sleep past six.

Allie. “Shit.”

I ripped the sheets from my legs and flew out of bed. My boxer briefs were on the floor, stuck in my jeans from where I’d shoved them off last night. I dragged both on, not bothering with my zipper, and bolted for the door.

The moment I turned the knob, I heard Allie’s soft giggle. The smell of coffee and bacon hit my nose, and when I searched the house, I found my girls together in the kitchen.

Vera had Alaina on her hip. The two of them were staring out the window over the sink.

“Tee.” Allie pointed.

“Yes, that’s a tree. What color is it?”

“Geen.” Someday, Allie would be able to say her rs. I hated that day already.

“And what color is the sky?”

“Boo.”

“Good job, Jellybean.” Vera kissed Allie’s cheek. “Do you know what sound a dog makes?”

“Woof woof.”

“That’s right.”

They smiled at each other, and my hand came to my heart.

After last night, there was no going back with Vera. She wasn’t just under my skin, she’d burrowed down to my bones, infusing the marrow each passing day. The way she was with Allie was … a gift.

For the first time in her life, Allie had someone like a mother. I patted my pocket for my phone to take a picture, but it was empty. It must have fallen on the floor at some point last night. So I stared, committing the moment to memory, wishing I could bottle it up for Allie to revisit when she was older.

I watched them run through barnyard animal noises. A cat. A chicken. A sheep. A cow. Every sound was followed by a quiet laugh.

No matter what else happened today, it would be a good day.

“What sound does a pig make?” Vera asked.

Allie snorted. Not an oink. A snort.

A snort that sounded a lot like the one Vera made when she laughed too hard.

I hadn’t taught Allie to snort. Vera must have. Was it possible to love someone this early in a relationship?

Though I guess we weren’t exactly new, not in a lot of ways. Vera had been a part of my life for years. A part of Allie’s too.

We were just starting down a different path.

And there was no looking back.

“Daddy!” Allie spotted me first. She squirmed so Vera would set her down, then her feet pounded across the floor as she raced over and into my arms.

“Morning, Sprout.” I kissed her temple and pushed her hair off her face as I carried her to the kitchen. “How are my girls?”

Allie let out a string of words, something about Vera and eggs and juice.

And Vera blushed, trying to hide her rosy cheeks with her coffee mug.

God, I hoped that blush didn’t fade. I hoped that twenty years from now, she blushed just as often and kept giving me that sweet, shy smile.

“Hi.” I took her chin, tilting her face up. Then I brushed a kiss to her lips, my tongue darting out for a quick taste.

“Hi.”

“Sorry I slept in. I haven’t done that in, well … two years.”

“Daddy, dow.” Allie kicked her legs to be set free.

She raced off like a rocket for the toys I’d cleaned up last night. The toys I’d have to clean up again tonight.

“I hope you don’t mind, but I cooked breakfast.” Vera nodded to the stove, where a frying pan was out with scrambled eggs and bacon. “Allie was hungry.”

“Not at all.” I hauled her into my arms, her hair tickling my naked chest. “What are you doing today?”

“I have to work at ten.”

“For how long?”

“Until closing.”

Damn. So much for spending a day together. “All right.”

“I should actually get going so I can make it home to shower and change, then get to town.”

“Drive safe. The gravel roads get slick when they’re wet.” The warning was pointless. Vera drove exactly like my father: five miles under the speed limit and with hands placed firmly on ten and two.

I kissed her perfect mouth, then stole her coffee mug, taking a sip as she walked to the door.

She pulled on her shoes. “Bye, Allie.”

“Ve-wa, you go?” Outrage contorted her little face.

The feeling was mutual.

“Sorry. I have to work.”

“Oh.” Allie’s pout was short-lived. It disappeared a second later when she picked up a doll to brush its hair.

Damn, I regretted sleeping in. She opened the door and stepped outside before I was ready to say goodbye. “See you later.”

“Bye.” She smiled and jogged down the porch stairs.

I leaned against the doorway, the air cold against my naked chest, and watched as Vera got in her car. Then, with the brake lights glowing red because, like Dad, she’d ride those brakes so hard they’d need to be replaced every year, she retreated down the mountain.

With a sigh, I turned inside and went about my day, starting with a breakfast that wasn’t cereal for a change. Then Allie and I got dressed in muck boots and old jeans to go outside and work on the sunken firepit I was building out back.

Allie jumped in puddles while I arranged blocks for the retaining wall. And when we were both soaked, her with water and me with sweat, I went inside to make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for lunch.

As the afternoon passed, I checked the clock too. I picked up the house, let Allie mess it up, then picked it up again. Restless energy made it impossible for me to sit and read or watch TV.

Would it be too clingy to visit Vera at Eden Coffee? Probably. Yes. Damn it.

Another rainstorm brewed during Allie’s nap, thwarting any plans to go outside and keep working, so I took a shower and put on clean clothes. And by the time five o’clock rolled around, two hours until Vera would be off work, I’d had enough of my own damn house.

So I loaded Allie into my truck and we set off for town to have an early dinner at Knox’s restaurant.

Knuckles was on the first floor of The Eloise Inn. Two family businesses, one owned by my brother, the other my sister, that were the heart of downtown Quincy. And across the street, the other piece of my hometown’s heart, Eden Coffee.

I wasn’t going to visit that little green building. Yet. We’d probably go after dinner.

The restaurant was busy for a Sunday night. Though these days, it was always busy. Knox’s food had a chokehold on tourists and locals alike.

Once the busy summer season started, there’d be no popping in for a quick bite unless I wanted to sit in the kitchen. Every table would be full from open to close. But even then, I didn’t go often without Knox’s cooking. My family took pity on my pathetic culinary skills, and Knox would swing out extra from Knuckles to the cabin.

There was never extra. But I think he worried Allie would come to prefer the blue box macaroni and cheese over his homemade version.

The hostess seated us at a booth in the back corner of the restaurant, a place where Allie could bounce around and not disturb other patrons. After leaving a coloring menu and crayons for my daughter, she went to get our drinks and let Knox know we were here.

My brother came out with flour dusting the sleeve of his black T-shirt. A dish rag hung from his back jeans pocket.

“Hey.” Knox clapped me on the shoulder, then bent and snagged Allie from the booth for a hug. “How’s my Allie girl?”

She giggled as he blew a raspberry on her neck. Then she pointed to the crayons, prattling off their colors.

He set her down, sitting in the space beside her while she went wild coloring. Her tongue stuck out of the side of her mouth as she fisted a crayon, scribbling over the kids’ menu.

Those were Memphis’s contribution to the restaurant. Since she’d come into my brother’s life, they’d not only added coloring pages for kids at Knuckles, but the number of options on the kids’ menu had doubled.

“Didn’t think you’d be working tonight,” I told him.

“I’m trying to put in as many hours as I can before the baby is born. And Memphis wanted a special hot dog and movie night with the boys.”

Their daughter was due any day now. They were naming her Annie, after Mom. I liked that we’d have an Annie and an Allie. I hoped their similarities wouldn’t end with their names and that they’d become friends, not just cousins. We all wanted our kids to be close.

“Let me know what I can do to help,” I told him. “Whatever you guys need.”

Knox and Memphis had come to my rescue more than a few times when Allie was a newborn. They’d done more than just show up with meals too. Not long after I’d brought Allie home from Alaska, Knox had hung out at the cabin one afternoon just so I could take a nap. And whenever I was in a bind for a babysitter, Memphis was right behind Mom in line to volunteer.

“So how are things going?” he asked. “Lyla mentioned you’re teaching Vera how to fly.”

News didn’t take long to travel through our family, did it? “Yeah.”

“How’s it going with you two?”

It would be easy to blow him off. But both Griffin and Knox had always been more than just my brothers. Because they were so much older, I’d always looked up to them. Tried to be like them.

They were good men. They were good husbands and fathers.

And if I wanted to be like them, maybe all I needed to do was ask for a bit of help.

“I don’t want to fuck it up with Vera.” For myself. And for Allie. I didn’t want to mess up the chance for her to have someone like that in her life.

“Then don’t fuck it up,” Knox said.

I laughed. “That easy?”

“Yeah, brother. It’s that easy. Just love her. The rest takes care of itself.”

Just love her.

Simple. It sounded too simple.

“If you can’t do that,” Knox said, “let her go.”Property © of NôvelDrama.Org.

No. Not an option. Not after last night.

Just love her.

Could I do that?

I cared about Vera. But love? It was too soon. Too early. But the potential was there, like a flower waiting to bloom. Waiting for when the time was right.

“Thanks,” I told Knox.

“Anytime.” He kissed Allie again, then tapped the menu. “I’m making myself a cheeseburger quesadilla for dinner. Want one?”

“Hell yes.” It was my favorite concoction of his and something he refused to put on the Knuckles menu. It was for special guests only.

“Allie, do you want chicken strips and french fries?”

“Yep.”

He ruffled her hair, then slid from the booth, disappearing to the kitchen as the waitress brought over our drinks.

Allie nibbled on her food. She was a good eater, albeit slow, and by the time we made it out of Knuckles, the lights were off at Eden Coffee and Vera’s car was already gone from the alley.

So I headed to the ranch, bypassing Mom and Dad’s house to park behind the Honda. Then I carried Allie to the loft and knocked on Vera’s door.

She answered with wild hair and a massive, wet stain on the front of her Eden Coffee shirt. “Hi.”

“Hey.” I nodded to the stain. “You okay?”

“I was locking up and spilled my coffee.” She gave herself an eye roll and opened the door so we could come inside. “Not my most graceful moment.”

“Ah. Want to take a shower? Or just change your shirt before we leave?”

Vera blinked. “Uh, where are we going?”

“Home.”

“Oh. Um, I didn’t … I have to study tonight.”

“Okay.”

She didn’t move. Why wasn’t she moving?

“Vera, get your stuff.”

“But you just said okay.”

“Okay, as in you can study at home. Allie sleeps best in her bed. And I want you in mine.”

Her cheeks pinkened.

It never got old.