Chapter 6
When Avery called, insisting he meet her at Fred’s because, “You absolutely have to judge at the school’s Model UN, and I have to provide the details,” Jordan was at his brother’s rented beach house, having moved in the week before.
The ocean breeze and late August afternoon sun washed into the living room. His phone, which used to ring at every hour of the day, including the middle of the night, had been silent on his brother’s wooden coffee table. Therefore, when it had chirped, Jordan had nearly jumped.
“I’m at a friend’s near Wayford,” Avery said after unsuccessfully trying to induce guilt in him for not keeping in touch—he had never promised or even hinted he would. In fact, he thought he had done the opposite. “Wanna meet me at Fred’s so I can walk you through our Model’s details?”
“It’s elementary school level; can’t you email it to me?” he asked.
“Come on; it’s five minutes from you,” she insisted.
He liked Fred’s and had been there with Luke and a few old friends over the past several weeks. If he’d had to drive more than five minutes to meet her, he would have declined. And maybe because she had managed to make him feel a little guilty for being a dick, he agreed.
What he hadn’t expected was seeing her climb out of the passenger seat of her friend’s car and wave goodbye to her once he got there.
“How do you plan on getting back to Riviera View?” he asked when she reached him at the bar’s entrance.
“I could stay in Wayford, or you could drive me,” Avery replied with a wink, pushing open the door to Fred’s bar.
He smacked himself internally but didn’t say anything.
“I saw Belinda Soto—she’s Belinda Tuffin now, by the way—in town yesterday,” Avery said as they walked in. “She said she bumped into you outside Books And More.”
Luke and Libby lived above the bookstore. Jordan had encountered Belinda when he had visited them. Belinda had been his girlfriend in their sophomore year at Riviera View’s high school. Unlike Avery, seeing her hadn’t included hints or invitations to hook up. She was happily married and had introduced him to her teenage kids. Looking at them, it had been strange to realize that people his age had kids the age that he and Belinda had been when they had lost their virginities to each other.
“I forget how small these towns are,” he muttered just when another proof of the smallness of their area caught his eyes.
Libby’s redheaded friend was in the booth furthest in from the table that he and Avery were approaching. His heart lurched at the sight of her. Then, just as unexpectedly, it plunged when he noticed a man sitting with her.
He smiled at her and noticed she had gone red in the face.
The moment they sat down, Avery opened again about how shitty it was of him to not keep in touch, but his attention was elsewhere.
There it was again—Hope’s plain-to-read face that expressed everything she felt. It somehow defrosted the edges of his heart that had been invariably cooled by the poker faces that he had encountered in D.C.
She seemed uneasy, and he tried not to look in her direction, thinking that Avery’s and his presence had probably contributed to it. But the redness soon cleared when the guy she was with became loud, bordering on aggressive, and her face went from flushed to pale.
Although his job had taught him not to stick his nose into things that didn’t concern him, lest others would stick their noses into his business, he got up from his seat without a word to Avery. Guided only by instinct, he went to make sure Hope knew she wasn’t alone there.
“Aren’t you worried about your employee?” he asked Avery after Hope had exited the place, passing them with her smudgy jeans and tee, leaving the idiot who she had been with to mumble to himself over his empty beer glass. He used “employee” instead of “colleague,” hoping to inspire some responsibility in her.
“She’s a big girl. I hope that wasn’t a date, though she seems to have a thing for douchebags. You wouldn’t expect it from her I-initiated-a-food-program exterior.”
Jordan gritted his teeth. “Douchebags tend to leach on to good people.”
“So, about the model UN,” Avery started after a moment’s silence, just when he opened with, “What food program?”
“She, and Anne and Connie from Breading Dreams—Oh, you know Connie! I forgot. Anyway, they distribute unsold products from a few shops at the end of the day. Connie’s daughter is a social worker, but you know that, too, of course … And Anne is my … Anyway, we have a free-to-all sandwich tray at school every morning. Most of our kids come from good homes, but a few need the help, and since it’s free to all, no one knows because everyone can just grab a freebie.”
He just looked at her and nodded. It wasn’t her face he saw.
They barely managed to get through half their drinks when that Blake guy stood up and walked toward the exit.
“Damn, he’s wearing sandals. I really hope for her it wasn’t a date,” Avery sneered.
“I’ll be right back,” Jordan said, getting to his feet to follow the man.
When he reached the entrance, he saw Hope standing outside, looking at her cell phone, ten minutes after she had left. The guy he had followed cut toward the men’s room.