She sighed and shook her head, then stood up a little straighter. “Fine. Let’s do it.”
He kissed her forehead. “We’ve got this.”
Elise was bent over the table on the patio, placing plates and silverware in front of each chair, when they stepped into the courtyard. The doors to the kitchen were open, and the sound of pots clinking, water running, and voices murmuring drifted across the stone pavers.
Elise looked up, a smile breaking across her face. When she’d first come to the house, she’d been skinny and pale, barely able to speak. She’d never gone into detail about what had happened to her at the hands of Manifest, not with Nick anyway, but the things he imagined made him want to hurt someone.
The last year had been good to her. She seemed to enjoy her job at the boutique downtown, and if she didn’t have a long-term plan, who could blame her? At least she was healthy again, able to eat and to sleep, able to smile.
“Hey!” She came toward them and held out a hand. “You must be Alexa.”
“You must be Elise,” Alexa said shaking her hand. She was pretty, tall and willowy with long blond hair and strikingly deep brown eyes. “I’ve heard so much about you.”
“Only the good stuff, I hope.”
“I assumed that’s all there was.” Alexa scowled at Nick. “Were you holding out on me?”
Elise laughed and Chief came trotting over, sniffing at Alexa’s feet. She laughed and bent to run her hands through Chief’s thick fur.
“Who’s this?” she asked, scrubbing Chief’s face just the way the dog liked. “Who’s this beauty, huh?”
“That’s Chief,” Nick said. “She served with Ronan in the Navy.”
“She’s gorgeous. Aren’t you, girl? You’re gorgeous,” Alexa said.
“Now she’ll expect you to feed her from the table like Julia does,” Elise said.
“I’ll be on my best behavior,” Alexa said, winking at Chief.
They laughed and Nick looked at Elise. “Everyone inside?”
“Yep.” She slapped him on the back. “You can’t put this off forever.”
He rolled his eyes and took Alexa’s hand. “Gee, thanks.”
“Don't worry, they said they’d be on their best behavior,” she said as they headed for the kitchen.
The grill was heating up outside, waves of heat emanating off its closed lid as they walked past it to the kitchen. He took a deep breath as they stepped inside.
He’d only been at the hotel for a little over a week, but just stepping into the house made him realize how much he’d missed it.
How much he’d missed the people in it.
Declan was bent over, his head in the fridge. “Did someone drink that beer I put in here? There were three left…”
Julia stood at the island, the baby cradled in a carrier against her chest as she stirred potato salad in a giant bowl.
“I can do that,” Ronan said, hovering over her shoulder. “You should be resting. Let me — ”
He stopped talking when he spotted Nick and Alexa. Declan straightened, and for a split second, Nick couldn’t hear a sound except for the soft clatter of Elise setting the table outside and hum of the fridge, still wide open while Dec stared.
Julia stopped stirring and looked up with a serene smile. “Nick!” She left the spoon in the bowl and came toward him. “I’m so glad you’re back.”
“Just for dinner,” he said. “For now.”
He hadn’t decided if or when he wanted to move back into the house. Correction: he wanted very much to move back into the house, but not if it meant leaving Alexa at the hotel alone.
Julia kissed his cheek, working around the baby, and he looked down at the tiny, fuzzy head nestled against her chest.