Rescuing the Bad Boy (Second Chance #2)(77)

Shuffling into the ballroom, Sofie sipped from her coffee mug and decided to check in with Faith. She asked if there were any messages. There weren’t. “Well, I’m here if you need me to measure anything else.”

Faith snorted. “Hmm, there is something I’d like to know the size of…”

“I’m talking about the ballroom.”

“Well, I would hope there’s room in his pants for those, too.” Laughter trickled through the phone.

“Are you through?” Sofie sighed, but she smiled.

“Do not play innocent with me, missy. I know you’ve been sexed up, down, and probably sideways from the sound of your voice.”

She was not wrong.

Faith sniffed after her bout of laughter and got down to business. “Anyway. Pretty slow morning. The normal glut of e-mails to answer, but I’ve got it under control.”

Sofie could kiss her. “Did I give you a raise yet?”

“Not yet.” She seemed to sober. “I happened to talk to Gretchen today.” A friend of Faith’s who worked at Abundance Market. “I guess Michael and Cookie are no more. He found her banging the stockroom guy. Told you she was a tramp.”

“With the stamp to prove it,” Sofie added helpfully.

“Damn straight.” There was a pregnant pause, then Faith said, “He called me last night.”

Uh-oh.

“I didn’t answer,” she was quick to add. “Which is why I called Gretchen this morning. To get the scoop. He’s single. And she said he’s not doing too well. He’s miserable, apparently. I think we’re both trying to figure out where to go from here. How to move on from a future that didn’t go as planned.”

Sofie clucked her tongue. “Honey…”

“I know what you’re going to say.” Her friend heaved a sigh. “But you don’t know what it was like with Michael and me, when we were alone. Everyone makes mistakes. God knows I’ve made mistakes.”

“Yes, but you didn’t make a mistake with another person.”

“Sofie,” Faith said, her tone both resolute and gentle, “I’m not going to lecture you about climbing back into bed with the guy who stole your virginity and broke your heart.”

Silence clung to the seconds stretching between them.

“It’s a bad idea. If he cheats once, he will cheat again,” Faith said. “That’s what you want to tell me.”

“No.” Sofie put her coffee mug down on the bar and sat on a backless stool. “That’s not what I want to tell you,” she said, her voice echoing in the cavernous ballroom. I want to tell you he made a mistake he will never make again. I want to tell you he still loves you. I want to tell you that you and Michael will walk down a long, white runner in a big garish church where you both say your I dos. I want to tell you you’ll buy a house with a picket fence and have two children. Honey, that’s what I want to tell you. That’s what I want for you. But I don’t have a crystal ball. I’m not sure what’s going to happen between the two of you.”

“I want that, too,” Faith said quietly. “I want all of that. Watching the years I had with Michael wash down the drain… What if I let him go and I wasn’t supposed to? What if this is my destiny? What if we are meant to have those two children you just mentioned?” Her voice was full of hope, and it broke Sofie’s heart to hear.

Hope.

She could relate. A very similar emotion was swirling in her chest now. She was filled with hope. And wasn’t Donovan proof that people could change? He was different from what he used to be. Wasn’t it possible for Michael to change, too?

“I’m going to call him, Sofe. I can’t see the harm in a phone call. And I can’t push him away, pretend he doesn’t exist. We had a home together at one point.”

“I know.”

“He never did anything like this when we were together. And it is no secret that I have been putting off planning our wedding for a very long time. Maybe we both got cold feet… it was just that his led him to someone else.”

She had to give it to her friend. If Faith was willing to overlook Michael cheating on her, she had a more forgiving heart than Sofie. She just hoped Faith wasn’t making the biggest mistake of her life by making that phone call.





Sofie found Donovan outside, bent over a round hole in the ground where he was stacking bricks. The sun blazed hot overhead and he wore a pair of sunglasses, a black folded bandanna over his head. He looked so much like the Donny in her memory her heart gave a little leap.

Donny. The man who’d made her see stars this morning after making her see fireworks last night. The man who had a tattoo matching hers because he considered her one of his scars. Was this really happening to her?

Rather than say what she was thinking, instead she went with, “Hi.”

“Scampi,” he greeted, continuing to place bricks in a circle.

“What you doing?”

“Fire pit.” He looked up at her and grinned, that sinister smile below dark shades doing funny things to her stomach. “I know how you like s’mores.”

She guessed he winked from under those dark lenses, but she couldn’t be sure.

The sound of an engine firing in the distance had her looking out at the field. Connor, astride a lawnmower, held up a hand to wave. She waved back.