The Decoy Girlfriend(75)

In New York, it was Freya’s favorite going-out-for-brunch food, and she’d sweet-talked the chef into giving her the recipe. Toasted English muffins, crispy Canadian bacon, perfectly poached egg, all smothered in Hollandaise sauce and a confetti of Taft’s windowsill dill? Her mouth waters just thinking about it.

While she waits for him, she sends Ava a message.


Freya: GUESS WHO’S OFF FRIEND ISLAND?


Ava: or


Freya: Mind-blowing +


Ava: HOLY MOTHER FORKING SHIRTBALLS



“Did you cook?” Taft’s eyes are wide when he comes into the kitchen, sniffing appreciatively.

Freya puts her phone facedown on the table. “It’s no avocado on toast, but I hope you like it.”

“Okay, I may have been an Angeleno since I was eighteen, but I’m not an avocado evangelist,” he says with a grin, sitting down at the table. “More of a beans-on-toast guy.”

Freya hands him a knife and fork. “This is so good it’ll convert you into an eggs Benedict guy.”

Taft cuts into the egg, letting the runny yolk pool. He spears a forkful and sends her a lazy, disarming grin. “You making me breakfast is enough to make me a Freya guy for life.”



* * *



—

Later, Freya’s arrival at Books & Brambles coincides perfectly with everyone’s lunch break, so she has the shop floor more or less to herself. Skye and her wife swing by early in Freya’s shift to buy romance books, chide her for missing their barbecue, and slyly congratulate her on the love bite blossoming on her neck.

Freya makes sure to hide it with her hair, air-dried into its nest of messy curls, before she video-calls her dad. “Hi, Dad!” she says brightly when he picks up on the first ring.

His response of “Sweet pea!” is every bit as enthusiastic, but she sees his smile falter just a touch. She’s taken aback, too—that endearment was usually reserved for her mom.

“Are you going out?” she asks, taking in the wallet and keys in his free hand. “I can call back.”

“Nonsense,” Jay Lal says firmly. “It’s just some errands. I always have time for you.”

It’s corny, but it makes her smile. She watches as he takes a seat in his favorite living room armchair before she asks, “How have you been?”

“Honestly, honey, I miss the hell out of you. But I guess I can’t blame LA for sweeping you away from boring old Dad,” he says with a chuckle.

Freya fixates on the family portrait behind his head. “It’s not like that. I needed to be somewhere—”

Else. Somewhere without all the memories that hurt too much right now to remember.

He nods. “I know, hon. I know. And at least you’re living with family. Has Stori been a good influence on you? I seem to remember a certain twenty-first birthday in Atlantic City—”

Freya hastily cuts him off. “She’s been great. More than great. And I’ve been great. But you’re not off the hook, Dad! You still haven’t really told me how you’re doing.”

“Me? I’m great.” He can’t keep his face straight.

“Dad.”

“Saving all your other adjectives for your book?” he teases. “The one Stori tells me is almost done?”

“Interesting segue. Very not suspicious at all,” she drawls right back.

“How did that TikTok sound from that animal video you sent me go? ‘Don’t be suspicious, don’t be suspicious.’?” His smile is so wide that she can count every single one of his crow’s-feet. “Mom would be so proud of you.”

Eye contact suddenly gets to be too much. Freya swerves her eyes to the shelves she just rearranged.

“I’m proud of you, too,” her dad continues, voice infinitely soft and gentle. “And all jokes aside, I’m doing well. I’m so glad that you are, too. You look happy like I haven’t seen in . . . well, a long time. I hated seeing how stressed and lost you were, like all the magic had gone out of the world.”

She takes in his words and then she takes in his appearance. His shirt is ironed, the collar crisp. He’s less haggard, like he’s sleeping through the night and drinking enough water and doing all those other things Freya worried he wasn’t taking seriously.

“You look happy, too,” she realizes out loud.

She wishes she could tell him about Taft, but there’s no way she’s ready for a paternal freak-out.

“Freya, there’s something else I wanted to talk to you about, too. I met someone at my grief counseling group. Sakura Takahashi, she’s an English professor. We’ve met for coffee a few times. I never thought that after Mom, I would ever . . . But I wanted to make sure that . . .” He hesitates, teeth scraping over his lip. The gesture is so Freya that she suddenly can’t remember if he picked up the habit from her or the other way around. “Are you okay with that, sweet pea?”

“Dad, of course. I . . . Mom told me that one day you might want to date again. She wouldn’t want you to be alone. I don’t, either.”

“That’s Anjali, all right.” He chuckles. “She always knew everything. Knew us better than we knew ourselves. Remember how she said your first book was the one?”