buddy,” he said, scratching the dog’s head, “that just happened.”
When his phone rang again, he considered not answering. With a quick glance at the Caller ID, he shifted gears.
“Rafael. What’s up, amigo?”
“You talked to Jessie this afternoon?” Rafe asked.
“Not yet. We’re having dinner out at the marina tonight. Why?”
“She had a visit from Stanton earlier.”
Danny’s blood churned, hot and angry. “You gotta be kidding me. And she had to call you for backup?”
“Her friend Piper did. They were over at her store when the guy showed up.”
“What did he do?”
“Nothing to speak about,” Rafe replied. “We picked him up a few miles away and brought him into the precinct so I could have a talk with him.”
Danny closed his eyes and rested his head on the back of the chair. “I’m sure that was a pleasure.”
“Schooled him on the seriousness of a restraining order. And just a heads up: the guy filed for the divorce everyone thought he already had.”
“From Patty.”
“Right. He says he went over to tell Jessie that he was doing the right thing.”
“Too little, too late.”
“Thing is, Callahan,” Rafe said, “I get the feeling he’s doing this with an end game in mind that involves a reconciliation with Jessie.”
Crickets chirped from a mile down the beach.
“Not that it matters. I mean, she’s got her head on straight where he’s concerned. I just thought I’d let you know. It’s likely there’s some more trouble brewing, that’s all I’m saying.”
Danny groaned. “Yeah. Thanks.”
“In other news . . .”
He waited a few beats before prodding Rafe. “Yeah?”
“Jessie’s friend Amber. She seems cool.”
“Uh. Yeah. I guess.” The words rolled around his brain for a moment before he caught on. “Oh. You’re interested.”
“She . . . seeing anybody?”
“I have no idea.” Danny chuckled. “The only thing I really know about Amber is she makes Jessie’s life infinitely better.”
“Make an inquiry? Let me know if there’s a shot for me?”
“You got it,” he replied. “Stay tuned.”
“Oh, I will.”
“Let me know if anything else comes up with Stanton, will ya?”
“You know it. Later.”
Chapter 3
3
Danny couldn’t remember who had said it—just some anonymous Joe at some AA meeting he’d attended during the peak of his recovery.
“Don’t wait until you’re staring down the neck of the bottle to come to a meeting. Grab your jacket and keys the minute you hear the clink of glass in the next room.”
He wasn’t quite sure why, but the news of Stanton’s designs on winning Jessie back had provided just the clink of motivation he needed.
As usual on his way to the downstairs level of the Lutheran church on Ocean Park, Danny sidetracked to Dogtown Coffee for something more satisfying than the bitter, watered-down concoction served with miniature donuts and odd-shaped muffins at the start of the meeting. The woman in line ahead of him ordered a salted caramel coffee with extra sea-salt foam, and Danny couldn’t help thinking of Jessie. She’d asked for “something caramel” the morning they’d met with Chaz to discuss the sale of her Neil Lane rock. She’d managed to build an entirely new life on that ring; a life that—blessedly—had included opening her heart to someone like him.
Jarring him from the throes of sappy nostalgia, the woman turned with her coffee and Danny found himself face-to-face with a familiar fire, eyes blazing with prickly hatred.
“Jackie,” he declared.
Rebecca’s mother had never managed to come to terms with the events that had torn her daughter from the arms of her family. Worse, he understood. Without the grace God had revealed to him after that terrible night, he didn’t know how he ever could have lived with the torment of getting behind the wheel of a car in that condition . . . and worse, letting his wife climb in beside him.
Jackie didn’t actually spit on him as she sidestepped, but she may as well have. Without a single word spoken, she’d let him know that nothing had changed. She despised Danny for what he’d done.
“What can I get you?” the clerk asked.
Shaking away the scales, he braced himself on the edge of the counter between them. “Large black.”
The last time he’d seen Jackie, he and Jessie had run into her and Brent—Rebecca’s father—out at the pier. The memory momentarily pierced his heart with a hot, sharp knife. But as he paid the clerk for his coffee, he grinned at the recollection of Jessie’s reaction to the venom aimed at him, not unlike a mama cat protecting her kittens, hackles raised. “Danny hasn’t had one drop of alcohol since that night. He served his jail time, and he’s changed his life as a result of that horrible thing that happened—”
“Can I give you a slice of advice, Jessie?” Jackie had spewed in reply. “Run away from Danny Callahan as fast as your legs will carry you before he’s the something that just happens to your life, too.”
As he climbed into the Jeep, Danny sent a silent prayer of thanks upward. If he hadn’t been on his way to a meeting already, he sure would have needed to find one now.
Thirty minutes later, he set his coffee cup next to him on the linoleum floor and found himself on his feet amidst a dozen other ever-recovering alcoholics seated on folding chairs. “I’m Danny, and I’m nearly ten years sober.”
“Hi, Danny,” they hummed. The familiarity of those greetings from a room full of virtual strangers soothed his aching heart.
“The last time I drank,” he told them, his focus trained on the comb-over on the otherwise bald head of the guy in the metal chair ahead of him, “I got behind the wheel with my wife in the seat next to me. She . . . died on impact.”
Claire, a middle-aged woman he saw at meetings from time to time, reached across the back of his chair and touched his arm. The empathetic gesture didn’t reveal how many times she’d heard his story over the years.
“I was headed here today. . . . I’m not sure why, exactly . . . but the woman I’m involved with is being pursued by her ex—a scumbag of a guy—and I just . . . felt drawn.” He wiped his palms on
