“Now I figure I’m going to deal with it here.”
The sound of a feminine throat clearing caused both men to turn. “Hi,” Lane said, a sheepish smile on her face. She was standing in the doorway to the kitchen, her hands clasped behind her back.
“Cain,” Finn said, doing his best to school his voice into an even tone, “this is Lane.”
“Is she your...”
“Oh, no,” Lane said, a note of incredulity running through the denial. “I’m just his friend. I came to bring casserole, because I knew that you would be coming. At least, I assume you’re the person that I thought would be coming. You’re his brother, right? You do look like him,” she said, rambling now at that full-tilt pace that he had only ever seen Lane accomplish.
Cain looked slightly surprised by the avalanche of words he had just been subjected to, but then he seemed to recover quickly enough. “Hi,” he said, “I’m Cain.”
Lane looked at Finn as if she was waiting for additional information. Well, Finn didn’t have any. At least any he felt like giving. The silence stretched on, and he could sense Lane getting increasingly twitchy, since silence was an enemy she typically made it her mission to defeat.
“Cain and Lane,” she burst out. “That’s funny. And you probably won’t forget my name.”
She stood there, looking no less uncomfortable. As uncomfortable as Finn was starting to feel.
“How long are you staying for?” Finn asked.
Cain glanced around the room, studying the surroundings intently. And then his blue eyes fell back to Finn, looking far too serious for Finn’s liking.
“Well,” he said slowly, “I figured we would be staying for good.”
MAYBE SHE HAD demonstrated a little bit of cowardice in leaving Finn alone with his invading family. But Lane hadn’t really seen what she could contribute to the scene. She loved Finn to pieces, and he was her best friend in the world. But he was gruff and he didn’t share his feelings easily. He was the kind of guy who led with angry, then made up for it with grand gestures, like the time he’d come to her house and built a deerproof fence for her new garden. Or the time he’d spent an entire day clearing away all the thick brush around the cabin, and forging a path for her that led into the woods so she could more easily access the berry bushes that grew around her property. Or when he’d rebuilt the dock at the lake by her home so that it was larger and didn’t have any soft, damaged boards.
Yeah, Finn was more hammer and nails than hearts and flowers. He had a soul of gold beneath his general cranky exterior.
That didn’t mean she wanted to hang out and witness the ensuing crankiness, though.
And anyway, she had standing plans to meet up with her friends Rebecca Bear and Alison Davis.
She was just going a little earlier than necessary. And if they could make it at the new time, all the better. If not, she would just sit there and eat French fries while she waited. Since she hadn’t stayed for dinner at Finn’s, she was officially starving to death.
And here she had given him a hard time about his palate. But she, Lane Jensen, known foodie, also had a soft spot for really greasy food. And when she wanted that, Ace’s bar was the place to go.
“Hi, Lane,” Ace Thompson said from his position behind the bar. “French fries?”
Ace had made women swoon across town for years. And he still did, but the wedding ring on his left hand put a damper on things. He was lumbersexual hot. But he was also a one-woman man since marrying Sierra West and starting a family with her.
“You’re like my dealer. And yes. Regular, not sweet potato. I’m not in the market to pretend that there’s any nutritional value involved in this.”
She breezed through the dining room and took her place at the counter-height table that she and her friends typically occupied on their nights at the bar.
She sighed, picking up a menu and examining the dinner column, even though she knew exactly what was served at Ace’s. Just in case he’d added something new.
Ultimately, she decided that she was going to order a hamburger. And when the server came with her basket of fries, she did just that.
“I was able to get one of the girls to close up for me.” Lane looked up and saw her friend Alison approaching the table. Her red hair was disheveled, dark shadows beneath her eyes. “I think I might need a vacation.”
“You definitely do. I think you’ve been working more than overtime getting the bakery stable over the past couple of years.”
Alison took her seat across from Lane and immediately stuck her hand in the basket of fries. “True. And I also lost two of my long-term employees last week, so I’ve been scrambling to try and fill holes in the schedule. I haven’t had anybody approach me for a while about a job. Which is good, I guess. Since I have a reputation of hiring people in dire circumstances, I can only suppose that there isn’t anybody hanging out in a dire circumstance. But I’d be more grateful if I wasn’t working my fingers to the bone.”
“That’s not a very appealing visual. Considering that your fingers touch baked goods.”
Alison made a scoffing sound. “Why did you order those pale, anemic fries?” she asked, as she took another one.
“Oh, you mean real fries instead of your imposter sweet potato nonsense?”
“They’re better. That’s just a fact,” Alison said, reaching into her purse and pulling out her phone, checking it quickly.
“What? Who are you? What is our friendship?”
“Rebecca said she’s almost here.”
As if on cue, Rebecca walked into the bar and crossed the room, heading straight for the table. “Sorry. I tried to get here sooner but Gage was at the store helping me close.”
“I imagine that’s relationship code for doing something that is absolutely not helping you close your store,” Alison said.
Rebecca turned bright red. “Possibly.”
Lane tried to ignore the stab of jealousy in her stomach. She had been single going on way too long now. It was getting old.
It was incredibly petty to have any sort of jealousy regarding Rebecca’s relationship with Gage West. It had been hard-won, the obstacles between them seemingly impossible to overcome given the fact that Gage had been at fault for an accident that had caused Rebecca serious scarring—inside and out. If anyone deserved happiness, it was Rebecca.
However, her friend’s happiness certainly highlighted Lane’s own aloneness. Granted, to a degree it was a choice. She didn’t exactly have the time or energy to devote to a relationship right now.
Too bad her discontentment had nothing to do with rationality. She knew that she didn’t want a man in her life at the moment—not in a romantic capacity—it was
