Page 128 of Let Me Be the One
Intrigued, her mother asked, “So my daughter pursued you?”
“She takes after me,” her dad said. “You remember how I chased you down, Liz?”
As the conversation shifted, Callie accepted that her parents weren’t leaving anytime soon. She gave Tanner a look.
He winked at her. “I’m calling Addie so she can bring over Blu. I’m sure she’d like to meet your folks, too.”
Until he said it, she hadn’t noticed that Blu wasn’t around! She was used to him greeting her, but she’d quickly gotten distracted with sensual promises from Tanner. Now she had to wonder if he’d had sex on the brain too, and that was why he’d taken the dog to Addie.
It seemed so, yet now it was all upside down.
Grinning at her forlorn expression, he reached under the table and curved his hand over her knee, his thumb gently stroking. “Soon,” he whispered.
She wanted to hold on to that, but then Addie showed up, and naturally she hit it off with Callie’s parents. Who wouldn’t love Addie?
The surprise was that her parents were so warm and open. Of course they could be; their success in business depended on them being likable. The difference was, this seemed genuine. It was a side of her mom she hadn’t seen lately. She immediately thanked Addie for taking care of Callie, and then she grilled her with a million questions. The two women ended up sitting on the sofa together, angled toward each other, knees touching, while they discussed the worries of adult children.
It was a novel experience for Callie.
Her dad was clearly in his element here, getting to know Blu in the confines of a small house while Tanner told him more about the tree farm and caught him up on the comings and goings of Hoker, Kentucky. There’d been a lot of changes since her mom and dad lived locally, but the vibe was much the same, and her dad loved it.
A few hours later, Kam came over. Then Nell texted and asked if she could visit. Addie insisted on everyone staying for dinner, and to Callie’s surprise her parents agreed, extending their visit even longer.
Her day that had started with so much promise quickly turned into a family gathering.
* * *
WITH SO MANYpeople around, Tanner knew Callie had all the help she needed, so he took some time before dinner to wrap up a nearby job for a longtime customer. Now that he knew he’d have Callie again, leaving her for any reason was difficult. He felt primed, as if they’d indulged hours of sexual teasing, and it was only the promise of the coming night that made the wait bearable.
A few hours later he took a break and gave her a call.She answered by saying, “I need an outside job so I can escape, but all I could do is sneak out to talk to the goats.”
Just then he heard them bleating. He pictured her leaning against a tree, the soft sunlight through the trees playing over her skin. He saw the warmth of her smile. How the breeze teased her hair. Dropping his voice to a hushed whisper, he asked, “Is it really so awful?”
“Actually, no.” Bewildered, she explained, “My parents are behaving…differently. Friendlier, more approachable, and my mother actually seems carefree instead of rushed and distracted. I don’t get it.”
“They like Addie.”
“Everyonelikes Addie, even Dirk and Lang.”
Yeah, he’d noticed, and it had given him a lot to think about. Not that he’d fully trust them yet; years of hard lessons were hard to shake. Yet most of his reasons for disliking them so much were leftover from their late teens and early twenties. He couldn’t think of a single thing the brothers had done in the last few years except spread nasty rumors and act like assholes—and Tanner was honest enough to admit that it usually started with him. “Maybe they’re just enjoying themselves.”
“It’s just that the last time I saw Mom, she was abrupt and wired, insisting that I marry Sutter. Then boom, she says she knows it won’t work and she doesn’t seem at all bothered by it.”
“Whatever her reasoning, I’m glad she’s let go of that idea.” Now that he knew Callie cared, he wasn’t about to share her with that obnoxious ass. “They used to live in Hoker. Maybe they like getting reacquainted with the area. Your dad had a ton of questions for me.”
“And now for Kam,” she said. “They asked aboutthe ice cream shop. Apparently, they had a lot of early dates there.”
He grinned. “It hasn’t changed much, though the original owner retired and now it’s his granddaughter running it.”
Abruptly, she said, “There’s something I didn’t tell you.”
That sounded serious, putting him on guard. “What’s up?”
“My parents are overextended. Financially, I mean. Last time Dad was here, he said my marriage to Sutter, which would have partnered the companies, could have given them new opportunities so they could recoup.”
Son of a—
“No one knows about their business troubles yet, but I expected Mom to keep digging in, to try to insist that I do what was best for the family.” She let out a quiet sigh. “Dad said he wanted me happy, and he promised that Mom would come around. I didn’t believe him though.”
