Noelle was already shaking her head again. “No. There’s no way it was nothing. You haven’t seen Beau for the last week and a half. It’s like… Ugh, I don’t know. He’s always been a grumpy fucker, but now he’s just… awful. I don’t think he’s nearly as unaffected as you seem to think he is.”
“Yeah, well, he certainly knows how to find me, and yet he hasn’t,” Val snapped bitterly. They lived across the hall from one another, for heaven’s sake! They worked next door to each other,every single day! “He said he’s always going to be a bachelor. He’s not going to settle down, he’s not dating material, and he’s certainly never going to get married. I won’t settle for someone that doesn’t want the whole thing. I wasted too many years with someone that was never going to want to go the long haul with me. Don’t I deserve that? Don’t we all deserve that kind of love?”
Willow sighed and stepped closer to her. “Do you really think that the kind of love you read about in your books is out there? In real life?”
“Yes,” Val whispered immediately, without hesitation. She believed it with everything that was inside of her. “Yes, I do. And dammit, that’s what I want.”
“A tall, dark haired, bearded, heavily tattooed lumberjack—er,coffeehouse owner—”
“No, that’s not what I’m saying—”
“Puh-lease. You’re so head over heels in love with Beau, even Theo with his one brain cell can see it,” Noelle muttered, rolling her eyes.
“I’m not in love with Beau,” Val whispered, though her heart started thudding in her chest at the blatant lie. When her sisters simply glared at her, she said sadly, “I’m not.”
But the truth was, that of course she was in love with Beau. Hadn’t she always been? Isn’t that why it had been so easy to ask him to kiss her? To stay? Because it wasBeau.
Beau, who was always there for her. Always. No matter what.
Beau, who gave the best, longest, steadiest hugs in the history of a hug.
Beau, so handsome and sexy and dear lord, the giver of the best orgasms in the entire world.
She hadn’t felt as beautiful and desirable as she had with him, possibly ever. He made her feel wanted, but he made her feel safe to be herself, too. With all of her quirks and baggage, he’d never made her feel like a burden, like Wes had.
He remembered the small things that no one else had everbothered to pay attention to. She wanted him. Wanted all of him. Wanted to have the chance to give whatever they’d discovered a go. She did.
But she wouldn’t beg, or ask, not again. He would have to come to her. She wouldn’t sit around waiting for him, either.
CHAPTER 20
“Good morning, Noelle,” Beau said when she stepped up to the counter. He raised an eyebrow when she simply crossed her arms and glared at him. Tilting his head to the side, he narrowed his eyes slightly. “The usual, I’m assuming?”
“You’re a giant dickhead, you know that, right?”
Inhaling deeply, he looked away from her, glancing at the woman standing behind her. The woman’s eyes were wide, bouncing from his to the back of Noelle’s head in shock. “Are you going to order? I have a line, Noe.”
“Yes, I want the usual. It doesn’t change the validity of my statement,” she snapped, slapping her palms down onto the counter between them and leaning forward onto her stiff arms. “You’re a dickhead. And I don’t appreciate you breaking my sister’s heart by ignoring her.”
Beau tapped the screen and entered the usual order, then pressed the cash button before Noelle could offer payment. The headache that he’d been fighting for several days was back. In the form of a pissed off brunette this time instead of a blonde-haired idiot brother.
“She deserves the world, Noelle. And I can’tbe the one to give it to her,” he said simply, keeping his voice low to avoid anyone in the line behind her from hearing. “Ican’tgive it to her.”
“Why? Why not, Beau? I’ve never met two people so miserable trying to stay away from each other as you two!” she hissed, following him along the counter as he walked away to pour their coffees. “And you’re right, she does deserve the world. She wants you.”
Miles stepped into the spot he’d vacated, taking over orders, so he continued down the counter until they were far enough away from other customers to speak privately. Leaning on his hands on the counter, he sighed. “I’m not what she wants. She wants Prince Charming. I’m not him.”
“No, Prince Charming would have swooped in and carried her away, instead of being an ass and pretending she doesn’t exist,” Noelle muttered sourly. When he nodded in agreement, she rolled her eyes. “I’ll say this once. Get your head out of your ass and realize what you’ve got before it goes away for good. Because you’re right, she does deserve the world, but she wants you in that world, for whatever reason that I can’t understand right now because I want to punch you in your stupid face so badly I can’t see straight. She’s a great person and I thought you knew that… but you’re just like all the other douchebags she went on dates with in the last four months. Only instead of just wounding her pride, you broke her heart. And I don’t know that I can forgive you for that.”
Grabbing up the coffee carrier with the three travel coffees tucked into it, she turned and stalked off. But then she stopped and turned around, coming back to stand directly in front of him again. He raised his eyes to hers.
“She has a date for her birthday tomorrow. Do with that information what you will.”
Staring after her, he let her words sink in, cutting him deeply. She was already going on a date? With someone new?
Fuck that.
At two o’clock, he left Miles and Theo in charge for the evening and walked the few blocks down to one of the local bookstores in the downtown district. Gold letters painted across the wide window readTurn The Pageand he pushed open the door. Two women stood on opposite sides of a small wooden counter, one side lined with the week’s new arrival and the other filled with individually wrapped baked goods.
