Cooking school. A memory pierced Hadley’s consciousness. Lucy at thirteen baking endless creations, always looking for taste testers. She and Cam had gotten a lot of free—and tasty—cookies that way.
“Is that what you want?” she asked.
Lucy’s watery eyes gave Hadley the answer. “Sometimes I get so angry at him for interfering.” Lucy swiped away her tears. “He makes it sound like it’s easy to pick up and start a new life with an eight-month-old.” She shook her head in an exasperated way. “Imagine! I mean, I’m not complaining—I love being a mom. But cooking school would take my life to a whole new level. It would require me to cash in every single favor. It would mean leaning on my family, on Cam—and on myself—in ways that would be really scary.”
Lucy looked up, and in that flash of her eyes, Hadley saw…a lot. A fiercely independent woman, for one. And a giant unrealized dream, for another.
“You agree, don’t you? It would be crazy.”
That was a loaded question. “Maybe not so crazy,” Hadley finally said. “I’m sort of up to my ears in what to do about my grandmother’s business. And the whole world knows about my giant romantic failure. So, I might not be the best person to ask.”
“My brother’s a real pain in the rear,” Lucy said, wiping her eyes.
“We can definitely agree on that.” Hadley couldn’t help smiling just a little. One thing she could say about Cam was that he certainly hadn’t left his family behind as his fame had skyrocketed.
Lucy stood up then, straightening her baby sling and gathering her diaper bag. “Well, anyway, I…I just thought you should know. It might make you dislike him a little less.”
“Lucy, I don’t hate him,” Hadley said. “I’ve just accepted that he’s not going to back down. We’re going to have to duke it out until one of us wins.”
That sounded awful. She didn’t want to do that. But what choice did she have but to fight for what she believed was right?
“My brother can be difficult, but don’t give up on him.” Lucy smiled at her. “You two were kind of wonderful together. Maybe it’s not too late.”
Kind of wonderful. What did that even mean? Lucy had been just a kid when Hadley and Cam had dated, and she’d looked up to both of them. But her words made Hadley admit that what she’d had with Cam…it was the best first love anyone could have ever dreamed of. It had been wonderful. Until it wasn’t.
She wished she hadn’t known about Lucy. The fact that this whole restaurant scheme involved helping his sister was one more reason to like Cam. And she could not afford to like him. Too much was at stake.
Chapter 11
Cam awakened around midnight to Bowie climbing into his bed. A flash of lightning and a clap of thunder sent the dog burrowing under his covers.
“It’s okay, Bowsers.” Cam got up to close some windows just as the rain began to pour down in buckets. When he returned to his bed, the dog was in the middle, cozied right in with his head on Cam’s pillow, staring up at him with big, moony eyes. Cam climbed in, heaving a sigh. “You can stay, as long as you scoot to your own side, okay?”
An hour later, he woke up again, this time to a loud crash from outside that sounded like raccoons in the trash cans. Bowie’s long body was draped across his chest, his ears flopping beneath Cam’s chin.
“You might consider brushing your teeth before bed next time, bud.” He gently slid the dog off. He seemed to weigh a hundred pounds limp and asleep.
When he flipped on the outdoor floodlights and peeked through the kitchen curtains, he found Hadley rummaging around in her grandmother’s garage, loading buckets and flowerpots into her grandma’s Prius.
“What’s going on?” he asked, walking outside.
As soon as she looked at him, he knew something was wrong. And not because he’d forgotten a shirt and his hair was in a jumble from sleeping. “What is it?” He raked his fingers hastily through his hair to get presentable. “What happened?”
“Jared Chen called me. The ceiling is leaking over at the building.”
Before he could ask how the police chief had noticed, Hadley continued. “He was on his way home after a late-night call when he happened to see water gushing into the main room.”
“Gushing?”
“I have to get over there,” she said, slamming down the lid of the hatchback.
“Are there any dogs there?” he asked.
She shook her head. “Mayellen and Ivy took the two strays we’re caring for.” And of course Bowie and Jagger were safe with Hadley and him.
“I’ll be right back,” he said, turning back to the house. “Don’t leave,” he called over his shoulder.
“Where are you going?” she asked.
He stopped at the doorway. “I’m grabbing a shirt and keys. I’m going with you, and we’re taking my truck.” He preempted the protest he was certain she was about to express, probably loudly. “You don’t have to like me, just my muscles, okay? And yes, I don’t just own a vintage car. Be right back.”
Cam called Nick to put him on standby for help with the roof. Then he and Hadley drove over together in the rain, because there was no way he was going to let her go alone. But first they grabbed some recycling bins, old storage containers, and whatever else they could find that would hold water.
He was protecting his would-be investment, he told himself. But honestly, he knew that for the lie it was.
A short while later, the rain still dumping down in buckets, he pulled his truck up to the back of the Palace and dragged in the empty trash cans that stood against the building. He had a feeling they were going to need all the help they could get.
That was confirmed a minute later when they stood in the middle of the main room, staring up at a gaping hole in the ceiling, watching a waterfall spill onto the old tile floor.
“I don’t even know where to begin.” Hadley shook her head incredulously.
Cam cursed, a sound mostly obliterated by the loud splatting of water. “It’s okay,” he said, although it definitely wasn’t. “We’ll clean it up. It’ll be all right.”
“How did this happen?” The dread lacing her voice made his stomach sink.
He followed her gaze to the ugly white-tile drop ceiling. An enormous water ring encircled a considerable area. In the center, the cheap foam-like tiles had fallen to the floor and broken into multiple pieces, leaving a gaping black hole.
“The water leaked into the space above the drop ceiling,” Cam said, “and it just couldn’t hold the weight.”
He should be glad on some level for this disaster. It might make Maddy want to give up the building for good. And it would surely make Hadley see what a money pit it was.
He should be feeling positive. Only he just felt bad. They were both entitled to make their case for the building, but this curveball might make the playing field uneven, because he could afford a thousand roofs. And he didn’t want to win that way.
But also, he hated to see her distressed and upset.
“You know, you don’t have to be here,” she said. “This isn’t your problem.”