“All the Carpinos are close. My grandmother’s been gone for about 5 years now, she had lung cancer even though she never smoked a day in her life, but she grew up around second-hand smoke. When we lost my parents, my Pop was alone and I was renting an apartment at the time, so I moved in with him for a few months. Not that it wasn’t tragic losing my parents, but you never expect to lose a child, no matter what age they are. And my Pop loves all four of his daughters-in-law—it was like he lost a son and a daughter at the same time.” Jude keeps looking at me but doesn’t say anything so I keep on. “I guess you can say we have a bond because we sort of got through that together. I’m probably closer to him than the other grandkids because of it.”
Jude walks over to me again, but barely touching me this time, his hand coming up to my face. “I’m glad you had that Gabby. I’m glad you weren’t alone.” There’s something working in his eyes I can’t put my finger on, but before I can search them out further, he bends, kisses me softly and instructs, “Go set your alarm and get to bed.”
“All right.” I head to the alarm panel, arm the system, and make kissy noises for Mia to follow, which, of course, she does.
“See you in the morning,” Jude calls softly as I head to my childhood bedroom.
“Goodnight, Jude.” Mia and I head to my old double bed and climb in. Mia prances around the bed about three times wondering what’s up with the change in location. “Lay down, baby,” I coo at her and she curls into me instantly.
Thinking there’s no possible way I’ll fall asleep after one of the longest days of my life, a day that ended with Jude kissing me and sleeping in the next room, I snuggle closer to my dog and close my eyes. Minutes later with my mind on all things Jude, sleep takes over.
Chapter Six
Beautiful
“Girl, when I saw you walk into church with that man—whip me with a feather—it shocked the hell out of me. He is lush.”
“Don’t you mean strike me down with a feather, Reagan?” I ask, as I sit on my friend’s kitchen floor prepping her island for its last treatment.
Reagan Ford and I met in college, but we’re pretty sure we were BFF’s at birth and were somehow separated by an evil curse, wandering our hometown of Omaha aimlessly until we found each other again in college. That’s how much we get each other. Reagan is a teacher, but just recently quit to stay home with their first baby, Ben. Two days ago, when I was experiencing my post-sleepover-morning with Jude, I told him I was going to church at ten thirty and he insisted on coming with me. So, when I walked through the front doors of my church with Jude holding my hand—yes, that’s right, holding my hand—well, Reagan saw and flipped out. And she didn’t flip out quietly. She flipped out rather dramatically.
“Stop correcting me, Gab, you know I’m sleep deprived. John was on call all weekend. Between Ben waking up every two hours to nurse because he’s going through a growth spurt and the off-hours service calling, I’m a walking zombie.”
John is Reagan’s husband, a couple years older than us, a pediatrician and all around great guy. He’s an amazing husband to my friend and is proving to be a great dad as well. But he’s recently out of Fellowship, is new to his practice, so he’s on call a lot and works pretty long hours.
Reagan and John have a great house not far from mine, it’s about fifteen years old and we’ve just semi-renovated their kitchen. Reagan has many house projects she wants to tackle so they’re on a budget. We decided to reface the perimeter cabinets, gutting just a couple above the new range to open that area for a super cool stainless-steel hood. Now their old oak cabinets are a warm white with clean lines, showcasing all new cabinet doors and drawer fronts. After the granite was installed, the wood floors were hand scraped and refinished to a warm dark brown.
Now it looks like the entire room has been gutted. Because her kitchen is spacious, we were able to use the dinky island, adding two legs with corbels for support, extending it. This made the island huge and now houses four barstools, providing another area for seating, a place they’ll use daily with their growing family.
The island helped the room look completely transformed, but the paint treatment Reagan wanted was going to be expensive. I knew she had her eye on a new farmhouse kitchen table and I knew how much that table cost. By doing the paint treatment for her and cutting a few corners here and there on the project, she will get her table and the room will be perfect. Early last week, we painted the island a grey but with subtle blue undertones, lightly glazing it with a smoky brown that gives it interest and depth, pulling out the greys and browns from the granite.
“Maybe you should go and take a nap while I’m doing this. I’ll watch Ben and you can catch up on some sleep,” I try, knowing full and well there’s no way Reagan will give up.
“Uh-huh. I cannot believe my best friend in the whole wide world just waltzed into church holding hands with some shit-hot guy and me not know anything about it. How do you think that made me feel?”
“Quit talking so loud, you’re going to scare your son.”
“Gabby,” she warns.
I sigh and decide I owe her some answers. I was her maid of honor after all—there has to be some sort of “know all” stipulation that comes with that.
“I met him Friday at Megan’s. That’s a whole different story altogether that I absolutely cannot get into, so do not ask.” I give her my stern look and she glares in return. “Anyway, he stopped by my house for something Saturday morning right after I found water all over my basement. He helped move furniture, Tony asked him to join the Fantasy Football league, and he insisted on coming with me, which you know what that means.” Reagan gasps, because she gets me and knows my family well. “I know, right? You can imagine how that went and the pile of shit I got from everyone. Jude, on the other hand, seemed to think it was all hunky-dory. Then I got a call my bedroom deck door had been broken into, tripping the alarm. New drama all around and Jude insisted on staying the night so I wouldn't be alone.”
Reagan gasps again. “He spent the night with you?”
“Yes. That’s the thing, I can’t seem to shake this guy or say no to him.”
“Why on God’s Green Earth would you want to say no to him?” she asks, appalled.
“Well, I don’t know. I haven’t been with anyone in forever. Not since James and we both know how well that ended.” Reagan gives her head a knowing tip to the side in agreement.
“So, you met him Friday?” she asks.
“Yeah.”
“And he spent the night Saturday?” Her eyes go big, asking way more than her words.
“On my sofa, Reagan. He made me sleep in my old room since the door was busted out. And he stayed again Sunday night…” I go on and she just glares at me so I continue hesitantly. “And last night, too.”
“Holy shit,” she whispers.
I start working on the island and peek over at Reagan holding her sweet sleeping baby boy as she’s deep in thought. “What are you thinking?”
“What else? He might be sleeping on your sofa, but there’s more, isn’t there?”