Magic Kiss (Hope Falls Book 11) (5 page)

She needed to back-burner her less-than-familial feelings for Logan and concentrate on the events at hand. Her future—as well as Drew’s—depended on her being present and not distracted.

Which might prove to be a little more difficult than it sounded. Emma had always known that Logan Dorsey was a lot of things: dependable, honest, trustworthy, strong, capable, and a man of few words. Now, she needed to add another quality to that list: extremely distracting.

‡

“G
et whatever you want.” Logan set his menu down.

“Seriously?” Drew asked in disbelief.

“Seriously.”

“Sweet!” Drew exclaimed with a huge smile.

Logan’s lips pulled at the corners, which had been happening all day. When Drew beat a level in
Halo
after Logan had shown him a cheat code, in his excitement, he’d practically jumped up and down on the couch with the same enthusiasm Tom Cruise had shown for Katie Holmes. When they’d ordered a pizza for lunch and Logan had gotten a two liter of cola, Drew hadn’t been able to stop smiling even as he guzzled two glasses. And when they’d walked down to the diner and two twenty-something girls, who Logan had assumed were tourists because he hadn’t seen them around before, pulled their tank tops up and flashed them their bikini-covered chests, Drew had high-fived Logan like it had been the coolest thing in the world.

Logan had smiled more today than he probably had in the last six years. Drew’s enthusiasm was contagious.

Sue Ann Perkins stepped up to their table. “Hello, boys. What can I get for you tonight?”

“Hey, Sue Ann,” Logan said. “This is my godson, Drew. Drew, this is Mrs. Perkins. This is her café.”

Drew stood and reached his hand out. “Hi, Mrs. Perkins.”

Just like the smiles that had been a reoccurring theme of the day, pride swelled in his chest, which had also happened several times since Drew had shown up on his doorstep that morning. Pride for the young man Drew was. Andrew would’ve been so damn proud. His son was well-mannered, smart, and funny, and he had really good taste in video games.

“It’s very nice to meet you, Drew, and please call me Sue Ann.” Instead of taking his hand, she pulled him in for a hug not unlike the kind Logan had received more than once. Sue Ann was definitely a hugger.

Before he’d come to Hope Falls, most people—other than the ones trying to hook up with him—had kept their distance from Logan. It might’ve had something to do with the energy he put off, which he’d been told was less than friendly. He kept to himself. Always had. But the people in this town either were immune to his personal boundaries or didn’t even sense them in the first place. It was odd, but not horrible.

“Will you be getting your usual, Logan?” Sue Ann asked after she’d released Drew and he’d sat back down.

The third time he had come in, he’d ordered the pork chop plate with corn on the cob and mashed potatoes, and it had been the best thing he’d ever tasted. When Logan found a good thing, he stuck with it, so ever since that night, he’d ordered the pork chop plate with corn on the cob and mashed potatoes when having dinner at the café.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“And what about you?” Sue Ann asked Drew.

Drew’s eyes scanned the menu as he ordered. “Can I have chicken strips with fries, a hot dog, and a Coke and a large chocolate malt?”

Sue Ann shot a quick look at Logan. He nodded. He’d said that the kid could order whatever he wanted, and he was a man of his word.

“All right, but I think your eyes might be bigger than your stomach.” Sue Ann chuckled as she gathered the menus and headed behind the lunch counter at the far end of the café.

Before Logan had a chance to ask Drew if he really thought he’d be able to eat all of that food, his phone alerted him that he had a text. When he looked at it, he saw that it was from Emma. She’d just finished up her last meeting and was heading to the airport. It was seven thirty in California, which meant that it was ten thirty in New York. She’d been going nonstop all day.

When she’d contacted him earlier to tell him that her last meeting had been scheduled as drinks after dinner, he’d suggested that she just stay the night there and fly back tomorrow. But she hadn’t taken his advice.

Logan messaged her back asking how her meetings had gone. As he was setting his phone down, it buzzed again, and he saw a thumbs-up emoticon on the screen. He grinned and did something he’d never done before—he search for an emoticon to respond. After finding the clapping hands emoticon, he texted back.

Have a safe flight. See you soon.

“Your mom’s done with her meetings. She’s on her way to the airport,” he informed Drew, whose grin faded as his shoulders slumped. “She should be here by the morning—”

“Oh my God!” Drew’s eyes widened and he stuck his hand out, pointing over Logan’s shoulder. “Is that Karina Black and Ryan Perkins?”

Logan didn’t have to turn around to know the answer was yes. Karina Black was a huge pop star who’d grown up in Hope Falls and moved back to her hometown a few years ago. Ryan was a musician as well, Karina’s fiancé, and also Sue Ann’s grandson. The story around town was that the two had met when he’d come out to help Sue Ann run the café.

“Yep, they live here.”

“They do?” Drew asked.

“Yeah.” Logan nodded. He’d forgotten that they were even celebrities. They didn’t act like it at all.

“They’re coming over here!” Drew whispered, excited but trying to act cool.

“Hey, man. I’ve been hoping to run into you.” Ryan approached the table, Karina at his side.

“Hey, guys. Karina, Ryan, this is my godson, Drew. Drew, this is Karina and Ryan.”

“I know.” Drew’s eyes darted between the two singers in total disbelief. His expression read like he was seeing an alien or Bigfoot.

Ryan smiled broadly. “Hey, man.”

Karina, who Logan was sure was used to having that kind of effect on people, motioned to his chest. “Hi, Drew. Cool shirt.
Sandlot
. I love that movie.”

Drew looked down at his shirt, which had Ham’s face with the phrase “
You’re killin’ me, Smalls”
written over his head. “Thanks.” Then he smiled at the compliment.

“I used to have the biggest crush on Benny.” Karina swooned before grinning. “Hey, you kinda look like him.”

Logan almost laughed when Drew’s cheeks turn red. Poor kid. He didn’t stand a chance against the charm that was Karina Black. Hell, grown men didn’t stand a chance against that kind of power.

“Hey, I’m standing right here,” Ryan joked.

“I love you, babe. But you’re no Benny,” Karina teased before lifting up onto her tiptoes and briefly kissing Ryan.

“No respect, I tell ya.” Ryan shook his head and pulled his arm around Karina’s waist, holding her tight against him. “Hey, so I was wondering if you might want to come down and play ball on Tuesday nights? We always need alternates, and Levi said you used to play.”

Logan had played basketball in high school. He’d even been offered a scholarship from two Pac-12 schools, but he’d turned it down. He hadn’t wanted to take the chance that he’d injure himself and lose the free ride. So he’d joined the Marines instead.

“Yeah, maybe. What time do you guys play?”

“Seven thirty.”

“All right. I might stop by.” Logan hadn’t played in years, but he wanted to get out on the court again.

Glancing down at Drew, Logan realized that the last time he’d played was with Andrew, just days before…

Karina snapped her fingers as if she’d just thought of something. “Hey. How long are you in town, Drew?”

“I’m not sure. My mom’s coming tomorrow.”

“Well, if you are around the next few days, you should stop by Mountain Ridge. My friends, Amanda and Justin, are running a Junior Ranger program, and they can always use help with the horses and—”

“Horses?” Drew sat up straighter, a wide grin spreading on his face.

“Yep. They have horseback riding, zip-lining, river rafting, hiking—all kinds of things. Amanda was just saying today they could use a few more hands.”

“Can I?” Drew’s large brown eyes implored up at Logan.

“Let’s talk to your mom when she gets here, okay?”

The thought of Drew and Emma sticking around for a few days was a lot more appealing than it probably should’ve been.

Who was he kidding? Just the thought of
seeing
Emma again held a lot more appeal than it should have.

*

“Sorry about earlier,” the woman sitting next to Emma on the plane said in a whisper, not wanting the baby who was sound asleep on her shoulder to wake up.

The little one had been crying from the time they’d boarded. It was now an hour into the flight and she’d finally drifted off to sleep.

Emma looked up from her screen and smiled. “No problem.” She remembered those days all too well.

“She’s not usually this fussy, but she has an ear infection,” the young mom explained. “Sorry if you were trying to work.”

“It’s fine,” Emma assured her.

“Were you trying to work?” the woman persisted.

Knowing that this was a losing battle, she stopped typing and took her headphones out. She wasn’t actually listening to anything. She used them as the first line of defense against strangers who were prone to small talk—mainly other parents at practices and games.

It wasn’t that Emma was anti-social. Well, that wasn’t the totality of it. As a single mom, her time was precious and she needed to grab opportunities to work where she could.

But one look into the young mother’s eyes and she immediately recognized the yearning to have an adult conversation. When Drew had been young and Andrew had been deployed, Emma had longed to speak to someone who used complete sentences and whose interests extended past
Barney
and
Blue’s Clues
.

Making sure she spoke softly, Emma answered, “I’m working on my next book.”

The woman’s brown eyes brightened. “You’re an author.”

“Yeah.” It was still odd for Emma to think of herself as an “author.” She spent her days carpooling, doing laundry, cooking, and making sure homework got done. It was hard for her to think of herself as anything but Drew’s mom.

“What do you write?”

Oh boy.

This was always a fun point in any conversation. Emma wrote under a pen name, and now, unless Drew was telling people what she did and who she was, she kept her secret identity to herself. People’s reactions to the genre she wrote were varied, with extremes being at both ends of the spectrum.

Some people were intrigued and wanted to ask her a million questions about it. There was middle ground, where people got strange expressions on their faces and said variations of their personal observation that she didn’t look like she wrote
those
kinds of books. And then there were the people who spit on her (yes, spit on her) and told her that she was going to Hell. Needless to say, after the first year, she’d decided to keep her identity close to the vest.

Against her better judgment, she found herself giving up the goods. “I write romance novels.”

The woman’s doe eyes instantly widened. “You do? I love romance novels.”

Whew
. Looked like her aisle buddy was from the first category of people.

“What’s your name? Maybe I’ve read you,” the woman asked.

“I write under the pen name Chelsea Paige.”

“Oh my gosh!” she cried out, causing her daughter to wake up in a start.

Uh oh
.

“Shh, shh, shh,” the woman shushed her baby as she bounced her up and down and patted her bottom.

Within a few minutes, the baby was lulled back into slumber and the woman turned her attention back to Emma.

“I love
When It’s Love
! I’ve read it, like, twenty times! And
When It’s Real
… Oh my gosh. I sobbed when Savannah thought she had to let Ethan go so he’d never find out about the baby she gave up.” The woman’s eyes filled with tears, and her voice shook. “That was the
sweetest
, most
heartbreaking
scene ever! You are seriously one of my favorite authors! I’ve devoured the entire series!”

“Thanks.” Emma smiled as her cheeks heated. As much as she enjoyed hearing what readers thought, it was a little embarrassing to have your work being gushed over. She would almost prefer the haters. Taking compliments had never been her strong suit.