THE GIFT (15 page)

She awoke with him still on her mind and determined to shake it off. She called her mother and asked if she wanted to go out for brunch and to get some shopping in while her father was watching he shop. Over their meal, she told her all about Cody and Ben, laughing at the shocked look on her face.

“I had no idea. I wonder if Tank knows?” she asked.

“He will soon enough. Everyone will,” Amanda told her.

“Well, I hope they do well together. He seems like a sweet kid. I have to admit that I thought he might be just the ticket to take your mind off other things, but I guess I was way off base on that one!” The two of them laughed and moved on to the latest hobby her father had taken up, which was golf.

“Golf? Dad has never played a day of golf in his whole life!” Amanda exclaimed.

‘I know, but he’s decided that all of his friends go out golfing now that they are retired and he should be able to go with them. He’s bought golf clubs, a bag, gloves, joined the country club, the whole shebang. You should see the goofy outfits he has picked out. Ridiculous!” her mother laughed.

“Gotta love him, Mom. As goofy as he is, he’s a wonderful man. You’re lucky,” Amanda told her.

“Oh, honey. Don’t worry. There will be other men. My mother once told me that if you had to beg them to stay, you should be glad they were leaving. I think it suits your situation with your fellow pretty nicely. He is really messed up in the head I’d say and there is a reason he’s backed away. Just let him go and move on. You’ve already missed out on so much and I don’t want you to miss out on another moment that you could be having fun.”

“I know, Mom. It’s just so hard. We seemed to be so happy together and if I hadn’t found out about her, about how he had found me, we probably would be. I wonder if I had just not walked into that study that day, would we still be okay. Would he still be keeping the truth from me or would he have found some way to come clean about it? It just would have been so much better if he had told me himself instead of the way it happened,” Amanda told her.

“Things don’t always go the way we expect them to, hon. The bottom line is that you know now and can you accept it? If you can, then maybe you should stop being stubborn and make the first move. Pride has no place in love. If you want this man, you have to do what he can’t bring himself to do. If he meets you halfway and can give you the answers you want, then there is no reason the two of you can’t work this out,” she told her.

“Maybe. I don’t know,” Amanda said quietly.

“You never will if you both keep just sitting around wondering what went wrong instead of trying to get together and fix it,” her mom said.

“True. I just really hate that he hasn’t come to me. I just thought he would. I guess I need to know I mean that much to him,” Amanda confided.

“Men can’t read minds any more than we can, baby. He might be thinking that you’ll only shoot him down after what he has done. I really don’t know how I feel about all of this. I still think it is creepy how he stalked you, but maybe he had reasons for it that neither of us can understand and I know you care about him still. Just do what you feel like you can live with.”

“Thanks, Mom. I will. Now, let’s get this check taken care of and go try on some clothes. Maybe you can find something to get Dad’s mind off of golf tonight,” Amanda said with a wink.

“Oh, good grief,” her mother replied, waving her off as she dropped some cash in the folder the waiter had left. “Let’s get out of here.”

After a long day of shopping, she went home with her Mom to eat dinner. They were still busy in the kitchen when her father came in.

“Well, what a nice surprise! Both of my favorite women in one place,” he called out.

“Hey, Dad. Good to see you too. How’s my coffee shop?” Amanda replied.

“Wow, honey. That place is so busy these days. All the changes you’ve made have really paid off. I might have to take it back from you I loved it so much. Really got the adrenaline pumping during those peak hours,” he told her.

“You can’t take it back. Besides, it would cut into your golf game too much. Mom says you’re really getting into the swing of things,” Amanda told him.

“Oh, so you women have been talking about me behind my back, huh?”

“Since the day I was old enough to say my first words,” Amanda retorted.

“That guy came in looking for you today,” he said out of the blue.

“What guy?” Amanda asked, shooting her mother a look of surprise.

“The one you were dating I reckon. I was surprised that he’s so much older,” her father told her.

“Okay, yeah. There is that. What did he say though, Dad?”

“He asked if you were off on your honeymoon,” he laughed.

“He did not,” Amanda said, her eyes wide.

“Yeah, he did. I told him I didn’t know what he was talking about. You didn’t get married behind my back did you?” he asked.

“Dad, of course I didn’t. You know my friends were getting married this weekend. That’s why you were watching the shop!” she told him.

“They did? No, you didn’t’ tell me. You just asked if I would watch the shop because you had some friends in town. You didn’t say anything about a wedding,” he told her, picking at the chicken her mother just pulled from the oven until she slapped his hands away.

Amanda looked at him with a puzzled look. He was right. She hadn’t told him or her mother until earlier today. She had been afraid she would have to explain it to them and hadn’t thought her Dad would really understand.

“Well, what did he say after that?” she asked.

“Fool asked me if I was sure. Of course I was sure. I’d know if my own daughter was getting married!” her father scowled.

“Did he say anything else?” she asked.

“No, he just ordered a drink and sat in the corner staring out the window. Hey, by the way, do you care if I watch the shop one more day? I have some buddies coming into town that want to stop by and hang out there. I thought I could just do another day and spend some time with them while helping you at the same time,” he said.

“Sure, Dad. That’s fine, but I’ll probably be in for a while just to check on some things,” she said. She really didn’t need to. She had complete trust in her Dad, but she thought that maybe if she hung out there for a while, she might run into Jagger. If her Dad was there as a backup and he wanted to talk, then she wouldn’t have to worry about leaving the shop unmanaged with just the staff in place. It was a long shot, but she could hope.

“Don’t trust the old man?” he said with a frown.

“I trust you completely, Dad, but I still need to check some computer entries and order some stuff I forgot to get going before I took a couple of days off. One more might put me in the hole on some of my ingredients.”

“All right then, I’ll see you whenever you turn up tomorrow then. Now, let’s eat. It smells good and I’m starving!” he told her, taking his place at the table.

The following morning, Amanda took her time getting dressed, even curling her hair for a change so that it hung in long flowing tendrils instead of being cinched up in a ponytail or a loose knot as she so often did. She chose a bright red shirt and dark jeans, finishing them off with a cute little pair of wedges. After carefully applying her makeup, she looked in the mirror at herself. If Jagger Remington did show up, she intended to at least show him what he had been missing all of these months.

“Wow, you look stunning this morning,” her father said as she walked behind the counter. Amanda had already taken a cursory look around the dining area and found that Jagger was nowhere to be seen.

“Yeah, I had to run some errands before I came by and didn’t want to look all frumpy,” she said. “I’m going to do a quick inventory and go back to my office to place an order.”

“All right, honey,” her father replied, as he began to ring up the next customer.

It was true that she did need to get an order placed, but she could have just as easily done it tomorrow. Since she was here, she might as well get it over with. She ran through the items stocked in front before moving into the kitchen area, once again scanning the dining area before disappearing behind the kitchen doors. After another inventory back there, she returned to her office and picked up the phone, calling several different vendors and placing the necessary orders.

She checked some email since she hadn’t been checking it from home and her father didn’t like to fool with it and found a handful that needed to be answered. Though she didn’t get much email here at the shop, they did have a web page and patrons would sometimes email them from there or other local businesses would send invitations to community events, mostly charity gatherings that they wanted contributions for. She went ahead and dealt with all of them so that she didn’t have to tomorrow.

Once she was done, she returned to the front and saw that there was still no Jagger. She thought about going home. This was stupid and fruitless to wait around her to see if he turned up again when he knew where she lived and when she would be here all day for the rest of the week if he had anything to say to her, but her mother’s words about meeting him halfway rang in her ears and she decided to hang out a while long and wait.

“I’m going to fix myself a chai latte and just hang out for a while, Dad,” she said.

“Okay, honey. I’m going to go over and talk to the boys for a bit, but Della has the register and I’m here if she needs me. It’s slowing down a bit now.”

Amanda made her usual soy chai latte and took a seat in the corner where Jagger had always sat when he came here. People were beginning to thin out and she watched them leave little by little until there was only the group of men her father new and a couple of new people that came a little while later. She watched the people walking by on the sidewalk and wondered about their lives, whether they were happy or sad. Did they have love in their life or was she the only one feeling lonely?

“I believe you are in my seat,” came an unexpected voice from her right, causing her to jump a little. It was Jagger. Where had he come from? He wasn’t in the shop when she had come out from the back and she would have seen if he had come through the front door since then.

“This seat was empty when I sat in it,” she countered, her stomach lurching and her heart pounding against her chest.

“I know the owner. I can have you relocated to a different table,” he said without a trace of humor in his voice. If anything, he looked nervous and sounded a little unsure of himself.

“I know the owner’s father. I can have you carried out the door by your collar and tossed into the street,” she said with a dry smirk. “Besides, you don’t even have a drink. These tables are reserved for patrons, not bums off the street that just wander in looking for a place to sit.”

He reached forward and picked up her drink, tacking a sip from it and making a face. “That is horrible!” he complained. “Who made that for you?”

“I made this for myself!” she told him.

“No. I’m going to speak to someone about this. I’ll be right back.” He sat her drink down on the table and went over to the counter. She sat looking at him, completely confused. Was this his way of making up? Sneaking into her shop and starting a mock argument over seating arrangements and drink selections? Moments later, her returned with another cup of chai and handed it to her. “Here. Try this, instead.”

Amanda took the cup and sipped from it. She laughed a little as she sat it back down on the counter. It was the same hot chai, except he had it made with regular milk. She sat it back down on the table and pushed it toward him.

“That is unacceptable. It contains milk,” she said.

“Exactly and it tastes twenty times better!” he informed her.

“The soy chai tastes just fine!” she defended.