Love Me Nots (Jasper Falls 3)

For more than a week, Perrin had been bouncing between the third and fourth stages of grief. She’d done denial, refusing to accept that this was once again her life and she’d been duped again. Then she’d slid neatly into the anger of hating men and their penises, which seemed to be everywhere. Could they never just be with one woman? Next came the instinct to bargain, quickly followed up with depression. So, when she wasn’t sulking over a pint of ice cream, she was concocting maniacal plans to take down Gage King and get back her land.

She didn’t have any extra money to compete with his deal. Nor did she have the equity to roll a cash deal like Gage. She had nothing. Nothing but her ice cream.

Plunging her spoon into the melted chocolate, she flopped to her back and stared at the ceiling of her loft. Depression was winning today.

She desperately wanted to expand. In her heart, she knew that was the answer, where her future was meant to go. If they grew the bar, it would no longer be the old O’Malley’s, but a great new business able to stay afloat with all the other start-ups taking shape in Jasper Falls.

Without some sort of new branding and allure, O’Malley’s would descend to hole-in-the-wall status and eventually disappear. She didn’t want to see all of her and Maggie’s hard work, money, and time wasted. And bars like theirs didn’t simply go away overnight. They died slow deaths that left owners with nothing but a story that started out like once, I owned a bar…

She couldn’t let this place suck them dry. It could either be an amazing investment or a soul-sucking debt. The town was changing. They had to change with it. Which was exactly why the prior owners had sold, they didn’t have the energy for rebranding. But Perrin did.

Not only that, running the bar did something for her. It kept her thoughts occupied and her life busy enough she hardly noticed the empty spots anymore. She didn’t want to go back to washing hair at a salon.

If they got the land and made the addition, eventually a profit would turn. That meant more money for everyone. It meant moving out of her tiny loft and possibly buying a house someday. There had to be a way to make that happen.

She dug her spoon deep in the ice cream and took a bite. Her eyes staring at the blank television, her imagination seeing the addition take shape. She was back to bargaining, willing to do whatever it would take to have that land. Money wasn’t the only way to do business. What did she really have to lose? Her heart?

She laughed. Light a match to that sucker, because it was already dead.

Gage stared through the windshield at the open land. It would be a perfect location, but some things cost more than they were worth.

It started to drizzle, so he set the windshield wipers to low, his gaze drifting up to the lights showing in the back of the bar on the second floor, where Perrin lived. Was she happy there? She seemed so content with her little loft.

On the flight to Chicago they spoke briefly about her family. She adored her sister Maggie, and Gage envied their bond. But she didn’t seem incredibly close with her parents. She said her father got more indifferent with age and her mother could be over critical. She used to harp on Maggie, but now that her sister was married and Perrin was single, the tables had turned. He admired her for not letting her mother’s criticism direct her decisions. Perrin did what Perrin wanted.

He let out a long breath. She was never going to forgive him.

He should have told her he was getting a divorce the moment they met. But she’d been so reluctant to have dinner with him, he didn’t want to give her one more reason to say no.

Would it have mattered? The moment he explained he was still married, she would have kicked him out. Perrin hated baggage and specifically went looking for his. He’d had the opening but chose to avoid the subject.

Glancing at his phone, he read the last text from Tara, a heartless, accusatory threat that she would now go for the jugular, since her sister reported seeing him with another woman.

She had no grounds for such anger, not when she’d had the pool boy and half the landscapers in her mouth. Gage saw exactly who he married the moment she grew bored of him.

He savored consistency and strove for stability. Since he was a young boy, it had been everything he fantasized about. But the moment the wedding was over, the house was built, the furniture was delivered, the cars were signed, and the vacations booked, the idleness got to Tara and a malicious viper showed up.