Never Say Never (Haven Harbor #3)

Chapter 16

SIXTEEN

WHY ARE YOU GIVING ME THAT LOOK?

T ucker

Daisy is a lot of things— sweet, adventurous, easy on the eyes—but the girl is also as stubborn as they come. And trying to get her to bend against her will is just never going to happen. Which is why, after we finished dinner, I said goodnight to her at Delila’s.

First, she wouldn’t allow me to buy her dinner, and then she wouldn’t allow me to walk her home. I argued— man, did I put up a fight—but I knew there would be no changing her mind. My guess is that she thought it would make tonight feel too much like a date if I paid for the meal or escorted her back home. God knows, she’s made it clear that we need to stick to the rules. I get that she wants to stick to the pact, but does she really need to act like dating me would be worse than getting poked in the eye with a hot stick?

That’s Daisy, though. The girl has always been so damn independent. She’d probably have my head if she knew the lengths I went to in high school to keep guys away from her. She thinks I’ve interfered too much in her personal life over the years, but she doesn’t know the half of it. I made sure every guy at Heritage High knew that Daisy Carter was off limits. And if some idiot was stupid enough to go near her, I made sure he knew I wasn’t fucking around.

I always had her best interests at heart. There just wasn’t a single guy worthy of dating Daisy, so why bother wasting her time?

I’m walking up the driveway to my house when Jake pulls his F-150 into his driveway next door. He parks, and Everly slowly slips out of the passenger seat before opening the rear door for her daughter Birdie. Ev waves to me, her other hand rubbing her pregnant belly, as Jake rounds the car and presses a kiss to her temple. I have never seen Jake this happy, and it is all because of Everly and Birdie.

I love the guy, but Jake has always been a bit grumpy. When us guys would get together, he’d be the one sitting in the corner complaining about the noise. Or the food. Or the company. But that all changed when he met Ev. She had moved to Reed Point after leaving her ex-husband. She’s seven years older than Jake, but their age gap never seemed to matter. He fell fast and hard for her.

None of us saw it coming, but Jake knew what he wanted and went after it. Everly hadn’t been looking to get into another relationship, especially because she had her daughter to think about, but she slowly let her walls down and the rest is history. Now they’re engaged, have a baby on the way and are living their own happily ever after.

I’m happy for Jake. I don’t know if I can see it for myself—marriage, kids, the whole package. But if I were to force myself to try to imagine it, I would only ever see Daisy. God knows I’ve compared every woman I’ve ever dated to her, only to have them all come up short. But the white picket fence, two and half kids and a minivan—nope, not for me. Would I feel differently if I thought a life with Daisy was a possibility? Sometimes I wonder. A part of me thinks that my heart has decided that if it can’t have her, it doesn’t want anyone else.

“Where are you coming from?” Jake asks shutting the truck door as Birdie skips toward me.

“Hey, cutie pop!” I ignore Jake as she crashes into me and wraps her little arms around me in a hug. “Why do you look extra cute today, huh? I might need to call the cute police on you.”

I ruffle her blonde curls, careful not to knock the pink cat ears head band she has on every time I see her. “We went to see Aunt Sierra at the bakery. She’s trying out a new cupcake flavour, pink lemonade, and she said I could taste test.”

“And…?” I ask her.

Her little brows pinch together, “And what?”

“And how was it?”

“It was soooo good,” she beams, stretching out the o sound. “But everything Aunt Sierra makes is delicious.”

“I agree, Birdie,” I say, bopping her on her nose.

“Hey, Dad, can I go play on the swing set?”

“Of course you can, Birdie-girl. We’ll meet you back there in a few minutes,” Jake answers, crossing the lawn to where I’m standing as Birdie takes off for the gate at the side of their house hollering bye Uncle Tuck. It’s fucking cool to hear Birdie call my big brute of a friend “Dad.” I know how much that little girl means to him, and he is her dad in every sense of the word, even if she doesn’t have his DNA.

“I’ll see ya later, Tuck,” Everly says with a wave. “I’m going inside. My feet are killing me.”

“I hear you were out with Daisy?” Jake asks. “You’re finally manning up. It’s about fucking time.”

I shake my head. Living on the same street in the same small town with your best friends is the dream, but it also makes having a private life basically impossible. “It wasn’t like that. We sort of ran into each other on a hike, and we were both hungry, so we went to Delila’s. That’s all.”

“If you think for a second, I’m buying your bullshit, you’re fooling yourself. Anyone with two eyes can tell that you have a thing for her. Hell, you’ve had a thing for her for years. What the hell are you waiting for?”

I stare at Jake for a second, weighing my options. I haven’t admitted my feelings for Daisy to anyone. Not ever. Jake has always been easy to talk to. He’s also the human version of a vault. So, I know that whatever I say to him will stay between us.

“I slept with her.” I exhale, feeling some of the weight lift from my shoulders.

With a nod, he drags his hand over his beard. “Okay, and…”

“It’s complicated. She’s not into me like that. We’re not dating, we’re not together. We’re just friends with benefits for the next few months, until she leaves on her trip.”

“Why the fuck would you agree to that?”

“It was my idea.” I wince.

Jake lets out a slow whistle, shaking his head. “And now you’ve caught feelings for the girl.”

“Yeah,” I force out, running my fingers through my hair.

“You realize this isn’t going to end well, right? Someone’s getting their heart broken and I have a feeling it’s going to be you.”

Jake isn’t telling me anything I don’t already know. It was clear to me after the kiss in my father’s office that this wasn’t just a pact for me. Daisy has always been it for me. She’s always been the one.

“You could tell her how you feel. Let the chips fall where they fall.”

“Not that easy, man. One, I told you she isn’t into me like that. And two, my parents would have a huge issue with it. Three, I finally have her back in my life, and I don’t want to lose her.”

“You think your parents will get caught up on the god-sister thing?”

“It’s my dad. He can barely tolerate me, but he’s always thought of Daisy as a daughter. I’m sure he thinks I’m not good enough for her. Fuck, if he so much as knew I was sleeping with her, he would bury my body.”

“Well, then I guess you have your fun on the down-low, hopefully fuck her out of your system and move on with your life.”

“That’s your advice? I watched you put it all on the line to get Ev, and you’re telling me to fuck the girl I’ve wanted for my entire life and then just move on ? Is that what you would do?”

“Fuck, no. There’s no way I could have said goodbye to Ev, and just friends was never going to be enough. I would have done anything I had to do, and I wouldn’t have stopped until she was mine.”

I chew on my lip, thinking about what Jake just said. In another world, maybe I could be with Daisy. Our families would adjust, my father would get over it, and everything would just be… okay. But there’s no reasoning with my dad. And he doesn’t bark out threats without backing them up with consequences. He would never understand what Daisy means to me. He’s so convinced I’m a fuck-up, of course he’d assume that I’d screw up her life, too—tire of her or break her heart, and shatter our family’s bond with the Carters in the process.

“So, what are you going to do?”

“I wish like hell I knew.”

Jake shakes his head with that smug look that he gets when he thinks he knows everything.

“What? Why are you giving me that look?”

He shrugs. “I’m not giving you any kind of look.”

“You are too. It’s that thing you do when you push your lips together, raise your eyebrows and do that thing with your eyes.”

He busts out laughing. “I think you have it worse for Daisy than you’re willing to admit. Look at me, Tuck—did you ever think you’d see me married with kids? And happy as hell about it? You could be next, buddy.”

“The fuck? Good for you, man, but that’s not for me. I care about Daisy, sure, but you’re way off track.”

“You literally can’t stop smiling when you’re talking about her.”

“That’s because she’s my best friend.” I raise my voice at him.

“And you have a serious crush on her.”

“For the love of everything, you need to listen to my husband,” a voice shouts from behind Jake. “You’re crazy about the girl, Tucker, it’s so obvious.”

Everly is standing in their front door, a hand on her belly.

“You good, baby?”

“I have a craving for a McDonalds’s sundae. Will you, pretty-please, go get me one?”

“You know I will. I’ll go right now.”

Jake starts to walk to his truck, grinning at Everly, who blows him a kiss before going back inside. Without turning around, Jake shouts at me from his driveway.

“Good luck, my man. Don’t fuck it up.”

I snort. Knowing me, that’s exactly what I’ll do.