Wanting a Family Man (Raven’s Cove #3)

Chapter Eighteen

C loe was standing in the galley, crutches under her arms, stirring hot water into a bowl of instant oatmeal when the door beeped. Her heart skipped as Trystan entered with Storm in his arms.

“Good morning,” she said warily.

“You’re up. Good.”

It was eight o’clock. When they were on the water, she was up by six.

“How’s your ankle?”

“Fine.” Throbbing.

“Are you allergic to cats?” He dropped the diaper bag onto the settee. “Mom’s friend Fabiana says you can stay at her place if you feed her cats while she’s in Vancouver. Logan has some painting you can do for the marina, so you can stay on payroll.”

“Oh.” She was still trying to catch up to the fact that he’d walked in here wearing stubble, a T-shirt that hugged his shoulders, and that air of command she found so compelling. He was carrying a well-rested, cheerful baby who smiled at her. It was too much coming off the hard day and rough night she’d had.

She focused on Storm, offering the baby a smile so she wouldn’t have to meet Trystan’s eyes. She didn’t want him to see the bruised heart she was nursing or the bags under her eyes from tossing and turning.

“Is that something that appeals or…?” he prompted.

He knew how many choices she didn’t have. She was grateful, she really was, but she hated the part where she was relying on him to solve her problems again.

“I had a half-baked plan to get on a bus and see if I could find my dad, but sure. I’m not allergic. That sounds great. Thank you.” She took a bite of the oatmeal, which she had made because it was easy. It was too hot and tasted like cinnamon-flavored kindergarten paste.

“You want to go to Florida ?”

“I didn’t think I had a job or a place to stay,” she said defensively. “I’m supposed to keep my foot up. Four days on a bus seemed like a rational plan at two in the morning, when I couldn’t sleep because I didn’t know what else I would do.”

She set her bowl aside and started to lean into her crutches.

“What do you need?”

“Milk.”

Trystan opened the fridge and brought the carton across.

Cloe leaned back on the counter and picked up her bowl so he could pour a dollop into it. He stayed way too close, watching her stir it in. When she glanced up, he was glowering at her.

“What?” she asked.

“What does it say about how angry you are that you want to go to the farthest point on the continent from where I’m at?”

“Did you hear the part where I think my dad lives there?”

“ Think ,” he repeated.

She held his gaze, refusing to concede he was right, but it was hard. Because yes, she was angry and hurt. But her whole life wasn’t about him. She was lost . She needed a goal. A purpose. A connection. She needed a place to live and a job.

Shelter, fire, food.

Family.

His dark brows were pulled into a heavy line. His scowl called her a challenging river he had to find his way across. The air between them crackled.

“Ummum!” Storm batted at the bowl and leaned out, mouth open.

Oh, this little seagull. She was too funny, melting the wall of frost Cloe was trying to keep between her and Trystan.

“Did big brother forget to feed you this morning?” Cloe tasted the oatmeal to be sure it wasn’t too hot, then offered a little on the edge of her spoon.

Storm’s baby lips closed while she worked it around in her mouth. She quickly opened her mouth again, wanting more of the sugary stuff.

“I fed her. She ate half my eggs and most of my toast along with a metric ton of blueberries and a bowl of her own mush.” Trystan walked the milk back to the fridge.

Storm went stiff in his arm, giving Cloe a look over Trystan’s shoulder that suggested she was being torn away from her last friend. Her face screwed up and she released an angry cry that called Trystan the worst monster ever created.

“Really?” He was unimpressed by her dramatics.

“I don’t mind sharing.” On the contrary, Cloe was more than willing to buy her niece’s affection with sweets.

He brought Storm back for another taste, which Cloe offered, but she hurried to polish the lion’s share of it, mostly so Trystan didn’t have to stand so close to her.

“Should I get dressed and get my stuff? Are we going there now?” Cloe asked as she set her empty bowl in the sink.

“Yeah. Fabiana will spend the night in Bella Bella with Glenda and catch the ferry in the morning.” The ferry south came through at a more civilized six thirty a.m.

While Cloe gathered her things, Trystan borrowed the company vehicle so he could drive them up the hill to a collection of homes near the school. Fabiana’s was a single-wide trailer surrounded by a fenced yard that contained a wild array of shrubs, flowers, bird baths, and potted plants, all of which also needed watering and tending.

“The cats have a door onto the back porch. It’s screened so they can’t get out beyond that,” Fabiana told Cloe as she explained how to refill the hummingbird feeders. “They would eat the birds or something might eat them so I don’t let them out the front.”

She introduced Cloe to Milo, Silas, and Pompom. They were a tuxedo, a calico, and a tortoiseshell respectively. All were laid back, purring as she gave them each a brief pat of hello.

The hallway was narrow for crutches, and the spare bedroom was cluttered with the flotsam of a long life in one place, but it was a cozy home that Cloe resolved she would leave extra clean as a thank-you.

Glenda turned up and they all sat on the screened porch, drinking coffee, chatting about Fabiana’s grandchildren.

“Oh, that’s my neighbor. She’s up,” Fabiana said as they heard the sound of a small dog barking. “Let me call her and invite her to meet you, Cloe. She’ll want to say hi to all of you.”

“I actually have to run away for five minutes,” Trystan said after glancing at his phone. “Sophie wants the truck. Can I leave her with you?” He nodded at Storm in Cloe’s lap.

“Mm-hmm.” Cloe was playing hide the spoon by tucking Storm’s flat pink spoon between the pages of a cloth book, then gasping with discovery when she turned the page and it appeared.

Cloe waited until she heard the truck depart and Fabiana’s voice was chattering gaily from inside before she asked Glenda in an undertone, “Are you mad at me?”

“What on earth for?” She seemed genuinely surprised.

“Trystan said…” Oh God. Was he wrong? Did Glenda not know they were sleeping together? Or rather, had been?

“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Glenda scoffed lightly. “Surely, you’ve heard by now that Wilf was still married to Miriam when he and I got together. I’m in no position to judge what adults do with their time. What is there to judge anyway?”

That seemed like a loaded question, one that was gently but deliberately probing.

“Nothing. Not anymore so…” Cloe shrugged. It never was in the first place .

“Oh?” Glenda’s thoughtful gaze dropped into her coffee as she sipped.

“He didn’t think…” Cloe swallowed to ease the dryness that entered her throat. “It’s not a good time for either of us. It’s messy, given…” She waved vaguely at Storm.

When she looked up, Glenda was watching her with such empathy, such understanding, it caused a physical ache in Cloe’s chest.

“Please don’t tell anyone,” Cloe whispered.

“I’m nosy, Cloe. Especially where my boys are concerned, but I’m not a gossip.” Glenda’s mouth twitched. “It amuses me that I still have any influence on them at all. Or that I ever did, to be honest. They act as though I knew what I was doing back then, but I got myself pregnant by a man who was very funny and full of big dreams, but he had a wife and far too much baggage for any three women to carry.” She lifted her brows and dipped her chin to emphasize her point. “But I gave it a shot because that’s what marriage is, or so I thought. I didn’t expect I would raise his three sons here, in the middle of nowhere. When I asked Pauline to let Trystan stay with us, it was supposed to be for a couple of semesters while she finished her degree.”

“He told me he liked it here.”

“He did. In the same way Logan belongs on the water, Trystan needs his natural spaces. And those two were peas in a pod when they were young. Logan would cry when Trystan left.” She leaned forward. “Don’t repeat that. Here I said I wasn’t a gossip.” She tsked at herself and sat back again. “Trystan always wanted to come back for Logan’s sake as much as his own, I think. He knew how lucky he was to have so many relatives who were all very tightly knit. It bothered him that Reid and Logan didn’t have cousins or other family the way he did.”

“I accused him once of being close to his brothers and he almost threw me overboard.”

“That’s Wilf’s influence. Real men don’t hug.” She rolled her eyes. “They don’t need each other. Then Reid joined us and Trystan was so confused. I remember him asking me why Reid didn’t want to be part of our family.”

“Oh.” Cloe covered the pang in her chest.

“Broke my heart, too,” Glenda agreed with a nod. “Reid had his reasons for being so withdrawn, but it lit a fire in me. All I wanted was to find that early harmony again so I refused to let them fight. If they were looking to throw fists, I asked Wilf to put them to work, usually on something heavy that they had to do together.”

“That’s diabolical,” Cloe said with a chuckle.

“I’m pretty sure that’s how the pyramids were built. A frustrated mother sent her boys outside to do something with their animosity that was both collective and constructive.”

“No doubt.”

“I think that’s the trick of life, though,” Glenda mused, offering her metal spoon for the plastic one that Storm dropped. “If you’ve tasted some kind of peace and joy, you’re willing to play dirty and fight through any hardship to get back to it. We found moments of it.” She nodded with distant satisfaction. “And had a healthy sense of humor about the rest.”

Cloe gave a slow nod as she absorbed the truth in Glenda’s words. She would forever chase this little bit of almost love and almost belonging that she had found here. She dropped her nose into Storm’s hair and breathed her in, programming her brain to find this again. Home. Love. The things that would satisfy the yearnings in her heart.

“Then Trystan finished school and left,” Glenda continued absently. “And I wondered why I was still here, trying to raise the boy I was married to.”

“Oh.” Cloe picked up her head, thinking how sad that sounded.

Glenda shrugged. “So you see? I never had all the answers. Would I make all those same choices given what I know about myself today? I don’t know. We can only make the best of where we are when we’re there. Even someone like Reid, who maps his life into cells on a spreadsheet, has to adjust for life’s little surprises.” She nodded at Storm.

“Oh God. There won’t be any little surprises here, if that’s what you’re asking,” Cloe said with sudden alarm, clutching Storm a little more firmly.

“You’ll hate me for saying I think that’s a pity.” Glenda’s mouth twitched with self-deprecation, then her expression turned more solemn. “Wilf thought he was a good father because he didn’t beat his boys with a belt. That’s what he came from, among other awful things.”

Cloe’s heart juddered to a stop in her chest. “That’s horrible.”

“It is. He had his failings, but he was a better father than his own, which gave these boys a chance to be better again. When I see them with her…” A tender smile spread across her lips. “I see the father Wilf almost was. They are capable of being really good fathers and that makes me so happy.” Glenda’s eyes grew damp. “So yes, I would love to see each of them happily married with their own children. Which is selfish, but…” She was unrepentant the way so many grandmothers were.

“I hope you get your wish.” Cloe swallowed the lump in her throat. She didn’t want to think of Trystan married and having children with anyone else. It made her jealous, but Glenda was right. If that’s what he chose to do, he’d be amazing at it. “That won’t happen with me, though.”

Glenda didn’t get a chance to argue. Fabiana came out to join them, bringing her neighbor Leah so the conversation shifted to introductions and friendly catch-ups.

*

Cloe seemed to be making herself at home at Fabiana’s so Trystan brought Storm to Logan, so she could nap in the office cot while Trystan finished his pre-cruise chores for the Storm Ridge .

Ninety minutes later, he had finished stowing the last of the groceries and was coming up to return the truck when he noticed Cloe standing outside the coffee shop, slouching on her crutches. She was talking to Logan, who held Storm.

Trystan slammed the back of the SUV, brushed his palms, and strode across to them, arriving as the pair were midlaugh over something Logan had just said.

“Oh, hey,” Logan said in greeting. “I was just telling Cloe the eagle has landed and she should stick around to watch the reunion with you-know-who.” He gave Storm a little boost on his arm.

Cloe gave Trystan a vague nod of greeting, but was busy pretending Storm was the only person on the planet.

He bit back a sigh. He had wanted to get her to Fabiana’s, to be sure that arrangement would work, but he should have taken some time to talk with her first. About them. This force field she was using against him was really irritating.

“How did you get here?” he asked her, determined to make her look at him. “The golf cart?” He couldn’t see it.

“Fabiana forgot to plug it in. Which reminds me—” She lifted her gaze to meet Logan’s. “If you’re bringing Glenda to the wharf, Fabiana said please get her and her luggage, too.”

“Sure.”

“You walked ?” Trystan’s already short temper sizzled down another inch.

“Do we call it walking?” Cloe joked, shifting the tip of one crutch.

“Why didn’t you call me to pick you up?”

“You said you had to get the Storm Ridge ready.”

“I can spare five minutes. And why the hell were the beds made?”

“Dude,” Logan cautioned him on his tone.

“I’m sorry, did I cross a picket line?” Cloe picked herself up off the crutches to stand taller. “When I woke up, I remembered I hadn’t done it yesterday, so I did it.”

“With a sprained ankle. You went up and down those stairs, on crutches, on a boat. That’s what you did?” Trystan was flabbergasted. Furious, actually.

“I had a few shots of tequila first.” She looked to Logan for a laugh, but Logan was giving Trystan a hard stare that Trystan ignored.

“Now you’ve walked all this way, downhill, on that shitty road full of potholes—”

“Oh my gawd , Trystan. Fabiana is past the age of owning tampons. Okay?” Cloe shook one crutch so he would notice the small plastic bag she had tied to the cross bar. “Is it fine by you that I came here to buy some? Should I have asked you which stall to use when I went into the pub to insert one?”

She was bright red with anger and embarrassment. He was hot from hairline to guts, sorry he’d pushed her into saying that. He was irritated that Logan was listening. Logan was still glaring at him and wore a dark shade of ire himself.

“Hey, dum-dums,” Sophie called as she came out of the hardware store. “Are you playing hide-and-seek with that kid? Em’s here.” She pointed.

The water taxi was approaching the wharf.

“Guess who’s here, Storm? Let’s go see.” Logan brushed by him to catch up with Sophie as they hurried toward the wharf.

“I’m not afraid to buy tampons. You only had to ask,” Trystan muttered, hanging back to pace alongside Cloe as she swung out on her crutches to follow Logan.

“I’m a grown woman who can buy her own fucking tampons.”

They weren’t arguing about tampons.

“I want to help you, Cloe. You can still ask me for things.”

“I don’t want to.”

Wow. That was a knee in the gut he had not expected. It left his stomach feeling curdled and radiated a dull ache through the rest of him.

She didn’t try to go down the ramp. She stopped on the grassy verge to look down to where the taxi was tying up. Her severe profile softened as she watched Emma scramble off the water taxi to gather up Storm.

Storm was beside herself, crowing with excitement and crying a little, throwing herself into Emma’s arms, then clinging like any baby mammal to its mama.

“Did I miss it?” Glenda came up beside them. “Oh, look at them. That’s cute.”

Storm had her fist curled around the open zipper of Reid’s jacket as he encircled both Emma and Storm, but Storm kept her head on Emma’s shoulder. Reid kissed her hair before he stepped away to help Logan bring up the luggage.

Trystan moved to reopen the back of the SUV. Emma had taken an empty suitcase and would have filled it with clothes and other things for Storm. There was probably a pallet of diapers and other bulk supplies, too.

“Glenda!” Emma was already beaming as she came up the ramp from the wharf, but brightened even more as she saw their small party waiting. She squashed Storm between them as she hugged Glenda, then she made a sympathy face at Cloe’s ankle. “I heard about that. It’s not broken, though?”

“Just a sprain,” Cloe confirmed.

“Good. Hi, Trys.” She gave him a brief hug and kissed his cheek.

“Good trip?” he asked.

“Really good.”

Reid and Logan arrived with the luggage. Trystan took what was in Reid’s hands and stowed it so Reid could hug Glenda.

“I’m inviting myself for coffee with you and Emma before Fabiana and I go over to Bella Bella for the night,” Glenda told Reid.

“Reid needs to meet with me and Trys for a minute,” Logan said as he slammed the back of the SUV. “And Cloe needs a lift to Fabiana’s. Can you drop her?”

“Come have coffee with us,” Emma invited her. “I want to hear exactly what happened. It’s kind of a miracle the same hasn’t happened to me.”

“I’ll bring the luggage in when I get home.” Reid dropped a kiss on Emma’s mouth while Glenda got behind the wheel and took the women up the hill.

“What’s up?” Reid asked Logan. Reid wore none of the tension that used to grip him for days after returning from a visit with his mom.

“Let’s take it to the Storm Ridge ,” Logan suggested and started down the ramp.

Reid cocked a brow at Trystan.

Trystan shrugged, asking, “How’s your mom?”

“Good. We spent the day at Butchart Gardens. Not really my cup of tea, but Mom and Em enjoyed it.”

“You tell her about the sale?” Logan asked over his shoulder as he stepped up onto the deck of the Storm Ridge .

“Yeah, she’s disappointed that the money will be tied up until God knows when, but she was happy to hear that Em and I will stay in BC while we wait for the adoption process to finalize. She suggested we bring Storm next time.”

“That’s progress,” Trystan noted.

“It is.” Reid followed Logan into the saloon. “She really likes Em, probably because Em is super honest with her. She told Mom that her first mother-in-law would say things to belittle her and talk about her behind her back. She said, ‘Please never do that to me,’ and Mom said, ‘I never will.’ I always thought that if I married, I would have to manage the relationship between my wife and my mother, but they want to be friends and they’re making it happen.”

“That’s good to hear. Em deserves that. So does Miriam.” Trystan started to lock the door open, to let in the breeze, but Logan shook his head so Trystan closed it instead.

“What’s going on?” Reid frowned with concern, looking between them.

“Nothing much.” Logan crossed his arms and leaned against the galley island. “Just that Trys is breaking rule number one.”

“Oh, fuck off,” Trystan said to the ceiling, but the guilt of being found out poured like an open tap straight into his veins.

“What do you mean? The nanny was with me in Vict—” Reid swore under his breath. “Really, Trys? I expect that shit from this one, but you?”

“Hey. I’m marrying Sophie.” Logan lifted his palms in a WTF? “And we had history. It doesn’t count.”

“First of all, what makes you think there’s anything going on between us?” Trystan asked, meeting Logan’s eyes while wearing his best poker face.

“The fact that you’re not denying it,” Logan said with a choke of laughter at how badly Trystan was failing at his bluff. “The fact that you know who I’m talking about.”

“Who are we talking about?” Reid asked cautiously.

“Cloe,” Logan said.

“Just making sure I’m keeping up.” Reid nodded.

“You should have heard them bickering over tampons. They are definitely fucking,” Logan assured him.

“Hey,” Trystan warned. “Clean it up.”

“Oh. My mistake. They are definitely having a torrid, secret affair.”

“You are not the moral compass you think you are.” Trystan glared at Logan. “And my private life is none of your business.”

“Did you really just say that to me? With a straight face? The guy who ghosted me for eight years because you didn’t like the way I’d treated Sophie? I was young and stupid, Trys. You’re not. You’re old enough to know better.”

“I’m old enough to choose my partners without running it by my brothers, so you can fuck all the way off.”

“Okay, look.” Reid put out a calming hand. “Let’s not climb anger mountain. You’re right, Trys. Who you sleep with is none of our business. All we’re saying is, when it comes to the actual business, and Storm, we have a right to ask a few questions.”

That got Trystan’s back up even more. “We’re all clear on the fact that Cloe’s motive is to have a relationship with her niece, aren’t we?”

“I’d be more sure of that if she wasn’t sleeping with you,” Reid said frankly. “Now that I know she is, I have to wonder what her end game is. Does she want a piece of Raven’s Cove? Does she want your money?”

“What money?” he near shouted.

Guilt had pushed that out of him. Defensiveness. He was insulted on Cloe’s behalf, and he’d known from the jump he shouldn’t sleep with her. He’d ended it, thinking that was the right thing to do, but he’d hurt her feelings and she’d literally been injured because of their breakup. Now his brothers wanted to pile on her? No .

“What do you mean, ‘what money’?” Reid frowned.

“I’m broke,” he threw out, glad to get it off his chest. “And Cloe knows it. I dumped everything I had into keeping this place afloat. It’s not coming back to me anytime soon and I can’t”— won’t —“leverage against the resort. So, no. She is not sleeping with me for my money. I don’t have any.”

She had wanted to feel good. That’s all. And what had he done? Made her feel bad about it. And the one thing she hadn’t wanted was for people to talk about her sex life and question her motives.

He ran his hand over his face, feeling like a supreme asshole for having this conversation.

“When you say ‘broke’…” Logan prompted.

“Yeah. Spell that out for us. We all had to rejig our finances to make this work, but…” Reid’s frown intensified.

Jesus, this was humiliating.

“What do you think happens when you tell investors you’ll deliver a product, then you don’t deliver it?”

“But you’ve been making money for years, Trys. You bought a house in California. You have assets,” Logan insisted. “Don’t you?”

“Okay, get out your bibs because you’ll be dining on this for a while.” Trystan pinched the bridge of his nose. “Yes. I had money. I still have equipment sitting in storage that I need to produce my show, but I made decisions around the tone of the show that cost me my backers. Then the woman I was sharing that house with took it. I won’t bother getting into why. All you need to know is that I know what it looks like when a woman is sleeping with me for money. That’s not what Cloe is doing.”

“Damn. Sorry, man,” Logan said. “So what are you saying? That you and Cloe are, like, in a relationship?”

“We’ll circle back to that,” Reid cut in. “Why didn’t you tell us this when we first threw our money into Raven’s Cove?”

“Because we all had to ante up. Crew not cargo.” He tapped his chest. “My start-up money came out of this place, so it had to go back in. I wasn’t going to cry poor and leave it all on you two to bail this place out.”

“You still could have told us what you were up against,” Reid insisted.

“I didn’t want you rubbing my nose in it? All right?”

“Why the hell would we do that?” Reid asked.

“Fine. I didn’t want you to be completely indifferent.” He didn’t realize how true that was until he said it aloud, without thinking.

Reid choked out an exhale as though he’d taken a punch.

“Yeah. Ouch,” Logan agreed. “We care, Trys. Why would you think we don’t?”

“Because we never fucking talk to each other. I ghosted you? It was all on me, was it?” Trystan charged.

“Fair. Shit.” Logan scraped his hand over his jaw. “I didn’t think you wanted to talk to me, and I didn’t blame you. It was easier to leave my mistakes here than deal with them.” He shook his head in self-disgust. “The longer it went on, the worse I felt and the harder it was to patch up. By the time I saw you at Mom’s wedding, you were living the life of a movie star. What did you need me for?”

“You did fuck up with Sophie.” Trystan leapt on the chance to say what had been sitting inside him for years. “She told me to stay out of it so I did, but you are a colossal ass . If you ever hurt her like that again, I will put you in the ground.”

“Message received, man. But there’s nothing out there I want more than her, so you can stand down,” Logan said mildly.

He wouldn’t even give him the fight he wanted? What an asshole.

“I should have kept in touch more, too,” Reid admitted.

“It’s okay,” Trystan muttered, more or less out of habit. “Your mom—”

“Has a mental illness,” Reid cut in sharply. “ I don’t. Except, you know, the clinical arrogance we all inherited from dear ol’ Dad.” Reid squeezed the back of his neck and sighed. “I had a lot going on, that’s true, but it was no excuse not to pick up a phone once in a while and check in with my brothers. I was a prick. I should have done better.”

“We never called you a prick,” Logan said solemnly. “To your face.” He shared a grimace of culpability with Trystan.

Reid ignored that and said, “It never occurred to me you weren’t okay, Trys. You’ve always been the one who had his act together.”

“With respect, Reid, go fuck yourself,” Trystan said wearily. “I am not magic. Yeah, Mom’s side of the family made a deliberate effort to build me up and set me up for success. They’re trying to repair generations of oppression and genocide. Do you know how much shit she took for letting me live with Dad instead of her, though? Because she believed I should have a relationship with my father and brothers?”

“Then you didn’t wind up with one,” Reid realized. “Not with any of us.”

“We really suck,” Logan said.

“It doesn’t matter,” Trystan muttered, capable of a touchy-feely conversation with nearly anyone except either of these two asshats.

“What are you really mad about, Trys? That we found out about you and Cloe?” Logan asked. “Or that we weren’t there for you when you needed us? We’re here now. Tell us what you need.”

“I need to get back to work,” he bit out. “Filming.”

“Okay. Let’s figure out how to make that happen,” Reid said. “But first, let’s circle back to why you’re sleeping with Cloe. If she’s not moving in on your bank account, what’s going on between you two?”

“We’re friends.” Were they, though? He used his thumbnail to scratch his eyebrow, avoiding Logan’s eyes because he could feel him questioning that statement, given the antagonism he’d witnessed. “We both have things we need to do. She knows I have to get back to my show. Filming has never been conducive to me holding down a relationship, so no, it’s not serious, and it’s actually over.” Why was that such a knife in his gut? “I’m done talking about Cloe because she deserves some privacy.”

His brothers exchanged a look that seemed to suggest they weren’t done being curious, but all Reid said was, “Okay, then. If we found a new first mate, is Johnny ready to captain the Storm Ridge tour?”