Gram didn’t reply, just kept watching me eat.
“What?”
“Nothing.” She took a sip of her tea.
“Gram, stop. You do this every time she comes home for a break. We’re friends, but that’s all.”
“Friends can be excited to see each other when it’s been a while.”
I shrugged.
When she spoke again, her voice was soft. “It’s okay to miss her, Bear.”
She didn’t mean miss her because I hadn’t seen her since Christmas, and I knew it. She meant miss the way we used to be. We hadn’t just been close, we’d been inseparable. As kids, Grace and I had been best friends. Basically glued to each other.
Not anymore.
We sat in silence for a while. Gram sipped her tea and I devoured the slice of pie. It was the perfect blend of tart and sweet, with a flaky crust that melted in my mouth.
I ate my last few bites, still thinking about Grace. The last time I’d seen her, the distance between us had felt like a canyon. It had sucked, but after she’d gone back to school, I’d mostly put her out of my mind. I was busy all the time, so that had made it easier. But now she was home, and I once again had to face the truth.
I had a thing for Grace. I had for a long time. And I’d never told her. Never told anyone.
I had my reasons, and it didn’t matter now anyway. She was dating someone else. In a few short months, she’d go back to school. And maybe next summer would be the year she didn’t come back home.
Thinking about a world without Grace—my world without her—was putting me in a shitty mood. Maybe I needed more pie.
“This was amazing.” I gestured to my empty plate, then stood and took it to the counter where the pies were cooling.
“Don’t even think about it, Bear.” Gram wagged her finger at me. “You want more, you go pick me more strawberries.”
“There’s two more in the oven.”
“I expect we’ll have company soon.” She paused to sip her tea. “In fact, go next door and ask Naomi and the kids to come on over before that wild pack of wolves you call brothers gets back.”
I shot Gram a look. I should have known she’d have an ulterior motive for giving me the first slice of pie.
“Go on, now,” she said, shooing me with her hand. “Don’t make me tell you twice.”
With a soft chuckle, I put my plate in the sink and lifted my hands in a gesture of surrender. “Okay, okay, I’m going.”
I gave Gram a kiss on the head, then left to go tell Naomi and Elijah—and Grace—that we had pie.
Continue reading Protecting You
Dear Reader
Dear reader,
If you’re new to Tilikum, I hope you enjoyed your stay! And if you’re making a return trip after the Bailey Brothers, I hope it was fun to be back.
Starting this book, I found myself in a bit of a conundrum. I’d always planned to write the Haven brothers as their own series after the Baileys, which meant I was contemplating these stories several years before it was time to begin writing. I had a loose outline that included the series order and basic ideas for each book.
But when it came time to start this book, none of it felt right anymore.
I know why. I lost my husband unexpectedly in 2021 and my life changed in every way imaginable. As I slowly and gently picked up the pieces of my life and heart, and began finding ways to move forward, there was a lot from “the before” that no longer felt relevant. That included my loose outline and ideas for the Havens.
However, I wasn’t ready to give up. I’d set myself up to write this series and I knew there was a way to get excited about it. I just had to find it.
So I let go. I let go of my loose outline, the order of the books, the female main characters, the plot ideas, all of it. I looked at it with fresh eyes and spent a lot of time thinking about what I wanted to write.
The solution came in the title. I was thinking of ideas and already felt the nudge to lean into romantic suspense. I started playing around with words and, long story short, came up with this and several other title ideas.
I loved them and so did my team. I could picture them on book covers and they told me something about the direction I needed to go to jumpstart my brain again.
So I ran with it. Did I worry that existing readers would balk at the emphasis on romantic suspense? Oh yeah. Did I worry that new readers wouldn’t take a chance on me? For sure. Was I afraid that I was straying too far from reader expectations? Definitely.
But did I do it anyway? Yep. Sometimes you just have to do it scared.