Sucker Punch Read Free

this time. “That should be easy enough. When are you leaving?”
    “Tomorrow morning.” He eyed me cautiously, as if he expected me to wig out or something. “I know it’s short notice, but it’s really a last-minute thing.”
    This is the beauty of an uncommitted relationship , I told myself. There’s no pressure. One partner can flit off at a moment’s notice and the other one is just fine with it. No drama. No hysterics. No jealousy. I shot an I-told-you-so look at Karen and practically beamed at Jawarski. “I think it sounds wonderful. Where are you going?”
    “Montana. Ridge’s birthday is next week, and Bree called last night to suggest I come up there. She thought I might like to spend some time with the kids.”
    All those ugly insecurities bashed me, and my smile grew brittle. One whack with a kitchen mallet and it would have shattered into a hundred pieces. Don’t get me wrong. I didn’t begrudge him a visit with his kids. But the one time I’d met Cheyenne and Ridge had been a total disaster. He wasn’t ready for me to be part of their lives, so every time he slipped into dad mode, I was left out. Some day I might become a part of their special triumvirate, but I wasn’t yet.
    But that wasn’t what made my nerve endings tingle. Somewhere along the way I’d developed a case of ex-wife-itis—probably because Jawarski mentioned his ex so rarely, I was never certain where things stood between them.
    It was hard to ignore the smug look Karen flung at me, but I did my best. “The trip was your ex-wife’s idea?”
    Jawarski nodded as if dropping everything to accept an invitation from the ex was the most natural thing in the world. “I haven’t seen the kids in a few months, and I have a couple of weeks of vacation saved up.”
    Jealous girlfriend questions rose in my throat, but I bit them all back. My reaction had nothing to do with Jawarski and everything to do with Roger. Karen’s earlier comments had just made me more susceptible to doubt, that’s all.
    “What a great idea,” I said, trying very hard to mean it. “I’ll bet the kids are excited.”
    Jawarski smiled, relief evident in every line on his face. “They seem to be.”
    See? We were fine. And Jawarski leaving for two weeks should prove, even to Karen, that there are some couples who are just fine without hearts and flowers . . . and even candy.
    Apparently satisfied that I wasn’t angry with him, Jawarski leaned across the counter and kissed me briefly. “Listen, I’ve gotta run. There’s some kind of trouble over at the theater and I need to check on it. But I’ll call you while I’m gone. And I should be back by Valentine’s Day, so think about what you want to do that night.” He walked backward for a couple of steps and spread his arms wide. “I’m all yours, babe. Just name it.”
    Babe?
    It was a good thing he left when he did, because if I’d named it right then, we’d probably both have been sorry.
     
     
    The door had barely closed behind Jawarski when the bell tinkled to signal another customer. We get a fair amount of walk-in traffic since we’re situated in a prime location, one I could never afford if I were trying to set up a business today. Paradise is growing rapidly, and in the tourist season we get a lot of spillover from Aspen and Vail. So it’s not unusual for someone I don’t recognize to walk into Divinity.
    It is unusual for that someone to be barking into a cell phone so intently he doesn’t pay any attention to where he’s walking. The customer, a twig of a man with reddish hair and hard blue eyes, plowed into a display table loaded with old-fashioned candy sticks and sent half of them crashing to the floor. He glared at them as if they’d bashed into him and shifted his cell phone to his other ear.
    “No, no, no. I said today. It has to be here today. Which part of that word do you have trouble understanding?”
    Karen was still busy with the boxes and Liberty wasn’t in yet, so