The Family Man

Book 2: Belmont Beach Brides

by Kelly Eadon

Genres: Family Life; Women's Fiction; Contemporary Romance; Romantic Comedy

Synopsis

A sexy single dad gets a second chance at love... TEMPTATION NEVER TASTED SO SWEET... When life hands lemons to Beth Beverley, she makes mouthwatering lemon squares. Mostly because they're coveted by the sexy single dad who owns Belmont's most popular coffee shop. But that's where her crush on Griffin has to end. Her sweet treats are selling like crazy cakes in his shop, and she doesn't mix business with pleasure. Too bad his sinful smile has her flirting with the idea of forever. Griffin Hall definitely needs to keep his eyes--and his hands--off Beth. Since he's traded in late-night gigs and partying for bedtime stories with his little girl in his arms, he doesn't have time for anything else. So why does Beth's big heart and easy way with his daughter make him finally feel alive again? But there's a little secret Beth doesn't know, something he can't bear to tell her . . .

Release date: July 5, 2016

Publisher: Forever Yours

Print pages: 258

Sample

CHAPTER ONE

Beth Beverly adjusted the wings strapped to her back, balanced the box on her hip, and slammed the heel of her hand onto the door to the coffee house.

Thud thud thud.

Sarah would flip when she saw her costume. You were never too old to dress up for Halloween. And not the slutty bunny, slutty genie, slutty maid kind of dress up. Those costumes had their time and place, but 6:00 a.m. on a weekday wasn’t one of them.

She bounced on the balls of her feet as she imagined her college friend’s reaction. It was too perfect that Halloween fell on a Thursday this year. Little Ray of Sunshine had started ordering her muffins a month earlier and she always delivered on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 6:00 a.m. On Thursdays, it was Sarah who accepted the delivery, and on Tuesdays, it was her hot boss. Which was also perfect. Every week she got both a dose of eye candy and a chance to catch up with one of her favorite people.

Her antennae swayed back and forth as she shifted impatiently on her feet. She had a lot of muffin deliveries to make and if Sarah didn’t hurry, they’d miss their weekly gab session.

The door jerked open. Griffin Hall towered over her, his eyebrows furrowing on his perfect face.

Shit. Her heart lodged in her stomach. She swallowed hard, her eyes taking in the dark-blond hair that curled over the corners of his ears and the few days’ worth of facial hair on his chin.

Where was Sarah? Suddenly Beth wished she’d gone with slutty…something. Anything sexier than a bumblebee. Then again, weren’t most things sexier than a bumblebee?

“Um.” Her throat was scratchy. “Muffin delivery?”

He studied her for a second, then gave a polite half smile. “Thanks. We already have a line of people at the counter waiting for their fix.” He stepped to the side and held the door open with one sinewy arm. “Nice costume, by the way.”

She arched an eyebrow as she stepped inside. “You, too. What are you? Belmont coffee shop owner who’s awake way too early? Caffeine addict who hasn’t gotten his morning jolt yet?”

He chuckled. “Maybe a combination of the two.”

Her skin tingled. A chuckle and an almost smile. She was making progress.

“So, are you guys having a good morning?” She eased past him and into the back prep area of the bustling coffee house. The smell of dark-roast coffee enveloped her, causing her mouth to water. The clamor of voices drifted from the front service area. Griffin’s business was always hopping and yet she’d never seen him really smile, a fact that stymied her. After all, the business she had poured her heart and soul into had bombed catastrophically two years earlier and she still found plenty of reasons to smile.

Then again, she didn’t know anything about him. Maybe his family had been lost at sea and he was the sole survivor. Or maybe he was a coffee shop owner who hated mornings. Or maybe he belonged to some weird cult that required he wear mohair underwear. Whatever it was, Griffin carried something heavy. She could sense it.

Which only made him sexier.

“Sure. Been pretty busy.” His voice was a low rumble, which sent her stomach into a series of somersaults.

God, he was hot. Someday, when she had more than a few seconds to spare, she’d find a way to make him smile. Not one of those smiles that merely curved the edge of his lips. A real, soul-melting smile that radiated from inside.

Today, while she stood before him as a bumblebee, was not that day. She had a dozen deliveries to make before 8:00 a.m. Time to get moving. She’d have to catch up with Sarah another time.

She lifted the lid of the box so he could see inside. “One dozen carrot cake, one dozen lemon corn, and one dozen good old chocolate chip. Think that’ll get you through?”

The corners of his eyes crinkled. “You know they’ll sell out in an hour. They always do.”

She shrugged. “What can I say? That’s one of the hazards of being a small business. I can only make so many muffins in a day.”

One failed business per lifetime was sufficient and she was perfectly content working as a part-time baker, part-time kids’ drama teacher, part-time seamstress, part-time whatever. Although, ever since she’d added Little Ray to her list of clients, she hadn’t been able to keep up with demand.

“Believe me, I completely understand.” His irises took on a blue hue and for the hundredth time she wondered what that meant. She scanned his forehead, cheeks, chin, jaw, eyebrows. Usually she was good at reading people, intuiting their emotional states. But with Griffin? Nothing. Nada. Zip.

She tore her eyes from him and peeked into the dining room, where people crowded around tables and waited in line. Griffin’s shop was a haven for people from every walk of life: local wannabe artists, bikers, stay-at-home moms, starving actors, and high school athletes. It was something he’d fostered since he’d opened six months earlier and it was one of the things that intrigued her most about him.

When she turned back, his eyes were fixed intently on her. A fire ignited low in her stomach and she had to focus to keep her breathing steady.

Holy shit. What if her crush wasn’t some unrequited, one-way kind of deal?

He met her gaze and held it. Her heart raced a million miles a minute, but her tongue was glued to the roof of her mouth. What should she do now? What should she say?

She’d never in a million years expected him to look at her the way she knew she looked at him: like she was a cupcake and he wanted to lick the frosting off.

He was still holding her gaze when Sarah entered from the storage area.

“Beth!”

She jumped, like a child who’d been caught with her hand in the cookie jar.

Now she shows up.

Sarah blinked at her, then dissolved into laughter, grasping her sides as she heaved for breath. “Again? The bee?”

Beth’s face burned. She’d forgotten she was dressed as a giant bumblebee. No wonder Griffin had been staring.

“And what are you supposed to be?” she teased.

Sarah wore black tights, an orange dress and a green headband that clashed with her purple hair.

Sarah folded her into a hug. “I’m a pumpkin. We can’t all be as awesome as you and fit into clothes from freshman year.”

“Eh.” Beth’s face grew even hotter. “I don’t know that anyone would call this clothes.” Sarah released her, and Beth waved at her torso, which was enveloped in yellow and black stripes. Who cared what the fashion police said? Horizontal stripes would come back in eventually.

Sarah hooked an elbow through hers. “So, what kind of goodies did you bring for us today?”

Beth always made sure to feed the staff. After all, sugar was happiness.

“I haven’t unloaded them yet. Come see.” She glanced over her shoulder. “Griffin, you want to join us? I don’t know if Sarah can be trusted to escort them safely inside.”

Today’s baked goods had been made specifically with him in mind.

“I’d follow you a lot farther than the parking lot for treats,” he said. The left side of his mouth quirked up and her pulse sped. She was getting closer to that elusive real smile.

He opened the door and held it while Sarah and Beth walked through. As Beth passed him she caught a whiff of coffee and caramel and something manly and musky. Her heart thumped.

Sarah led the way across the parking lot to the van, which Beth had bought when she’d opened the stained-glass studio. They’d made custom stained glass and sold it in a storefront, but had also offered a delivery option. When that went out of business she’d had to find a way to repurpose the van.

“So Griff, what’s May going to be for Halloween?” Sarah called out.

Beth’s stomach wrenched. A daughter. He had a daughter? Her chest grew tight. She really should have worked up the nerve to pump Sarah for more of his personal details before she’d fallen so far into like. Or lust. This crush seemed to have a healthy dose of both. At least she’d been stealthy enough to ascertain from Sarah that he was single.

Daughters were…serious. And serious wasn’t her forte.

“She’s dressing as a fairy princess cat. That was an interesting shopping trip to the costume store.” Griffin’s voice hummed with amusement.

She grinned. May sounded like her kind of kid.

She reached for the handle to the van’s door, which creaked as she tried to pry it open. Poor Martha, as she thought of her van, had seen a lot of use over the years and wasn’t getting any younger.

“Need some help?” Griffin’s arm brushed against hers, making her skin sing with awareness.

She abruptly stepped back from the door. “Um, sure. Just be careful with Martha. She’s getting up there and she requires a delicate touch sometimes.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Martha, eh?”

“Like Martha Stewart. The Hostess with the Mostest. Hostess cupcakes. Baking. Maybe you have to be drunk, but it seemed fitting when I thought of it.” She and her friends Kate and Ryan had once gotten drunk during a snowstorm and brainstormed stupid names for their businesses. Ryan’s recording label was named Hungry Hippo, Beth’s van was Martha, and none of them could look at a bottle of Jack Daniels ever again.

Plus, renaming the van had made the bankruptcy sting a tiny bit less.

“I like it.” His mouth lifted into a real, genuine smile and her skin broke into goose bumps. With a pointed look her way, he eased the door open. She ducked her head inside the van to grab a small box, which she shoved into Griffin’s hands. Her stomach seemed to have launched into a full-scale fireworks display.

He grinned and arched an eyebrow as he held a finger out to her, a smattering of silver and purple sparkles flecking the surface.

She fought the urge to snort with laughter as she racked her brain. Glitter? It had to be left over from the balloons she’d decorated with her children’s theater class last week. Or maybe it was from that dress she’d found at the thrift shop. Either way, there were certain things she’d never outgrow, and glitter was definitely one of them. Glitter and costumes.

She leaned toward him and whispered, as if she were sharing a secret. “I don’t ask where Martha goes or what she does at night. I try not to pry into her private life.”

He laughed, a low rumble. “Probably a good plan.”

Mentally she patted herself on the back. A real smile and a laugh. And they hadn’t even gotten to the contents of the box yet.

“What did you bring us?” Sarah snatched it from Griffin’s hand.

“Lemon bars. I found some Meyer lemons at the store the other day.” By “found” she meant she’d hunted through four local supermarkets until she’d located the perfect ones. It was imperative that these particular lemon bars be the best she’d ever made.

Griffin’s eyes snapped to her face, another smile crossing his lips. “Lemon bars are my favorite.”

“Really? That’s crazy.” She couldn’t admit that she’d already known that. Someone on his staff had let it slip and the tidbit had haunted her into lemon-hunting submission. Once she got an idea in her head, she had to create the vision or it would drive her mad.

At least, that’s the excuse she was going with. The fact that Griffin was dead sexy in a rugged-logger-from-the-woods kind of way only made her challenge more imperative.

“I will never say no to a lemon bar,” Sarah said and shoved one into her mouth, sending crumbs flying from her lips. “You find a new roommate yet?”

Beth glanced at Griffin, who had extracted the box from Sarah’s hands and firmly secured it under one arm. Out of Sarah’s reach.

“Nah. I’m just sort of seeing.” She’d crunched the numbers a million different ways, and she could afford to live by herself. At least, for now.

Her heart twinged at the idea of letting someone else move into Kate’s room. She was happy her best friend was madly in love and engaged, but she missed seeing her every day. There was a certain kind of intimacy you only experienced when you saw someone at their drunkest, sleepiest, craziest, and crankiest. She wasn’t sure she was ready to take that leap with someone new. What if she picked the wrong person? Kate was right; maybe she should get a dog.

“If you want, you can put a flyer up in the shop. I’ll make sure it stays on the front of the bulletin board and I’ll try to deter any crazies from applying,” Griffin offered.

She forced a smile. She wasn’t prepared to have this conversation right now, especially not with him. “I’ll think about it. As long as you promise to tell anyone who looks like a serial killer that I love to blast John Philip Sousa marches first thing in the morning.”

He arched an eyebrow. “A John Philip Sousa reference? I’m impressed.”

Sarah placed a hand on her shoulder, dragging her attention away from Griffin. “I was asking because my cousin’s looking for a place. Do you want me to give her your info?”

Sarah had good taste in people, but after living with her best friend she couldn’t live with just anyone. “If I decide to get a roommate, you’re the first person I’ll call. I promise.”

She glanced back at Griffin, whose eyes had darkened. The back of her neck prickled. When had her hard-earned smile disappeared? And why?

She checked her watch, and her heart lurched. Almost six thirty. She and Martha had better get back to their regularly scheduled deliveries.

“I’ll see you guys next week. Get ready for some exciting new muffin flavors! I’ve been experimenting.” That was another reason she loved Little Ray of Sunshine. They sold whatever muffins she brought them, no questions asked. They’d even managed to sell out of her chipotle chocolate.

“Thanks for the lemon squares. I’ll make sure everyone else gets one, including May. She’ll love them. And I’ll look forward to seeing you Tuesday.” His voice was warm, but his expression had returned to unreadable.

“Anytime.” She winked and climbed into the van. She’d never been one to back away from a challenge. Daughter or not, she couldn’t help but be excited to earn another of his smiles on Tuesday.

*  *  *

Griffin stared after the van as it drove from the parking lot, willing himself to look away. He had things to do. Coffee to make, customers to serve, employees to supervise. And yet all he could think about was Beth. Her short, curly hair and the way her eyes had danced as her pink lips formed the words “lemon squares.” Adrenaline shot through his veins, the way it had whenever he’d stepped onto a stage in front of a crowd of people.

A lump formed in his throat. That rush of energy was one of the few things he missed about his life as a professional musician. It hadn’t been hard to say goodbye to living on the road or squabbling with his bandmates. The lifestyle had never been for him, and it was almost a relief when the band broke up. But the music? There were moments when he missed writing and performing so acutely that his chest ached.

He pushed the thought away.

No regrets. The judge had granted him. . .