Anne Ha - Long, Tall Temporary Husband

Back at the house, Jake stared after her. He watched his truck disappear around the bend. Slowly the dust settled until all traces of his wife’s flight had vanished.

She was gone.

Gone. As if she’d never been here. As if the past five weeks were nothing but a childish fantasy, a naive dream. She was gone, and good riddance.

He bent down and lifted her rings off the ground. He blew the dirt off them, rubbed them clean. They were still warm with the heat of her body, and as he slipped them into his pocket an ache settled deep in his chest.

Good riddance? Who was he trying to kid? Depression closed over him. He’d thought they had a future together. He’d lost his heart to her and she’d behaved exactly as he’d feared, abandoning him along with her discarded rings.

With a last look at the empty drive, he turned and headed for the barn. He would lose himself in work, and eventually he would forget her.

Chapter One

Five months later

“Excuse me, Miss, but this toast is burned. And I clearly asked for real half-and-half with my coffee, not this nondairy junk.”

Taylor stared down at the annoying customer seated at table fifteen, wishing he would just disappear. Every Saturday morning he came to the Pancake Hut for breakfast, and every Saturday morning he found something wrong with his food—which meant she had to take it back to the kitchen.

The cook—her boss—hated it when she took an order back. He usually got mad and purposely messed up her next several orders.

That had the same result every time. Lower tips.

Taylor needed those tips. Desperately. She lived from paycheck to paycheck, barely managing to keep a roof over her head and make payments on the debts she’d racked up several months ago. So instead of telling Mr. Annoying where he could put his toast—which was what she would have done a few months ago—she gritted her teeth and counted to ten.

He waved to his side order plate. “What are you gonna do about my toast? I’m hungry and I don’t got all day.”

She reached for the toast. The slices were a light golden brown, not burned at all. It figured. “I’m very sorry, sir. I’ll replace this as quickly as I can.” If she timed it right, she could do it herself while the cook was busy at the grill. If he didn’t see her she’d be all right.

The customer huffed, then gave her a grudging nod. “What about my cream?”

“We don’t have any, but I could bring some milk. Would that do?”

“Well, be quick about it.”

Fighting the urge to bop the man on the head, Taylor turned away from the table.

That was when she saw him. Jake. Standing at the entrance to the coffee shop, gorgeous and rugged in faded jeans and a thick shearling coat.

In the space of an instant, Taylor’s world shifted sideways. She felt as if her stomach had plummeted to the ground. Her whole body tingled with shock.

Five months, she thought. It had been five long, challenging months since she’d seen him, yet it might have been only yesterday. He was so much the same, so familiar with that long, lean rancher’s body and thick dark hair.

How many times this fall had she imagined being with him again? Imagined what it would feel like to be in his arms again, warm and comforted instead of alone in a cold, impersonal city?

Everything about him had haunted her. His seductive brown eyes, the masculine grace of his movements, the warm scent of his skin. She remembered the first day they’d met, on vacation last summer. The sensations came back to her: hot sun on her skin, powder-soft sand underfoot. The scent of suntan lotion. And Jake, sitting there on the beach in Mexico, propped up on his elbows, watching her walk by. She’d felt an intense attraction the moment her gaze had locked onto his chiseled features and dark, windtousled hair. And when their eyes had met, she’d felt the most heady response.

It had been a magical week, full of champagne and music and moonlit dancing. They’d eloped before the trip was over, each of them absolutely confident they’d found their life partner.

But then he’d brought her home to the Cassidy Ranch—and everything had fallen apart. Within days she’d felt the change in him. The subtle withdrawal. She’d married him for his passion, for his joy in life, but once on the ranch he’d settled into a pattern of nonstop twelve-hour days and left her to her own devices. Their physical attraction had been strong, but not strong enough to bridge the growing gulf between them.

She’d tried to ignore it. But the feeling of abandonment she’d experienced was all too familiar. Her mother and father had always valued their work and their social lives more than her. She’d thought Jake would be different, that he would value her more, but he didn’t.

Their marriage was an impulsive mistake. Though it had started in a passionate whirlwind, it crashed and burned in barely a month.

She watched Jake now as he scanned the busy restaurant, looking for her, she knew. Nothing else would have brought him to Boston, to this dingy little dive in a bad part of town.

And the only reason he’d be looking for her was to initiate their divorce. A sick feeling settled in her stomach. She’d known this day would come, had tried to tell herself it was what she wanted. To be free of him. But that didn’t explain her reaction, her sudden flash of despair.

Finally Jake’s deep brown eyes locked onto hers, steady, assessing. Feeling like a deer caught in the headlights of a car, she stared back at him, frozen and vulnerable. Even her mind seemed frozen, stuck on that one awful thought. Divorce.

Jake crossed the room in a few easy strides, his gaze never leaving hers, his expression unreadable.

“Hello, Taylor.”

That voice. Low, rough, whiskey-soft. Seductive even now, when he’d only tracked her down to say their marriage was over.

She wasn’t ready for this confrontation. Wasn’t ready to hear that Jake had found someone else, someone who was selfless and caring, mature and responsible. All the things Taylor hadn’t been.

But she forced herself to stand firm. “Hello, Jake,” she said. Her voice was cool, remote, as if she felt nothing, no anxiety, no pain.

His eyes narrowed almost imperceptibly. Taylor waited for him to say something, but he seemed content to stand there taking in her pink polyester blouse and skirt and frilly white Pancake Hut apron.

Mr. Annoying on fifteen broke the moment. “Hey, Miss! Are you going to get my toast or not?”

She’d forgotten she still held the plate. She gave him her best waitressing smile. “Just a minute,” she said as cheerfully as she could. Then she addressed Jake. “Whatever you’re here for, I don’t have time.”

“We need to talk.”

“Not right now, we don’t.” She wondered whether he’d brought the divorce papers with him. Would he whip them out and demand she sign on the dotted line? Would he offer her money? Or would they have to go through a long legal battle she couldn’t afford to fight?

“It’s important.”

Like it or not, her marriage had blown up in her face; the only graceful thing to do was to accept it like a lady. But she didn’t feel graceful, and she didn’t feel like a lady. She felt like a tired waitress without enough money and way too much loneliness. “Look,” she said, “you’ve already lost me my tip from this guy, and I’m not in the mood.”

“I’ll pay you the difference.”

“Forget it, Jake.” She didn’t want a dime of his money. She was going to support herself, and prove to herself, her parents and Jake that she wasn’t a total loser.

Her mind flashed back over the past five months. When she’d first returned to Boston her need to forget Jake had made her wild and reckless. She’d spent money like crazy, blowing through her father’s generous allowance in only six days. Her father had given her more, on the condition she shape up, become an adult, start taking life more seriously. She hadn’t. Instead she’d dealt with the pain of her failed marriage the only way she knew how: by buying everything in sight.

Her mother had given her more money, but had said that was it until she got her life together. Taylor hadn’t believed her. Her parents had always thrown money at her instead of love; why would anything be different this time?

But it was. Her parents had cut her off. They’d offered her a place to stay and food to eat but only on the condition that she take a paper-pushing, closely supervised job in the personnel department at her father’s company.

Chafing at their control like a petulant child, Taylor had thrown it back in their faces. She’d moved in with a friend that afternoon. But her credit cards were tapped out, and none of the stylish jobs she applied for worked out. In the end, she couldn’t keep up with her friends’ glamorous life-styles, and they blew her off.

She’d had no money, no job, no friends, no place to live. She’d thrown it all away. She’d been a fool, and pride prevented her from accepting her parents’ new tough-love brand of assistance.

Finally she’d tried in earnest to get a job, and ended up a week later at the Pancake Hut. She’d done more growing up in that one week, and in the months of backbreaking restaurant work that followed, than she had in her entire life. With newfound grit and determination, she’d started to get her life back together.

And she’d keep doing it—alone.

Taylor pointed into the kitchen where her boss, Sleazy Steve, glared at her over the grill. “Do you see that man back there? If I’m more than thirty seconds late to pick up a plate he bums my next two orders. So I don’t really care what you have to talk to me about. It’s not more important than my job.”

Jake fixed his gaze on her, unblinking. “You don’t know that.” His tone was even, calm. Not argumentative, but still it raised Taylor’s hackles.

Like herself, Jake could be an incredibly stubborn person. “You might not believe it, Jake, but nothing is more important than my job. Nothing.”

Not even you. Not even my husband. The words remained unspoken, but she knew they both heard them echo through the restaurant.

Five months and one week ago she never would have even thought those words. Five months and one week ago her husband had been the most important thing in her life. But she hadn’t been the most important thing in his. Not by a long shot.

“I’m not going to leave,” Jake said.

“Fine,” Taylor returned. “You can wait all day for me if you want. Just don’t do it in the aisle.”

That brought a hint of a smile to his lips. “Where’s your section?”

“Over there.” She pointed. “But don’t you dare...” She trailed off as Jake sauntered over to the only vacant booth in her section. He slipped out of his shearling coat and sat down.

Taylor took a deep breath and counted to ten. By seven she’d calmed down, and when she hit ten she knew how she’d handle the situation. The moment Jake had sat down he’d become a customer. Nothing more, nothing less.

And she’d learned how to deal with customers.

She ducked into the kitchen to make fresh toast for the man on fifteen, then took a menu to Jake. She slid it onto the table. “Coffee?”

He met her eyes. “Taylor...”

A lot of her customers liked to call her by her first name. It was written on a little plastic tag pinned to her blouse. But no one said it in that rough, sexy way, like a lion trying to growl but ending up purring. “Cream or sugar?” she asked brightly.

She knew how he took his coffee. Black and strong.

“Neither.”