“Joe,” I whispered, both to answer Ryan and to assure my brain that I was actually talking to the man who fathered me. I had almost convinced myself that he’d never call.

Ryan pulled his sunglasses off, hooking them over the front of his T-shirt, and focused all of his attention on me. The man on the other end of my phone sounded close to tears as his breath stuttered in my ear. I knew how he felt; I wanted to cry with him.

“Yeah,” he choked. “Oh God. I, um . . .

never thought I’d . . . that we’d . . . Oh God, I don’t even know where to begin. It’s been so long. Please, let me hear your voice. Say something. Anything.”

“I don’t know what to say. How are you?” Joe laughed uncomfortably. “I’m good, sweetheart. I’m good. A little speechless right now, though.”

“Me too.”

It was hard to concentrate. Airport security officers were surrounding us, moving a section of the nylon barricades out of the way to usher us through into another pathway toward a TSA security agent.

Ryan nodded at me. “Tar, you’re going to have to call him back.”

I knew I needed to move, to get through security and away from the spying paparazzi, but my feet didn’t want to move. My hand gripped my phone tighter, fumbling through an awkward apology for our bad timing. Joe nervously chuckled in my ear, being quite understanding that I was not able to give him any more of my time at the moment while going through baggage scan.

As I stowed my cell away in my bag, sadness mixed with my elation. The most important part was that he reached out to make the first connection. That was a huge step.

Ryan pulled his shoes off, dropping them into a plastic bin. I slipped my purse from my shoulder and followed suit, hating with a passion this part of flying.

It wasn’t until we were in the air and getting served our first beverage that Ryan asked me about the call. “Talk to me. What did he have to say?”

It was hard to talk with several passengers blatantly gawking at us. “He mentioned getting together.”

Ryan’s expression said that’s good and is that something you want to do?

I answered his nonverbal question with

“Yes. I need to.”

He squeezed my hand and gave me a res-olute nod, assuring me that he’d make that happen.

“Oh my God, Taryn. I’m gonna choke her,” Marie announced loudly and in no uncertain terms into my ear. After spending a few hours on a plane, a forty-minute drive to the hotel, and a restless night’s sleep on a very stiff hotel mattress, I was not awake enough to understand her reasons. I set my coffee cup down and held my cell away and could still hear her clearly.

Ryan was rubbing the sleep out of his eyes as he took the silver lid off the omelet that room service had just delivered. We had slept in, since Ryan didn’t have to be anywhere until one o’clock.

“You know that girl Gary has been seeing?

Well, I just found out that she’s a friend of Tammy’s.”

I winced as my stomach felt drop-kicked.

“You’re kidding?”

“Nope. I wish I was. I am so mad I can kill them both.”

“How did you find this out?” Marie scoffed. “Because the whore is in your pub kitchen right now helping Tammy out, that’s how. I just came down to prep and stock and there she was, baking and shit like it’s no big deal. I cannot believe Tammy would do this to me! I thought we were friends, but friends don’t hook up their other friends with my scumbag soon-to-be-ex husband.”

I pulled the sheer curtain back, looking out at the gray skies over Vancouver, thinking about how quickly wonderful things can turn to shit.

“Did you say anything to her?”

Marie hemmed. “No. I thought she looked familiar, until it dawned on me how I knew her. She’d better stay the hell out of the pub, that’s all I have to say. She sets one foot in here and I swear to God I’m going to hammer-fist her. As a matter of fact, screw it.

I’m going back there and giving both of those hags a piece of my mind.”

I could hear her on the move. “Wait a minute! Stop! I don’t think you want to do that.”

She groaned in anger. “Oh yeah, I do. She crossed the line by bringing her here. I’m gonna—”

“Wait.” I scrambled, watching Ryan saunter in his boxers over to the dining table.

“I have a question first.”

She huffed. “What?”

“Boxers or briefs?”

“What?”

“Mike. Is he a boxers or a briefs guy?”

Ryan’s eyes glared up over the top of his laptop screen while he chewed his breakfast.

I held out a finger for him to hold on to that disapproving thought for a second—I had a point to make.

Marie sucked in some air. “Boxer briefs.

Best invention ever. With that elastic band riding real low.” She sighed a bit. “He’s got those Ken doll leg-hinge muscle-gap things going on. You know what I mean? The V

pockets?”

I’d just so happened to have been staring at my own set of amazing leg hinges, which disappeared like an arrow into his shorts, moments before. “Yes, I do.” Ryan smirked at me, apparently taking my dirty purr and hungry eyes for what they were worth.

“Thanks,” Marie whispered out, sounding a bit calmer. “I know you’re trying to calm me down but I still want to go back there and confront her. Bringing that girl here is not cool, Tar. I don’t care how you color it. Is she doing this to rub my nose in it? I mean, why?”

“I honestly don’t know, but I promise I’ll find out. Just swear to me you’ll stay out of the kitchen until I get to the bottom of it, okay?”

As soon as I hung up with Marie, I took a deep breath and scrolled down to Tammy’s number, knowing loyalties were about to be tested. Right off the bat she greeted me with a snarky snip to her voice, which didn’t bode well.

After getting a quick update on how Pete was doing, I got to the second purpose of my call.

“I don’t know how to ask this so I’m just going to come right out with it. I know you have someone there with you today, and I want to know if it’s the girl that Gary is seeing.”

Tammy sighed—loudly. “What difference does it make?”

Cocky was not the way to deal with me right now. “Are you kidding?”

“I have a business to run and I needed the help. What do you want me to say?” If I could have climbed through my phone and shaken her, I would have. “And you didn’t think that this would be a problem?