The One Who Got Away (Ribbons of Love Book 2)

  The One Who Got Away

  Ribbons of Love: 2

  AJ Matthews

  Contents

  1. One

  2. Two

  3. Three

  4. Four

  Also by AJ Matthews

  About AJ

  Copyright © 2016 by Nancy Colbert-Hardy

  Cover Art and Interior Formatting by Colbert Creative Design LLC

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review. Participation in any aspect of piracy of copyrighted materials, inclusive of the obtainment of this book through non-retail or other unauthorized means, is in actionable violation of the author’s rights.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and registered trademark owners or all branded names referenced without TM, SM, or ® symbols due to formatting restraints, and is not claiming ownership of or collaboration with said trademark brands.

  Dedication

  The white ribbon on the cover symbolizes a number of causes, but for this book, it represents the importance of adoption and honors all families who have been made complete when they adopted a child. This book is dedicated to them, and especially to the grandparents who, in whatever circumstances, took on the important task of raising their baby’s baby. You are treasures, and the world needs more people like you.

  1

  One

  The adorable freckle-faced teen examined the folded one hundred dollar bill and crinkled her nose. “Are you sure about this, Miss Anna? I mean, isn’t Valentine’s Day the busiest time of year for you?”

  Anna Powers, the lone florist in Darden, North Carolina, cringed as she handed the girl a second hundred dollar bill to emphasize she was sure, at least about taking the weekend off.

  “You know every house and business in town. You’ve worked with me on deliveries. I trust you and your brother to do this.” Anna nodded firmly at the girl, who pulled at her sweater and tugged at her ear. She had no need to be nervous though. Anna was positive Dana and her brother David would successfully deliver all the flower orders and make all the couples in Darden, old and new, happy, even if just for a day or two.

  Was she upset about the teen’s reminder about Anna abandoning her family’s beloved business the day before the remaining flower orders were delivered—the one holiday her now-deceased grandparents, the people who had raised, never trusted to anyone else?

  Or was she more disturbed by the “Miss” part the seventeen-year-old Dana attached to her name?

  Anna had started babysitting the girl and her twin brother when Anna was sixteen, and seeing the beautiful, accomplished young woman Dana had transformed into over the years made Anna feel proud—and old.

  The “Miss” made her feel so very…unmarried.

  Which was supposed to be the point of this weekend at Folly Beach, her favorite place in her admittedly limited exposure to the world, with her favorite person on the planet: her boyfriend of ten years, Tony Martino. Anna had planned to propose, because Tony was never going to do it himself, and she’d thought a weekend at the beach in the honeymoon suite of the Paradise Palms Resort would be the perfect place to set her unconventional plan into motion.

  That was until Tony texted her this morning and said he “wasn’t into Valentine’s” this year and could they chill out at home instead of making a big deal. She’d responded with an “okay” and “see you at six” but now she’d changed her mind.

  He could chill out. At home. Alone.

  She was going to the beach. She’d already dipped into her “rainy day” savings to pay for the monumental weekend, which was going to be a surprise.

  Now she would have to make the weekend remarkable on her own.

  Could it be that way without the one person she’d had in her life for the past ten years… longer if you counted their friendship in high school?

  Her stomach knotted in agitation, as though laughing at the soft place in her heart, the one that always allowed Tony to avoid the big commitment she wanted him to make. Screw that soft spot. He obviously thought Anna wasn’t worth more energy than a bag of microwave popcorn and a Netflix marathon on what was supposed to be the most romantic weekend of the year. She had made the effort for more, but he wanted to “chill.” Maybe some time apart would be good for them. Give them each some perspective.

  Or maybe he would catch up on his naps.

  Jerk.

  Anna shook her head, turned to her desk and picked up the master delivery list. Dana took the paper from Anna’s outstretched hand, as the older woman went over the procedures again. “Remaining deliveries are in the refrigerator. Alphabetical order, left to right, top to bottom. As you take the orders out, check them off. I’ve also e-mailed the list to you, and the orders are clearly labeled so there won’t be any mix-ups. You’ve got this.”

  The girl also took the key Anna offered and nodded her head. “Yep, David and I, we’re good. You?”

  Wow, did this young woman sense how nuts Anna was feeling inside? Was she so obvious?

  “Yes, it’s all good, why do you ask?” Anna turned around before Dana noticed the tears welling up.

  “No reason. I know V-Day can make anyone a wreck, wondering if you’re going to have a date and everything. You don’t have to worry though. You have Mr. Tony and you guys are so crazy in love and I want that someday too.”

  Anna suppressed the sob triggered by the girl’s words, but her shoulders shook as a few tears spilled from her eyes.

  Did she have Tony?

  “Ooooookay, so I’m gonna go. Mom’s making tacos and I don’t wanna be late. Have a fun weekend and say hi to Mr. Tony for me.”

  The bell over the front door chimed as the girl exited the shop.

  Anna decided to give that crazy-making man one more shot to make all her dreams come true. She wanted to get married. This weekend would be the start of her plan no matter what.

  She typed out a quick text:

  So I planned a trip to my favorite place…come with me tonight and I promise it will be worth your while.

  After a minute, three dots appeared. Tony was on the other end, typing. Then the words popped up.

  Babe, so tired. We do this later? I’ll make it up to you. ;)

  Seriously? A winking emoji was supposed to make it all okay?

  A sob escaped Anna’s throat, but she refused to cry anymore. Instead, she clicked off the lamp over the desk, turned the sign on the front door to “Sorry, we’re closed,” and locked the door behind her as she hit “send” on what might be her final message to Tony Martino:

  If you want me in your life, you know where I’ll be. Not coming will tell me all I need to know. I do love you, but I’m done asking.

  His almost immediate “whatever” response was the only answer she needed.

  It was over, and her trip to the beach was the start of her new life.

  Without Tony.

  Now she really was alone.

  She was okay with that.

  Right?

  Tony bolted upright on the couch, startled by the pounding on the solid wood of his front door. He rubbed his eyes and stood up, and before he could walk the ten steps to the entryway, the pounding rattled the walls.

  “What the hell? I’m coming
. Damn!” He expected to find his neighbor’s kid, who’d come by earlier as Tony was getting home from working with the dogs at his best friend Eric Donnelly’s training center. The boy had been selling cookie dough for some scout or school fundraiser or something, and he was going to buy some for Anna, because a few days every month he’d watch her scoop dough out of a tub she kept in the fridge of her little apartment above the flower shop. If he had some here, he could tempt her to stay more often. He’d wanted a shower first and told the kid to come back later.

  When Tony flung open the door, however, he instead found Eric, a scowl firmly etched on his dark-whiskered face.

  “What’s up, bro? Didn’t get enough of my handsome face and tight bod earlier?” Tony joked as he waved his friend inside.

  “Don’t ‘bro’ me. You know why I’m here.” Eric strode across the threshold and into Tony’s kitchen, emerging from the room with a beer in hand. The bottle hissed as Eric twisted off the cap. He took a long swig and returned his glare to Tony.

  Tony’s head ached a bit as he tried to figure out the reason for Eric’s appearance at his house a couple hours after he’d left work.

  “No. Don’t do that.” Eric pointed at his own forehead, telling Tony he was wearing his usual expression of confusion: scrunched nose and wrinkled forehead. Semi-vacant look in his eyes. Or so he’d been told.

  “Seriously dude, I have no idea what you’re talking about. Shouldn’t you be home putting the final touches on your Valentine’s surprise for Winn?” Eric had cleared out space in his closet and dresser, as well as transforming one of the spare bedrooms in his house into an office for his girlfriend of less than three months, in preparation for asking her to move in with him. Tony had thought Eric was nuts to make such a big commitment after such a short time together, but that conversation had quickly escalated into name calling— specifically Eric reminding Tony he was a commitment-phobe asshat.

  “Yes, that.” The volume of Eric’s voice increased.

  Oh boy. His best friend of too many years to count was usually a pretty chill guy, so something had him riled up. “Did she say no?”

  “Did she…” Eric sputtered and chugged the beer, then stomped into the kitchen again. Glass scraped against glass as Eric dropped the bottle into the recycling bin Anna had brought over, then walked out of the kitchen with another open beer. “She didn’t have a chance to say no, because I didn’t have the chance to ask. Or show her what I’d done. As soon as she got to the house, Winn got a call from Anna. Then she left. As in left town, to go away for the weekend, with your girlfriend. Something you were supposed to do, right?”

  “What the fuck are you talking about, man? Anna’s coming over and we’re gonna chill tonight and then we have her deliveries tomorrow and we’re not making a big deal about Valentine’s.” Tony glanced at his watch. Hmmmm. Anna should have been here an hour ago.

  Eric laughed, but the sound was less “ha ha, you’re hysterical” and more “my God, you are a total moron.” Tony was used to his friend calling him a moron, but usually in a joking manner. The stiff stance and dagger-filled eyes were not joking. At all.

  “Look, man, see. Here’s the last message I got from her.” Tony opened his texts, waiting to show Eric the one where Anna said she’d be here at six. But there was more. He didn’t remember getting any other messages, but some had apparently come through after he’d fallen asleep on the couch.

  So I planned a trip to my favorite place…come with me tonight and I promise it will be worth your while.

  What was she talking about? Her favorite place? Shit. The beach. The place where his uncle had worked years ago and Tony took her for her twenty-first birthday. His response to her was a nearly incoherent jumble of words. This was not good. It got worse.

  If you want me in your life, you know where I’ll be. Not coming will tell me all I need to know. I do love you, but I’m done asking.

  His eyes widened and his sharp intake of breath burned a hole in his lungs. Shit. He knew what she was asking, or in this case, done asking.

  She wanted to get married, something Tony vowed to never to do after watching his own parents suffer for years through a loveless marriage “for the kids,” Tony and his two brothers.

  “I know, right?” Eric’s matter-of-fact tone did nothing to improve the situation. Especially when Tony got to his one-word response on the last line.

  Whatever.

  Had he blown off his girlfriend of a decade, the woman he couldn’t imagine living without but was terrified to make that big leap of faith with, in a single word? He didn’t mean it. He never would have been so callous, would he? Then again, all these years, all these hints from her…and no proposal from him. What could be more callous than that? Maybe he should have ended it, let her go so she could find someone ready to commit to forever. For him, “forever” always seemed too scary. But nothing was scarier than thinking about a forever without his snarky, sassy-mouthed, big-hearted Anna Banana Split.

  “Go home and pack a bag, Donnelly. We got some girls to go get.”

  2

  Two

  Anna and Winn sat at the open-air rooftop bar, enjoying the unseasonably warm weather and the waves lapping at the shore below. These elements combined to soothe Anna’s fried nerves.

  The two shots of tequila helped immensely as well.

  “You need another?” Anna glanced down at the bar to see her friend hadn’t made much of a dent in the beer she’d ordered ten minutes ago. “Never mind. I see someone’s becoming a borderline teetotaler.”

  Winn chuckled, then took a sip from her pint glass, swiping at the bit of beer clinging to her upper lip. “Not so. I simply want to be clearheaded when you need someone to hold your hair later.”

  “I promise not to get that drunk. In fact, watch this.” Anna waved down the bartender from the other end of the twenty foot bar.

  “Need another, gorgeous?” The cute bartender, Joey, held the tequila bottle, ready to pour.

  Anna reached out and touched his arm, not missing the sideways glance her friend gave her. “Ya know handsome, let’s change it up. I’ll stick with the tequila, but it’s so warm out tonight, let’s make it a frozen margarita.”

  Joey grinned. “You got it, babe.”

  As he made his way to the back of the bar to fix the frozen drink, Winn swiveled on her barstool. “Do you know him or something? He seems a little, I don’t know, young. Overly friendly.”

  Anna laughed, the sound broken and a bit disingenuous, even to her own ears. “Too young for what? Don’t be so serious! It’s just flirting. He’s cute, and quite a sweet talker. I could use all the propping up I can get tonight.”

  Winn shrugged. “Or we could talk about what happened.”

  Anna waved her hand in the air, poo-pooing Winn’s suggestion. “We talked in the car. I don’t need to talk about it anymore. It is what it is, right? God, I hate that saying. But in this case I think it’s true.”

  “I get it, sweetie. You were so good to me when all that stuff happened at Christmas, helping me understand Eric and why he wanted to make Christmas nice for Tyler and me. I want to help you too.”

  Anna choked a bit. She hadn’t known Winn long, but she was closer to her than anyone since her grandparents had died, except for Tony. Now she didn’t have him. Having Winn here meant so much.

  “I appreciate that, babe. You coming with me is enough. I mean seriously, you left Eric on your first Valentine’s together. Was he mad?”

  “Mad? Eric doesn’t get mad about much. Disappointed, it seemed. He said he needed to show me something, ask me something, but when you called I didn’t want to leave you hanging. He’s so understanding, told me to go. He has such a big heart. Thanks for helping me see that.”

  Anna shook her head, knowing Winn would have eventually come around. Eric was a kind, sensitive, and gorgeous man. Winn was the first woman he’d showered with that kind of attention. God, she missed that. When they were first dating, Tony had be
en so attentive and demonstrative. With each passing year, well, he showed less and less. She didn’t think he loved her less, but the “cherish” part of their relationship seemed to have faded.

  Cherish. As in the marriage vows. Tony had never promised to cherish her, not verbally anyway.

  He’d made it clear a long time ago he never planned on getting married.

  If it ain’t broke why fix it? was a favorite refrain of his.

  Marriage was important to her. She’d been the baby of a teen mother, one who’d died tragically of cancer when Anna was two years old. She didn’t know who her father was. No one had ever told Anna who he was. Even in a gossipy town like Darden, no one talked about it. Not that it mattered. She didn’t remember her mom, but could tell by the photos of the two of them together she’d loved Anna and had been so affectionate with her, even when the young woman looked ill.

  After her passing, Anna’s grandparents, Eddie and Dani Powers raised her as their own. She’d never felt unloved or unwanted a day in her life. She was technically orphaned, but had only felt joy and contentment in her family life. She wanted that now. Mama and Papa were gone, leaving a hole in Anna’s heart, a hole she believed could only be filled with the stability of marriage and a family of her own.

  Tony liked things status quo. Even though she spent most nights at his place, they’d never formally committed to living together, so Anna maintained the tiny apartment above the shop for herself on those nights Tony needed some “space.”

  Well, now he’s got all the space he could want.

  “Maybe I’ll stay here.”

  Winn spit her beer back into the glass. “What?”

  “I love it here. It’s my favorite place. I don’t have anything left in Darden.”

  “You have me. Eric. We’re your friends, and even if Tony is an idiot, we love you. And the shop. What about the shop?”