Single Mum Seeking...: A Daddy for Her Sons / Marriage for Her Baby / Single Mom Seeks...

“No kidding.” He frowned. “Is he the same official who comes every time?”

“No. But he does come the most. And he says the goofiest things. In fact, I called the health department to complain about him a few weeks ago. They claimed they hadn’t sent anyone.”

Connor’s face was hard as stone. “That doesn’t seem right.”

“I know. But what can I do? I don’t dare confront him. What if he pulls my license?”

Connor shook his head. “Jill, I don’t buy it for a minute.”

She stared at him. “What do you mean?”

“I think he’s a phony. He’s got to go.”

“What?” She grabbed at his arm to stop him, but he pulled away and marched back into the kitchen, catching the stranger with a tiny camera in his hand.

“Get the hell out of here,” he told the inspector in a low, furious voice.

“Connor!” Jill cried, coming in behind him. “You can’t talk that way to the inspector!”

But the man seemed to take Connor quite seriously. He raised his hands as though to show he didn’t mean any harm and said, “Okay, okay. Take it easy. I’m going.”

And he turned around and left as quickly as he could.

Jill stared after him, then looked at Connor. “What the heck?” she cried.

He turned and gave her a look. “Jill, that man’s not a real health inspector. Can’t you see that?”

“No.” She blinked in bewilderment. “What is he then?”

“A private investigator pretending to be a health inspector.”

“But why would...?” Her face cleared. “Brad!”

Connor nodded. “That’s my guess.”

She sank into a chair. “Oh, my gosh. I can’t believe that. Brad sent him to spy on me.”

“And to sabotage your business, I would guess.”

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “Why didn’t I think of that? I knew there was something fishy about the way he kept showing up.” She looked up at Connor. “I should have known.”

But Connor was still thinking things over. “Okay, I’m ready to believe that was Brad at work. So the question is, what else has he been meddling in?”

She thought for a moment, then put a hand over her mouth. “Oh, my gosh.” She grabbed his hand and held it tightly. “Connor, I don’t know this for sure, but I was told that Brad tried to get them to disallow my license. Right at the beginning.”

He lowered himself into the chair beside her, still holding her hand. “Why would he do that?”

“Well, he never wanted me to keep this house. He thought I ought to move to the mainland and get an apartment, put the kids in day care and get a regular job. He sort of acted like he thought I was trying to extort money from him by doing anything else.”

His face was cold as granite. “Tell me more.”

“It took a while to get started. At first, I didn’t have any of the right equipment. I used every penny I got from Brad to help pay for the commercial oven, but I still needed to buy a three-unit sink and the special refrigeration I needed. When he found out what I was doing, he was furious.”

“And stopped giving you money,” he guessed.

She nodded. “Pretty much. Which only made it more important that I find a way to grow my business.” She laced her fingers with his.

“You know, you hit a place where you can either move forward, or settle for something less, and get stuck in that great big nowhere land.” She sighed. “In order to get to where I might make some actual profit, I had to take the chance. I needed funding. So...”

She met his gaze and looked guilty. “So, yes, I took out a loan so that I could finish buying the supplies I needed.”

“What did you use to get a loan? The house?”

She nodded. “That’s why it’s so scary that this house is still underwater and they won’t give me a mortgage modification.”

“You’ve tried?”

“Countless times.”

“You’re in a tight spot.”

She nodded. “I’m standing at the edge of the cliff, you mean. And the ground is starting to crumble under my feet.”

His free hand took her chin and lifted her face toward his, then he leaned in and kissed her softly. “I’ll catch you,” he said, his voice husky. “I’m here, Jill. I won’t let you hit the rocks.”

She smiled, loving his generous spirit, but not really believing his words. How could he stop the chain of events that seemed to be overwhelming her? It wasn’t likely. They’d had a good day yesterday and he’d made that possible. But goodwill—and cake sales—could only go so far. Every step forward seemed to bring on two steps back. She was beginning to lose hope.

He hesitated, then shook his head and drew back from her. “Okay, here’s what I don’t understand. This just really gets to me. Why do you let Brad still be such a huge part of your life?”

“I...I don’t.”

“Yes, you do. You’re divorced. He’s not even giving you the money you should be getting for the kids. He doesn’t want anything to do with the children.” He frowned, searching her eyes. “Why let him affect you in any way? Why maintain any ties at all?”

She blinked. It was hard to put this in words. How to explain how alone she felt in the world? In some ways, Brad was still her only lifeline. It was too scary to cut that off.

“The only real, legal ties we still have is the business,” she said instead of trying to explain her emotional connection to her past. “I still own fifteen percent of it.”

He nodded. He knew that. “Do you have a voting position on the board?”

She shrugged. “I’m not really sure if I do or not. I think I’m supposed to but I’ve never tried to use it. I suppose I should ask a lawyer.”

“At the very least.”

“The only reason I keep it, to tell you the truth, is that emotionally, I just can’t give up on it yet. It’s still a part of my life, a part of my past, all those years we spent building it into the enterprise it is today.”

He nodded. Did that answer the question? Her ties to Brad were still too strong. But were they that way from fear...or love? Hard to pull those two apart for analysis. And the answer to that meant everything.

Connor was so angry inside, both at Brad and at himself, he couldn’t stay near her for now. Instead he went out and walked down to the ferry and then around the quaint little village and back again. He finally had something he wanted to say to Brad, but when he tried calling him, he found his old pal had turned the tables, and now he wasn’t taking calls from Connor.