Let It Be Me (Men of the Misfit Inn #1) - Kait Nolan Page 0,4

was still pressed against him. A faint tinge of embarrassment brought color back to her pale cheeks.

Caleb forced himself to drop his arms and step back. “Are you up to seeing her now?”

She sucked in a breath and squared her shoulders. “Take me to her.”

The moment they stepped through the door to the room, Fiona broke. Emerson didn’t hesitate, edging onto the bed and pulling the girl tight into her arms as she sobbed, even as tears tracked down her own cheeks.

Eventually, the unintelligible cries turned into words. “I don’t want to go to my grandparents. You know what they’re like.”

Emerson’s face went fierce. “Not a chance in hell, baby. Your…” She swallowed. “Your mom made provisions. You’re with me.”

Everything in her posture and expression said she’d go to war for this kid.

Some tension in Caleb released. They had a long road to go, but he had a feeling these two would be just fine.

Chapter 2

4 Years Later

Emerson braced her hands on the kitchen counter and summoned every ounce of Mom-sternness she could manage. “Child, you have got to pack.”

Fiona swiped a Coke out of the fridge and shrugged with a nonchalance that had Emerson’s blood pressure rising. “Eh.”

She was a good kid. A great one, in fact. At no point during the dreaded high school years had she given Emerson more than a few silver hairs, and those had readily been dealt with by her stylist. There’d been no worrisome brushes with boys, no drinking, no excessive partying, and she’d been an exceptional student, all of which Emerson was eternally grateful for. But this whole college thing just might be the death of her. Or Fiona. She wasn’t sure which.

Tamping down her frustration, she trailed her goddaughter down the hall, past the dining room that had been turned into a staging area, full of neatly ordered—by Emerson—piles of bedding, towels, bathroom gear, a microwave, shoe pockets and other detritus associated with freshman living, all packed, labeled, and ready to go. By contrast, the upstairs bedroom Fi swung into looked like a bomb had gone off. She had yet to pack any clothes or toiletries or the personal pictures and knickknacks that were a mark of home. Emerson didn’t know if this was typical teenage procrastination or a sign of Fiona’s true reluctance to go off to college.

She worried about that. Despite the fact that the kid could’ve gone out for Best Teen of the Year at any point, worry about Fi had been Emerson’s default state since she became guardian to her best friend’s child. Every day had been joy and grief as she saw Micah’s eyes looking back at her. She’d done right by her goddaughter, fulfilling to the best of her ability the promise she’d made senior year of high school, when Fiona had been born and Micah’s parents had disowned her. But she’d never stopped questioning whether it was enough, whether she’d gotten it right.

Pinching the bridge of her nose, Emerson sent up a prayer. Micah, give me patience for our girl. “Fiona.”

Fi flopped into the lipstick-pink moon chair that was one of the few surfaces in the room not currently draped with clothes. “There’s time.”

“Honey, move-in day is tomorrow.” It wasn’t as if she was ready for the girl to move out. A part of Emerson still wanted to wrap her in cotton and shield her from the world. But facts were facts. This was happening. All the paperwork was signed, the scholarship awarded. Fiona Elizabeth Gaffney was matriculating as a freshman tomorrow.

Thick, gold lashes hid her eyes as she shrugged again. “Yeah, but I’d rather spend the time with you. It’s our last night together.”

Twin surges of love and frustration shot through Emerson. She’d made Fi the center of her world. It was what they’d both needed. But moments like this, she wondered if she’d gone too far in that direction. Had they become codependent? Had she hobbled Fiona’s natural progression to independence? Was she pushing her baby bird out of the nest too soon?

Whatever response she might have made was interrupted by a familiar knock on the back door. Fiona brightened, shooting out of her room like a rocket and bouncing past Emerson to fly downstairs.

She sighed. There’d be no packing now.

The low rumble of a male voice reached her before she got to the kitchen. Pausing in the hall to steel herself for the encounter, she called herself an idiot.

It’s just Caleb.

Caleb Romero, their neighbor and resident hero, had become a familiar