Page 83 of Chasing the Sun

“I don’t know, Elle.”

“C’mon. It’s a great idea.”

“It still doesn’t solve the problem. In a few more weeks, my job will be done, and I’ll have to go back home.”

“You just said yourself you could imagine living here.”

“Yes, but I can’t expect Bryce to ask me to stay. He won’t even need me once Molly starts school. Besides, as much as I enjoy being Molly’s nanny, I want to get back to teaching dance.”

“You tried finding an instructor job before you came here, and it was a dead end.”

“So, I’ll have to try harder or take some interim job while I’m looking. The point is, I can’t stay here and mooch off Bryce.”

“You could look for jobs around here. You could even move into an apartment if you don’t want to ‘mooch off Bryce,’ but you don’t have to leave.”

“You make everything sound so easy, but I don’t even know if he wants me to stay.”

“You won’t know until you talk to him. You need to tell him how you feel, Chloe. That’s the only way to know for sure.”

“I’ll think about it. In the meantime, please don’t tell Jamie about this. I already broke my promise to Bryce by telling you.”

“Your secret’s safe with me.”

When Jamie got home later, Elle was in the kitchen making dinner, and Chloe was in the lanai, talking to her mom on the phone. She’d just hung up when he came outside to join her.

He gave her a quick kiss on the cheek and then plopped onto the chair beside her. “Did Elle ban you from the kitchen too?” he asked, his eyes lit with amusement.

“Yep.”

“Geez. You’d think she was a professional chef or something!”

Chloe laughed. It was well documented that Elle didn’t want anyone in the kitchen when she was cooking. It was her passion, and she liked to make a grand presentation when she was done.

“How was your golf outing?” Chloe ventured.

“Not bad.”

He’d come outside with a can of beer, and he averted his eyes and took a deep swallow. She suddenly got a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach.

“Did you golf okay?”

“I shot an eighty-eight, so not bad. Bryce beat me, of course.”

“What was his score?”

“An eighty-two. In my defense, he plays a lot more than me.”

“He is really good at it,” she said without thinking.

Jamie shot her a curious look. “You played with him?”

In more ways than one! “Um…yeah…once.”

“How’d you like it?”

LOVED IT! “It was fun.”

“Do you plan to do it again?”