“What? It has the same ingredients. Flour, salt, eggs…”

He set it down and pulled out a package of stuffed grape leaves. My mouth watered. “Fruits and vegetables.”

He shook his head. “It’s the leaf of a fruit. Not quite sure it counts as a fruit or vegetable itself.”

I took them from his hand. “Semantics.”

Chuckling, he reached in again. This time, he came up with a large jar of Nutella. “This one I know.”

“You do?”

He ignored me and opened the jar, peeling back the silver freshness seal before sticking his finger in and scooping out some of the heavenly creamy stuff inside. I knew from the cheeky grin on his face when he looked up that his interest had nothing to do with the deliciousness of the spread. Leaning in, he ran his finger along my exposed collarbone before bending to suck the hazelnut off.

“Body paint. This goes in the bedroom for later.”

I laughed because I thought he was kidding, but he disappeared into the bedroom with that jar. My mind started to race with what I’d be painting and sucking later.

When he returned, he squeezed me from behind and kissed the top of my head. “Thank you for going to the store. I’ll help you unpack and then finish up. I only need ten more minutes or so.”

“Don’t be silly. Go do your work. I’ll get everything unpacked and put away and make us a nice spread of snacks.”

Hunter kissed my forehead. “Thanks.” He walked halfway to the dining room table and turned back. “Almost forgot...Derek called while you were out. He’s coming to town for business in two weeks. Wants to meet us for drinks.”

“Okay. That sounds great. Anna mentioned he had a trip coming up.”

I took my time with the groceries and made a sampler platter of all the goodies. Hunter had blueprints spread all over the table, and when I saw him begin to ravel the top one back into a roll, I brought lunch and some plates to the table.

“Looks awesome,” he said.

“Did you get done what you needed to do?”

“Yeah. This project’s been going on for years. We’re the third builder on it. Whenever there’s more than one builder, there’s a reason.” He wrapped a rubber band around the roll he’d been working on and tapped it to the table. “Owner is from Dubai and doesn’t realize New York City has a byzantine building code. The building is old and needs structural reinforcements for everything he wants to do. Which is fine, but when you change the weight of what you’re building three times during the renovation, and the first builder used beams that barely supported the first set of plans, you’re basically starting over. And even though almost all blueprints and plans are done on a computer now, he wants to see every set of changes on an old-school, pencil-and-paper blueprint drawing.”

“What does he keep changing that makes it so heavy?”

“The house on top of the building.”

I’d thought I’d heard him wrong. “He’s housing something on top of the building?”

“Yeah. A house.” Hunter chuckled. “He’s building a house on top of the roof of an old cast-iron building.”

“A whole house?”

“Pretty much.”

“Why? Is the building not residential?”

“No, most of it’s residential except for the commercial storefronts on the bottom two floors.”

“So why not just renovate an apartment instead of building a house on top of the roof. I don’t get it.”

“Building is a playground for the extraordinarily wealthy in New York. You can’t look for logic. The answer is always the same—because they can.”

“That’s crazy.”

“Keeps me employed. This particular building is actually really beautiful. I’ll take you to see it one day, if you want. The top floors are closed during renovations, and we’re at a standstill until the city approves the recent round of changes.”

“I’d like that. Even though I’ve lived here all my life, I don’t really take the time to appreciate the architecture.”

“Ever think about living somewhere else?” Hunter asked.

“I used to. I went to college here in the city, and Anna went to school out in California. We’d take turns visiting each other over breaks and had big plans for me to move out to the west coast so we could live next door to each other again. We planned to be pregnant at the same time and for our daughters to be second-generation best friends.”

“Could still happen. I’m sure Anna and Derek will have more kids.”

A picture of Anna and me sitting in Hunter’s yard with babies on our laps, while Derek and Hunter stood nearby at the barbeque making dinner, suddenly flashed before my eyes. The thought warmed me, even though it also scared the crap out of me that my head had gone there. Hunter wasn’t in this for the long haul. This was just a fling. Wasn’t it?

I smiled hesitantly, afraid to get my hopes up, but deep down knowing they already were. “Maybe. You never know, I guess.”

Chapter 26

Natalia

Hunter and Derek were already seated at the bar when I walked in. Spotting me, both men stood. As I made my way over, I realized it was the first time Hunter and I had been out in public with a friend. Over the last few weeks, we’d spent as much time as we could together—meeting for breakfast if we couldn’t see each other at night, taking a dozen kids out to dinner for Izzy’s sixteenth birthday, watching her basketball games, sneaking in a daytime movie between my counseling sessions. We even had lunch on the roof of his jobsite one afternoon, not to mention we’d spent so much time in bed, it was surprising I could walk. Yet we’d been in a private bubble. Unless you counted Izzy, we were always alone.

So as I approached the two men, I wasn’t quite sure how to greet Hunter. He settled that internal debate for me the moment I neared. Taking my hand, he pulled me flush against him, gave my hair a little tug, urging my head back, and planted a possessive kiss on my lips.

I smiled, more than satisfied with his greeting, and let out a breathy “hey” before turning my attention to Derek. “How’s my sweet little Caroline’s baby daddy?”

Derek smiled and bent to kiss my cheek. “I’m good. Will I sound like a total wuss-bag if I say I miss the way she smells?”

My heart let out a beautiful sigh. “Not at all. You sound like the perfect man.”

“Hey…what about me?” Hunter chided.

“Awww.... You’re slighted because I paid a compliment to another man? That’s cute. But my heart just melted a little hearing him say he missed the way she smells. It’s the most romantic thing I’ve ever heard. Not sure you can top that, pretty boy.”

Hunter wrapped his arm around my waist and pulled me to him. “I miss the way parts of you smell, too.”

I elbowed him. “That’s not romantic; that’s perverted.”

“What’s the difference?”

We all laughed, and Hunter pulled a bar stool around so the three of us could sit in a little circle at the bar. We caught up on baby pictures, Anna’s newest obsession with everything in the house needing to be organic, and Caroline’s most recent checkup.

“I almost forgot—Anna wants me to call while I’m with you guys. She gave me specific instructions to order you both mimosas and call on speakerphone.”

Hunter had already ordered a glass of wine for me. I held it up to my lips before sipping. “We can skip the mimosas. I’ll tell her you ordered them if she asks.”

“Oh no. You have no idea how hormonal my wife is right now. I’m not taking any chances.” Derek motioned for the bartender and asked for three mimosas before calling Anna on speakerphone.

“Hey, babe. You’re on speakerphone.”

“Do they have mimosas?”

“They do. Got myself one, too.”

“After we hang up, send me a picture of the two of them with their drinks.”

Derek arched an eyebrow at us as if to say I told you. “Will do.”

“Hi, Nat!” Anna yelled.

“Hi!”

“Hi, Hunter. Are you taking good care of my girl?”

“I’m trying,” he said and gave my knee a little squeeze.

“I wish I could be there with you guys right now. But it’s too soon to fly with Caroline with all the recycled germs on a plane. So, since Derek had to be in town for business this week anyway, this is as close to the four of us sitting together as I could come up with. Derek, do you have my props ready?”

He shook his head, indicating that he thought his wife was loony, but reached into his pocket, nonetheless. “Got it.”

“Okay. Show the first picture.”

Derek held up a picture of me and Anna. We were probably only about four or five and were pushing our old baby carriages with our dolls inside.