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  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Copyright © 2018 by Alison Bliss

  Cover photography by Claudio Marinesco.

  Cover design by Elizabeth Turner.

  Cover copyright © 2018 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  Hachette Book Group supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright. The purpose of copyright is to encourage writers and artists to produce the creative works that enrich our culture.

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book without permission is a theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like permission to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), please contact [email protected]. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

  Forever

  Hachette Book Group

  1290 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10104

  forever-romance.com

  twitter.com/foreverromance

  First Edition: January 2018

  Forever is an imprint of Grand Central Publishing. The Forever name and logo are trademarks of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.

  The Hachette Speakers Bureau provides a wide range of authors for speaking events. To find out more, go to www.hachettespeakersbureau.com or call (866) 376-6591.

  ISBNs: 978-1-4555-6810-9 (mass market), 978-1-4555-6808-6 (ebook)

  E3-20180102-DA-NF

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Epilogue

  Discover More Alison Bliss

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Also by Alison Bliss

  Fall in Love with Forever Romance

  For my mother-in-law, Terry.

  Thank you for your love and support…and for single-handedly raising a hero I could call my own.

  Acknowledgments

  I always have many people to thank and very little space to do it in, so I apologize if I leave anyone out. Thank you to my husband, Denny, for always having my back and supporting me in ways I never even imagined. I’m grateful for all that you do for me. Big kisses and hugs go out to my boys, who I sincerely believe are the best kids in the whole world. You guys make me proud!

  Thank you to my family and friends for always supporting me in everything I do. It means a lot. Thanks also to my awesome PA and good friend, Crystal Wegrzynowicz. One day I will learn to pronounce your name correctly. Thanks as well to the other members of my Pure Bliss Street Team. I can’t tell you all how much you mean to me.

  Thanks to my wonderful agent, Andrea Somberg, whose support and guidance have been invaluable. To Alex Logan, my genius editor, thank you for being such a pleasure to work with. Those late night e-mails where you ask me why I’m still awake always make me smile. Also, thank you to the other members of the Grand Central gang for all of your never-ending support.

  And last but never least, thank you to my readers. I hope you all keep enjoying my stories of love, laughter, and friendship.

  Chapter One

  Max Hager was starving to death.

  Okay, maybe not to death. That was a little dramatic, even for him. But as he pulled his truck into the parking lot of the Empty Plate Café in Granite, Texas, his stomach growled so loudly that he considered checking the backseat for a rabid dog.

  He might’ve done so if he hadn’t already known what was back there. He’d tossed a small black suitcase behind his seat this morning after saying farewell to his family, and it had rattled against the door for the entire four-hour trip back home from Galveston. About drove him half-nuts. And since his overbearing parents had taken care of the other half during the past two weeks, that meant he was almost at his limit.

  Sure, he could’ve stopped somewhere along the way and adjusted the suitcase to give his ears and jumbled nerves some much needed relief. But every time he’d considered the idea, the only places he found to pull over were fast food joints with drive-thru windows. As hungry as he was, he didn’t trust himself not to pull through one rather than waiting until he got back into town to eat.

  If he had wanted something unhealthy, he would’ve eaten the calorie-laden breakfast his mother had offered him before he’d left. Fried eggs, grits slathered in butter, and bacon biscuits…with cheese. Because apparently consuming eight hundred calories at one meal wasn’t enough. Why not go for an even thousand?

  Dear God. Just thinking about it had his arteries cringing.

  He couldn’t believe he’d grown up eating that kind of stuff and actually lived to tell about it. It was like consuming an entire day’s worth of fat in one sitting. Which was exactly why he weighed over two hundred pounds by the time he’d entered junior high. And his weight had only ballooned upward from there.

  Being an only child had been lonely enough without the added complication of being the heaviest kid in school. The constant harassment from his peers in the halls after class or in the boys’ locker room had been enough to make him want to quit school altogether. Thankfully, it had never come to that.

  As an army brat, he had always hated being the new kid on the block and regretted not ever having that one special place to call home, but being the son of a brigadier general did occasionally have its perks. All he had to do back then was ignore the bullies long enough and his father would eventually end up receiving orders to some new faraway location. It was inevitable.

  They moved from one military installation to another so often that Max had never really seen much of a point in unpacking…or making friends. Not that anyone had wanted to be his friend back then. When he was younger, his parents had been the only constants in his life. But after graduating high school, Max had decided he needed to grow the hell up and make some actual career plans.

  So he’d entered trade school and signed on to an electrician’s training program, much to his father’s chagrin. Then, to make sure his mother was equally disappointed in him, Max had stayed behind in Texas as his parents moved on to his father’s next duty assignment without him.

  Between working outdoors in the heat and not having his mom there to cook mostly unhealthy meals for him, Max had lost an entire pant size in just the first month of being on his own. Without even trying. That had only motivated him to make more changes in his life. Bigger ones.

  He’d joined a local gym, hired a personal trainer, and started following a strict diet and exercise regimen that had him shedding pounds as quickly as sloughing off dead skin cells in the shower. As strange as it was, losing weight was the easy part for him. Of course that probably had something to do with being so young at the time.

  Too bad that was no longer the case.

  Max wasn’t eighteen anymore, and his thirty-two-year-old body didn’t work in quite the same way. Over the years, he’d built a muscul
ar physique, one he was damn proud of. Every cut and bulge was worth the hours he’d spent in the gym perfecting them. But the hard part now was keeping the excess weight off. Unfortunately, it was a daily challenge.

  Each time he veered from his diet plan, even just the slightest, he gained weight back and had to work extra hard to take it off again. Especially whenever he’d go to his parents’ house for a visit. Maybe most grown men couldn’t wait to get one of their mom’s home-cooked meals—the ones they had been accustomed to while growing up—but not Max. He couldn’t eat like that anymore without suffering the consequences.

  His parents, however, hadn’t adopted his healthier eating habits. They just didn’t get it. Unlike him, they ate red meat at nearly every meal, loaded up on unhealthy carbs, fried everything in oil, and added gobs of cheese or butter to whatever was on their plates. Basically, they ate the same way they always had.

  Which meant Max didn’t visit them often. Only once or twice a year. The last thing he’d wanted to do was be an inconvenience. He didn’t want to put his mother out by asking her to prepare two separate meals. And he couldn’t cook to save his own life. So he’d spent the last two weeks living off of bagged salads, fresh fruits, raw vegetables, and protein shakes…all the while feeling like he was slowly starving to death. It had been miserable.

  That was exactly why he couldn’t wait to get back into town. Max needed a hot meal or he was going to crack up at any moment. Unrelenting hunger did that to a guy. He’d been longing for some real food—something satisfying that would fill his belly and warm him from the inside out—and couldn’t wait to sink his teeth into today’s special over at the Empty Plate Café. Now that he was finally home, he could. Thank God.

  As usual the parking lot was packed with vehicles, so Max found an available spot around the back. The sizable, bluish-gray building was in desperate need of repairs and a fresh coat of paint, but this place had been the local hangout for the past forty years. Not that Max had witnessed that personally or anything. He hadn’t even been born when the restaurant first opened, much less lived in Granite. Hell, back then, he’d still been a twinkle in his dad’s eye.

  But that didn’t stop him from enjoying it to the fullest now.

  Max headed inside the restaurant, barely noticing the familiar ding of the door chime as he entered. As usual, he expected to see patrons milling about the room with the dull roar of conversation in the background. But instead, only silence greeted him, which had him coming to a dead stop just inside the doorway.

  He’d been eating at this place for the past ten years straight, and not once had he ever seen it so desolate. Instead of calling it the Empty Plate Café, maybe the name should be changed to the Empty Café. Because at the moment, other than him, there was no one else there.

  “Hey, anyone around?”

  The restaurant owner, an elderly gentleman with a full head of white hair, stuck his head out of the kitchen door. “Hey, Max. Good to see you back. Did you have a nice visit with your parents?”

  Max smiled at the kind, old man everyone in town lovingly referred to as Pops. “Yeah, Pops, I did. But I’m ready to get back to my regularly scheduled programs.” Max glanced around the empty room once more before letting his gaze shift back to the man in front of him. “Um, so what’s up?”

  Pops shrugged. “Not much. What’s up with you?”

  Max shook his head. “No, I mean, where is everyone?”

  “You mean what happened to all the customers?” When Max nodded, Pops gestured to the room around him, “Well, as you can see, business has been a little slow lately.”

  “A little? This place is dead. There’s no one here.”

  Pops grinned. “You are.”

  “Yeah, but your place has always been busy as hell. Where did everyone go?”

  “Gone.”

  “What do you mean ‘gone’? You have a shit load of cars outside. What did they do—park here and run for the hills?”

  “Not really. More like they left their vehicle here and sprinted over to the park across the street.”

  Confusion swept through Max. “I don’t get it. Why would they do that? Is there a marathon or something going on today?”

  “You haven’t heard?” Pops waited until Max shook his head before continuing. “Hmm, I guess you must’ve already left on your vacation before it happened.”

  “Before what happened?”

  Pops sighed heavily. “A new food truck pulled into town last week.”

  “So?”

  “So it’s been parking across the street in that small lot next to Windsor Park. Ever since it showed up, business over here has been slow. It’s been this way all week and only gets worse every day.”

  “Well, go over there and tell that idiot to move the truck.”

  “I can’t. It’s not like they’re parked at my restaurant. And I don’t own the street or the park. That’s all public property.”

  “But those customers are using your lot. You could have their cars towed, ya know?”

  “And alienate everyone in town? Come on, Max. You know I can’t do that. A lot of these people are my longtime friends and neighbors. Besides, they would never come back here to eat if I had their vehicles towed away.”

  “Some friends and neighbors,” Max said, gritting his teeth. “Sounds more like a bunch of traitors.”

  “Yeah, maybe. But it’s not like I can tell them where to spend their hard-earned money.”

  “Well, you have to do something. You can’t possibly take this lying down. That jerk across the street is stealing your customers.”

  Pops shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. It would be no different if a new restaurant opened across the street and took some of my business.”

  “But they aren’t taking some of your business. They’re taking all of it. Pops, there’s no way you can make a living this way.”

  “I know,” Pops said, expelling a hard breath. “And as unfortunate as the timing is, I recently made some bad financial decisions that are making this even rougher on me. I have no savings to count on during rainy days, and from the looks of things, it’s going to be one hell of a storm. I hate to say it, but I won’t be able to ride it out. If something doesn’t happen soon, I’m going to have to close down.”

  The bottom fell out of Max’s stomach. “What? You can’t do that.”

  “Sorry, Max. But I’m already losing hundreds of dollars a day, and I can’t afford to keep this place going if I’m not making money. I won’t be able to pay my vendors, and the last thing I need at my age is to take on a huge amount of debt. I’ve got just enough to keep me in business until the end of the month, but after that…well, I just won’t be able to do it anymore. I’ll have to shut down for good.”

  Max ran a hand through his hair. “God, Pops. I’m sorry. If there’s anything I can do…”

  “Thanks. I appreciate it.” Pops shook his head. “But there’s nothing anyone can really do about it. This is just how life works. You win some, you lose some.” The old guy straightened his shoulders and proudly held his head up high. “Now tell me what I can get for you. I have to take care of my loyal customers while I still have them.”

  Though it wasn’t heartfelt, Max tried to smile. “I’ll have the special.”

  “You got it. One special coming up,” Pops said, nodding and heading for the kitchen.

  Max leaned back in his chair and stared out the window, glaring at the park across the street. There were too many trees blocking the view for him to see the food truck itself, but he noticed the long line of customers standing in formation along the sidewalk, the scattered crowd sitting around picnic tables eating, and the people traveling to and from the park via Pops’ parking lot. And every bit of it burned his ass.

  When Max had first moved to Granite ten years ago, he’d been determined to find a restaurant in town where he could eat a quick, healthy lunch without having to make it himself. So he’d stopped into this very café to look over the menu. After on
e glance, he’d frowned and headed for the door. Pops had been a stranger to him at the time, but he’d met him there with a frown of his own and asked why Max hadn’t ordered lunch. Max hesitated to tell him the truth since his move to this town had been all about giving him a fresh new start in a place where no one knew about his past and his issues with food. But something about this man had assured Max that Pops was someone he could trust.

  So Max took a chance and had whispered to Pops about the strict diet he was on and how it wouldn’t allow him to eat anything listed on the menu. Rubbing at his chin, Pops had rocked back on his heels, taking a moment to think about what Max had just said. Then, with a sly wink, he’d suggested Max order “the special” whenever he came in and promised to make sure it would be diet-friendly…and kept strictly between them.

  From that day forward, the kind old man had lived up to his word.

  Not only that, but when Sam had moved to town and started up his construction business, Pops had been the one to put a good word in for Max. Now Max handled all of Sam’s electrical work, which had tripled his income and given him steady work, and they had become best friends.

  Max owed Pops a lot.

  But that was just the kind of guy Pops was. He was a great friend to everyone in town and a decent person who worked hard to make a good living. What kind of insensitive asshole would take business away from an old man? A real jackass, that’s who.

  “Hey,” someone said from the door.

  Max twisted his neck to see his best friend weaving around a table and crossing the room to join him. “About damn time you showed up. You’re late. I told you to meet me here at noon.”

  Sam slid into the seat across from Max, pulled up his right sleeve, and glanced at the gold watch on his wrist. “It’s only fifteen after. Couldn’t be helped. I got hung up on the job site.”

  “By who—your wife?”

  Sam grinned. “Just because I let Leah seduce me in the construction trailer one time doesn’t mean that every time I’m late I’m off with her having sex somewhere.”