Begin Again Read online

  Begin Again

  by

  NICOLE PYLAND

  Begin Again

  Tahoe Series Book #4

  Chris Florence’s circumstances had never been ideal, but they’d gotten worse after a car accident took the lives of her parents and left her with a kid brother to support. She’d always wondered if she was raising Wesley the way they’d want him to be raised while she juggled waiting tables at a pizza place in South Lake Tahoe with parenting a now teenage brother. She had friends, but their lives were so different from her own, Chris had always felt like she was on the outside looking in.

  Paxton Williams only planned to visit her sister, Adler, in South Lake. She was supposed to stay for a few days, check in on her big sister, and return to Seattle. Instead, Paxton finds an old rundown hotel, meets Christina Florence, and her life suddenly has a purpose. She could return to Seattle and remain the owner of her real estate business, or she could take a chance and turn a rundown hotel into the best place to stay in Tahoe and take a chance on the woman that doesn’t let her get away with anything.

  With the arrival of Paxton, Chris’s life turns upside down. It’s Chris’s decision, though. All those changes, all those feelings could cause Chris pain or could possibly give her the life she’d always dreamed up for herself and her family.

  To contact the author or for any additional information, visit: https://nicolepyland.com

  This is a work of fiction. Any names or characters, businesses or places, events or incidents, are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the author.

  Copyright © 2019 Nicole Pyland

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN-13: 978-1-949308-32-7

  BY THE AUTHOR

  Stand-alone books:

  • The Fire

  • The Moments

  • The Disappeared

  Chicago Series:

  • Introduction – Fresh Start

  • Book #1 – The Best Lines

  • Book #2 – Just Tell Her

  • Book #3 – Love Walked into The Lantern

  • Series Finale – What Happened After

  San Francisco Series:

  • Book #1 – Checking the Right Box

  • Book #2 – Macon’s Heart

  (recommended to read after Keep Tahoe Blue )

  • Book #3 – This Above All

  • Series Finale – What Happened After

  Tahoe Series:

  • Book #1 – Keep Tahoe Blue

  • Book #2 – Time of Day

  • Book #3 – The Perfect View

  • Book #4 – Begin Again

  • Series Finale – What Happened After

  Celebrities Series:

  • Book #1 – No After You

  • Book #2 – All the Love Songs

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  CHAPTER 26

  CHAPTER 27

  CHAPTER 28

  CHAPTER 29

  CHAPTER 30

  CHAPTER 31

  CHAPTER 32

  EPILOGUE

  COMING NEXT

  CHAPTER 1

  Christina Florence was exhausted. She’d pulled double shifts at Donoto’s for the past two weeks. Since a normal shift was between four to six hours, she’d worked at minimum twelve hours a day. On Fridays and Saturdays, though, she’d worked fourteen to sixteen. Those were the busiest nights at the best pizza place in South Lake Tahoe. She’d been working at Donoto’s for years now. She was the most tenured waitress in the place by five years easy. She also bartended when they needed extra hands. She used the gig to make herself some extra and much-needed tips. Money had been tight for a very long time. At this rate, despite being thirty-one years old, she wasn’t sure money would ever be loose. That wasn’t the expression, but that was how it felt to Chris.

  “Excuse me?” A woman at one of her six tables called her over.

  “What can I get you?” Chris asked her, sliding the empty brown tray under her arm.

  “I asked for no sausage on this pizza, and there’s sausage,” she replied.

  “You asked for no sausage?”

  “I did. I specifically said no sausage,” the woman said.

  “I’m sorry. I’ll have them make you another one. I’ll get it out as soon as it’s ready,” Chris replied and reached for the pizza on its stand.

  “What are you going to do with this one?” the man across from the woman asked.

  “Take it back to the kitchen to get you a new one,” Chris answered.

  “Right. But are you just going to throw it away? If so, I’ll just keep it,” he said.

  “Should I still go ahead and put in the other order, though?”

  “Yes,” he said with a glare. “This is free, though, right? I mean, you messed up the order.”

  “Right.” Chris choked back her words. “I’ll ring up the new one. Would you like a box for this one?”

  “No, I’ll eat it now,” he said.

  She smiled, nodded, turned, and walked back to the kitchen. The woman had not asked for no sausage. She had, in fact, only asked for the meat lover’s pizza. She’d made no alterations to the order whatsoever. The man across from her hadn’t ordered anything at all. It wasn’t uncommon for people to split a pizza between the two of them, but the woman had ordered a small one. The man was built like a damn house. They’d planned this. As she typed in the order for the extra pizza she’d then have to comp, she seethed, because she hated people getting away with free food like this. She also knew this kind of table would tip fifteen percent if she were lucky. She could only hope for a day where she would no longer have to wait on tourists in her tiny lakeside town.

  ◆◆◆

  “Hey, Chris?”

  “What’s up?” Chris asked as she flopped down onto their secondhand sofa.

  “I need that check for the trip,” her brother, Wesley, replied.

  “Oh, right,” she sighed out. “My checkbook is on the counter. Can you grab it for me?”

  Wesley walked over to the counter, grabbed the checkbook, and brought it back to Chris. He then sat on the sofa next to her and turned her way.

  “How was work?”

  “Long. How was school?” she replied while reaching for the pen on the coffee table in front of her.

  “Fine.”

  “Fine? That’s all I get?” She started filling out the check for Wesley’s school-sponsored trip to the local university where he’d fall in love with the place. He’d want to attend. She’d have to figure out how to pay for it. She wasn’t exactly looking forward to that part but didn’t want to stop him from experiencing the trip with his friends. “Nothing happened today that’s worth talking about?”

  “You said your day was long. I said mine was fine. Why do you get to give me a one-word answer, but I can’t give you one?”

  “Because I’m in charge,” she answ
ered, tore the check out of the book, and passed it to him. “I hope they wait until Friday to try to cash that.”

  “The trip isn’t until Friday. I doubt they’d do anything with this until we get back,” he replied, tucking the check into his pocket. “Are you sure we can afford this? It’s a weekend away. It’s three hundred dollars, and because I’m there, I won’t be able to work at the bookstore for my normal shifts. It’s too much, Chris.”

  “Wes, you’re a junior in high school.”

  “Exactly. I can do this whole thing as a senior. I was just being greedy, wanting to do it now. I can save up for it myself by next year,” he said.

  “Wes, it’s fine. We’re okay. I shouldn’t have said that Friday thing. I just haven’t been to the bank to deposit my tips. I’ll go tomorrow.”

  That wasn’t totally wrong. She hadn’t deposited her tips; that was true. She also knew their bank account had exactly enough money to afford their bills. They rarely had any left over to use for frivolous things like cable or fast food. Most of the time, it didn’t bother either of them. There were some moments, though, she’d see a look in her kid brother’s eyes that caused her pain. She knew he wasn’t ashamed of them. He was, most likely, embarrassed and concerned. He was seventeen. His parents were gone. They had been for eleven years. She was the closest thing to a parent he had. Chris didn’t consider herself to be a particularly good one. She did do the best she could, though.

  “I have some homework I still need to finish.” He stood, ran his hand through his sandy blonde hair, and gave her a two-fingered peace sign before he walked off.

  He looked so much like their father when he did that. Sometimes, watching him grow up was actually hard for Chris. It only reminded her of their dead parents and how she was all he had left in the world. There were good times, though. She focused on those whenever she could. Wes was a bright, athletic, respectful teenage boy. He worked on the weekends, did his homework, didn’t cause any trouble at school, and helped around the house. He’d always seemed to understand the sacrifice she’d made when she was twenty years old. She’d left college for Wes. When she couldn’t find good enough work in their own hometown, she’d moved them to South Lake Tahoe and took the job at Donoto’s. It paid enough to support both of them and not much more, but they got by.

  It was well after midnight when she finally retired to her bedroom. She’d paid a few bills, checked the classifieds online for the possibility of a second job, and then did the dishes. She fell asleep around one in the morning, woke up at seven to send Wes off to school, then showered and dressed to head back to the restaurant that sometimes felt more like home than the two-bedroom rental they lived in.

  ◆◆◆

  “Chris, hey,” Morgan Burns greeted from her booth.

  “Hey. Is it just you and Adler tonight or are James and Riley joining?” Chris asked, sitting on the other side of the booth from her friends.

  “We only sit on the same side of the booth when other people are joining. We’re not that couple,” Morgan replied, looking over at her girlfriend of just over a year, Adler Williams.

  “You say that, but I see it literally every night,” Chris replied.

  “I draw the line somewhere,” Adler said with a wink. “I do like sitting next to her, though.”

  “James and Riles are on their way. You on a break any time soon? You could join us, too,” Morgan suggested.

  James was Kinsley James, and Riles was Riley Sanders. Kinsley and Riley had been engaged for a few months now. Their wedding date hadn’t yet been set, but Chris had seen her friends, including Reese and Kellan, the married couple of the group, more and more around Donoto’s. Whenever she waited on them, she’d hear snippets of conversation revolving around the upcoming wedding. Chris liked her friends, but she’d always felt like an outsider looking in. She wasn’t even sure she could call them friends. They’d all been customers that had turned into regulars. She’d spent some time with them outside of the restaurant, but not all that much. They didn’t invite her places often. She didn’t take offense to it. She knew she couldn’t go, anyway. It either cost too much, whatever they were doing, or she’d be working.

  “I just took my break, unfortunately.”

  “Bummer,” Morgan said. “Hey, a bunch of us are getting together at our place this weekend. Do you want to swing by? It’s an all-day kind of thing. We’re going to barbecue and have some drinks. We’re celebrating Addie making the official move to Tahoe.”

  “I’m working.” She shrugged.

  “It starts at, like, two. What time do you have to be here?” Adler asked.

  “Not until four,” Chris replied. “I guess I could stop by for an hour or something. Do you want me to bring anything?”

  She prayed they’d say no.

  “No, we’re good. Reese and Kellan are in charge of chips and stuff. James and Riley are bringing the booze. We’ve got the meat and the location covered,” Morgan said.

  “Okay. I’ll try to stop by,” she replied and stood. “Drinks?”

  “The usual for me,” Adler said.

  “Me too,” Morgan added. “And probably the same for Kinsley and Riley. If not, I’ll just drink them.” She turned to Adler and smiled when Adler rolled her eyes at her.

  “Congrats, by the way. The move, I mean.”

  “Thanks,” Adler said. “It took forever to finally get it all worked out.”

  “She was moving for months,” Morgan said.

  “That’s an exaggeration. We were working pretty hard there for a while. We opened another store in between me deciding to move here and today, remember?” she asked Morgan.

  “Yes, but you told me how much you loved me, how much you loved working with me, and then took forever to actually get all your crap here.”

  “I had to sell my place and get movers, Morgan.” Adler laughed.

  Chris walked off, recognizing that as her cue to leave. It was always interesting to her as a waitress. Sometimes, people would have a conversation as if she wasn’t even standing at their table waiting for them to order or tell her to go. Her friends were normally good about the fact that she was at work and would have to wait on them, but sometimes, they did the same thing. She didn’t fault them for it. They were very nice women who had their own lives that existed outside of Donoto’s Family Italian Restaurant. She grabbed the beers from behind the bar herself. When she dropped them off at the table, she noticed Adler’s phone on the table. It wasn’t ringing, but it was vibrating with a call. On the screen was a picture of a woman and the name, Paxton.

  CHAPTER 2

  “Yes, I’ll be there. My flight is at four,” Paxton told her sister over the phone. “Where are you, anyway?”

  “Out, with Morgan. Kinsley and Riley are on their way. You’ll meet them this weekend, too.”

  “Right. The engaged couple.”

  “Yes, Pax. They got engaged a few months ago. Reese and Kellan are married. They’ll be there. Remy is Reese’s twin sister. She’ll be there with her boyfriend, Ryan. I think a few others will be there, too. It’s an all-day thing, so people will come in and out, I’m sure.”

  “I don’t know if I’m going to be up for all that entertaining, big sis. I’m super busy these days. I’m tired a lot. Plus, I was looking forward to having some sister time with you.”

  “You’re young, Paxton. You can’t be that tired,” Adler replied.

  “I’m thirty-three; that’s not all that young. And I’m the hottest real estate agent in our hometown – that makes me pretty busy; our hometown that you ditched for greener pastures and hot sex with your live-in girlfriend, by the way.”

  “You’re right. It is greener here most of the time, and it is hot, Pax. It’s really, really hot. Like, when she–”

  “Okay!” Paxton yelled through the phone to get her sister to stop talking.

  Adler laughed wildly and said, “I wasn’t actually going to finish that sentence.”

  “Thank God.”


  “Pax, I can’t wait for you to see this place. I think you’re really going to like it.”

  “I don’t have the hot live-in girlfriend, remember?” Paxton said. “And I’ll see you in a few days, sis. I have to go now. I’ve got to put in an offer before the clock strikes midnight or my clients will lose out on their dream home, and they’ll have you to blame.”

  “I’ll see you in a few days, Pax,” Adler replied through laughter. “Thanks, Chris.”

  “Who’s Chris?” Paxton asked.

  “Our waitress,” Adler said. “And a friend,” she added seemingly hastily. “She’s a friend, too.”

  “Oh, okay. I’ll see you soon,” Paxton replied and disconnected the call. She put in another hour of work on her laptop before she finally climbed into her bed. For some reason, after she pulled the covers up to her neck, she said, “Chris.”

  ◆◆◆

  Paxton had been a realtor since she graduated from college at twenty-two, pursued her license, earned it, and started in a large, nationwide realtor office. She liked that enough but knew she wanted to break out on her own one day. It took many years and a lot of hard work, but by the time she was twenty-eight, she was at a small, boutique agency. She became a partner there by thirty. Now, at thirty-three, she owned her own business. She had the overhead from her office space. She had employees on the payroll. She had a thriving business with high-powered clients. Things were going well. There were just three problems for Paxton.

  Her first problem was simple: she was overworked. She needed to hire more office staff and, likely, agents, too. Her heart also wasn’t in it as much as it used to be. Paxton still liked selling homes. She liked making the people that bought and sold them happy, which was typically the case. And she didn’t even particularly mind that some clients could be difficult. She just wasn’t sure she was up for the grind. She worked every single day, even when she was off the clock, so to speak. Saturdays and Sundays were big open house days. Clients were off work and wanted to be taken on tours of the houses on their lists. Other clients wanted to meet after hours on weekdays, since they had jobs, too. It meant that she was never actually off the clock. She was always tired as a result.