Second Chance Sunset

By Ellie Hall

They say true love only happens once in a lifetime. But what about a second chance with your first love?

Navy
College. Wait tables. Hospital. Repeat...until a customer with a smoldering smirk makes an offer I have to refuse...well, until I face cold, hard reality.

If I marry him so he can get his green card, I'll be able to pay the bills. The only problem is, I was in love with him once before.

Cooper
I've heard all it takes is one look. Try two. When I see the sassy sweetheart of a waitress, I do a double take. Newsflash, she's off-limits.

They say money can't buy happiness...or a green card. However, it can buy a quick marriage of convenience. But that will cost me, especially since we have a past that I have to keep secret.

This is a standalone sweet, "clean and wholesome" romance. It's faith-friendly, without swearing or mature content, and contains a happily ever after. Longtime readers will spot Easter Eggs from my other books and series. New readers will get teases from some of my books and series, sprinkled throughout Navy and Cooper's love story.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ellie Hall
• Release date: Apr 29, 2024
• ISBN: 9798224389667

Book preview

Chapter 1

Table for Two

It’s a tale as old as time—girl does well in high school, gets into college on a scholarship, and now waits tables to help—never mind. If I think too hard about how I ended up here—over a decade later—I’ll cry. 

Everyone knows customers don’t want spit in their food, and they probably don’t want tears either.

I despise Mondays. Well, this Monday. Not only is it slow, but I’ll also miss visiting hours because I signed on to work a double. Scratch that. My manager put me on the schedule after I expressly told her no.

Stop scowling. I have mouths to feed, Connie says. Her hair is a dark poof streaked with silver. I’ve never seen her without lipstick on her teeth and she knows the name and life story of every single one of our regulars.

Then again, before every shift, I paint my lips red, which makes me feel bulletproof, and hides any marinara sauce if I sneak a few bites of my employee meal behind the server station.

Between you and me, I’m afraid Connie is grooming me to take her place. Then again, she’ll be working front of house until she draws her last breath. I swallow thickly. Better not to think about stuff like that. I’m on the clock.

She doesn’t mean she has to feed her own children, I mutter to Alicia as she returns a few menus to the hostess stand. She’s our latest victim. Er, I mean, our newest waitress.

I thought Leo was her son. Alicia’s cheeks turn the color of an apple—my favorite kind of autumn pie.

He can fend for himself. And boy does he...

Alicia’s eyes widen.

If you’re looking for a steady boyfriend, avoid Leo. If you’re looking for a fling— I tilt my head from side to side. Not that I would know firsthand.

Leo, and dozens of other guys, think we waitresses wearing our pomodoro red V-necks and tight black pants are available. On the market. Not this one.

Vincenzo’s Pizza and Pasta is a New York City staple along with Il Bacio. But we claim seniority since the spot has been here since 1922, as the menu says. If I didn’t know better, I’d argue that Connie has been too, and that’s why she’s so bitter.

I should probably avoid Connie too, Alicia says. She terrifies me.

Stay on her good side and you’re golden.

I think she hates me.

You’ll learn to love her. Despite our banter, I do. Once you start working here, you become part of the family—one that will never let you go. Which is likely what’ll happen because of bills. Lots of them. I have bills coming out my⁠—

Swatting me gently on the backside with the guest check holder, Connie hisses, Navy, table eight looks thirsty.

Alicia, I thought that was your table.

We’re not sending the new girl into the lion’s den. Her New York accent is thick and convincing.

But you’ll send me, I grumble.

Connie arches an eyebrow. My mistake giving her that pair that looks like they’ll send you to the hospital, then the morgue. She’ll learn in time, but you’re better equipped to handle guys like them.

I should take this as a compliment from her. I plaster on my best smile and approach the two guys sitting in the corner. They’ve been talking in hushed tones for hours, occasionally interspersed with sharp laughter. They sip their drinks, pick at their food, and presumably talk about something important. I’ll have to give Alicia the 411 on profiling customers.

Families with kids need constant attention.

Focus on the female when waiting on couples out on a date, so she doesn’t get insecure and snappy.

And when two guys come in with muscles straining against dark fabric, gazes that assess the room like they’re watching for trouble, and whose muted conversation stretches for hours, keep a polite distance. You probably don’t want to know what they’re talking about.

The table intended for four juts perpendicular to the wall and the two men sit diagonally across from each other. The one facing me when I approach has brown eyes and a sneer. His T-shirt has the letters MX Global written on it.

The other guy looks up sharply. Blue-gray eyes capture mine and hold there for a long second.

My throat tightens and I swallow thickly. I stagger backward and stammer, Can I get you each a refill? The words float, suspended in the air, because this can’t be happening. 

There’s no way Cooper found his way into this little corner of Manhattan. If luck is on my side, he doesn’t recognize me. It’s been years, practically a lifetime, if you catalog everything that happened since the wild and wonderful summer when we met. But there’s no mistaking his eyes even if he’s filled out, broadened in the shoulder region…and the general muscle area. His hair is cropped fairly short, and he’s tall, but not overly so.

Mr. MX snorts, and he taps his empty glass against the tablecloth before passing it to me. The years in this line of work have taught me this is an arrogant way of indicating he’d like a refill.

Same thing? I ask Cooper.

No, we’re just wrapping up. His voice is deeper than I remember, almost gravelly. A scar crests across the outer edge of his eyebrow. Given that, and the time spanning between us, I can’t fathom the stories he has to tell.

The little hairs on the back of my neck lift ever so slightly. Either that or the AC came on and there’s a draft.

His head inclines slightly, but our gazes don’t connect. I realize I’m standing here awkwardly. Waitstaff no-no number one.

Just the bill. His rumbling voice carries a fainter European accent than I remember.

He must not recognize me. I’ve been told I have a youthful face, meaning I look much the same since high school, but maybe out of context he doesn’t remember who I am. Then again, he forgot about me easily enough. I pat my apron and check the faux-leather guest check holder. But Alicia has their bill since this was originally her table.

Be right back. My voice is a weird whistle that sounds nothing like me. More like a goose breathing through a straw. How would that work with a beak? Never mind. Now is not the time for distractions. Actually, scratch that, I’d trade my best shift of the week for a distraction right now.

I take a sharp left toward the employee-only hallway. I’ve been holding my breath and need fresh air. Connie collects entrée plates from the kitchen pass-through window and I make a U-turn. The senior waitress won’t want Alicia out there by herself.

But what about me? Cooper is sitting in the dining room. He was breathing the same air as me. Sharing space. It’s like I’m caught in a summer hurricane and an earthquake all at once. I’m a walking, talking natural disaster.

I need chocolate, stat.

Alicia chats with a mother-daughter pair and I find the bill for table eight at the waitress station.

Taking a fortifying breath, I tell myself the man who requested this check isn’t Remington Cooper III. Not my first true love. Nope. He’s a lookalike. A soundalike. A figment of my exhausted, lonely, and stupidly hopeful imagination.

Don’t get me wrong, I’d never date him again. I won’t give him the time of day. He only gets the bill for services rendered. But the feelings of first love rush back, washing over me like the gentle waves on the beach where we met.

When I get to the table, he takes the check folder from my hand and our fingers brush.

The hairs on the back of my neck relax, replaced by a warm flush. Our eyes still don’t meet.

Gut check: I’m safe. Not that Cooper is dangerous, at least he wasn’t when we knew each other. However, his dining companion is menacing. The problem is my heart is in a box labeled Fragile, handle with care.

Then again, he’s the one who put it there.

Connie eyes me on her way to the kitchen as if she’s making sure I’m doing my job and not being devoured by the lions.

Avoiding eye contact with Mr. MX and Cooper, I robotically say the line employees are supposed to use when closing out a table, "We’re glad you joined us at Vincenzo’s Pizza and Pasta, where everyone is welcome at our table. Grazie." I’m as not-Italian as they come, at least compared to Connie and the Vincenzos, but I say the word with a slight accent—like a robot imitating an Italian. Like a dork. Because I am.

Get it together, Navy.

Mr. MX leans back and folds his arms across his chest while Cooper pulls out a leather wallet.

This is my cue to leave them to figure out the bill, but for another awkward moment, I’m frozen like a mouse in front of a cat. Or in this case, a lion.

My thoughts are fuzzy. My legs wobble.

I hear my name from somewhere else in the room and snap to. I haven’t eaten since breakfast and it’s nearly four p.m.

Hurrying to the employees-only hallway, Alphonso, one of the older kitchen guys, shoves a plate in my hands. "Mangia."

It’s not my break yet.

Gotta put some meat on those bones. Unlike some of the more jerky customers, Alphonso means this in a fatherly way, not that I’d know what that’s like.

If Connie sees me⁠—

She’ll have kittens. I know. Just scarf it down. It was a mistake. The customer didn’t want garlic. Go figure, coming here. We have garlic coming out of the wazoo. If Louis sees that I screwed up again, forget kittens, he’ll have hyenas. Have you ever seen those things? They’re vicious, even as babies.

I chuckle and take a big bite of the fettuccini alfredo laced with garlic and fresh basil. This is delicious. The upside to not having a dating life is I don’t have to worry about garlic breath.

Alphonso chuckles. The right guy is out there, just waiting for you...and so is that guy. He points to Cooper with his depthful eyes and scar. His gaze hovers on me for a long moment, and my pulse doubles before I realize what Alphonso meant.