Chapter One
Paige Richards was still awake at 5:00 a.m. It was the witching hour when the monkeys in her brain would start to fling bananas at her until she worked herself up into a panic attack that would leave her sobbing and gasping to breathe. Giving up on sleep, she flung the covers back and stumbled down to the large kitchen of her bed and breakfast to make coffee.
Pushing aside the Keurig, she pulled out the coffee bean grinder. She needed the big guns to survive this. As she ground the beans, she inhaled the rich, earthy scent. Aromatherapy at its finest. While the coffee was percolating, she paced the kitchen, making a mental list of things for Jack and Dean to do today so she could be ready for the inn’s grand opening next month. All ten of her rooms were booked, and some of them still needed a little TLC to be perfect.
The thought of it made her sit down at the table and take deep, calming breaths. She couldn’t fail. It just wasn’t an option. If she failed, she’d have to hear “I told you so” from her parents.
After she drained her 401K and most of her savings, Paige had sold her house on Long Island to cover the costs of buying the Nutmeg Inn. It was a “fixer upper” on Hamlet Island off the Connecticut shoreline, just past the Thimble Islands. She didn’t own a boat, but there was a daily ferry that went to and from the main land. Being a bit of a recluse had appealed to her, but she needed to expand her comfort zone and decided to become an innkeeper after her marriage, and her life, fell apart. Unfortunately, she hadn’t budgeted for zero income coming in for the last year while repairs were being done. She was in dire straits financially. Her parents reluctantly gave her a loan, but the cost of that check was more than monetary.
“You’re not smart enough to do this.”
“You’re going to make a fool out of yourself.”
Paige could have been more careful with budgeting, but after her ex gave her the house in her name, even before the divorce had been final, she didn’t stop to think. She wanted nothing to do with her old life.
Her parents, though, thought she should have made more of an effort to save her marriage. Fred was the son her father always wanted, and her mother approved of him because he was wealthy and successful. It didn’t hurt that he always remembered to send her mother flowers on her birthday. Too bad, more often than not, he forgot Paige’s.
However, when she needed the loan—while her parents oozed with disappointment at her failed life—they saw a great real estate investment. Paige had seen something more in the Nutmeg Inn: her future on her own terms. For the first time in a long while, she was the captain of her destiny.
Until she fucked it up, like everyone was expecting.
Ugh. The monkeys slipped their leashes. Only they sounded like her ex-husband, Fred. She forced the impending feeling of doom away from her as her breathing started to get choppy.
Not today.
The smell of brewing coffee soothed her as she rubbed the gritty lack of sleep from her eyes. Grimacing, she poured herself a cup of coffee and then opened her laptop. Maybe her perfect sister had finally taken her turn in Words With Friends. Janice’s husband was a lawyer and they had three perfect kids and they lived in a perfect house in the Hamptons. But Janice sucked at Words With Friends.
QUIZ on a double word tile. Forty-four points, bitch!
Paige smiled for the first time this morning.
The online Scrabble game was one of her weaknesses, and she had six games going on at once with different people. By the time she finished taking her turns, she was finally feeling tired. Not enough to go back to bed, but enough that a late morning nap might not be out of the question. It was weird, but when Dean and Jack worked on the inn during the day, the sound of it put her to sleep like a lullaby.
She made the mistake of looking at her email. Crap. A message from Fred from last night around ten.
She debated opening it. They had nothing to say to each other, as the divorce had been finalized over three months ago, even though they had been separated for more than a year. It had been handled in a civilized, sterile manner by their lawyers. Fred had been very generous. Well, he had to be after she caught him literally with his pants down, with a woman named Barbie. Janice’s husband, the perfect attorney, had been a shark. For a moment, she felt a pang over playing QUIZ, but the feeling quickly passed.
Against her better judgment, she clicked the email open.
Paige, have you lost your mind? it began.
She should have hit the delete button right then and there. But she read on instead.
You can’t sell our house. It’s prime real estate in Long Island.
“My house, shithead,” she said in the empty kitchen.
I made sure you had a roof over your head, so I didn’t have to worry about you.
“No longer your job.” Paige hated that her voice shook. That it still hurt.
But if you’ve got your heart set on this foolishness, I can’t stop you.
“Got that right, buster.”
I must insist that you give me the right of first refusal. I will make you a generous offer.
“Too late.”
For once, Fred had real old information. Someone’s head was going to roll for that oversight—not only was the house already sold, but the new owners had already moved in. After she caught him red-handed, Paige went on an extended vacation. Her parents used to have a summer home on Hamlet Island, so she had come here to see if she could find the happy little girl she used to be. She found the Nutmeg Inn and never left. When the owner told her he was going to put the bed and breakfast on the market, she called her realtor right away.
Fred had more to say, but Paige just didn’t have the energy to read it. She took her coffee and walked down to the beach. It was cold for May and she should have put on a hoodie. The sleep T-shirt and shorts she wore weren’t enough to stop the goose bumps. Still, it was too much effort to go back inside—especially when the ocean called to her with the crash of waves that soothed her jagged nerves. In the pink light of sunrise, she saw two joggers down the beach.
It made her boobs hurt just to look at them. Wrapping her arms over her chest, she shook her head. Even if she wanted to jog, she’d need two bras to keep the girls from bouncing into her chin. Plus, the thought of jogging right now made her sick. She was more a swimming type of girl. Floating really. On an inflatable raft. With a margarita.
That first summer here had been like a bandage on her soul. She’d gotten to know the charming little island again, this time as a resident instead of a tourist. She’d made a few friends who didn’t care if she didn’t have matching plates or if she liked to wear maxi dresses with large sunhats. This island represented peace as well as the start of her new life. Of course, it wasn’t all sunshine and roses. The community tended to be archly conservative and distrustful of newcomers, but some old-timers remembered her and her family, so she’d been given the benefit of the doubt, no matter how grudgingly. She resolved to ignore the grim discussions around the town square over politics, and concentrated instead on the beach and her inn.
“Earth to Paige?”
Paige took in a deep, shuddering breath. A gray UConn sweatshirt filled her vision.
Warm hands on her upper arms made her shiver. “Jesus, Paige, you’re an icicle.”
“D-Dean,” she said, still gulping breaths.
The joggers had been Dean and Jack, her handymen and the first friends she made on Hamlet Island last year. And now they were standing in front of her, looking so concerned.
She didn’t protest when Jack took the coffee out of her hand. Didn’t move when Dean stripped his sweatshirt off and plunked it over her head. Then he started rubbing her arms, and reality snapped back into place.
His shirt was toasty warm and smelled like his spicy aftershave.
“I’m okay,” she said, stepping away from the vigorous caress that she was enjoying too much. Dean was naked from the waist up, his six-pack in full display. Paige tore her eyes from his tight jogging shorts as she slipped her arms through the sleeves of his sweatshirt. The shaking subsided as the fleece covered her like a comforting blanket.
“Thanks,” she said to Jack, who handed her back the cup of coffee.
“You sure you’re okay?” Jack’s deep voice rumbled through her. Even though he was fully clothed, he was just as handsome as Dean. Jack had dirty-blond hair that he wore long, whereas Dean’s dark hair was shorn close to his skull. She knew from watching them work shirtless that Jack had tattoos all over his fabulous chest, while Dean’s tanned and toned body was unmarked.
“Yeah,” Paige muttered, forcing herself to stop eye-fucking them. They were a good five years older than her, in better shape, oh and yeah, in a committed relationship—with each other. “I must have fallen asleep on my feet or something.” She gave a shaky laugh.
“You poor thing. You’ve been working yourself ragged.” Jack stroked her hair, and it felt so damned good she almost burst into tears.
“Come on, let’s get you back inside.” Dean slung an arm around her shoulders while Jack curved an arm around her waist.
The urge just to let them comfort her was too great to fight. She hoped they never realized how big of a crush she had on both of them.