Chapter Twenty-Six
CADEN’S PHONE CALL had breathed new life into Bella. She’d gotten up right after the call and started packing. She’d already packed most of her don’t-ever-throw-out stuff. The items that she would never need again but couldn’t bear to part with—prom dresses, love notes from boys in elementary school, letters from her Seaside friends. She couldn’t help but try on some of the prom dresses and was surprised that she could still fit into a few of them. As she moved around now in one of the light pink frocks and caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror, she didn’t look anything like the Bella everyone knew and loved, but she felt more like herself than she had in years. She was a woman and she was ready to take charge of her life and roar.
She was startled when her phone rang, and she scrambled to find it among her boxes. Jenna’s name and picture flashed on her screen.
“Don’t kill me for leaving,” Bella said before Jenna could say a word. She heard Jenna say, “She answered. She answered!” Then she heard the telltale empty box sound of the call being put on speakerphone.
“Geez, woman. We would have gone with you. Leanna and Amy are here with me. Are you okay? Please tell me you’re okay. I tried to call you yesterday and you didn’t answer your phone.” Jenna’s voice was full of worry. “I was ready to drive to Connecticut, but Amy wouldn’t let me. She said you needed to sort this out without us. Is that true?”
She heard the hurt in Jenna’s last words. “Yes, it was true. I’m so sorry, Jenna, and thank you, Amy.”
“I’ve got your back, Bells,” Amy said.
“Oh,” Jenna said quietly. “But we love you.”
“I know that. I love you guys, too. I just…I couldn’t deal with it, Jenna. I needed to clear my head, and if you guys were with me, you’d let me cry for as long as I needed to. You’d make me feel better and you’d help me figure it all out.”
“No duh, Sherlock. That’s what girlfriends are for,” Jenna said.
Sarcasm. Bella smiled. “This was something that I needed to figure out on my own. I knew you’d understand.”
“I do, but next time can you just answer your stupid phone and tell me? I cleaned my cottage for three hours, and you know it wasn’t dirty to begin with. I even had Amy mess up my shoes so I could reorganize them.”
Bella laughed. “She’s a good friend to do that for you.”
“Yeah, she is,” Jenna said.
“Bella, it’s Leanna. How are you holding up? Are you okay, or do you want us to come there and be with you?”
“I’m good, Leanna. Caden called, and we talked.”
“And?” Jenna asked.
“And it made me feel better. I know he needed that time with Evan. I finally made a decision. I turned down the job here and signed the papers to sell my house.”
“Bella. You’re doing it after all?” Jenna asked.
“I am. You know, Tony was right. I am the epitome of strength and confidence. But Caden knows me even better than I know myself. He saw right through my public persona.”
“Fate,” Leanna said. “I knew you two were meant to be together.”
“So, what about your plan?” Amy asked.
“You mean my modified plan? I don’t need a man to be whole, and I don’t need a man as a reason to make my decisions. I can want a man without needing him.” Bella knew she’d made the right decision, and she heard little happy noises that weren’t laughs or squeals, but were the types of sounds that came straight from that happy place rooted deep inside her friends. She imagined them holding hands, smiling for her, with her, and waiting with bated breath for the rest of her decision.
“And?” Jenna finally asked.
“And I want Caden.”
THE NEARER BELLA got to Caden’s house, the faster her heart raced. This was it. Her now or never moment. This was her life, and she was going to tell him exactly what she thought of his needing a break. She drove down Route 6 and turned down the side road toward his house. She was breathing so hard she had to pull over for a minute just to take a few deep breaths.
Okay. Okay. Okay. I can do this.
She tugged at the hem of her dress, then pulled at the flimsy ribbons holding up her top. With one last loud exhalation, she drove back onto the road and turned onto his street. His driveway was empty.
Shoot.
She hadn’t even considered that he might not be home. She blamed her error on the sugar rush from eating all the chocolate she possibly could. He could be anywhere—fishing with Evan, or at a beach, at work. This was supposed to be easy. Knock on his door, say her two cents, and either—
Caden’s truck pulled into the driveway behind her.
She couldn’t breathe.
She watched in her side-view mirror as he stepped from the truck in his uniform, looking exactly like he had the first night they’d met. When his eyes caught hers in the mirror, she felt her heart swell. Only this time the sadness in his eyes mirrored how she felt, but she couldn’t let that dissuade her from where she was heading.
His powerful legs carried him one sure step at a time toward her car. Her breathing became shallow, and when he reached for the door handle, she no longer felt like she was a woman who needed to roar.
She just felt like a woman, and that was enough.
CADEN COULDN’T BELIEVE his eyes. Bella was right there, stepping out of her car wearing—holy cow. What was she wearing? Some pink polyester number that hugged her breasts and hips and appeared to be held on by two thin ribbons that tied around her neck. There was a pink satin bow at her waist, and the fabric stopped above her knees in the front and hung to her heels in the back.
“Stop looking at me like that.” She crossed her arms, and her shoulders rounded forward. She drew them back and lifted her chin.
“I’m…Bella…” Come on, say something. “I’m sorry.”
“So am I.” Her eyes narrowed. “I’m going to tell you something,” she said with a serious tone. “And I’m only going to say it once.”
Caden touched her arm.
“I can’t think if you touch me.”
That made him smile, which brought a narrowing of her eyes. He stared at his hand before peeling his fingers from her skin.
“I’m sorry. But you’re here. Even if you’re annoyed with me, I’m happy you’re here.” How could he not smile? He’d missed her so much, and here she was, wearing some ridiculous outfit, angry and crazy adorable. The sound of her voice was like a new heart to a dying man.
“I missed your voice,” he admitted.
“You.” She poked his chest. “Hurt.” Poke. “Me.” Poke.
He grabbed her finger and pressed her palm to his chest. She tried to pull away, but he held on tight.
“Darn it, Caden.” Her voice trembled. “You hurt me. A lot.”
“I’m sorry.” He took a step closer and she peered up at him, then lowered her eyes to her hand, trapped beneath his. “I hurt me, too.”
At that, she lifted her beautiful eyes to his, and he could see her struggling to sound angry when he knew she felt as compelled to fall into his arms as he did to wrap them around her and hold her close.
“You waited too many days before you called me,” she said just above a whisper.
He shook his head. “I didn’t know if I should call.”
Her eyes narrowed again. “You should have.”
“I couldn’t be more sorry.” He wanted to pull her into his arms and kiss her, hold her, make both their pains go away, but before he could move, she spoke.
“You’re standing there all handsome and apologetic, and…hot in that stupid sexy uniform, with that look in your eyes like you love me more than life itself, and…”
“I do,” he said.
“You…”
“I do love you more than life itself.”
She clenched her jaw and looked away, and when she turned back, her voice was determined once again. “Oh. Wait. I have…I love you, too, but darn it, I need to finish.”
He smiled. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay.” She bit her lower lip and furrowed her brow, as if she was trying to remember what she was saying. “You let me be strong, but you also make me weak.” She shook her head. “But you don’t really make me weak. You love me in ways that make me feel safe enough to forget I’m strong, and that scares the daylights out of me—even though I love that feeling. I’ve never had that feeling before, but you, Caden Grant…” She fisted her hands in that silly pink getup, and a second later she poked his chest again. “You.” Poke. “Are.” Poke.
He grabbed her hand again and held it tight.
She drew her brows together. “You are the man that I want to be with. I like how you make me feel, and…I’m embracing it. See?” She swatted the skirt of her ridiculous dress. “I like how you take care of me. It makes me want to take care of you and Evan. But I won’t be jerked around. I won’t be treated like I’m expendable. You either take me or leave me, but there is no in between.”
He tightened his grip on her hand. “I don’t have a lot of experience with being in love or taking breaks.” His heart squeezed as her words took root, and he softened his tone. “Or realizing I was the biggest fool on earth.”
“You…” She hooked her finger into the waistband of his pants. “What?”
“I was an idiot. I blamed Evan’s hooking up with the wrong friends on my not giving him enough attention because I was so wrapped up in us that I couldn’t see straight.”
“You made a commitment to Evan, and I respect that.” She stared at his chest. He lifted her chin with his finger.
“I made a commitment to you, too, Bella. To us. I thought I needed to focus solely on Evan, but, babe, I was wrong. We need to focus on Evan. Together. I can’t be a good father when I’m spending my emotional energy missing you. I can’t sleep. I can’t eat. I can’t do a single thing because I love you, Bella, and without you, seeing straight isn’t even an option.” He paused to let his words sink in. “I made an impulsive suggestion because Evan is…”
“Everything, as he should be,” she said softly. “I overreacted. I was selfish and I’m sorry.”
“No. You’re wrong about Evan being everything. Evan was everything until I met you. He is my son, and I love him. But the space he fills in my heart is the space that only a child can fill.” He cupped her cheeks and took a step closer, so they were thigh to thigh, as they should be. “You’re my soul mate. My lover. My friend. The woman I want to spend my life with, and maybe one day, if you want to, you’ll be the mother of our child. That side of my heart that Evan fills has room for more, but the other side of my heart? Your side? It only has room for you.”
Her eyes dampened. “Caden.”
“Let me finish, please.” He touched his forehead to hers. She sighed, and when he pressed his hands to her cheeks and lifted her face so he could look deeply into her eyes, a warm tear slid over his thumb.
“I love you, Bella. I love your strength, your loud laugh, the way you think of Evan even when you should be thinking about your work. I love the way you love your friends and your hidden adoration of all things pink. I will always love you, Bella, and I want you in our lives.”
He sealed his lips to hers, and all those empty spots that had appeared over the last few days filled with Bella.
With them.
When they drew apart, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a piece of paper the size and thickness of a business card. “I wanted to give you something to show you that I’m serious about my commitment to you.”
He put the paper in her palm and folded her fingers over it; then he pressed a soft kiss to the back of her hand. Caden kissed her forehead.
“Before you open it, please tell me what you’re wearing.”
Bella looked down at her dress and her cheeks flushed. “It’s a prom dress. I bought it to wear to my high school prom, but that was before I realized that girly girls got taken advantage of.”
“So you didn’t wear it?” He loved her so much his heart ached.
She shook her head. “I wore a black dress. But when I saw it in my closet, I remembered how you saw right through me and how you loved that side of me. And how you said to embrace it.” She lifted one shoulder in a shrug.
He kissed her again, and she melted against him.
“Maybe we should go shopping for something from this decade,” he teased.
“Maybe shopping can wait,” she said against his lips.
The sound of tires on gravel drew their lips apart.
“Bella!” Evan dropped his bike and wrapped his arms around the two of them. “You’re here. Jenna said you were in Connecticut, and I thought…” He hugged her again. “I thought you decided to take that job.”
“I missed you, too, Evan.” She ran her eyes between Evan and Caden. “How could I take a job that was so far from my favorite two men?”
He shot a look at Caden. “You’re back together?”
Caden nodded, and Evan did a fist pump. “Yes! Please take him out of here, Bella. He’s been moping around and driving me crazy.”
“Oh, I think I can handle that,” she said with mischief in her eyes.
“Um.” Evan ran his eyes down Bella’s dress. “You might want to change your clothes first. I’m pretty sure that went out of style in the fifties.”
“Nineties,” Bella corrected him.
“Whatever.” Evan headed for the front door.
Whatever, said with a smile. Music to Caden’s ears.
Evan stopped halfway to the door and returned to Bella’s side with a serious look in his eyes. “Bella, I’m sorry for lying to you about being at the campground that day. I was afraid I’d get in trouble, and…well, I won’t lie again.”
Confusion flashed in her eyes. Caden realized he hadn’t even had a chance to tell her everything that Evan had told him yet.
“That’s okay, Evan. I’m glad you did the right thing in the end.”
“Cool. Thanks.” He headed inside.
“Thank you,” Caden said to Bella. “I have a lot to tell you, but I’m proud of him for apologizing. I never asked him to.”
“He’s an amazing kid, Caden.”
Bella unfurled her hand and read the note on the card. She fisted her hands in Caden’s shirt. “A get-out-of-jail-free card? Did you steal this from a Monopoly game?”
“No, but I copied the idea from the game, sort of.” His chest swelled with love for her.
“Don’t you ever compromise your beliefs for me. I love you for your convictions.”
He kissed her softly. “Oh, sorry. That was meant for me. In case you decide to use your fuzzy handcuffs and forget to respect our safe word.” He arched a brow and she laughed.
“Turn it over,” he whispered.
She looked down at the card.
“Read the other side.” He held his breath as she flipped over the flimsy card. He felt her heart beat harder against his chest. She looked from the card to him, then back again.
“Is…?” Her eyes welled with tears again. “Is this a joke?” She read the words again.
Marry me.
“I’ve never been more serious in my life. I love you, Bella. I knew it the moment you fell into my arms that first night. I want to be your YMCA guy. The guy who does or doesn’t fix your deck, depending on your mood. I want to wake up with you in my arms and I never, ever, want another frigging break from you. Will you marry me, Bella?”
“But…Evan?” Her lower lip trembled.
“I’m not asking you to marry Evan, but if you’re worried that he will be upset, he won’t. He was ready to clobber me for messing things up with you. I have only one stipulation.”
Her eyes widened.
“I don’t ever want to be not-a-husband with you. I want the real deal. You in a white dress, me in a monkey suit. I want you to have the wedding you secretly dreamed of.”
Tears streamed down her cheeks. “How do you know I’ve dreamed of anything like that?”
He touched her dress. “Anyone who kept a dress like this, dreams of a real wedding. Please don’t make me wait any longer for an answer.”
“Yes, Caden. I want to be your real wife, and never, ever be your not-a-wife.”
Please enjoy a preview of the next Sweet with Heat novel
Chapter One
THERE SHOULD BE a rule about drooling over construction workers, but Jenna Ward was sure glad there wasn’t. She sat on the porch of the Bookstore Restaurant, soaking up the deliciousness of the three bronzed males clad in nothing more than jeans and glistening muscles that flexed and bulged like an offering to the gods as they forced thick, sticky tar into submission. Their jeans hung low on strong hips, gripping their powerful thighs like second skins and ending in scuffed and tarred work boots. What red-blooded woman didn’t get worked up over a gorgeous shirtless man in work boots?
Heaven help her, because she needed this distraction to take away her desire for Peter Lacroux, which went hand in hand with summers on the Cape and consumed her in the nine months they were apart. She zeroed in on one particularly handsome blond construction worker. His hair was nearly white, his jaw square and manly. She wanted to march right out to the middle of the road that split the earth between the restaurant and the beach and be manhandled into submission. Right there on the tar. Wrestled and groped until all thoughts of Pete evaporated.
“Wipe the drool from your chin, chica.” Amy Maples handed Jenna a margarita and, pointedly, a fresh napkin, as she settled into the chair across from her. “Good grief, woman. What’s up with you this summer? I swear you’re in heat. I can practically smell your pheromones from over here.”
Jenna gulped her drink and righted her red bikini top, which was trying its hardest to relieve itself of her enormous breasts. Even her bikini top was ready for a man. A real man. A man who craved her as much as she craved him.
Jenna reluctantly turned away from Testosterone Road and faced her best friends. The women she had spent her summers with here in Wellfleet, Massachusetts, for as long as she could remember and the women she hoped would help her through her most important summer ever.
Okay, she’d self-defined it as such, and it was probably a poor excuse for most important, but that’s how it felt. Huge. Momentous. Gargantuan. Great. Now she was thinking about other huge things…
“You’ve been here for a week, and you still haven’t told us why you’re all claws and hormones. Want to clue us in, or are we supposed to guess?” Bella Abbascia was a brazen blonde—and she, like Leanna Bray, the disorganized brunette of their bestie clan—had already found her true love. A feat Jenna only dreamed of. Ached for might be more accurate, and Bella was right; it was time to come clean.
Jenna downed the last of her drink and slapped her palms on the table.
“I don’t care what it takes; this is my summer. I’m done pussyfooting around. I want a man. A real man.” She slid her eyes to the construction workers again. Yum! She tried to convince herself to feel something more for the construction worker, but the only person her mind found yummy was Pete—and it didn’t seem to want to make room for others.
She wasn’t above faking it to pull herself through the charade. Maybe if she tried hard enough, she could talk herself into believing it.
“So, you’re going after Pete?” Leanna sipped her margarita and arched a brow. “How is that any different than every single one of the last five summers?”
“Oh no. Peter Lacroux can kiss my big, sexy butt.”
“Jenna!” Amy’s eyes widened. The sweetest of the group, she was perfectly petite, with kindness that sailed from her green eyes like a summer breeze.
“You do have a mighty fine butt, Jen,” Bella said. “But you’ve had a wicked crush on that man forever. If you’re going to focus your attention on someone—” Bella bit her lower lip and shook her head as one of the construction workers wiped sweat from his brow, pecs in full, drool-inciting view. Bella raked her eyes down his sculpted abs. “Um…Okay, yeah. They’re pretty hot. But why throw Pete away?”
Jenna had been over this in her mind a hundred times. She locked her eyes on her glass and exhaled. “Because I’m not going to spend another summer chasing a man who doesn’t want me. And this is a tough summer for me. I have to break up with my mother, and that’s enough heartache for a few short weeks.”
“Break up with your mom? Can a person do that?” Amy glanced around the table.
“I gather she’s not taking your dad getting remarried well?” Leanna asked. “I had such high hopes when she didn’t fall apart during the divorce.”
Jenna rolled her eyes. “So did I. You’d think that two years after her divorce, she’d be able to sort of compartmentalize it all, but, girls, you have no idea.” Jenna shook her head and held up her glass, indicating to the bartender that she needed another drink. She could have gotten up and retrieved the drink herself, but Jenna wanted the diversion of the sexy waiter who would deliver it to their table. She’d take as many diversions as she could get to keep from thinking of Pete.
“She’s gone…hmm…how do I say this respectfully? She’s not gone cougar, but she’s definitely acting different. She’s dressing way too young for a fifty-seven-year-old woman, and I swear she thinks she’s my new best friend. She wants to talk about guys and sex, and what’s worse is that she suddenly wants to go dancing and to bars. I love my mom, but I don’t need to go to bars with her, and talking about sex with her? Please.”
“I was wondering what was going on when she texted you a hundred times last night.” Bella pulled her hair back and secured it with an elastic band. “She’s going through a hard time, Jenna. Give her a break. She was married for thirty-four years. That’s a long time. I’m not even married to Caden yet, and if we broke up and he married a younger chick, I’d be devastated.” Bella and Caden met last year when Bella had been busy rearranging her own life. She’d started a work-study program for the local school district, fallen in love with Caden Grant, a cop on the Cape, and now she was as close as a mother to his almost sixteen-year-old son, Evan. The Cape was a narrow stretch of land between the bay and the ocean. Bella and Caden lived on the bay side in a house that Caden had owned when they’d met, and they would be staying at Bella’s Seaside cottage on and off this summer.
“I get it, okay? I just…it’s just so hard to see her struggling with her looks, and honestly, you know I adore her, but she’s sort of making a fool of herself. It’s been two years since the divorce. She just needs to get over it and move on. I do feel bad because I had to take a firm stand and tell her that I wasn’t going to come home until after the summer.”
“Why do you feel bad? That’s what you do every summer.” Amy eyed one of the construction workers, a water bottle held above his mouth, a stream of wetness disappearing down his throat. “Holy hotness.” She fanned herself with her napkin.
Jenna watched the guy wipe his mouth with his heavily muscled forearm. “Yeah, but she wanted me to come home to hang out with her a few times.” The sexy waiter brought Jenna her drink.
“Thank you, doll.” She watched his fine butt as he walked away.
“Doll?” Amy giggled.
“See?” Jenna bonked her forehead on the table. “That’s her word. Doll? Who says that? You have to help me. She’ll ruin me, and I swear if I spend one more summer lusting after Pete, then I’ll be empty on all accounts. My mother will hate me, my hoo-ha will be lonely, and I’ll use words like doll. Come on, do us all a favor and shoot me now.”
“Yeah, well, about that whole Pete thing?” Leanna nodded toward the crosswalk, where Pete Lacroux was crossing the road carrying the cutest puppy.
Holy mother of hotness, he is fine. I want to be that puppy. Those construction workers couldn’t hold a candle to Pete, and Jenna’s body was proof as her pulse quickened and her mouth went dry. His shoulders were twice as broad as those of the boys on the pavement, his waist was trim and he shifted the pup to the side, giving Jenna a clear view of the pronounced muscles that blazed a path south from his abs and disappeared into his snug jeans. Those muscles turned her mind to mush. Yup. She’d gone as dumb as a doorknob.
“Breathe, Jenna,” Amy whispered. “You are so not over him.”
Jenna couldn’t tear her eyes from him. Years of lust and anticipation brewed deep in her belly. Just one more summer? One more try?
No. No. I can’t do this anymore. “The man’s one big tease. I’m moving on.” She forced herself to tear her eyes away from him and guzzle her drink.
And then it happened.
She felt his presence behind her before he ever said a word. Jenna, the woman who could talk to anyone, anytime, had spent years fumbling for words and making atrocious attempts at flirting with the six-foot-two, dark-haired, mysterious specimen that was Peter Lacroux, but despite catching a few heated glances from him, she remained in the friend zone.
Regardless of how her body reacted to him, she didn’t need to beg for a man she could barely talk to, or follow after him like that adorable puppy snuggled against his powerful chest.
She was totally, utterly, done with him.
Maybe.
PETE EYED THE women from the Seaside cottage community, or the Seaside girls, as he’d come to refer to them, on his way across the street. They hadn’t spotted him watching them as they ogled the young construction workers from the patio of the Bookstore Restaurant. Pete had done the community and pool maintenance for the cottages at Seaside for about six years. He was a boat restorer by trade, but when he’d begun working at Seaside, his career hadn’t yet taken off. By the time word got around that he was an exceptional craftsman, he was too loyal of a man to stop doing the maintenance work. Besides, the girls were fun, and he’d become friends with the guys in the community, Tony Black, a professional surfer and motivational speaker, and Jamie Reed, who’d developed OneClick, a search engine second only to Google. And then there was Jenna Ward, the buxom brunette with the killer butt, a cackle of a laugh, and the most intense, alluring blue eyes he’d ever seen.
Frigging Jenna.
He watched her eyes shift to him as he neared the restaurant. Other than his craftsman skills, reading women was Pete’s next best finely honed ability—or so he thought. He could tell when a woman was into him, or when she was toying with the idea of being into him, but Jenna Ward? Jenna confused the heck out of him. She was confident and funny, smart, and too cute for her own good when she was around her friends. Just watching Jenna sent fire through his veins, but when it came to Pete, Jenna lost all that gumption, and she turned into a…Heck, he didn’t know what happened to her. She grew quiet and tentative when she was near him. Pete liked confident women. A lily to look at and a tigress in the bedroom. His mouth quirked up at the thought. He wasn’t a Neanderthal. He respected women, but he also knew what he liked. He wanted to devour and be devoured—and with Jenna, who swallowed her confidence around him, he feared his sexual appetite would scare her off. Besides, with his alcoholic father to care for, he didn’t have time for a relationship.
Jenna turned away as he stepped behind her. Her hair was longer this summer, framing her face in rich chocolate waves that fell past her shoulders. Pete preferred long hair. There was nothing like the feeling of burying his hands in a woman’s hair and giving it a gentle tug when she was just about to come apart beneath him.
He held Joey, the female golden retriever he’d rescued a few weeks earlier, in one arm, placed his other hand on the back of Jenna’s chair, and inhaled deeply. Jenna smelled like no other woman he’d ever known, a tantalizing combination of sweet and spicy. Her scent, and the view of her cleavage from above, pushed all of his sexual buttons, despite her tentative nature around him. But he had no endgame with Jenna Ward. No matter how much he wanted to explore the white-hot attraction he felt toward her, he respected Jenna and treasured her friendship too much to take her for a test ride.
“Hello, ladies.”
“Aww. Can I hold her?” Amy jumped to her feet and took the puppy from his hands. Joey covered her face with kisses.
“She’s a little shy,” Pete teased. He’d found the pup in a duffel bag by a dumpster behind Mac’s Seafood, down at the Wellfleet Pier. The poor thing was hungry and scared, but other than that, she wasn’t too bad off. The first night Pete had her, the pup had slept curled up against Pete’s chest, and they’d been constant companions ever since.
“Yeah, real shy. How’s she doing?” Leanna asked.
“She’s great. She sticks to me like glue.” He shrugged. “I was just coming over to get her a bowl of fresh water, maybe a hamburger.”
“Hamburger?” Leanna wrinkled her thinly manicured brow. “How about puppy food?”
“Puppies love burgers.” Chicks were so weird with their rules about proper foods. He glanced down at Jenna, whose eyes were locked on the table. She usually went ape over puppies, and he wondered what was up with her cool demeanor.
“Want to join us for a drink?” Bella slid a slanty-eyed look in Jenna’s direction.
He felt Jenna bristle at the offer. He should probably walk away and give her some breathing room. She obviously wasn’t herself today. He was just about to leave when Amy grabbed his arm and pulled him down to the chair beside Jenna. Great. Now Jenna had a death stare locked on Amy. Pete was beginning to take her standoffishness personally.
“Sit for a while. I want to play with Joey anyway.” When Amy met Jenna’s heated stare, she rolled her eyes and kissed Joey’s head.
“How’s the boat coming along?” Leanna Bray was a quirky woman, too. Her cottage had always been a mess before she met her fiancé, Kurt Remington. Every time Pete had gone by to fix a broken cabinet or a faucet, she’d had laundry piles everywhere, and sticky goo from her jam making seemed to cover every surface, including herself. Almost all of her clothing had conspicuous stains in various shades of red, purple, and orange. Kurt was as neat and organized as Jenna. He’d taken over the laundry and didn’t seem to mind picking up after Leanna. In any case, her place was much more organized these days.
“She’s coming along.” Pete had been refinishing a custom-built 1966 thirty-four-foot gaff-rigged wooden schooner for the past two summers. Working with his hands was not only his passion, but it was also cathartic. He’d spent the last two years pouring the guilt over his father’s drinking into refitting the boat.
“What will you do with it when you’re done?” Amy Maples looked like the girl next door, with her sandy blond hair and big green eyes, and acted like a mother hen, always worrying about her friends.
Pete shrugged. “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe I’ll sail someplace far, far away.” He’d never leave his father, or the Cape, but there were days…
That brought Jenna’s eyes to him. She had the most gorgeous eyes. They weren’t sea blue or sky blue or even midnight blue. They were more of a cerulean frost, and at the moment, pointedly icy. What on earth did I do? He racked his brain, going over the last two weeks, but he hadn’t seen Jenna for more than a minute or two. He couldn’t imagine what he’d done to warrant her attitude.
Jenna raised her eyebrows in Amy’s direction. “Time for me to go away.” She rose to her feet, bringing her red-string-bikini-clad body into full view. The tiny triangles barely covered her and the bottom rode high on her hips, exposing every luscious curve.
Pete shot a look around the patio—every male eye was locked on Jenna. Jenna wasn’t even five feet tall, but she had a better body than any long-legged model. How the heck can a woman have a body like that and not be one hundred percent confident at all times? He stifled the urge to stand between her and the ogling men.
“Where are you going?” Bella’s eyes bounced between Pete and Jenna.
“I’m going to do what I came here to do. There’s a construction guy with my name on him over there.” Jenna lifted her chin toward the sky, and her pigeon-toed feet carried her fine body off the patio, across the grass, and directly toward one of the young construction workers.
“What’s she doing?” Pete narrowed his eyes as Jenna approached a ripped construction worker. He expected Jenna to put her hands behind her back and sway from side to side like she did when she spoke to him—reminiscent of an excited girl rather than a sensual woman—adorable and totally confusing.
“Oh. My. Gosh.” Bella rose to her feet, her eyes wide.
“Nothing, Pete. She’s…” Amy put Joey in Pete’s lap. “Take her. I…um.” Amy reached for Bella’s hand as they gawked, mesmerized by Jenna’s bold move.
Her shoulders were drawn back, her beautiful breasts on display—proudly on display! What the…? She put one hand on her hip, and wow, Pete didn’t need to see her face to feel the slow drag of her eyes down that jerk’s body in a way similar to how she usually looked at him when she thought he wasn’t looking. But then she’d go all nervous when he’d approach.
What the heck?
“Holy mackerel. She’s going for it.” Bella sat back down, as Jenna put her finger in the waistband of the guy’s jeans and shrugged. “She’s something this summer, isn’t she?”
Jealousy clutched Pete’s gut.
“Yes, and this summer’s rock fixation? What’s up with pitch-black rocks? She’s never collected them before.” Amy’s voice trailed off as she watched Jenna in action.
Pete made a mental note of the rocks Jenna was collecting this summer. He’d spent five years taking mental notes about Jenna. Every summer she collected different types of rocks—egg shaped, heart shaped, all white, gray, oval… There was never any rhyme or reason that Pete could see for her rock selection, but she knew what she liked, and the ones she liked ended up all over her cottage and deck.
Jenna’s eyes were fixated on the guy. That was the Jenna Pete had hoped would talk to him, and now…Now he was getting pretty pissed off.
“Those aren’t local guys; they’re contractors,” he warned. “They probably have women in every town around here. Want me to intervene?” Jenna wasn’t his to protect. They’d never even gone out on a single date, but somewhere in his mind, despite his confusion, she was his. Summers to Pete meant six to eight weeks of seeing Jenna, and over the last two years, while his father buried his troubles in alcohol, seeing Jenna meant even more to him. But until this very second, he never realized how much he wanted her, or how much she meant to him. Joey turned her tongue on Pete’s chin. Frustrated, Pete lifted his face out of reach.
Leanna shook her head. “Wow. Look at her go.”
Look at her go? You think this is okay?
“Pete, have you heard something bad about them? Should we worry?” Amy’s voice was laden with concern. “Bella, maybe we should…”
Pete watched Jenna take her phone from her pocket and type something. A second later the blond guy took his phone from his back pocket and nodded.
“She gave him her number. I can’t believe it,” Leanna said.
“She wasn’t lying to us,” Bella said. “Our girl’s getting her groove on.” She settled back in her seat and petted Joey. “Oh, Pete…tsk, tsk, tsk.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” He clenched his teeth so tight he thought they might crack.
“Nothing.” Leanna smacked Bella’s arm.
Bella set her eyes on him. “A woman like Jenna only comes around once in a lifetime.”
He was just beginning to realize how true those words were.
“Bella, don’t,” Amy warned.
Bella shrugged. “Just sayin’.”
He didn’t know what to make of the woman who was a wallflower around him and a sex kitten around a random idiot in the street. Jenna sashayed back toward the table with a grin on her face. That was Pete’s cue to get out of there before he was stuck listening to Jenna going on and on about that idiot. He rose to his feet with Joey in his arms.
“Wait. Don’t leave,” Amy pleaded. “You didn’t get Joey her water.”
“I’ve got to get going.” With Joey in his arms, he headed off the patio. Jenna brushed past him without so much as a word, and it pissed him off even more. He couldn’t escape fast enough.
“Guess who’s going to the Beachcomber tonight? Oh my. He’s even hotter up close.” Jenna’s voice echoed in his mind as he crossed the street to get Joey a bowl of water from Mac’s.
Like I needed to hear that crap.
(End of Sneak Peek)
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