Seaside Whispers: Matt Lacroux (Love in Bloom: Seaside Summers)

by Melissa Foster

  “She’ll be there,” Matt assured her. “She’s always watching.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  TUESDAY EVENING MIRA sat at the table on her deck reviewing the list she’d made of materials to prepare for prospective co-op partners. Hagen had been thrilled to go to the baseball game with Matt and the others. Matt had invited Drake and Rick, which she was also happy about. She didn’t want them to feel pushed out of Hagen’s life because Matt was getting more involved in it.

  True to his word, Matt had driven Hagen to camp the last two mornings, giving her time to try to garner interest in the co-op. Not that she was having much luck. Monday and Tuesday she’d gone through her entire list of potential companies and had found another six to call as well. None of them were interested, but she wasn’t giving up. Matt had offered to continue driving Hagen until she secured enough interest to make the co-op work. There was no way she could get the research done to find other companies to call and prepare the materials she’d need if the meetings came to fruition. Luckily, Serena was coming over to help.

  “Is my favorite mini-man off to do guy stuff?” Serena asked as she came around the side of the house carrying a bag in one hand and her laptop in the other.

  “Yes, off and happy as a clam.”

  “I got him something today.” She set her laptop and bag on the table, withdrew a thin children’s book, and plunked it down in front of Mira. “You told me they were going to build a Huckleberry Finn–style raft, so I got him a knockoff kid’s book, Hinkleberry Funn the Raft Builder. And I brought supplies for us.”

  She pulled a bottle of wine, a box of crackers, and a container of assorted cheese slices from the bag.

  “Hagen will be over the moon, and I am, too. Have I told you lately that I love you?” Mira asked, getting up to grab two wineglasses.

  “I can stand to hear it again. Your brother is making me crazy,” Serena called after her.

  What else is new? She carried the wineglasses out to the deck. “Which brother?”

  “That would be Drake. No, Rick. Okay, both.” Serena tilted her head, listening to several car doors closing. “Who’s that?”

  “No idea. I’m not expecting anyone.”

  They stepped off the deck as Sky, Bella, Jenna, Amy, Leanna, Parker, Jana, and Jessica came around the side of the house, each carrying a colorful beach bag and wearing sundresses over bathing suits, like they’d just come from the beach, even though it was six o’clock.

  “I think we need more wine,” Serena said quietly.

  “There she is!” Jenna said when she spotted them. “We came to help with the co-op stuff. Seaside girls at your service!”

  “Really? All of you?” Mira was overwhelmed. “How did you even know I needed help?”

  The girls came around to the deck and began unloading their bags—laptops, towels, wine, plastic cups, paper plates, a big bag of M&M’s, and two tubes of cookie dough covered the middle of the table.

  “Matt said you were working on the materials for your trip,” Amy said, lining up the plastic cups with the two wineglasses. She struggled to open the wine bottle, and Bella took it from her hands.

  Bella opened the wine and poured everyone a drink. “We’re experts at all things presentation related, and weddings, too. The triple wedding is planned, catered, and ready to roll.” She turned to Serena, who was taking in all the commotion with a glint of amusement in her eyes.

  “I’m Bella, and you must be Serena, Mira’s BFF that we’ve all heard about. You’re so cute. Do you have a boyfriend?”

  “Um…?” Serena raised her brows.

  “Ignore her.” Parker, Grayson’s fiancée was a beautiful blond actress. Luckily, she didn’t have a stuck-up bone in her body. She wore very little makeup and her hair was pinned up in a high ponytail. “Bella’s the prankster of the group, and she’s sworn off playing tricks on Theresa, the property manager of Seaside and the woman who’s officiating our wedding ceremony, so Bella needs a project to keep her mind busy. Being a mom, running a work-study program for high schoolers, and hanging out with us just isn’t enough for her. She’s like Wonder Woman on Energizer batteries.”

  “In that case, please feel free to find me a worthy man,” Serena said with complete seriousness. “I like them tall, dark, and well hung.”

  “Oh Lord. You are Bella’s dream project.” Jessica swung her long dark hair over one shoulder and sank down to a chair. She’d been a professional violinist before she and Jamie had their son, Dustin. Unlike busy Bella, Jessica was thrilled to devote all of her time to her family.

  “I could hook you up with my brother Brock,” Jana offered. “I have no idea about the well hung thing—and have no interest in knowing—but girls love him. He owns a boxing club in Eastham. He taught me to fight.”

  “You fight? Mira, where have you been hiding these amazing women?” Serena lifted her glass of wine and said, “To finding me a man. I might just have to start with Brock.”

  They toasted, and Mira introduced Serena to each of the girls. Then, as if the wind had shifted, everyone began opening their laptops and pulling out notebooks and pens and talking about the co-op.

  Amy pointed a pen at Mira. “Tell us what you’ve got.”

  “Okay.” Mira took a deep breath, exhaling slowly as she glanced around the table. “But first I just have to say thank you. I have been stressing out over how I was going to get everything done.”

  “No more stressing,” Sky said. “It’s bad for your aura, and with us around, you’ll never have to stress again.”

  Mira had been friendly with the girls since she started working with Neil. Everyone associated with the Lacrouxs were like one big family. But each of them giving up their free evening to help her? She felt like she’d fallen into a sisterhood. Sisterhood of the Traveling Helpers, she mused.

  She explained what she was thinking of presenting, and they all took notes. “Basically, I need everything, but I can get away with a professional-looking outline of the business plan, lists of warehouses, including prices, locations, and restrictions. I also need to formalize the projected return-on-investment financials. I’ve got the numbers, but I’ll need to present different scenarios, like if we get five investors versus six, or four. I also think it would be wise to give them examples of other businesses who have successfully formed co-ops. Nothing speaks louder than proof that it works. I have my initial research notes, but they’re not in a format that I can present to anyone.” Her shoulders dropped in defeat. “There’s a lot to do, and Matt and I think we should try to make the trip soon, so the people who are interested don’t lose interest.”

  “Nail them down before they get off the couch,” Parker said. “That’s what they say in Hollywood.”

  Jana and Sky laughed.

  “Not like that!” Parker insisted, which made everyone laugh. “You guys have sex on the brain.”

  “Look at our men,” Bella said. “Look at your man. Do you blame us?”

  Parker blushed. “I do adore my soon-to-be husband.”

  “Ladies,” Leanna said loudly. “Less sex talk, more co-op talk.”

  They divvied up jobs and formed teams to work on each one. They were the most organized women Mira had ever worked with. When they were finished, Jenna set a list in the center of the table outlining what they’d discussed.

  “Amy and Mira, you’ll handle the financial documents. Sky, Leanna, and Bella will research warehouses in the areas we discussed. Parker and Serena will take care of formalizing the business plan you’ve already outlined, and Jana, Jessica, and I will formalize your research on co-ops and also find others to include in the report.” Her eyes danced around the table. “Deadline? Does next Friday work?”

  “Pfft.” Amy waved her hand. “Easy-peasy.”

  “Absolutely. And I’ll ask the business manager of my foundation for any tips he has, too.” Parker had created a very successful children’s foundation, and Mira knew her experience would be invaluable.


  “Thank you all so much,” Mira said. “You can’t even begin to imagine how relieved I am to have help. I feel better already.”

  “Good!” Sky reached for the cookie dough and tore the package open. “Now give us the scoop on you and my brother.”

  “Wait, I thought we were going to skinny-dip,” Amy said with a pouty face.

  “Skinny-dip? Here?” Mira and Serena exchanged a wide-eyed glance. “We can’t. Anyone could see us.”

  “Your beach isn’t private?” Jessica asked. “I’m not stripping down on a public beach.”

  Jenna’s hand shot up in the air. “To Parker’s!”

  “I’ve got the cookie dough!” Amy held the tubes over her head.

  A flurry of packing began as food, towels, and computers were put away.

  “Wait.” Mira looked around the table in confusion. “Why are we going skinny-dipping?”

  Parker flashed a mischievous smile. “Remember I told you about the initiation?”

  “I thought that was a joke,” Mira said, remembering the story Parker had told her about skinny-dipping for the first time in her life with the girls in the pond by Grayson’s house.

  “No joke, sweet cakes.” Jenna winked. “You’re a Seaside girl now by association. We were going to initiate you last summer, but then you and Matt looked like you were eventually going to hook up, so we thought we’d wait and do it all at once.”

  “Oh my God. I love you guys!” Serena said as she gathered her things. “Skinny-dipping! We haven’t done that since we were kids!”

  “Oh, so you have done this before?” Jana asked. “I knew Mira wasn’t as goody-goody as she seemed.” She held her hand up, and Mira halfheartedly high-fived her.

  “But now I’m a mother,” she pointed out. “It feels wrong to skinny-dip.”

  “Please. Five of us are mothers,” Jenna pointed out. “Now go lock up so you can be a fun mother with us.”

  As Mira locked up the house and met them out front, excitement crept in. By the time they arrived at Grayson and Parker’s house, it was dark out. Christmas, Parker’s English mastiff, bounded out his doggy door and followed them through the woods to the pond. The girls took turns loving him up.

  The other girls dropped their clothes as they walked along the pier, leaving a trail of sundresses and flip-flops. When they reached the end of the pier, they stripped naked, held hands, and jumped in, shrieking on the way down, sending Christmas into a barking, whining frenzy.

  Serena and Mira shrieked from the dock as the girls’ splashes soaked their clothes.

  “Chipples!” Jenna yelled as she broke the surface. “Get ready for chilly nipples!”

  One by one the girls’ heads popped out of the water and a plethora of shouts ensued. “Brr! Freezing! Hurry! Get in! Good thing we’re not guys. Our dingies would disappear!”

  They all laughed.

  “Come on!” Serena stripped off her clothes. “Hurry up! It’s cold.”

  Mira glanced at her best friend’s hairless body as she stripped out of her clothes, lulled by the excitement of the group. “You really do use Nair!”

  Serena rolled her eyes. “You never know when the right guy will come along. Now, hurry up!”

  “You have to hold hands! It’s tradition!” Bella yelled.

  Mira pushed aside the embarrassment of standing naked on the dock and grabbed her best friend’s hand.

  “It’s not tradition,” Jenna snapped through chattering teeth.

  “It is now,” Amy said.

  “Do I have to do something?” Mira asked. It was an initiation after all.

  “You already did,” Sky said. “You brought my brother home for the summer!”

  “But what if we break up?” The words flew from Mira’s lips out of fear of losing not just Matt, but all these glorious friends, too. “You’ll hate me and you will have already initiated me. Isn’t that against a rule or something?”

  “Come on, silly girl,” Parker said through chattering teeth. “Once Lacrouxs fall, they never look back.”

  “Trust the Lacroux way!” Sky urged. “Take a leap of faith.”

  A leap of faith. She remembered what Matt had said when she’d asked how they’d figure things out when he went back to Princeton after his sabbatical. We have to trust that we’ll both know what the right thing to do is when we get to that point.

  The girls in the water began chanting, “Jump! Jump! Jump!”

  Mira had made one giant leap of faith in her life—when she’d had Hagen. She looked out over the bobbing heads of her smiling friends, feeling like she’d become part of another, bigger family.

  Trust the Lacroux way! Take a leap of faith!

  She’d never regretted her first leap of faith, and as she and Serena jumped off the pier and sliced through the chipple-inducing water, she thought of Matt and knew she wouldn’t regret this one, either.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  MIRA WAS SURE she’d been fueled by lust and adrenaline for the past two weeks. It was Saturday afternoon, and they’d come to Pete and Jenna’s house to build Hagen’s raft. She and Jenna were hanging out on the beach with Bea while the guys worked in the yard. It felt good to have some downtime after working day and night since they’d made the decision to push forward with the co-op, and she could hardly believe they’d pulled off the first step and were leaving tomorrow to meet with prospective partners.

  Embarking on our next adventure.

  The girls had come through with every little detail, giving her more support than she ever imagined possible. And just as Matt had promised, he’d driven Hagen to camp every morning for two weeks, giving her time to do the things she needed to in order to garner interest and prepare. She’d ended up making fifty-four calls instead of twelve, but it had paid off. She’d scheduled five meetings with six potential partners. Luckily, the two in Boston agreed to meet with her at the same time. Matt had made arrangements with his family to fill in for her at the store while they were gone, and Neil had surprised them both by agreeing to it all. She didn’t know for sure, but she had a feeling that might have been because she and Matt were taking on this endeavor together. She knew how much Neil hoped Matt would decide to stay on the Cape and run the hardware store. But she knew Matt had no interest in taking it over. His eyes sparked with excitement when he talked about how much he enjoyed the process of writing. She couldn’t see him giving that up, regardless of how great a team they made—in the bedroom and out.

  “They’ve been at this all morning,” Jenna said. “Do you think Hagen will last?”

  The raft was a much bigger endeavor than Mira had imagined. Matt had wanted Hagen to experience the entire project from start to finish, and had taken Hagen, along with Neil and Pete, to purchase the supplies earlier that morning. Her little man was eating up every second of being included in guy stuff.

  “Definitely. He’s as excited about the raft as he is about our trip. Thank you again, by the way. I couldn’t have done it without all of you. I still can’t believe all of Matt’s siblings are going to help mind the store while we’re gone. That’s a huge relief.”

  “Everyone’s excited about your trip and what it’ll mean for Neil’s store. He put his life into Lacroux Hardware, and until you came along, it looked like it might not last after he retired,” Jenna said.

  “I can’t imagine his store not being there. He has such fond memories of his wife visiting him there, and all his kids as they were growing up. The store, and Neil, are also a huge part of the community. Guys come in who knew Neil when they were Hagen’s age. I hope we can pull the co-op together. This trip will make it or break it.”

  “I bet you have it all planned. If it were me, I’d have an itinerary a mile long, with everything mapped out, from the moment our plane touched down until we set our heads on the pillow at night. Including a list of outfits and accessories for each outing.” Jenna sighed. “That would be so fun.”

  “I’ve planned every detail of the meetings, but I’m so
nervous about them I think I’ll be lucky to get through them without passing out. If I had to plan a whole itinerary, I might lose my mind. Luckily, Hagen and Matt like to plan. We decided to drive, since it’s only a couple hours between cities. I asked them not to overschedule our days because pressure will make me even more nervous, so they planned the library visits, chose the hotels, and made lists of what they wanted to see in each city. They were so cute looking at all the websites together and making lists, then whittling them down to a reasonable number of things to see. I swear those two are so alike it’s mindboggling. We’re starting in Boston, then working our way down to Rhode Island, Connecticut, and New York, and seeing three of the four libraries Hagen and I had on our list. I just hope I can pull this off. I’ve never done anything like this before.”

  Mira shielded her eyes from the blazing sun, watching the men working in the yard. Matt was shirtless, his muscles glistening with perspiration, flexing under the weight of the wood he carried over his shoulder. He patted Hagen’s shoulder, and her son looked up from where he sat beside Neil, doing something on the ground. How could she ever have thought she could be careful with their hearts around the man who had owned them for so long?

  “You’ll do great,” Jenna said.

  Joey trotted toward them and plunked down beside Bea on a blanket. Bea giggled and the pup licked her cheek.

  “And as for Matt?” Jenna added. “You’re exactly what he needed. You and Hagen both are. Pete’s been looking forward to today since Matt first mentioned it. It’s been years since they’ve worked on a project together. I mean years. Up until this summer, Matt always spent summers teaching and working on his never-ending list of research papers. I swear that man’s got more published papers than half the professors in his field combined.”

  “I’m glad he took this time off. I feel like we’ve been trying not to think about dating since Grayson and Parker’s engagement party.”