The Promise of Lightning

by Linda Seed

  Usually when she had animals hospitalized overnight, she had a vet tech on duty to care for them, but with just the one—and a small one, at that—it would be easy enough to do it herself.

  She was doing Drew and Eddie a favor, so of course it was reasonable to accept some kind of gesture in exchange.

  So, the trill of excitement fluttering around in her chest could just calm the hell down.

  They walked side by side toward the East Village, where the tourist-oriented art galleries, wine tasting shops, and souvenir boutiques stood side by side with the pharmacy, the bank, and other businesses catering mostly to locals.

  At Bridge Street, they made a left and headed up to The Café, where they ordered turkey and avocado sandwiches and sat in the shade of the back patio to eat.

  They started with the easy stuff.

  “How did you become a vet?” Drew asked as he dug into his sandwich.

  She started at the beginning, with the story about how she’d gotten a toy doctor kit for Christmas when she was six, and instead of practicing medicine on her family members, she’d treated the imaginary ailments and injuries of her stuffed animals and the family cat.

  She’d always loved animals, and had pressed her parents for more and more of them until their house had been teeming with a dog, two cats, a hamster, a bird, and three mice.

  It hadn’t surprised anyone when she’d announced her intention to study veterinary medicine in college. She’d gone to UC Davis, intending to come to the aid of the dogs and cats of the greater Los Angeles area, where she’d grown up.

  But something happened to her when she got to Davis. In the rural, green expanses of Northern California, she’d finally felt that she could breathe again after a lifetime of never realizing she couldn’t.

  She’d fallen in love with the space, the colors of nature, the fresh, smog-free air.

  After she’d done an internship with a veterinary practice that worked mostly with farm animals, she’d fallen in love with that, too.

  “I dreaded telling my mom that I wouldn’t be going back to Southern California after I got my doctorate,” she told Drew. “She cried.”

  But Megan knew she couldn’t live her life based on what her parents wanted, so she’d settled up north—first in Sacramento, working for another vet’s practice, and then, once she’d gained enough experience to open her own, in Cambria.

  “Is that how you met Liam?” Drew delivered the question casually, but he watched her carefully as she answered.

  “It is. I started doing work for the Delaneys, treating the cattle and the horses, months before I met Liam. Then, when he came to Cambria for his uncle’s funeral, we ran into each other while I was on the ranch to take a look at a dehydrated calf.”

  What she didn’t tell Drew was that they hadn’t just “run into” each other. Liam knew how to take care of a dehydrated calf; you didn’t spend as much time as he had on a ranch without figuring out that much. But he’d used the calf as a pretense for getting her out to the ranch after one of the hands had told him that the new vet in town was young, female, and hot. Liam had confessed as much once they’d been dating for a few weeks, but it didn’t seem helpful to recount the story now.

  “The funeral,” Drew said.

  “Yes. Liam was out here from Montana.”

  Drew nodded slowly. “Yeah. I was here, too.”

  “I know. Liam talked about you.”

  “Not in positive terms, I’ll bet.”

  The subject of how Drew and Liam didn’t get along was problematic, because if they thought about that, they would have to think about how much worse the two of them would get on if Liam knew that Drew was here now, with Megan.

  Megan picked a piece of lettuce off of her sandwich and changed the subject.

  “It was probably the stress of the flight that made Eddie sick,” she told him. “I’ll bet you flew economy class, right?” He was a Delaney, if not by name, then by DNA, and the Delaneys flew economy. Except for Colin, who had more of a taste for life’s luxuries than the rest of his family.

  “Yeah, on Delta,” he confirmed.

  She gave him a wry smile and shook her head. “Your inheritance was, what? In the hundreds of millions?” She raised a hand in a stop gesture. “No, don’t tell me. It’s none of my business. It’s just, why economy? Why not first class? For that matter, why not a private charter flight? I know why the rest of the Delaneys don’t do those kinds of things. They’ve got this ethic of regular-person thriftiness. Except for Colin. But you …” She gestured vaguely at him. “You were working-class, and then you came into a fortune. I’d expect you to be throwing it around a little. I know I would.”

  She knew she was prying, but the question had been nagging at her, and it felt good to get it out there.

  Drew sat with the remains of his sandwich on a plate in front of him, his elbows on the table, one hand entwined in his hair. He raised his eyebrows and looked at her in a way that made her insides feel hot and soft.

  “You know, I’m not entirely sure.” He plucked a slice of pickle off of his plate, popped it into his mouth, and chewed thoughtfully. “I always thought that if I ever won the lottery or something, I’d do what you said. Throw it around a little.”

  “But?”

  “But, I don’t know … I guess it still doesn’t seem real. Any of it. The money, being a Delaney, finding out my dad isn’t really my father …” He shook his head. “It was a shock. At first, I guess I didn’t do anything with the money because I was waiting for it to sink in. And it still kind of hasn’t. Besides, I didn’t earn it.”

  “But don’t you need to invest it, or … I don’t know. Whatever somebody does with that kind of money.”

  “That’s what Colin keeps telling me. Over and over.” He laughed. “I’m going to give that guy gray hair.”

  Megan looked at him with wide-eyed surprise. “But how can you … You must get people calling you, asking for money. Salespeople, charities, long-lost relatives …”

  “Every day,” he said. “I’ve had to change my phone number twice.”

  “But …”

  “I know it doesn’t make sense to you. It doesn’t make sense to me, either. But when I think about doing something with the money, I just kind of freeze up. I can’t make myself do it. Like if I take a first-class flight it means my dad—the one who raised me—never mattered.” He shrugged and looked at the table instead of at her.

  “But he did matter.” Megan reached across the table and put her hand on top of his. “The inheritance was Redmond’s way of saying that you mattered, too, even if he couldn’t tell you that.”

  He looked down at where her hand lay atop his, and they both fell silent. Suddenly, Megan was keenly aware of that touch, that point of connection between them. She felt herself blush, and she pulled her hand away.

  Chapter Eleven

  The moment she touched him—that was what did it. That was when he knew he was going to kiss her, even if she was still with Liam, even if kissing her would upset both of their families, even if kissing her would upend his world and break his heart and leave destruction in its wake. The only thing that was going to stop him was if she didn’t want him, and he knew she did. He could see it in the way she looked at him, and he could feel it in the electric charge of her hand on his.

  He couldn’t kiss her now, on a restaurant patio full of people, some of whom might know her and some of whom might be willing and even eager to spread the news of it to everyone they knew—including Liam. He wouldn’t do that, because he wanted the kiss, when it came, to be wholly positive for her, wholly good.

  So, he couldn’t kiss her now. But he would, and soon. He knew it as sure as he knew the yearnings of his own heart.

  He got his chance about a half-hour later when he took her back to her office. He walked her inside, and she turned to head toward the back room to check on Eddie. As she started to go, he caught her hand in his. She turned to him questioningly, and he pulled her
into his arms and kissed her.

  Given the fact that he’d decided to do it more than thirty minutes before, and that he’d been thinking about it for all that time, the kiss could have failed to meet expectations. It could have paled in comparison to the way it had felt in his fond imaginings.

  But it didn’t. It exceeded his expectations in ways that he couldn’t have anticipated. The feel of her mouth as she melted against him and responded to him, the scent of her skin, the taste of her lips and her tongue, the way she brought her arms around him and tangled her fingers in his hair—all of it combined not only to arouse him, but also to change his world view.

  After Tessa, he’d thought that he would likely never get into a serious relationship again. He would date, yes. He would have women in his life. He wasn’t about to close that door. But he’d thought that after the disaster of his marriage and its subsequent dissolution, he would never share his life with anyone, would never make himself that vulnerable to another person again.

  But now, with Megan in his arms, with her warm body pressed up against his, something in him recognized something in her. It was as though he’d known her all along and simply hadn’t realized it. As though he’d been waiting for her. And now, as he kissed her, he thought, There you are. I’d have known you anywhere.

  After a long moment, they pulled apart. Drew didn’t want to let her go—not now, not ever again.

  She looked at him with her eyes half closed, still languid from the luxury of the kiss.

  “Oh,” she said.

  “Megan ...” He didn’t know what he was about to say. Was he planning to apologize? Not likely. He wasn’t sorry, couldn’t ever be sorry. Was he planning to explain himself? How could he explain what he was feeling? And he certainly couldn’t tell her what he’d just experienced—that sense of having found someone he’d been looking for since the day he was born.

  So he just left the word sitting there, untouched. Just the sound of her name.

  “I ... I’d better go check on Eddie,” she said, and disappeared into the back room.

  Megan closed the door behind her, separating her from Drew, and slapped a hand to her mouth.

  “Oh, God.”

  Had she really just done that? Had she really just kissed another man while she was still with Liam? She wasn’t that person, the kind who did such things. She had a firm self-image, one that didn’t include making out with her boyfriend’s cousin on the sly.

  And yet.

  What she’d felt when Drew had kissed her—had she ever felt anything like that with a man before? Had she ever felt that jolt from the top of her head down to the ends of her toes, like her entire body was completely, gloriously on fire?

  Oh, she was in trouble.

  She reminded herself that she’d come into the room for Eddie, and she went to his cage, where she found the cat sleeping in relative peace. She opened the cage door and stroked him gently, without waking him.

  What was she going to do?

  She had to break up with Liam, obviously. And she was going to do that, just as she’d planned. But what then? If she took up with Drew now, everyone would think she’d split with Liam so she could be with Drew. That would ruin her relationship with the Delaneys. And she didn’t want to think about how much trouble it would cause between Liam and Drew. The two of them were family, whether they chose to acknowledge it or not. And she didn’t want to be a wedge between family.

  But, God, was there any way she could walk away from Drew after what she’d just experienced? After what she’d just felt?

  Megan’s pulse was pounding, and she didn’t want to go back out there until it slowed.

  She pulled her phone out of her back pocket and texted Breanna.

  He kissed me!!!

  In a moment, Breanna responded:

  I hope you're talking about Liam.

  Megan responded with the red-faced emoji of shame.

  Oh, boy, Breanna wrote back.

  By the time Megan emerged into the front room, she was half hoping that Drew had gone. But there he was, with such a look of hope and yearning on his face that it made Megan want to cradle him in her arms.

  Which she absolutely was not going to do.

  “I think you should go,” she said.

  He shifted awkwardly from one foot to the other. “Oh. Did I read the signals wrong? Because—”

  “You didn’t,” she told him. “But I still think you should go.”

  He looked at his feet and nodded. “I’ll check in on Eddie tomorrow.”

  When he was gone, she felt the loss like an injury, like a physical thing.

  Her phone buzzed in her pocket, and she pulled it out to find a new text from Breanna.

  You’re getting yourself into a mess, it said.

  No kidding, she thought.

  Drew left Megan’s office wondering what he was doing. He didn’t want a relationship with anyone, let alone his cousin’s girlfriend. But what his brain thought he wanted and what the entire rest of his being was urging him to do were two different things.

  He hadn’t planned on forging a close relationship with the Delaneys, but he didn’t want to make sworn enemies of them, either. If he went after Megan—really went after her in earnest, not just a lunch and a kiss—then not only would Liam have to kick his ass, but Drew would have to let him do it, because he would deserve it.

  He needed to talk to someone about all of this, but he didn’t have anyone he could confide in. If he told Julia about what had just happened, she’d be pissed that he was stirring up trouble with her future in-laws. He had friends on Salt Spring Island, but no one he talked to about his family situation.

  Here in Cambria, the people who were most friendly to him were Delaneys, and he couldn’t spill his secrets to any of them.

  Except maybe one of them. Especially one of them who’d already guessed about his feelings for Megan.

  He considered that option, rejected it, and then considered it again.

  What did he have to lose, really?

  He got into his car and headed toward the ranch.

  Sandra was outside in her garden when Drew got there. She was harvesting tomatoes from vines that were planted in neat rows, each one surrounded by a wire cage that supported the weight of the fat, ripe tomatoes. She was wearing jeans and sneakers, and a wide-brimmed straw hat protected her face from the sun. A pair of gloves and a selection of gardening tools sat on the ground nearby, and she held a five-gallon bucket for the tomatoes. Another bucket stood next to the tools, and Drew saw that it was half filled with weeds she’d pulled from around the foot of each plant.

  “Hey,” Drew said. He stood there awkwardly, with his hands in the pockets of his jeans.

  “Well, hey yourself,” Sandra replied.

  He approached her and peered into the bucket of tomatoes. “Those look good,” he said.

  She let out a grunt. “I guess they’ll do. A damned sight better than last year’s crop, I’ll tell you that. Those had blight, and the hornworms got ‘em. You let hornworms get a foothold, and they’ll eat any damned thing that’s not nailed down.”

  Despite Sandra’s tirade about hornworms, she seemed to be in a fine mood—at least for Sandra. Everyone else was in Morro Bay on the boat trip, so things were quiet around the ranch except for the sounds of the birds chasing each other around the fence posts that surrounded the garden.

  The sun was warm, and a gentle breeze that smelled of the ocean rustled the grass and the branches of a huge sycamore tree that towered over the house.

  “You might as well help me pick these tomatoes while you decide whether you’re going to come out with it,” Sandra told him, gesturing toward the plants.

  “Come out with what?”

  “Well, how the hell would I know that, boy? It’s your story, not mine.”

  He positioned himself at a plant near the one where she was working, and began to pick tomatoes.

  “Not those.” She pointed at the one in his hand.
“That one needed a little more time on the vine. There should be a little give when you press on them, like this one, here.” She showed him a tomato from the bucket to demonstrate.

  He turned his attention back to the plant and began inspecting tomatoes for ripeness. He picked one and held it out toward her.

  She gave him a crisp nod. “That’s more like it.”

  They worked together side by side in silence for a few minutes before he told her what was on his mind.

  “I … might have kissed Megan. Today, at her office.” He kept his eyes on the plant in front of him, avoiding looking at Sandra.

  She let out a hoot. “You might have? Well, if you don’t know for sure, then you probably didn’t do it right, by God.”

  He shrugged. “I do know for sure. I was just trying to make it sound better than it is.”

  “Did she kiss you back?” Sandra wanted to know.

  “I’d rather not say.”

  “Well, why not?”

  “It would be … ungentlemanly, I guess.”

  “Well, I suppose you’re right.” Sandra considered that. “I’m thinking she did kiss you back. I saw how she looked at you back at the house. Plus, if she’d shown you the door, I guess the whole thing would be in the past and you and I wouldn’t be having this conversation.” She pulled a tomato off the vine and deposited it into the bucket.

  “The thing is … I don’t like Liam.”

  “Well, that’s about the most poorly kept secret I’ve ever heard.” She cackled.

  “But … just because I don’t like him doesn’t mean I want to hurt him. Guys aren’t supposed to do that to each other, whether we like each other or not.”

  She straightened up from where she’d been bent over a plant and faced him with her hands on her narrow hips. “Seems sensible enough. So why’d you go and do it, then?”

  Why had he? Was it simple lust? Lack of impulse control? Hostility toward Liam? Or something else?

  “I just … I think she’s the one.” He hadn’t known he was going to say it until it was already out of his mouth.