by Cindy Kirk
“Hollis is marrying a great guy, Mom, so I think you can trust her decisions.” He pressed a kiss against her cheek. “Just enjoy the day.”
“I’ll do my best, but I still think they should have gotten married at Porter Lakeside—”
“I meant enjoy this one.” Ethan didn’t know whether to be amused or exasperated by his mother’s tenacity. Considering it was a trait she had passed on to both her children, he should probably go with amused.
“I just took a batch of blueberry scones out of the oven.” She pivoted toward the door. “I’ll bring a plate out to the patio if you care to join me.”
Ethan would rather have one of Mrs. Sweet’s cinnamon rolls, but he nodded. “I’ll be there in a minute.”
He walked to the desk and slid the scrapbook back into the drawer.
“Thanks, Dad,” Ethan whispered. “In a few weeks I’ll be starting one of my own.”
“Ethan!”
Ethan shook his head. The scones must be getting cold.
“I’m right here—” He pushed open the French doors leading onto the patio, and the first thing he saw was an enormous black Lab camped underneath the table.
His mother stood a safe distance away, as if she wasn’t sure whether the dog posed a threat to her or the scones. “I can’t get it to leave! Do you have any idea who that animal belongs to?”
Ethan scraped a hand across his jaw to hide a smile. “As a matter of fact, I do.” Thank you, Snap. “I’ll make sure he gets home.”
“I’m going inside.” His mother closed her eyes. “I feel a headache coming on. If you see Hollis, please remind her that we have a list of things to accomplish today.”
“I will.” Ethan clapped. “Let’s go, Snap.”
The Lab zigzagged through the woods as Ethan made his way to Mac’s house. The scent of bacon—so much better than scones—filtered through the screen in Coach’s kitchen window as Ethan rapped on the back door.
A barefoot Mac appeared a moment later. She wore a T-shirt and denim shorts and the same guarded look Ethan had seen on her face when he’d stumbled upon her in the gazebo the day he arrived in Red Leaf.
“I think this belongs to you.”
“Snap.” Mac yanked the door open and the Lab shuffled past her. “He doesn’t usually leave the yard when I let him out in the morning. He didn’t get into any trouble, did he?”
“Are you kidding? He saved me from having to eat a blueberry scone. Now I can sneak into town and buy one of Mrs. Sweet’s cinnamon rolls.”
“Get one for me!” a voice sang out.
Ethan blinked. “Is that Hollis?”
“They came over a little while ago.” Mac’s reluctance was obvious as she ushered him down the hallway and into the kitchen, where his sister and her soon-to-be husband sat at a table in the breakfast nook.
“Well, this explains why Mom couldn’t find you.”
Hollis had the grace to look guilty. “I promised her that I would go through her wedding checklist this afternoon, but Connor and I made a list of our own.”
Ethan glanced at the empty plates. “Starting with breakfast at the neighbor’s?”
“That was an added bonus.” Connor smiled at Mac.
“We want to take the canoe out to Granite Rock this morning, so I asked Mac if she minded interviewing me on the way there,” Hollis explained.
Ethan’s gaze shifted to Mac. “So you’re working from a canoe this morning instead of your office?”
“A reporter has to be flexible.” A smile chased through Mac’s eyes and Ethan realized that was what he wanted to see.
Hmmm. Maybe he’d start a list too.
“Connor has never paddled a canoe,” Hollis whispered, even though her fiancé was sitting right next to her. “He’s a city boy.”
“I’ve never climbed a tree, either, or caught crayfish under the dock,” Connor confessed cheerfully.
“I haven’t been in a canoe for years,” Ethan murmured.
“You should come with us, then.” Hollis rose. “Mac was just telling us that she would see you doing cannonballs off the side of Granite Rock.”
Ethan looked at her with interest. “You did?”
“You can see it from the deck.” Mac collected the empty coffee mugs from the table. She didn’t look at him but Ethan felt a surge of satisfaction when her freckles turned pink.
Check.
“So.” Hollis dipped her paddle into the water as Mac steered the canoe away from the dock. “What do you want to know first?”
Mac wanted to know what had happened to the Hollis Channing who’d dropped her wet towel on Mac’s clothes in the locker room after PE, forcing her to go to history class looking like she’d taken a shower with her clothes on. The one who ran for class president just so she could lobby for full-length mirrors in the girls’ bathroom.
When Ethan’s sister had marched into the church nursery, Mac was sure she was about to be fired. Hollis’s unexpected appearance had been as disconcerting as the hug that followed.
Over Hollis’s shoulder, Annie had given Mac a see-I-told-you-people-can-change smile.
Mac wasn’t sure about that. Until Hollis had shown up at Mac’s door that morning, her ponytail threaded through the back of an old baseball cap and not a speck of makeup on, her celebrity fiancé in tow.
“Well,” Mac said slowly, “when it comes to wedding stories, everyone wants to know how you met.”
“At a hospital fund-raiser . . . What? You look surprised.”
“I thought you were going to say you met at a club or a swanky party.”
“No swanky parties for me.” Hollis chuckled. “Running your own business doesn’t give you much time to socialize. I’d been away on a business trip, previewing a new clothing line for Crush—that’s the boutique I own—so I was late for the dinner.
“Ethan never mentioned he’d met Connor, let alone that they’d become friends. He squeezed in another chair at the table and Connor and I . . .” Hollis paused, searching for the right word.
“Clicked?”
“More like rubbed each other the wrong way. Connor was so standoffish. Whenever I tried to start up a conversation, he would get this strange look on his face.”
“What kind of look?”
“The look a person would have if a window mannequin started talking,” Hollis muttered.
Mac laughed and Hollis joined in.
“Poor Ethan.” Hollis shook her head. “He couldn’t understand why we weren’t getting along.”
“So you’re saying it wasn’t love at first sight.”
“More like second sight. I decided to throw a party for Ethan when he finished his residency at Midland Medical, and he put Connor’s name on the guest list.
“I’d spent weeks planning it, but the day of the party, everything went wrong. A freak storm buried the city in about a foot of snow. The caterer’s delivery truck slid off the road on the way to my condo and ruined everything.”
“No.” Mac pulled in a breath, imagining Hollis’s reaction.
“It gave a whole new meaning to the term fusion cooking, that’s for sure. I thought I’d have to cancel the dinner, but at about two o’clock someone knocked on my door. It was Connor, looking like the abominable snowman.
“He’d raided his pantry and managed to convince a very reluctant taxi driver to drop him off a few blocks from my condo. We made spaghetti and canned green beans and garlic bread out of hot dog buns for the people who braved the weather. By the time Connor served those little frosted animal cookies for dessert, I was already halfway in love with him.”
Mac knew their subscribers would love that story. “How did he propose?”
To Mac’s astonishment, Hollis blushed. “I . . . um . . . I kind of proposed to him.”
“You proposed. To him.”
“It was obvious Connor wasn’t going to do it,” Hollis said candidly. “So I decided the situation called for extreme measures.”
“He didn’t want to
get married?”
“Of course he did. It just took a little time to get him to come around to my way of thinking.” Hollis flashed her cheerleader smile. “When Connor finally said yes, I didn’t want him to change his mind . . . hence the very short engagement.”
“But . . .” Mac was still trying to wrap her mind around the fact that Hollis had proposed. “How? What did you say to him?”
“I’m afraid it wasn’t the most romantic proposal,” Hollis confessed. “I told Connor he was being an id—stubborn—and that I was afraid of the future, too, but as long as we were together, it would be perfect.”
Perfect.
Mac had her perfect future in mind too.
Red Leaf would be a place to take a creative break from her career as an award-winning journalist, not her permanent home.
Her gaze strayed to Ethan, laughing with Connor as their canoe cut a straight line through the center of the lake. He’d made his mark on the football field in high school and now he’d returned to Red Leaf as a doctor. A doctor. While Mac was still writing about the secret life of tomatoes.
Hollis’s cell phone chirped and her face lit up when she looked at the screen. “I’ve been tracking my wedding dress, and according to this message, it’s scheduled to be delivered at ten o’clock. I want to surprise my mother, so I should be there to sign for it.”
“That’s all right.” Mac felt a stab of disappointment. “We can finish the interview later. I should get back to work too.”
“You are working! Ethan said something about your editor wanting all the prewedding details. I would think a sneak peek at the wedding dress would qualify.” Hollis leaned forward and rested the canoe paddle across her knees. “Trust me. You’re going to want to see Mom’s reaction when I show her my wedding gown.”
“Because it’s . . . simple?” Mac guessed.
“Because it’s the laciest, puffiest, gaudiest dress you’ve ever seen.”
For all the changes she’d seen in Hollis Channing, the girl couldn’t do gaudy. “And you . . . like . . . it?”
“Mom picked it out.”
“But you just said it was going to be a surprise.” Remembering details was part of Mac’s job.
“Oh, it will be.” Hollis giggled. “I sneaked it out of Mom’s closet before we left.”
“You’re wearing your mother’s wedding dress?”
“Sometimes”—Hollis’s solemn tone was a counterbalance to the laughter in her eyes—“you do crazy things for the people you love.”
Things like delivering food in a snowstorm.
Mac couldn’t help but feel a pinch of envy.
“Change of plans, guys!” Hollis stood up and set the canoe rocking as she waved her arms to get their attention. “Time to go back!”
Connor and Ethan waved to acknowledge they’d gotten the message, but instead of heading to shore, they paddled in Hollis and Mac’s direction.
Hollis sat down. “Do you mind switching places with Connor for the trip back?”
“Switch places?” Panic flared inside Mac. “Why?”
“There’s something I have to talk to him about before we get to the house.”
Mac flicked a glance at the canoe cutting toward them through the water. Connor Blake might have the sculpted perfection of a leading man with his tawny hair and sapphire-blue eyes, but Mac didn’t experience even the tiniest blip in her heart rate when she looked at him.
But Ethan . . . well, she should carry one of those portable defibrillators in her pocket.
Which was why Mac had decided it would be better if she avoided him.
Unfortunately, avoiding Ethan didn’t seem to prevent her from thinking about Ethan. And thinking about Ethan had stirred up memories.
Only this time they weren’t painful high school memories.
They were memories of the way Ethan’s arms had tightened around her after he’d carried her over the touchdown line. The flash of heat in his eyes that raised the temperature in the air around them.
Dangerous memories now that Mac was so close to achieving her goal of leaving Red Leaf.
Hollis must have sensed her reluctance because she tilted her head. “Is there a reason why you don’t want to be in a canoe with my brother?”
“No.” Not one she could admit to, anyway.
Hollis dropped her voice as Ethan’s canoe drew closer. “I’m sorry, Mackenzie.”
Mac smiled. “For wanting to spend more time with your fiancé? I think that kind of goes with the territory.”
“For not being a very nice person in high school,” Hollis said in a low voice. “To be honest, I don’t think I was a very nice person until I met Connor. But love . . . it changes things.”
Ethan reached out to steady Mac as she climbed into his canoe. He wasn’t sure why Connor and Mac had switched places, but the situation couldn’t have worked out better if he’d planned it.
Although the saucy wink Hollis gave him behind Mac’s back when she and Connor’s canoe glided away made him wonder if his little sister didn’t have a plan of her own.
He steered closer to the shoreline and Mac frowned. “When you said detour, I didn’t realize we were going to portage the canoe.”
“We’re not.” Ethan peered over the side of the canoe. “Do you see that weed bed? Dad and I used to fish right here on Saturday mornings. We’d get up early and sneak out of the house before Mom and Hollis got up and—” Ethan’s throat closed suddenly, unexpectedly, sealing off the rest of the words. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be,” Mac said softly. “Is that why you didn’t come back? Because there were too many memories?”
Ethan wished he could say yes, because that would mean he was a sensitive guy. The kind of guy who’d been guided by his heart instead of blind ambition.
The kind of guy a woman like Mac would respect. But she respected honesty, too, so Ethan told the truth.
“I didn’t want to come back,” Ethan finally said. “My plan was to graduate at the top of my class in medical school and get a spot on Dr. Langley’s team at Midland Medical.”
“What changed your mind?”
The only way Ethan could answer that question was by asking one of his own. “What do you remember about my dad?”
The tiny pucker between Mac’s eyes deepened. “When I was in first grade, I fell off my bike and skinned my knee. I saw your dad in the checkout line at the hardware store and I ran up to him to show him what happened.
“There were people in line but he knelt down right there and examined it, then he wrote something down on a piece of paper and handed it to me.” A memory warmed her smile. “It was a prescription for a hot fudge sundae.”
That sounded like his dad, all right.
“Dad finished his residency at Midland, too, but he didn’t want to stay, let alone work in the trauma unit. Some doctors don’t like the stress of never knowing what’s coming through those doors, how you always have to be at the top of your game, but I thrived on the adrenaline rush.
“Last winter there was a three-car pileup on the interstate. We were told to prepare for multiple injuries, some of them life threatening.” The night had become permanently etched in Ethan’s mind. “I wanted to show off my stuff to Dr. Langley and prove that I could handle the situation, but first I had to examine a guy who came into the ER. He had a high fever and complained of fatigue.
“He said he’d gone through cancer treatments two years ago, and I could tell he was worried it had returned. But I blew it off. Told him he probably had the flu and handed him over to a nurse as fast as I could . . . and then I forgot about him.”
“There were other people who needed you.” Mac waded into the silence.
Ethan’s lips twisted. “We had enough help that night. I made a decision based on my best interests. Five or six hours went by before I even remembered to ask about my patient—and I couldn’t even remember the guy’s name. Bed Two. That’s what I called him. The nurse told me he’d been admitted for furthe
r testing, and I couldn’t shake the feeling that I should check on him.
“It was four in the morning but he wasn’t asleep. He was sitting up in bed and he looked at me . . . and I could tell he’d been having a rough night. But you know what he did?” The memory roughened Ethan’s voice. “He asked how I was doing. That was supposed to be my line. We ended up talking until the sun came up, and before I left, he asked if he could pray with me.
“For the first time in ten years, I actually took a day off to get my head on straight. I’d worked so hard to be like my dad—to honor his memory—but I forgot what it was that made him a great doctor. He always saw the whole person, not just a symptom or a disease.”
Without closing his eyes, Ethan could see the waves on Lake Michigan reshaping the shoreline while something was at work on the inside, reshaping his priorities. “I asked God what I was supposed to do, and a few days later I got a call from Dr. Heath. I knew what I wanted to do—but I had to decide who I wanted to be.”
Mac was silent for so long, Ethan started to wonder if he shouldn’t have been quite that honest. But when he dared a glance at her, she wasn’t looking at him.
Mac’s gaze remained fixed on the water, her slim shoulders set in a tense line. When she finally spoke, her voice barely broke above a whisper. “The patient in Bed Two. Did you ever see him again?”
Ethan smiled. “He’s marrying my sister on Saturday.”
“How are you doing on my front-page story, Mac?”
“Great.” Mac closed her laptop so Grant wouldn’t see that the only thing on the screen was the cursor, blinking out a measured SOS that couldn’t quite keep up with the erratic beating of her heart.
It wasn’t that she didn’t have material for the second installment of the Channing-Blake wedding story. Mac had been trailing Hollis around Red Leaf for the past two days, checking things off the list. She took photographs of her and Connor sampling cupcakes at the bakery. Listened to Hollis and Amanda Greer, the owner of The Shy Violet, reminisce while she chose the flowers for her bridal bouquet.
It was the story behind the story that was giving Mac a serious case of writer’s block.