The Summer House

by Susan Mallery

  Praise for the authors of THE SUMMER HOUSE

  SUSAN MALLERY

  “Susan Mallery is warmth and wit personified. Always a fabulous read.”

  —New York Times bestselling author Christina Dodd

  “Ms. Mallery’s unique writing style shines via vivid characters, layered disharmony and plenty of spice.”

  —Romantic Times

  “If you haven’t read Susan Mallery, you must!”

  —New York Times bestselling author Suzanne Forster

  TERESA SOUTHWICK

  “Ms. Southwick’s fetching characters and emotional impact keep reader interest high.”

  —Romantic Times

  “Teresa Southwick dishes up effective romantic tension and good character interplay.”

  —Romantic Times

  Susan Mallery

  Teresa Southwick

  THE SUMMER HOUSE

  CONTENTS

  MARRYING MANDY

  Letter to Reader

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  COURTING CASSANDRA

  Letter to Reader

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  SUSAN MALLERY

  is the USA TODAY bestselling author of nearly fifty books for Harlequin and Silhouette, as well as mainstream and historical romances. Frequently appearing on bestseller lists, she makes her home in the Pacific Northwest with her handsome prince of a husband and her two adorable-but-not-bright cats.

  TERESA SOUTHWICK

  lives in California with her husband of twenty-five years and has two handsome sons. Reading has been her passion since she was a girl, and she couldn’t be more delighted that her dream of writing full-time has come true. She has written over fifteen books for Silhouette, and has also written historical romance novels under the same name.

  MARRYING MANDY

  Susan Mallery

  Dear Reader,

  My writing career began in January 1989 when I walked into my first writing class. It was given at a local adult education center and the teacher was the only published author I had ever met. It was darned exciting, I have to tell you. We went around the room and each said what we’d written to date. I’ll admit I was proud of my fifty pages. Then a woman sitting behind me announced she’d written an eight-hundred-page book. Wow!

  The class was eight weeks long and by week six, I knew I’d found what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. I also made some friends in that class, one of whom joined me in a critique group where we read each other’s work and offered advice. That friendship, begun all those years ago, continues today.

  Teresa Southwick is the woman who wrote that eight-hundred-page historical romance. Those of you who have read her books know that she usually writes for Silhouette Romance. Now she is also writing for Silhouette Special Edition.

  Terry and I came up with the idea of writing a book together—one about two girlfriends sharing a summer vacation at a fabulous beach house. They have great plans for a “girls only” break, but romance is in the air and two handsome men have other plans for our friends.

  Please enjoy your chance to get away from winter for a little California sun in our very special 2-in-1 book.

  All the best,

  Chapter One

  “If the sex was amazing, why wouldn’t you want to see him again?”

  Mandy Carter held the phone at arm’s length and stared at the receiver. No way she’d heard what she thought she’d heard. It wasn’t possible.

  “You can’t know anything about our sex life,” she said as she tucked the receiver back into place between her ear and the crook of her neck. “And if you do, I don’t want to know about it.”

  On the other end of the phone, Joanne Benson laughed softly. “I know a lot more than you think I do.”

  “That scares me. I’m sorry, Jo, but talking to my ex-mother-in-law about my former sexual relationship with her son is just too weird for me.”

  There was another chuckle. “Your generation thinks it’s so hip and together, but the reality is you’re all a bunch of prudes. I came of age during the sixties and I have to tell you, that was a real sexual revolution.”

  “I can only imagine,” Mandy muttered, not really wanting to.

  “So…was it amazing?”

  Mandy threw down the granny square she was trying to crochet as part of a baby blanket for yet another pregnant co-worker. “You’re making me crazy.”

  “Then answer the question. I know what Rick said. I’m curious about your take on things.”

  Mandy was suddenly curious, as well. What exactly had Rick said about their sex life? Or was this all a bluff on Jo’s part? After all, mother and son might be very close, but Mandy doubted they’d actually talked about his sexual escapades.

  “I’m changing the subject,” she said firmly.

  “Fine. Change away. Or let me change it for you. If you don’t want to talk about sex, why don’t you at least get in touch with him? It’s been a long time. You two used to be friends. Wouldn’t you like that back?”

  Be friends with her ex-husband? “I don’t know,” Mandy said honestly. “I’ve done fine without him this long.”

  Mandy and Rick had met and married nine years ago. They’d divorced less than a year later. In all the time since, she’d never once spoken with him. Oh, she knew about his life. Being close friends with his mother meant that she was kept abreast of all his successes. She knew that he’d completed his Ph.D. program in record time, that he’d parlayed his genius in the world of laser physics into an incredibly lucrative career. That six years and multiple money making patents later, he’d quit to take on a different kind of challenge. He was currently working for some exclusive high-tech think tank in Santa Barbara.

  She also knew there had been several close calls but no second marriage.

  “You’re going to practically be neighbors,” Jo said lightly. “Have lunch with him. What would it hurt?”

  Mandy was less concerned about pain than how strange it would be. But she thought a lot of Jo and didn’t want to disappoint her friend. “You’re not matchmaking, are you?”

  “Of course not. That is so not my style. However, I will admit that I think it’s interesting neither of you has remarried. I can’t help wondering if there’s some unfinished business between you and Rick. If so, a lunch might help you both to move on. If nothing else, I would like two people I care about very much to at least be speaking to each other.”

  “Fair enough,” Mandy said, only a little concerned about meeting with her ex. But what was there to worry about? She and Rick hadn’t seen each other in eight years. She never thought about the man, except when Jo mentioned him.

  Besides, Jo had a valid point. She had remained friends with her son’s ex, while maintaining a close, loving relationship with him. Most divorcing couples argued over ownership of pets or custody of children, but Mandy and Rick had been forced to deal with sharing Jo. After years of not having a mother, Mandy hadn’t been willing to end a relationship with her charming, caring mother-in-law, not even with a pending divorce on the horizon. Rick was close to his mother and had been unwilling to break ties with her, as well. In the end, they’d agreed they would both have relationships with her, even if they didn’t have one with each other.

  For the past eight years, Jo had been a rock for Mandy. A confidante, someone to have fun with. A real and loving frien
d. Which made Mandy unable to refuse the request, even if it did sound strange.

  “I’m staying in Carpinteria for a month,” Mandy said. “That’s only about twenty minutes from Santa Barbara. I promise to get in touch with him while I’m there. If he’s willing to have lunch, then we’ll break bread together. Does that make you happy?”

  “Ecstatic. I’m all aquiver.”

  Electrons were tricky, Rick Benson reminded himself as he scanned the printout of the latest test and saw the experiment hadn’t produced the results they had anticipated. This was a third no-go, which meant he would not be recommending funding. He initialed the top of the report, scribbled comments in the margin and made a mental note to prepare for the outrage that would follow his decision.

  He knew this project was one of the board’s favorites, but if they didn’t want to know his opinion, they shouldn’t have bothered to ask him.

  The phone next to him buzzed. He hit the intercom button.

  “Benson.”

  “Hey, Rick. Two things. John Samuel called again. He wants to know if you have a recommendation yet.”

  Rick shoved the report into his out basket. “Tell him I have one, but he’s not going to like it.”

  Clara, his secretary, winced. “Maybe I’ll wait until I know he’s in a meeting, then leave it on his voice mail.”

  Rick grinned. “Chicken.”

  “You bet. I hate being yelled at by members of the board. On the one hand they think you’re brilliant, on the other hand, they hate it when you stand up to them. And I’m always the one stuck leaving messages.”

  “Then use e-mail.”

  “I’ll think about it. Oh, I almost forgot. You have a phone call. Someone named Mandy Carter. You want me to put her through?”

  Mandy? His first thought was that his caller was a different person with the same name. His second was concern that something had happened to his mother.

  “I’ll take the call,” he said, and reached for the receiver.

  “Benson,” he said sounding more curt than he’d meant to.

  “Hi, Rick. It’s, ah, Mandy…um, Carter. Your ex-wife.”

  She sounded nervous, not worried, which told him that she probably wasn’t calling to tell him something was wrong. He relaxed back in his chair.

  “I know who you are,” he said, surprised to find himself pleased to hear her voice. It had been a hell of a long time.

  “Okay. I wasn’t sure.” She cleared her throat. “So, how are you?”

  “Good. Busy. Yourself?”

  “The same. Well, probably not as busy as you. I’m a teacher and I have a month more off before classes start again.”

  “That’s right. Mom mentioned you’d gone into that. Special ed, wasn’t it?”

  “Uh huh. I work with elementary-school-age kids. It’s rewarding but grueling. I’m glad for the break. A friend offered to let me stay in her family summer home in Carpinteria for the month. She’s joining me in a couple of weeks.”

  “Sounds like fun.”

  He knew that Mandy had lived in Los Angeles after their divorce. She’d finished her college education, then had gone on to get a master’s.

  Which didn’t explain why she was calling after all these years.

  “So here’s the thing,” she said as if she could read his mind. “I was wondering if you’d like to have lunch.”

  Rick was now more surprised by her invitation than by her phone call.

  “Why?” he asked before he could stop himself.

  Mandy laughed. The sparkling sound did odd things to his concentration.

  “It would make your mom happy. She made me promise to call. She thinks we have unfinished business together, which I think is crazy, but you know how she is when she gets an idea in her head.”

  “She becomes the immovable object.”

  “Exactly. So I figured it was easier to just say yes. Hence the invitation. Are you game?”

  Up for lunch with Mandy? He could honestly say he hadn’t given her more than a moment’s thought in the past few years. But the idea of seeing her again, of talking with her, was strangely appealing.

  He pushed a button on his Palm Pilot. “When?”

  “Rick, I’m on vacation. My schedule consists of things like reading and watching old movies. You’re the one with meetings and projects. What’s good for you?”

  He scrolled through his electronic calendar. He didn’t have anything free until a week from Tuesday. Damn.

  “How about tomorrow?” he asked, knowing Clara was going to kill him for messing with his schedule.

  “Sounds good to me.”

  “There’s a place on the pier in Santa Barbara. The last restaurant on the left—a fish place. We can get a table by the water. Say noon?”

  “I’ll be there.”

  “I look forward to it.”

  They said their goodbyes and hung up. Talk about a blast from the past. He wondered if Mandy would look the same or different. He remembered a tall, slender redhead with big green eyes and a smile bright enough to light the world. They’d literally run into each other on campus one afternoon. He’d taken one look at her and had fallen hard.

  He’d proposed within four months, they’d been married within a year and separated less than eight months later. The speed-of-light set of events had left him shaken. He’d managed to dust himself off and get on with his life. Obviously she’d done the same.

  Getting together after all this time would be fun, he told himself as he e-mailed the schedule change to Clara. They’d talk about old times, then go their separate ways, probably not to see each other for another eight years.

  Mandy was nervous. She couldn’t believe it, but the roller-coaster sensation in her stomach didn’t lie. She was actually nervous about seeing Rick again.

  Rather than give in to growing panic, she turned her attention to the beautiful view before her. The pier stretched out into the ocean. It was early August and a perfect Southern California kind of day with blue skies and warm temperatures. The tang of salt water perfumed the air. Dozens of tourists walked the length of the pier, peeking into store windows and reading restaurant menus. They looked happy and carefree. She would bet none of them were having lunch with an ex.

  She stepped around a toddler with a teetering ice-cream cone and past a family with three kids, each wearing a bathing suit and holding a balloon animal. Compared to the out-of-town crowd, she was over-dressed in a simple light-green sundress and sandals with two-inch heels, but it was hard to know the appropriate kind of clothing for lunch with an ex-husband. She’d left her long hair loose. Looking at her no one would ever guess that she’d spent nearly two hours trying on every outfit she’d brought with her for her vacation, nor would they ever know that her casual cascade of curls was the result of an entire morning spent in electric curlers. Some things were better left a mystery.

  She spotted the restaurant up ahead. Her stomach zipped around a forty-five-degree angle, going about a hundred miles an hour. The sensation was far from pleasant.

  This was a really stupid idea, she told herself as she walked along the pier. Really stupid. The next time she spoke with Jo, she was going to tell her so. And what had she, Mandy, been thinking by calling Rick on her second day of vacation? Why hadn’t she put it off until the very end? Why had she—

  There were tables set up in front of the restaurant, small spots for patrons to wait or gather. Brightly colored umbrellas provided shade. As she approached, a tall, dark-haired man stood and moved toward her. A tall, dark-haired, really good-looking man with broad shoulders and the kind of hunky, filled-out body that deserved its own billboard campaign. A man without thick glasses or a faint frown, or a book anywhere to be seen. A man who sent her stomach into a five-G dive and made her normally sensible heart start to pitter-patter. A man who was smiling at her as if he knew her. As if he’d been married to her.

  She stumbled to a stop. “Rick?”

  He grinned. Oh, yeah, a real macho, tem
pting grin. Nothing so simple as a smile. While Mandy watched him approach those last few steps she had the feeling that the new and improved version of Rick Benson was going to be big-time trouble.

  “Mandy,” he said, when he paused in front of her, continuing to grin that mind-stealing grin.

  There was an awkward half second when she didn’t know if she was supposed to shake hands or start a hug or do nothing physical. She couldn’t recall reading any etiquette column about this particular dilemma.

  But Rick solved the problem by bending slightly—had he always been so many inches taller than her?—and drawing her against him. The semi-A-frame hug should have been completely platonic, but she had an instant sexual flashback, which was crazy because their sex life had been borderline okay but nothing that exciting, whatever he might have told his mother.

  She had a brief impression of heat, strength and confidence that made her toes tingle, then he lightly kissed her cheek and stepped back.

  “It’s been a long time,” he said, his voice low and sexy. Had it always been like that? She couldn’t remember, and then he took her hands in his, so she couldn’t think. “You look good.”

  “You, too,” she managed, forcing the words past slightly numb lips.

  Surprises had a way of sucking the life out of her brain. Not a really good thing to have happen when one was dealing with a man who had an IQ about double the national average.

  His hold on her fingers was light, yet she didn’t feel she could pull away. Something to think about later, she told herself, along with the fact that she should have felt weird about him touching her hands after all this time and she didn’t.

  He studied her, still grinning, as if he liked what he saw. “You’ve kept your hair long. It’s nice.”

  “Thanks. I thought about cutting it, but I’m too chicken. For work I have to keep it back in a braid, but the rest of the time I wear it down.”