The Summer House

by Susan Mallery

  “Why are you crying?” Eva asked from her place under the umbrella.

  Mandy quickly wiped her face and smiled. “I’m not. Well, not very much.”

  “Are you sad?”

  “No. I’ll be fine.” She smiled at Eva, then adjusted the girl’s sun hat.

  They sat on the sand in front of the beach house. Cassie was finally due to arrive in the next day or so. Mandy had officially become Eva’s foster parent and she’d nearly finished filling out the reams of adoption paperwork the caseworker had given her. Everything was going really, really well. Everything except for the fact that it had been four days and she hadn’t heard a word from Rick.

  Just thinking about him made her eyes tear, so she forced herself to think about something else. About the bedroom furniture she was going to get for Eva, and how her father had called from France and been delighted at the thought of having a granddaughter to spoil. She’d had to make him promise there would be no surprise ponies showing up at her front door.

  So she would be fine. Even if Rick didn’t come to his senses. If he didn’t know what he had in her, then he was an idiot and she was better off without him.

  She knew she was right, but all the logic in her heart didn’t heal the ache inside.

  “Mandy, look!” Eva called, sitting up and pointing.

  Mandy turned and saw a man with a puppy. The sun was in her eyes, so she couldn’t see more than his silhouette. She wanted to believe there was something familiar about him, but she’d already tricked herself about a hundred times. She was getting tired of the disappointment.

  Then Eva squealed and jumped to her feet.

  “Rick, Rick,” she called as she ran. “Have you got a puppy?”

  Rick?

  Mandy stood slowly, unable to believe, not sure what it meant. The man walked close enough for her to see his face. Her heart stood still for a second before thundering into double-time. Eva raced closer and he caught her up in his arms. They spoke for a few seconds, then she crowed with delight. He put her down and she and the puppy tumbled together.

  Rick crossed the sand to stand in front of her. He reached up and pulled off his sunglasses, bent low and kissed her mouth.

  “I’m sorry,” he said when he straightened. “About a lot of things.”

  She couldn’t speak; she could barely breathe. Instead she stared at him and waited for him to go on.

  “I’ve been thinking about what you said. I’ve finally figured it all out.” He touched her face. “You were right about a lot of it. You were wrong some, too.”

  Despite the fear, and the hope, she couldn’t help smiling. “That’s so like you.”

  “Isn’t it?” He touched her cheek. “The thing is, I love you. I’m beginning to think I never stopped loving you. I couldn’t seem to fall for anyone else, and I never knew why. It wasn’t about needing closure. The problem was I’d given my heart away and had yet to get it back. Now I don’t want it back. I want you to keep it.”

  She felt more tears in her eyes, but these were tears of happiness.

  “I know there’s no sure thing,” he continued. “I’ve needed it in the past, but now I’m okay with letting that go. What I want now is you and me together. I want us to adopt Eva and have some kids of our own. I want our lives to intertwine until we can’t figure out where one ends and the other begins. The sure thing I want is knowing you’ll always be there for me, and that you expect the same from me. Sometimes it will be easy and sometimes it will be hard. I want us to accept that, because we only make sense when we’re together.”

  She threw herself into his arms. “Oh, Rick. I love you so much.”

  “I’m glad.” He cupped her face. “Marry me, Mandy. Marry me again. This time, I swear I’ll get it right.”

  “Me, too.” She wiped away her tears and smiled at him. “I’ll never run away again. I’ve finally figured out my place is with you.”

  They embraced, then he kissed her. Eva and her new puppy ran over and bumped into them. Rick bent down and gathered the little girl in his arms. Nothing had ever felt as right as this moment. They were all where they belonged.

  COURTING CASSANDRA

  Teresa Southwick

  Dear Reader,

  I grew up in California. My parents had a condo a block from the beach in Carpinteria, a charming resort town just south of Santa Barbara. During the summer, I spent a lot of time there. Many of my favorite memories include reading on the beach.

  California is also where I met Susan Mallery. We took a class together on writing romance. She sat in the front row; I was in the back. Always prolific, she was writing more than her critique group could handle. She started another group and asked me to join and an enduring friendship was born. Eventually Susan sold a book to Silhouette Special Edition. And another. And another. I think she’d have to do the math to calculate the total. And I sold to the Romance line at Silhouette. I’m enormously pleased and proud to be a part of it.

  But with stories to tell that demand a longer length, I was finally able to break into Special Edition. When Susan and I were brainstorming this book, I casually mentioned that I’d always wanted to set a book in Carpinteria. With that we were off and running. I know it’s December. But what better time to let your imagination sweep you away to sand, sea and—most important—sun.

  I want to thank our editor, Karen Taylor Richman, for giving us the opportunity to do a book together and for always pushing us to dig deeper into the characters for maximum emotional impact. My gratitude to Susan Mallery, for teaming with me on this project and most especially, for always being there. And to all the Special Edition authors, my appreciation for the stories that still give me many happy hours of reading on the beach. Keep it up! I’m delighted to join your ranks.

  And last but by no means least, I’m indebted to the readers. I hope you enjoy Cassie and Kyle’s story and look for my debut Special Edition title—Midnight, Moonlight & Miracles, available next month.

  All the best,

  Chapter One

  “No good deed goes unpunished,” Cassandra Brightwell muttered.

  With the outside hose, she rinsed the paintbrush she’d just used, then swiped her fingers down her cheek. When she saw the paint on her hand, she knew it was smeared across her face. Then her idly spoken words sank in and she cringed. Not because she’d been talking to herself, although it was reason enough. But because if the statement was true, a happening of monumental badness was in her immediate future.

  Again assuming the statement to be true, what in heaven’s name had possessed her to do two good deeds? Deed number one: graciously letting her best friend Mandy Carter off the hook. They’d planned to spend a couple of weeks together at the beach house that summer. But Mandy had patched up her relationship with Rick Benson, the love of her life, and would rather be with him than hang with Cassie. Go figure.

  Deed number two: abandoned by said best friend, Cassie had decided to paint the Brightwell half of the duplex and complete the makeover her mother had started with the order of new furniture.

  Cassie shook her head. “Two good deeds. Not particularly bright for a Brightwell.”

  Then a red convertible BMW slowly passed her and pulled into the driveway that mirrored her own. She instantly recognized the driver and cringed again.

  Kyle Stratton. When she saw the beautiful brunette in the passenger seat, she prayed for her own personal tsunami to sweep her out to sea. The Stratton family owned the other half of the duplex and had spent summers there along with the Brightwells. Kyle was still her brother Dan’s best friend.

  The two of them, along with Cassie and Megan Brightwell and Kyle’s sister, Amy, had hung out together. She still considered him a good friend, even after their one and only date had cranked up her unrequited crush, then let her down with a resounding thud.

  Until recently, Cassie had lived in Phoenix, so she only saw him when she visited for holidays or summer vacation—her semiannual exposure to and reinfection of
what she called the Kyle crush.

  CRUSH—all capitals. What an appropriate word. Her tender feelings for him had certainly been crushed into many small pieces. Afterward, she’d carefully put them away—like dried basil in a plastic seasonings container relegated to the darkest, almost forgotten recesses of the pantry. It was best not to harbor false hope, to keep their relationship strictly as friends. He already treated her like a kid sister. No point in giving him a good laugh at her expense.

  Her experience with Kyle, or nonexperience depending on one’s interpretation, should have made her cautious about taking another chance on romance. But not Cassie Brightwell. Good deeds weren’t the only things she did in twos.

  But that was all history. She was over her crush on Kyle.

  As usual, Kyle looked like one of the top ten on the list of the fifty most beautiful people as he got out of the car and stretched. Before she could stop it, her heart skipped at the sight of him. He was tall—six feet if she remembered correctly. Who was she kidding? She could never quite forget anything about Kyle. Including his profession.

  In his long-sleeved white dress shirt, dark-brown slacks and loosened striped tie in shades of gold and chocolate, he looked every inch the wildly successful, hotshot divorce attorney he was. His hair, dark brown and cut stylishly short, was dashingly windblown. Cassie couldn’t see his eyes behind his trendy sunglasses, but she knew they were brown—puppy-dog eyes.

  He walked to the passenger side of the car then opened the door for the woman with him. Was it too late to head for the hills? Maybe he hadn’t seen her. No such luck. As Cassie considered slipping inside the duplex, his gaze met hers. He stared hard at her for a moment, then smiled, waved and moved toward her.

  She’d been made. The irony didn’t escape her. All those times she’d prayed he would notice her in a different way. How bad was her luck that he would start noticing her now when she was covered in paint? It was that second good deed. She jotted down a mental note to cease and desist all good deeds immediately.

  Accompanied by his female passenger, he stopped on the sidewalk in front of her. “Cassie Brightwell.”

  “Kyle Stratton, as I live and breathe.”

  Although that last part was questionable. The exchange of oxygen and carbon dioxide wasn’t happening very efficiently with her lungs suddenly unable to take in air. Standing this close to him was dangerous to her health.

  “How long has it been?” he asked.

  “Probably Christmas holidays when I was in from Phoenix. Who’s your friend?” She tried to make her tone as charming and Scarlett O’Hara-like as her “live and breathe” remark.

  “Oh. Sorry.” He glanced at the woman beside him. “Beth Deveraux, this is Cassie Brightwell.”

  “Dan’s little sister?” the woman asked. “He didn’t tell me you looked like Gwyneth Paltrow.”

  “If only. Besides, my brother’s not exactly a font of information. Then there’s the whole forgotten-middle-child thing.” When the woman stared at her with a blank expression, Cassie added, “Older brother, Dan, younger sister, Megan. I’m the one in the middle everybody forgets.”

  “Ah,” Beth said simply.

  “By the way, how do you know my brother?”

  “They met once or twice at my office,” Kyle explained. “Beth is a client of mine.”

  So that’s what he was calling it these days. “Kyle is your attorney?”

  Beth nodded, tucking a wind blown shoulder-length strand of reddish brown hair behind her ear. “The best. My ex-husband found that out the hard way.”

  “So are you two here for the weekend?” Cassie asked, praying he would say no.

  This was supposed to be her vacation. She’d planned down time, a chance to relax before starting the demanding new job that had brought her back to California. At least she told herself it was the job and not the shock of her fiancé’s betrayal that had brought her back. Once the decision had been made, she’d decided it was an opportunity for a do-over. She was determined to live life to the fullest and without regrets.

  Now that she was here, the last thing she’d expected was Kyle and his latest arm candy, bimbo queen of the valley, cuddling and snuggling and doing other stuff she didn’t want to know about on the other side of the shared wall between the duplexes.

  He rested his hands on his lean hips. “Beth hitched a ride with me. Her boyfriend lives in Santa Barbara. He should be here any minute to pick her up.”

  And what a lovely woman she was, Cassie thought.

  No sooner had Kyle explained the boyfriend, than a sporty two-seater Mercedes pulled up to the curb.

  “I told you he was good.” Beth leaned over and kissed his cheek—without standing on tiptoe. “Thanks for everything, Kyle. Nice to meet you, Cassie. Bye.”

  She wiggled her fingers, then turned away, hips doing a sexy sway, heels clicking on the sidewalk as she went to meet the man waiting for her. Cassie watched the car make a U-turn and drive back up palm-tree-lined Linden Avenue.

  Kyle looked down at her. “So, how are things in Phoenix? Are you here on vacation?”

  “Dan didn’t tell you I was moving back to California?”

  He shook his head. “Don’t recall him mentioning it. Did you finally get tired of living on the face of the sun?”

  It had been hot—and she wasn’t just talking about the weather. But her make-Kyle-think-twice-about-ignoring-her fantasy had never included sharing details of her recent romantic ruin. She had two major regrets, double motivation for her decision to live life to the fullest. Number one regret—agreeing to share her Phoenix apartment with Lynnda Bradley-Simmons, the she-devil of the planet. Regret number two—introducing Steve Turner, her fiancé, and a man who didn’t know the meaning of the word loyalty, to her roommate.

  She smiled up at Kyle. “I was offered a great job at Valley General Hospital. Too good to turn down.”

  “Congratulations. I was beginning to think maybe you’d abandoned nursing and taken up a new profession,” he said, reaching out to brush the smudge of paint from her nose.

  Damn. She hated the tingles dancing over her skin on account of his touch. She told herself it was only the sea breeze, but stepped back anyway.

  “Nursing pays better than volunteer painting. Mandy Carter and I had planned to spend a month here, to catch up on old times. But I got hung up in Phoenix. My two weeks’ notice turned into a four-week mercy mission to train my replacement. When I finally got here, Mandy had to leave. I decided to keep busy and give the duplex a coat of paint. What are you doing here?” she asked.

  One second a shadow flashed across his face, the next it was gone. It happened so quickly she wondered if she’d imagined the response.

  He crossed his arms over his chest. “I’m taking some time off.”

  “And you’re taking it here in Carpinteria?”

  “Yeah. Why?”

  She shrugged. “I just thought you’d vacation at the current trendy spot.”

  “It’s not a vacation.”

  “It should be,” she said. “You look terrible.”

  “Thank you very much.”

  “Sorry. I could have been a shade more diplomatic.”

  He shook his head. “Honesty is a rare quality these days. Rare and brutal,” he said, one corner of his wonderful mouth turning up.

  The attempt at a smile didn’t fool her. She studied him, really looked beyond what she remembered and took in what was there now. A muscle in his lean cheek moved tensely. Deep grooves bracketed his nose and mouth. He looked tired.

  She squeezed more water from her paintbrush. “I was planning to take a walk on the beach. Would you care to join me?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay. Give me a few minutes to clean up and make myself presentable. I wouldn’t want you to have to walk ten paces behind because you’re embarrassed to be seen with me.”

  “With those short legs, you couldn’t stay that far ahead of me,” he said, laughing.

  “T
he short jokes were annoying when we were kids. They’re going to crash and burn now that we’re adults.”

  “Okay. Your protest is noted and filed.”

  “Good. See you in a few.”

  “As soon as I slip into something more comfortable.”

  The words—cliché for let’s do the horizontal hopscotch—were innocent and had nothing to do with her, but Cassie didn’t know how to get that message to her wildly skipping pulse. She would have a better chance of flapping her arms and flying to the moon than getting Kyle Stratton to say something like that to her. And she didn’t want him to. Not really. She just wanted to dazzle him with all her clothes on and make him wish he’d paid more attention to her when he’d had the chance.

  With Cassie beside him, Kyle stepped off the sidewalk and into the sand. “Which way do you want to go?”

  She glanced left, then right and shielded her eyes from the sun with her hand. “Left.”

  He nodded and they trudged through the hot, loose sand to the darker hard-packed stuff by the ocean. As the waves broke on shore and rolled onto the beach, they dodged the water when it rushed up faster than expected. Cassie had changed into a T-shirt and sweatpants. A matching fleece top was tied around her neck. She’d pulled her just-below-shoulder-length blond hair to the top of her head. With her face free of makeup, she looked around twelve. But all the curves between her slender neck and shapely ankles told him it was a lie.

  Kyle had shed his own work clothes and put on shorts and a T-shirt. If only he could shed other concerns as easily. But there was something about coming back to the beach house. He didn’t have many good childhood memories, but most, if not all of the good ones, were tied up in this place. And the Brightwells.

  “So what made you decide to come here for your time off?” Cassie asked, breaking their companionable silence.

  Always, his first instinct was to gloss over everything. For some reason he didn’t choose to now.