“But, after being around you, it was kind of infectious. I started to see things the way you saw them. There is joy out there. There are good people. There’s wonder, and beauty, and nature. There are miracles every day. There can be good memories of the people you loved. There are so many things to live for.” He glanced at her. “What’s that saying? ‘Stay close to anything that makes you glad to be alive’?” He smiled. “It took me all the way until the Marquesas Islands to realize it, but you make me glad to be alive, Lia.”
Her heart skittered over a beat or two.
“You made a difference in my life, and I just had to come back to tell you. And to see . . .” He let the thought drift off.
“To see what?” she whispered.
“If I can still talk you into coming with me. I want to show you Paris. I want to show you the world.”
There didn’t seem to be enough air on the whole beach to reinflate Lia’s lungs, but she gulped for some anyway.
“So my ten good reasons to forget about you aren’t working at all?”
“I’m not buying them. Ten reasons we should give things a whirl seem more doable.”
“You start.”
His smile was relaxed. “Ten, I want to show you Paris. Nine, I want to make you happy. Eight, I want to make you smile—just like that—every day. Seven, I want you to still have orgasms. Six, I want you to have decent coffee every day, even when Cora’s not around. Five, I want you to—”
She reached out and put a finger over his lips. “I get five reasons, too.”
His lips curved beneath her fingertips. His eyes flashed. She couldn’t tell if he was amused or surprised or turned on, but he gave her a slight nod.
“Five, someone needs to teach you how to dance. Four, someone needs to allow you to let all those things back in your life that have ‘been a while’ for you.”
He smiled.
“Three, you deserve love in your life again, and I want to fill your life with it. Me, Drew, your parents, friends—you deserve our love, Evan.”
His smile turned more serious and he gave her another slight nod.
“Two, I want you to be a father again. You made a great dad.”
Evan’s eyes began to mist, and he looked away.
But Lia pulled his chin back. “And one, because I love you. You’re the first person I ever wanted to really share a life with, ever wanted to rely on, and take that scary leap into the abyss for. But I could see it with you. I trust you to take care of all the vulnerability I’m handing you, and hold my hand, and we’ll take the leap together.”
He nodded deeply, staring at her with all the love and tenderness she’d wanted him to feel again. It looked good on him. Evan was meant to love this way—with his whole heart.
“Can we first spend some time here to give me a chance to wrap up my accounts,” she asked, “and maybe spend time with Noelle and my mom and Coco, and then Giselle and Fin when they get back from their honeymoon?”
As if he finally realized she was really going with him, Evan gave her a smile of relief. “We can.”
“And, before we go, spend a little time with Drew and maybe go up to see your parents?”
“I was thinking about that, actually. And I definitely want to talk to Drew.” He glanced up the cliff.
“I think he’ll be happy.”
He looked at her sideways and quirked an eyebrow.
“Seriously. He told me about how he felt about me. And that it was in the past—he’s really happy with Sharon. But he was also just telling me that he thought he might not have given you a fair chance before.”
Evan was already nodding. “He sent me a telegram.”
“What?”
“In the Marquesas. Shocked the hell out of me. Anyway, he told me that you were sad. And that as much as he thought I’d hurt you by leaving, he’d probably done worse to you by nudging me away.”
“He didn’t tell me that.”
“He probably didn’t want to say anything in case I didn’t return.”
“But you did.”
“Of course. Are you crazy? I couldn’t turn the boat around fast enough. Had to head way up north to catch the North Pacific High current to slingshot me back to the States. I never sailed so fast in my life.”
“Oh, Evan.” She threw her arms around his neck and squeezed until he let out an “Ooph.”
“Drew offered me a job, too.” Evan grinned.
“You’re kidding.”
“I might take him up on it after you and I see all we want to see. He said he could use one more investor with him and Kyle.”
“Evan, that would be fabulous! You have friends here who haven’t even met you yet—Fin has been asking about you, and Giselle and Noelle want to know everything. And Douglas and Cora were asking about you just the other day—they miss you. They’re dating now.”
“No kidding?” Evan’s smile grew wider. “Good for them.” He squeezed Lia’s hand. “I’m ready. You’ve got a lifetime of me, if you’ll have me that long. I love you, Lia.”
Lia’s heart felt like it stopped beating a second. She’d never heard those words before. Had never even thought them before. And she could hardly believe they were coming from this decent, loving man.
“I love you, too, Evan.” Lia threw herself into his arms and kissed him again, hard, while a band struck up at the top of the cliff, sending some Frank Sinatra down their way to kiss to. Lia couldn’t believe Evan wanted a lifetime with her. . . . Or that she was looking forward to it. What Drew and Cora had said—you can’t fall in love until you give your whole heart fearlessly—was so very true.
“You want to head up for some bacon-wrapped shrimp and champagne?” she murmured, finally breaking the kiss.
“You’re not gonna trick me with asparagus again, are you?”
“I might. I can be tricky that way.” She rose and tugged his hand. She could hardly wait to introduce him again to Fin and Giselle, and Noelle, and her mom. And then get him home tonight . . .
He bent over and scooped up her blue stiletto. “What about this?”
“I’ve been . . . um . . . thinking about these shoes quite a bit. Can we have a repeat of our adventures in them?”
He chuckled. “As I said: a lifetime of adventures, if you’ll have me.”
“Oh, I’ll have you.”
He laughed again and leaned down in front of her to guide her heel in. “There you go, Cinderella.”
Read on for a special excerpt from another Sandy Cove Romance from Lauren Christopher
The Red Bikini
Available now from Berkley Sensation!
Giselle flung the suitcase on her sister’s tropical-patterned bedspread and let out the sigh she’d been holding since sometime over the air space of Kansas. Or maybe as far back as Illinois. Or maybe even since they’d been in the airport in Indiana.
She stared at a bright red cloth napkin Lia had left on the bed, next to a note in her sister’s loopy handwriting: “It’s okay. Relax.”
Giselle frowned and lifted the napkin, then felt four strings slip through her fingers.
It was a bikini. How very Lia. How very not Giselle.
It’s okay.
Relax.
She folded the triangles and tucked the package deep into the corner of Lia’s dresser drawer, amid some tissue-wrapped lingerie and a lavender drawer sachet.
“Mommy,” came a breathless voice from behind her, “there’s sand!”
Her daughter flung herself onto the bed, sending the suitcase and all their clothes bouncing and squeaking. “And Aunt Lia left me sandals! Can we go to the water now? Can I put on my suit?” Little hands gripped the edge of Giselle’s suitcase.
“In a minute.” Giselle closed the drawer. “Why don’t you help me unpack?”
Giselle’s fake ent
husiasm—held in a false falsetto since Indiana—sounded too breathless, but Coco seemed to buy it, and her little pale legs whisked her to the front room.
Giselle tried to take her twenty cleansing breaths while Coco was gone, but, as usual, she only got to about the seventh. Coco came bumping back through the doorway with a pink Barbie suitcase.
“I wonder how Aunt Lia knew I liked pink sandals.”
Giselle eyed Coco’s sparkly shoes and the tutu she’d worn on the plane. “Probably a good guess.” She lifted Coco’s suitcase onto the bed beside hers.
Lia’s beachside apartment was small—not much more than a box, really—but Giselle felt a wave of appreciation that her sister had opened it to them, and on such short notice. Sandy Cove was the perfect place to escape to for two weeks. But California would have been much too expensive without being able to use Lia’s apartment. Giselle couldn’t use up what was left of her cash reserves.
“What was that song Aunt Lia taught you?” Giselle asked over her shoulder as she yanked closed the bedroom’s palm-colored curtains.
Coco flung one of her blond braids over her shoulder and began swaying her hips. “Stir it up . . .” she began singing. Her toothlessness lent a lispy charm to the Bob Marley song.
Giselle smiled. “. . . Little darlin’ . . . stir it up . . .”
Their hips moved in exaggerated sways, and soon most of Giselle’s worries were tucked away with their T-shirts, shorts, Giselle’s tailored slacks, Coco’s sleep toy Ninja Kitty, and their sensible bathing suits.
While Giselle was sad she wouldn’t get to see Lia, who was tied up with a business trip in New York, she was sort of relieved. The pitying platitudes were exhausting. Especially when coupled with the hushed tones from friends and family in Indiana: Omygod, what will she do? And what will she do without Roy? Giselle knew the way to make the hushed voices stop was to show everyone what she was made of—lift her chin, showcase her strength, saunter into a room with a confidence she might dredge up from somewhere. But she hadn’t quite been able to do that. Maybe she just needed time. . . .
As Sandy Cove’s afternoon light began calming her through the mango-colored shades, Giselle felt relaxed enough to get into Lia’s tiny kitchen and bake. She’d picked up a few staples at the beach corner market to make her raisin cookies. Counting strokes and measuring ingredients always did her wonders.
While she measured and poured, Coco sat at the dining table and told knock-knock jokes until a sharp rap sounded at the door.
“Someone’s here,” Coco whispered.
The tightening began in her neck as Giselle wiped her hands on a towel and made her way to the entryway.
She peeked through the peephole and saw a totem pole of a boy standing on the porch.
He was young—maybe twenty—with a black rubber item folded like a tablecloth in his right hand. Sable brown hair coiled into quarter-sized curls all over his head, and a brown tuft of hair sprouted from his chin in a hippie “soul patch” style. His toast-colored eyes were close together, giving him a comical air. He brought them closer to the peephole, his face distorting in the funny glass.
Giselle opened the door a crack.
“Heeeeey,” he said. His eyes took in as much of her as he could see from behind the door, but the gesture didn’t feel insolent, or even flirtatious—which was good, since he seemed at least fifteen years younger than she was.
Giselle flung the dish towel over her shoulder and tucked a strand of hair back into her chignon as she pulled the door wider. He wore bright orange-and-brown knee-length swim trunks that hung low on his waist, as if there wasn’t quite enough body to hold them up. He stood the same height as Giselle, but was reedier, the outline of his ribs pressing through his tanned skin. His knobby feet were covered in sand.
“You must be Lia’s sister,” he said lazily.
“Yes.”
“You look just like her.” A note of wonder hung on his words.
“Thank you.” Giselle smoothed her skirt.
She was flattered—she thought of Lia as beautiful in every way—but Giselle didn’t see a resemblance. She felt much older, although their age difference was only six years. But she also felt duller, and at least a dress size bigger. Despite the fact Giselle had won beauty contests throughout her teens, her confidence had plummeted when Roy had had his first affair.
“This is for your daughter.” The rubber item unfurled from his fingers. It was a small wet suit. “I’m Rabbit.”
Rabbit? Giselle blinked back her surprise. So this was who Lia had told her about? Somehow she’d had the image differently in her mind: She’d pictured maybe a grizzled old guru who lived on a sand dune with parrots. Or at least someone out of junior college.
Clutching the wet suit against her chest, she held out her other hand in default hostess mode: “I’m Giselle.”
He regarded her hand with amusement, then shook it briefly. “Sweet. You have something cooking in there?” He tried to peek around the door.
“Oh—raisin cookies.” She stepped back, and Coco popped her head around, able to stand it no longer.
Rabbit studied her as she pushed her way through the doorway. “And you must be Coco.” He crouched to the ground, rubbing the tuft of hair on his chin. “I’ve heard all about you from your aunt. How do you feel about being a little grommet this week?”
“A grommet?”
“A young surfer. Lia signed you up for my camp. I have twelve new groms coming.”
Coco’s short, jilting bounces expressed everything.
Thank goodness Lia had arranged this. It would be good for Coco to escape the drama that had become their lives. All Giselle had to do in return was take pictures for Rabbit’s brochure. And go out on one date with a guy Lia knew named Dave or Don or something.
Although it was a pretty close toss-up, the brochure made her the most nervous. Marketing-minded Lia had coordinated it, even though Giselle had insisted she had no brochure experience. In fact, she had no work experience at all, unless you counted posing as the perfect doctor’s wife at charity balls. But Lia had insisted that the photos Giselle took of Coco were excellent. Your photos capture such truth and beauty, her sister had said. Giselle had continued to protest, but Lia reminded her that Rabbit wasn’t exactly a Fortune 500 company. He couldn’t even pay. Except in trade. Which was where Coco benefited.
“I have a surfboard for you,” Rabbit whispered to Coco. He glanced up at Giselle. “Can you come see it?”
Giselle hesitated. The unpacking wasn’t done. She hadn’t taken her twenty cleansing breaths. The raisin cookies had four minutes left. She needed to organize, prioritize, get their lives in order.
But she caught the expression on Coco’s face—one of hopefulness, a trust in adventure—and decided she could take a few cues from her daughter. Giselle did need to learn to relax. She did need to straighten her backbone and garner some strength. She did need to learn how to grasp adventure.
“Sure,” she said, shrugging as if she made impromptu decisions all the time. “But I have a few more minutes for the cookies.”
“I’ll wait.” Rabbit grinned.
When the buzzer finally went off, Giselle loaded the entire batch onto a plate to bring to his apartment. She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and took Coco’s hand. “Then let’s go.”
She tried not to think of the clothing still on the bed, or the blind date with the man whose name she couldn’t remember, or the twenty cleansing breaths, while she followed Rabbit next door.
Let their new life begin. . . .
* * *
A waist-high gate divided the halves of the second-story patio Rabbit and Lia shared.
When her sister had said that Rabbit lived “next door,” Giselle hadn’t realized how close that would be. No wonder their mother wouldn’t stay here. Having their coiffed, French-manicured mother
staying within shouting distance of a barely clad boy like Rabbit, who probably got stoned to the Doors and tracked sand across the patio on a regular basis, would be their mother’s undoing. Eve McCabe typically chose to stay at a Hilton in posh Newport Beach several miles up.
Rabbit strode toward his wide-open door in that rubbery way lanky boys move. Music tumbled out: some kind of folk singer with a mellow, seaside sound. Soon the music swallowed him.
Giselle stalled. She peered around the doorway, but he’d already disappeared.
His place was entirely white and beige, with an empty expanse of stained carpeting. A lone card table was set up where a dining table would normally be, a smattering of potato chips and empty beer bottles littered across its torn top. Beanbag chairs were tossed about the living area, filled with boys with shaggy hair and sandy feet. One was playing a guitar to a song on the speaker.
Along the living room wall were four bright surfboards, each more colorful than the last. One showed off brilliant stripes and flames, two teemed with plant shapes, and the last was in swirls of yellows, oranges, and reds. A fifth, with a bright turquoise stripe down the center, lay across the mottled carpet. One of the boys sat on top, his legs crossed into a suntanned X.
“Hey,” said the one on the board.
Giselle thought perhaps it was meant to be a greeting and gave an uncertain nod.
“C’min, Giselle,” yelled Rabbit from around the corner.
She took a few tentative steps onto the linoleum patch that served as an entryway, her espadrilles crunching in the scattered sand grains.
A boy in the kitchen drew a bottle of beer out of a cooler and held it toward her.
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