by Jill Shalvis
“Some things you don’t have to be taught,” Chloe said.
“He was uncertain about my big family, and how he might feel out of place, but he came anyway.”
Chloe squeezed her gently. “We’re a bunch of misfits ourselves, aren’t we? All of us. But we fit together. Including Nick.”
Mia’s throat tightened, and she turned into Chloe. They hugged for a long moment, then Mia pulled back. “I have to go.”
“You’re going to go eavesdrop on them,” Chloe said.
“Hell, yeah.”
Chloe grinned. “Me too.”
They skirted around the dance floor and made their surreptitious way toward the bar, hiding behind a white lattice that Chloe totally blended into with her wedding dress. Not so much Mia, in her forest green. In fact, with the lights flashing on the other side of the lattice, she probably looked like a Christmas tree.
But the guys were paying them no attention at all.
“You know she’s only twenty-two,” Ford was saying to Nick.
Mia opened her mouth at this because she was twenty-three, dammit. Or at least she would be next month. But Chloe squeezed her hand to keep her quiet.
“Yes,” Nick said. “She’s twenty-two. A grown-up. Listen, I get that you’re her family and you’re all very protective of her, but she kicks ass at life. You can trust her to make her own decisions.”
“She hasn’t decided on you yet,” Sawyer pointed out smoothly. Calmly. Eyes steady. He wasn’t wearing a gun on his hip today, not with his tux, but Mia would bet he had one hidden on him somewhere.
Chloe rolled her eyes at her new husband and muttered something about him being the sexiest stubborn ass she’d ever met.
“I realize she hasn’t chosen me,” Nick said. “But I’m still going to be here for her.”
“Even if she dumps you?” Jax asked.
“Yeah.”
“That’s quite a promise.”
“It’s a fact,” Nick said.
Chloe sighed dreamily.
Mia did the same. And her heart melted into a puddle of love that swelled against her rib cage.
“We weren’t always here for her,” Ford said quietly. “So we’re a little overprotective. I won’t apologize for that. But she’s everything to me, and I’m not a complete idiot. I can see that you’re everything to her. All I want is for her to be someone’s everything.”
“Done,” Nick said without hesitation. “And maybe you weren’t always a part of her life, but you gave her life. A great life. And she’s made the most of it. She’s really amazing.”
Chloe sighed again.
Mia didn’t have breath left in her lungs to sigh. Pulling free of Chloe, she walked around the lattice, eyes only on Nick.
Some things take time, Chloe had said. And that was true. It’d taken her seventeen years to get to meet her birth parents and find this great big family waiting to embrace her.
And six months to give her heart to Nick.
He’d come here for her. He’d picked her.
She walked right up to him and into his arms, which closed hard around her. “Mia,” he breathed into her hair, burying his face in her neck, inhaling deeply. Taking comfort, she realized. It wasn’t something he’d ever done before, actively sought comfort from her. She whispered his name and hugged him to her, aware that everyone had moved off to give them some privacy.
He pulled back enough to shove his hand into his pocket and come out with a small black box.
Her heart stopped. She pulled it open and stared down at the delicate white gold promise ring that was two ribbons woven together leading to a knot lined with tiny sapphires.
Her birthstone.
“It’s after midnight,” he said softly. “Merry Christmas.”
“We weren’t going to give each other a present,” she said just as softly, mirroring his words back to her from a few days ago as she ran a reverent finger over the beautiful ring.
“Then it’s just a present present,” he said, a smile in his voice. “A promise for the future. Our future.”
“Oh Nick,” she breathed, slipping the ring on, so happy she could scarcely contain herself. “I wasn’t sure you wanted a future.”
“I do, very much. I think about my life before you came into it, Mia. It sucked.” He met her gaze. “I need you. I want you to know that. I should have told you sooner, but I thought that made me weak. I was wrong about that. You’re the only thing I care about. You’re the only thing that matters to me. I turned down the job—”
“Nick,” she gasped. “No. You—”
“I took a different one, with the same company. Still restorative justice, but I’ll be staying within the state of New York.”
“But you wanted to travel.”
“Wanted. Past tense. I want to be with you, Mia. You’re it for me. You’re everything.” He paused and let his gaze touch her every feature. “You’re the best choice I ever made. You’re my only choice.”
She pressed her forehead to his, her words brushing against his lips. “I was just thinking the same thing about you.”
Also by Jill Shalvis
Simply Irresistible
The Sweetest Thing
Heating Up the Kitchen (cookbook)
Christmas in Lucky Harbor
Small Town Christmas (anthology)
Head over Heels
Lucky in Love
At Last
Forever and a Day
Under the Mistletoe (short story)
It Had to Be You
Always on My Mind
Praise for
Jill Shalvis
and Her Novels
“Shalvis writes with humor, heart, and sizzling heat!”
—Carly Phillips, New York Times bestselling author
“Jill Shalvis is a total original! It doesn’t get any better.”
—Suzanne Forster, New York Times bestselling author
“Count on Jill Shalvis for a witty, steamy, unputdownable love story.”
—Robyn Carr, New York Times bestselling author of Harvest Moon
“A Jill Shalvis hero is the stuff naughty dreams are made of.”
—Vicki Lewis Thompson, New York Times bestselling author of Chick with a Charm
The Lucky Harbor Series
The Sweetest Thing
“A wonderful romance of reunited lovers in a small town. A lot of hot sex, some delightful humor, and plenty of heartwarming emotion make this a book readers will love.”
—RT Book Reviews
“A Perfect 10! Once again Jill Shalvis provides readers with a sexy, funny, hot tale… The ending is as sweet as it is funny. Tara and Ford have some seriously hot chemistry going on and they make the most of it in The Sweetest Thing. Trust me: You’ll need an ice-cold drink nearby.”
—RomRevToday.com
“Witty, fun, and the characters are fabulous.”
—FreshFiction.com
“It is fabulous revisiting Lucky Harbor! I have been on tenterhooks waiting for Tara and Ford’s story and yet again, Jill Shalvis does not disappoint…”
—RomanceJunkiesReviews.com
“A fun-filled, sexy, entertaining story… [satisfies] one’s romantic sweet tooth.”
—TheRomanceReader.com
Simply Irresistible
“Heartwarming and sexy… an abundance of chemistry, smoldering romance, and hilarious sisterly antics.”
—Publishers Weekly
“The title says it all! Fans of Shalvis will recognize her trademark humor and sensuality.”
—TheRomanceStudio.com
“Five stars!… A talented writer. Simply Irresistible is fun, full of humor, and simply delightful in every way.”
—HuntressReviews.com
“This series is going to be one to watch as Jill Shalvis combines her quirky writing with a small-town America setting, while adding in some sizzling heat to make Simply Irresistible… simply irresistible!”
—RomRevToday.com
/> “A beautiful start to this new series. The characters are as charming as the town itself. A pleasure to read.”
—FreshFiction.com
“The very talented Jill Shalvis delivers up a delicious romance… hilarious… sparkling… one of her best books so far.”
—TheRomanceReadersConnection.com
“Jill Shalvis seems to have a golden touch with her books. Each one is better than the previous story.”
—RomanceJunkiesReviews.com
Leah is a brilliant pastry chef—who’s somehow botched all her opportunities for success.
Jack is an ex-hotshot wildfire fighter who’s back to taming the fires of a small town.
When these old friends reunite in Lucky Harbor, can they handle the heat?
Please turn this page for a preview of
Always on My Mind.
Chapter 1
Saying that she went to the annual Firefighter’s Charity Breakfast for pancakes was like saying she watched baseball for the game—when everyone knew that you watched baseball for the guys in the tight uniform pants.
But this time Leah Sullivan really did want pancakes. She also wanted her grandma to live forever, world peace, and hey, while she was making wishes, she wouldn’t object to being sweet-talked out of her clothes sometime this year.
But those were all issues for another day. Mid-August was hinting at an Indian summer for the Pacific Northwest. The morning was warm and heading toward hot as she walked to the already crowded pier. The people of Lucky Harbor loved a get-together, and if there was food involved—and cute firefighters to boot—well, that was just a bonus.
Leah accepted a short stack of pancakes from Tim Denison, a firefighter from Station #24. He was a rookie, fresh from the academy and at least five years younger than her, which didn’t stop him from sending her a wink. She took in his beachy, I-belong-in-a-Gap-ad-campaign appearance and waited for her good parts to flutter.
They didn’t.
For reasons unknown, her good parts were on vacation and had been for months.
Okay, so not for reasons unknown. But not wanting to go there, not today, she blew out a breath and continued down the length of the pier.
Picnic tables had been set up, most of them full of other Lucky Harbor locals supporting the firefighters’ annual breakfast. Leah’s friend Ali Winters was halfway through a huge stack of pancakes, eyeing the food line as if considering getting more.
Leah plopped down beside her. “You eating for two already?”
“Bite your tongue.” Ali aimed her fork at her along with a pointed don’t mess with me look. “I’ve only been with Luke for two months. Pregnancy isn’t anywhere on the to-do list yet. I’m just doing my part to support the community.”
“By eating two hundred pancakes?”
“Hey, the money goes to the senior center.”
There was a salty breeze making a mess of Leah’s and Ali’s hair, but it didn’t dare disturb the woman sitting on the other side of Ali. Nothing much disturbed the cool-as-a-cucumber Aubrey.
“I bet sex is on your to-do list,” Aubrey said, joining their conversation.
Ali gave a secret smile.
Aubrey narrowed her eyes. “I could really hate you for that smile.”
“You should hate me for this smile.”
“Luke’s that good, huh?”
Ali sighed dreamily. “He’s magic.”
“Magic’s just an illusion.” Aubrey licked the syrup off her fork while managing to somehow look both beautifully sophisticated and graceful.
Back in their school days, Aubrey had been untouchable, tough as nails, and Leah hadn’t been anywhere in the vicinity of her league. Nothing much had changed there. She looked down at herself and sucked in her stomach.
“There’s no illusion when it comes to Luke,” Ali told Aubrey. “He’s one-hundred-percent real. And all mine.”
“Well, now you’re just being mean,” Aubrey said. “And that’s my area. Leah, what’s with the expensive shoes and cheap haircut?”
Leah put a hand to her choppy auburn layers, and Aubrey smiled at Ali, like see? That’s how you do mean…
Most of Leah’s money went toward her school loans and helping to keep her grandma afloat, but she did have one vice. Okay, two, but being addicted to Pinterest wasn’t technically a vice. Her love of shoes most definitely was. She’d gotten today’s strappy leather wedges from Paris, and they’d been totally worth having to eat apples and peanut butter for a week. “They were on sale,” she said, clicking them together like she was Dorothy in Oz. “They’re knock-offs,” she admitted.
Aubrey sighed. “You’re not supposed to say that last part. It’s not as fun to be mean when you’re nice.”
“But I am nice,” Leah said.
“I know,” Aubrey said. “And I’m trying to like you anyway.”
The three of them were an extremely unlikely trio, connected by a cute, quirky Victorian building in downtown Lucky Harbor. The building was older than God, currently owned by Aubrey’s great-uncle, and divided into three shops. There was Ali’s floral shop, Leah’s grandma’s bakery, and a neglected bookstore that Aubrey had been making noises about taking over since her job at Town Hall had gone south a few weeks back.
Neither Ali nor Leah was sure yet if having Aubrey in the building every day would be fun or a nightmare. But regardless, Aubrey knew her path. So did Ali.
Leah admired the hell out of that. Especially since she’d never known her path. She’d known one thing, the need to get out of Lucky Harbor—and she had. At age seventeen, she’d gone and had rarely looked back.
But she was back now, putting her pastry chef skills to good use helping her grandma while she recovered from knee surgery. The problem was, Leah had gotten out of the habit of settling in one place.
Not quite true, said a little voice inside her. If not for a string of spectacularly bad decisions, she’d have finished French culinary school. And not embarrassed herself on the reality TV show Sweet Wars. And…
Don’t go there.
Instead, she scooped up a big bite of fluffy pancakes and concentrated on their delicious goodness rather than her own screw-ups. Obsessing over her bad decisions was something she saved for the deep, dark of night.
“Jack’s at the griddle,” Ali noted.
Leah twisted around to look at the cooking setup. Lieutenant Jack Harper was indeed manning the griddle. He was tall and broad shouldered and looked like a guy who could take on anything that came his way. This was a good thing since he ran station #24.
Fire station #24 was one of four that serviced the county, and thanks to the Olympic Mountain range at their back with its million acres of forest, all four stations were perpetually busy.
Jack thrived on busy. He could be as intimidating as hell when he chose to be, which wasn’t right now since he was head-bopping to some beat only he could hear in his headphones. Knowing him, it was some good, old-fashioned, ear-splitting hard rock.
Not too far from him, leashed to a bench off to the side sat Kevin, a huge Great Dane. He was white with black markings that made him look like a Dalmatian wannabe. Kevin had been given to a neighboring fire station where he’d remained until he’d eaten one-too-many expensive hoses, torn up one-too-many beds, and chewed dead one too many pairs of boots. The rambunctious one-year-old had then been put up for adoption.
The only problem was that no one had wanted what was by then a hundred-and-fifty-pound nuisance. Kevin had been headed for the Humane Society when Jack, always the protector, always the savior, had stepped in a few weeks back and saved the day.
Just like he’d done for Leah more times than she could count.
It’d become a great source of entertainment for the entire town that Jack Harper II, once the town terror himself—at least to mothers of teenage daughters everywhere—was now in charge of the latest town terror.
Another firefighter stepped up to the griddle to relieve Jack, who loaded a plate for himself a
nd stepped over to Kevin. He flipped the dog a sausage, which Kevin caught in midair with one snap of his huge jaws. The sausage instantly vanished, and Kevin licked his lips, staring intently at Jack’s plate as if he could make more sausage fly into his mouth by wish alone.
Jack laughed and crouched down to talk to the dog, a movement that had his shirt riding up, revealing low-riding BDUs—his uniform pants—a strip of taut, tantalizing male skin, and just the hint of a perfect ass.
On either side of Leah, both Ali and Aubrey gave lusty sighs. Leah completely understood. She could feel her own lusty sigh catching in her throat but she squelched it. They were in the F-zone, she and Jack. Friends. Friends didn’t do lust, or if they did, they also did the smart, logical thing and ignored it. Still, she felt a smile escape her at the contagious sound of Jack’s laughter. Truth was, he’d been making her smile since the sixth grade, when she’d first moved to Lucky Harbor.
As if sensing her appraisal, Jack lifted his head. His dark mirrored sunglasses hid his eyes, but she knew he was looking right at her because he arched a dark brow.
And on either side of her, Ali and Aubrey sighed again.
“Really?” Leah asked them.
“Well look at him,” Aubrey said unapologetically. “He’s hot, he’s got rhythm, and not just the fake white-boy kind either. He’s also funny as hell. And for a bonus, he’s gainfully employed. It’s just too bad I’m off men forever.”
“Forever’s a long time,” Ali said, and Leah’s gut cramped at the thought of the beautiful, blonde Aubrey going after Jack.
But Jack was still looking at Leah. Those glasses were still in the way but she knew his dark eyes were framed by thick, black lashes and the straight, dark lines of his eyebrows. And the right brow was sliced through by a thin scar, which he’d gotten at age fourteen when he and his cousin Ben had stolen his mom’s car and driven it into a fence.
“Forever,” Aubrey repeated emphatically. “I’m off men forever,” and Leah felt herself relax a little.