Shoreline Drive (Sanctuary Island)

by Everett, Lily

He sighed. “About five seconds before Java got loose. Something Ivan said when we were arguing—that I’d have to offer him twice as much to get him to leave.”

  “Oh.” Merry felt sick all over again.

  “But I didn’t put it together until he was standing there spilling his guts. I’m sorry, Merry.”

  “You!” She shook her head. “What are you apologizing for?”

  His mouth twisted wryly. “For being born to Tripp and Pamela Fairfax? I want to say I can’t believe they’d do something like this, but the truth is, I can. So maybe I’m apologizing for not figuring it out sooner and stopping them.”

  Ben tucked a lock of Merry’s hair behind her ear, the brush of his fingers sending shivers skating down her neck. “Or it could be that I’m sorry for the way this is hurting you.”

  Merry turned her head to press a kiss into the palm of Ben’s hand. “I wasn’t the only one who got hurt. I know you felt pushed aside when I let Ivan in. I regret that, so much. But there was more going on than I was ready to deal with.” She paused, unsure she’d even be able to get the words out.

  “I felt guilty,” she admitted, her voice a thread of sound. Ben tilted his head down until their foreheads were almost touching. “Because I’ve been so angry at Ivan for leaving me, for refusing to take responsibility—but I was almost as bad. When I found out I was pregnant, I wasn’t happy. I was terrified. I didn’t know anything about being a mother—I barely even remembered my mom from when I was a kid—and my whole life was about to change. I thought really seriously about ending the pregnancy.”

  “Shh,” Ben said softly, pain pulling his mouth into a frown. “Sweetheart, you don’t have to—”

  “I do, though.” Merry sucked back the tears that wanted to overflow. “I need you to understand. I honestly thought there was no way I’d be able to care for a child, that any kid of mine would have a disaster of a mom who ruined everything. But when it came right down to it, something stopped me. I just couldn’t go through with it—even though, rationally, it was nuts for me to have a baby on my own, no job, no way of supporting myself. But it was the right choice for me. And when I think about it now, it stops my heart every time, how close I came to never having Alex at all.”

  “I know.”

  Merry jerked back, shattered. “You know?”

  “Ivan told me.” Ben tipped her chin up with his fingers and forced her to meet his gaze when it was the last thing she wanted to do. “In the middle of our fight. Ivan threw it at me like a punch, as if he expected it to change anything about what I feel for you.”

  Breathing hard, Merry said, “And? Did it?”

  “Don’t take this the wrong way.” Ben cupped her jaw and gazed lovingly into her upturned face. “But you’re an idiot.”

  That was it. Merry laughed and sobbed at the same time, emotion welling out of her in an uncontrollable fountain. She threw her arms around Ben and hung on for dear life.

  “I just wanted,” she said, her words muffled by his chest. “I wanted so badly for Ivan to be exactly what he said he was: regretful, eager to have a relationship with his son. I thought, what could be wrong about Alex having three parents who love him?”

  “I get that.” Ben’s voice was so tender, it made Merry’s heart ache. “I do. And I wish I hadn’t been such an ass about it. You’re right—the more love in Alex’s life, the better off he’ll be.”

  But that wasn’t enough. From the beginning, Ben was the one making all the concessions, putting aside what he wanted and letting Merry dictate the terms. This time, she was going to make damn sure he got everything he wanted and deserved—and that included her and Alex.

  “Take me to the Firefly,” Merry said, scrubbing her face dry, determination giving her new energy. “I want to catch Ivan before he leaves the island.”

  Resignation and acceptance settled over Ben like a worn, comfortable jacket. “Okay. Might as well put the dumb kid out of his misery and tell him he’s forgiven.”

  “Oh, I will,” Merry said as they started up the hill to Ben’s truck. “Ivan is a kid, an immature child who’s been spoiled by all the people in his life catering to his every whim and indulging his moods—but he didn’t mean to endanger us with his tantrum. The bribery, though.”

  She paused, still a little gutted by the fact that she’d so misread the situation.

  “My parents can be very persuasive,” Ben said grimly.

  “I’m sure it didn’t take much. You heard him—he was offered money to do what he already had a half-formed desire to do anyway. In Ivan’s world, that’s a win-win, no downside. In his mind, I’m sure he wasn’t even lying about his motives for being here. But I don’t think I can forgive him for what he almost did to our marriage—at least, not yet.”

  “Then why are we going to the café? So you can tell him off again? Not that I’m arguing.” Ben opened the passenger side door and helped Merry transfer Alex to the baby seat in the back.

  “No.” Determination flooded Merry in a strengthening tide as she climbed onto the bench seat and waited for Ben to go around to the driver side. “You and I made an agreement, and I should never have endangered that. No matter what you say, you are the one who’s always there for Alex when he needs you. Screw genetics—you’re his father. I’m going to tell Ivan I want him to sign away his paternal rights, so you can officially adopt Alex as your son.”

  *

  It was exactly what Ben thought he wanted, handed to him across the bench seat of his old pickup truck. Merry was watching him with bright eyes, her hair still a mess and grass stains on her knees from hitting the dirt to protect her baby.

  Ben’s chest was in lockdown, his ribs cranked too tight for breath, but all he knew was that as much as he wanted Alex as his son, he wanted everything out on the table with Merry even more.

  “Can we forget about our agreement for a minute?” His mouth was so dry, dust scouring his lungs and turning his voice into a heavy croak.

  Fear speared through Merry’s gaze. She curled her hands around the hem of her sweatshirt and nodded.

  “I’m sorry,” she babbled. “I know it’s too little, too late—and I don’t want to be like Ivan, always apologizing as if that makes up for the fact that he does whatever the hell he wants the rest of the time, regardless of anyone else’s feelings. But I am sorry, Ben. This marriage is important to me.”

  She swallowed. With amazement, Ben realized he could actually see the flutter of her rapid pulse in the hollow of her throat. “I don’t want anything to come between us … because I’m in love with you.”

  Ben felt the smile start in the pit of his stomach and travel up through his chest, loosening the constriction there, before it ever hit his mouth. She loved him. Merry loved him, after all.

  “As apologies go, that was a pretty good one,” he said, hauling himself up into the cab of the truck to get closer to her. “Come here.”

  Merry leaned eagerly over the drive shaft and Ben met her halfway, thrusting his hands into her hair to hold her head for a kiss.

  “I love you, too,” he whispered against her mouth, the words escaping like a prayer or a vow. “And I love Alex. You’re right, I’ll be there for him no matter what … even if there’s no piece of paper out there that legally binds us together as father and son.”

  “But…” Merry drew back to search his eyes. “You are the last Fairfax heir. Do you really not care about passing it on?”

  Ben considered the caldron of anger still seething in his belly at the stunt his parents pulled with Ivan. “Right now? I’m thinking it would be a good thing for the Fairfax name to die with me. That much attachment to a legacy isn’t healthy or rational.”

  “You might feel differently as we get older,” Merry pointed out. “When your parents pass on, and you’re the only one left.”

  Ben smiled and nudged kisses against her cheek, her temple, her nose, the fragile skin of her closed eyelid—whatever he could reach. “I won’t be alone. I’ll have you. And a
s long as I have you and Alex in my life, for good, he can call me whatever he wants. Stepdad, Daddy, Pops, Uncle Ben … okay, maybe not Uncle Ben. I don’t like rice.”

  Merry laughed, and in the backseat, Alex clapped and laughed, too, already starting to mimic the emotions of those around him. That’s why it was so important to keep his mother happy, Ben reflected with satisfaction as Merry pushed her face up for another kiss.

  “The point is,” Ben finished, a few long, heated moments later. “I’ve loved you for a long time. And if you want to stay married to me and be a family, not because of an arrangement but because you love me—I’m happy. That’s all I wanted from life.”

  Merry pulled away and kicked open her door, rushing around to the back to pull Alex, barefoot and giggling, from his car seat.

  “What are you doing?” Ben asked, heart clenching.

  “Ivan can wait—we’ll figure out what to do about him later. Right now, I’m taking our son up to the barn and telling his grandmother she’s on babysitting duty,” Merry said, wrestling with the diaper bag. “And then I’m taking you home and kissing the daylights out of you.”

  Joy went off like a firecracker in Ben’s chest, a spinning pinwheel of sparks and love. “Are you sure?” he said gravely. “I know how much you hate asking for your mom’s help.”

  He was mostly teasing, so he was a little dismayed when Merry stilled and stared at him thoughtfully. “You know,” she said, “I think I’m over that. If I’ve learned anything, it’s that no parent is perfect—we all make mistakes. All you can do is work hard to do better.”

  Ben jumped down and went to help her with the diaper bag, which was wedged under the driver’s side seat. “Everyone can use a second chance, sometimes.”

  “Or a third or fourth,” Merry said, laughing, as Ben hefted the bag onto his shoulder. Side by side, holding hands, they walked up to the barn. “Besides, being with you—I feel stronger. More confident. Like, what am I trying to prove by cutting my mother out of Alex’s childhood?”

  “All you’d be doing is depriving us of a free babysitter,” Ben agreed.

  At the door of the barn, Merry stopped and turned around. They looked out over the sloping coastal farmland and the red-gold glory of fall on Sanctuary Island.

  “It’s amazing,” Merry said. “I moved here to get to know my mother and try to put our family back together. And now that family has grown and expanded to include Grady, Harrison, Taylor, everyone on the island … it’s more love than I ever dreamed I’d have in my life. But the best, most surprising part is that not only did I find the family I always wanted on Sanctuary Island, I found you. The man I didn’t even know enough to dream about.”

  Ben reveled in the fact that he could put his arms around Merry and Alex now, the way he couldn’t all those weeks and months ago. She rested her head on his chest with a happy sigh, and Alex clutched at the chest pocket on Ben’s shirt with his strong little fist.

  Standing there with his whole, perfect world in his arms, Ben’s rational side told him there was no such thing as perfection. “I love the fall,” he said. “But winter always comes after. It will be that way for us, too. There are storms ahead, problems to face and arguments to negotiate. There will be tears and laughter, joy and heartache, trouble and strife.”

  “Mmm,” Merry hummed, content as a cat sprawled in the sun. “And you’ll be there for all of it.”

  “I will,” Ben said, and that was his vow. Right there, standing in the spot where he’d first decided to propose. He would be there for everything—really there. “No more hiding behind a wall of sarcasm and cynicism to keep people out.”

  “Fair warning: this family is going to knock down all your walls and leave you nowhere to hide. We’ll burrow so deep into your heart, you’ll never get us out again.”

  Ben buried a kiss in his wife’s hair, breathing in sweet hay and apples. “I’m good with that.”

  Being part of a family like Merry’s would never be simple or easy—but it would always, always be worth it.

  Also by Lily Everett

  Sanctuary Island

  Available from St. Martin’s Paperbacks

  The Firefly Café

  The Summer Cottage

  Island Road

  The Fireside Inn

  Bonfire Beach

  Lantern Lake

  E-books available from St. Martin’s Press

  Praise for Sanctuary Island

  “I didn’t read this book, I inhaled it. An incredible story of love, forgiveness, healing and joy.”

  —Debbie Macomber, #1 New York Times bestselling author

  “Sanctuary Island is a novel to curl up with and enjoy by a crackling fire or on a sunny beach. It’s a beautifully told story of hope and forgiveness, celebrating the healing power of love. Lily Everett writes with warmth, wisdom and deep insight.”

  —Susan Wiggs, #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Willow Lake series

  “I loved it! A rare find.”

  —Lori Wilde, New York Times bestselling author of The First Love Cookie Club

  “A heartwarming, emotional, extremely romantic story that I couldn’t read fast enough!”

  —Bella Andre, New York Times bestselling author of the Sullivan series

  “With richly nuanced characters and able plotting … Everett’s sweet contemporary debut illustrates the power of forgiveness and the strength of relationships that may falter but never fail.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “I loved learning about Sanctuary Island and I felt as if I was there seeing and feeling everything first hand. A wonderful book to get lost in for a few hours. I definitely recommend it to other readers.”

  —Night Owl Reviews

  “The nostalgic, almost introspective story of a young woman, the mother who neglected her, and the wounded man who will walk the road to a happy ending with her. The story is the perfect blend of romance and women’s fiction that will equally satisfy readers of both genres as well as those who meet in the middle.”

  —Heroes and Heartbreakers

  “Everett’s newest novel is stirring. She skillfully blends the tender story of two daughters reuniting with their estranged mother with the love story of two emotionally closed people desperately trying to move toward each other. Readers will eagerly anticipate its sequel.”

  —RT Bookreviews

  “I couldn’t help but fall in love with Sanctuary Island and want to move there myself. This was an enchanting romance that swept me away!”

  —Books N Kisses

  “Lily has a talent for metaphors that make me melt … and I love the way she ties the story together. I’m so looking forward to the next book in the series.”

  —USA Today’s Happily Ever After blog

  “Everett captures the very special relationship sisters have.… A good comfort read, Sanctuary Island is a very peaceful place where you could cure all of your ills with ease.”

  —A Bookish Affair

  “A satisfying read about family, loyalty, taking risks, and love that any fan of women’s fiction would enjoy.”

  —Kindles and Wine

  “A riveting tale of overcoming fear and emotional roadblocks, Sanctuary Island makes you fall in love with the island and its inhabitants. Author Lily Everett brings tears, laughter and a happy-ever-after smile to your face while you’re experiencing her well-written, compassionate novel. I highly recommend Sanctuary Island as a ‘no excuses’ emotional fight for a happy life in a book that hits home with real-to-life characters.”

  —Romance Junkies

  This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  SHORELINE DRIVE

  Copyright © 2014 by Lily Everett.

  All rights reserved.

  For information address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.

  ISBN: 978-1-250-01839-7 />
  St. Martin’s Paperbacks edition / February 2014

  St. Martin’s Paperbacks are published by St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.

  eISBN 9781466808102

  The beloved Billionaire Brothers novella trilogy comes to print in …

  HOMECOMING:

  The Billionaire Brothers

  Coming in Summer 2014 from St. Martin’s Paperbacks

  Look for Lily Everett’s heartwarming novella trilogies.

  Now available in eBook, and coming to print soon!

  Find out more at www.lilyeverett.com

  THE BILLIONAIRE BROTHERS TRILOGY

  The Firefly Café

  The Summer Cottage

  Island Road

  THE BILLIONAIRE BACHELORS TRILOGY

  The Fireside Inn

  Bonfire Beach

  Lantern Lake