Summer Fling

by Sarah Morgan

  The one thing she hadn’t done was ask questions about her onward transfer to the island.

  Why would she? It would never have crossed her mind the pilot could be Zach.

  And how pathetic would she be if she let a joke marriage that had lasted barely five minutes affect her after a whole decade? She was bigger than that.

  Telling herself it was only a twenty-minute hop at most and that Zach was going to be too busy flying the plane to take any notice of her, Brittany walked up the steps. She was careful to avoid eye contact. He was strikingly good-looking, but it was those eyes that had been her downfall. They were so dark they seemed black, the hard gleam radiating his deep suspicion of mankind. He’d had a way of watching her, his hooded gaze brooding and dangerous, as if daring her to stop wondering and fantasizing and take the leap.

  Never one to turn down a challenge, she’d taken the dare.

  It had been like trying to tame a feral beast that was inevitably going to turn on her.

  She brushed past him and felt the hard swell of his bicep brush against her bare arm. She jerked back, but not before a rush of awareness had burned through her body.

  Her gaze slid to his shadowed jaw and from there to the hard lines of his mouth.

  She still remembered how it had felt to be kissed by him, and remembering kicked her heart rate up a notch.

  “Nice plane.” Her voice was as cold as a Maine winter. “Did you steal it?”

  Her question drew a flicker of a smile. “No, this time I was the one who was robbed. You have no idea what price they pin on this baby.”

  She wanted to ask how he could afford it, but didn’t want to show that much interest so instead she slid into one of the large leather seats. She wished now she’d chosen to wear something less casual than shorts. They were the practical choice for the life she led, and her favorite product was high-factor sunscreen. She’d learned that any makeup she applied was quickly sweated off in the heat, so she restricted herself to a lip balm that protected against the sun.

  As a result, her selection of cosmetics remained mostly unused, but she was woman enough that if she’d known she was going to meet Zachary Flynn after a gap of ten years, she would have raided the makeup counter. Maybe even worn a dress and heels, though her wardrobe contained few examples of either. With enough advance warning she would have called Skylar, who had a talent for color and dressing people.

  With the help of her friends, she would have planned the meeting carefully, deciding how she was going to handle it and what she was going to say so that she controlled every moment of the reunion. And she wouldn’t have chosen to do it this way.

  Knowing that he was studying her, Brittany resisted the temptation to shift in her seat.

  Yeah, that’s right, take a good look at what you gave up. Are you sorry now?

  Finally she looked at him, looked into those flinty eyes framed by lashes as dark as coal. Her heart started to pound and her head spun. Tired, she thought. I’m tired, that’s all. But she knew it wasn’t the long flight or the time change that was responsible for the shift in her heart rate. It was seeing him. Panic ripped through her because she didn’t want to feel anything and she was feeling—everything.

  Damn him.

  Damn every supersexy inch of him.

  Maybe flying private wasn’t so great after all. Right now she would even have embraced a bunch of screaming toddlers. Anything to dilute the tension. “So who are we waiting for? Am I your only passenger?”

  “The rich don’t share. I’m exclusively yours.”

  He’d never been exclusively hers, not even when he’d slid that cheap, hastily purchased gift-store ring onto her finger and spoken words that had almost jammed in his throat. Their marriage had been the shortest exclusive deal on record. He’d lasted ten days before walking out of her life. Brittany had been raised to believe that people kept their promises but had learned that words, at least when they were uttered by Zachary Flynn, were meaningless. It had been a devastating betrayal of her trust. Hadn’t she believed in him when no one else had? Hadn’t she defended and excused him? He’s had a bad childhood, it’s not surprising he doesn’t trust people when they’ve always let him down. She’d said those things to anyone and everyone who would listen and ignored warnings and dire prophecies. She’d been a true friend to him and he’d cast that friendship aside as if it were nothing.

  “Let’s go. If I’m the only passenger then there’s nothing keeping us from taking off.”

  “Sit down and strap in. There’s a strong crosswind today. You’re going to be shaken up some.”

  She was already shaken up, and it had nothing to do with the crosswind.

  Relieved it was a short flight, Brittany reached for the seat belt but he was there before her. Those strong fingers tangled with hers and she flattened herself to the seat.

  “I can do it.” Being helpless brought out the worst in her and she snatched her good hand away just as he eased back, a gleam in his eyes.

  “Still the same old Brittany. So who did you punch?”

  “What do you mean?” She wasn’t the same Brittany. The girl who had danced willingly into that reckless, short-lived marriage wasn’t the same girl who had limped out.

  “Unless you’re wearing that cast for show, you’ve broken your wrist.” He straightened his shoulders. Shoulders she’d once explored with her fingers and mouth. She knew he had a scar at the top of his right shoulder blade and another under his ribs on the left. He’d refused to discuss either. To her knowledge, apart from the social workers who had removed him from his abusive home, the only person who knew the details of his past was Philip Law and she suspected even he only knew a small part of the story. The rest Zach buried deep inside, allowing no one access. “Just wondered what happened to the other person. Knowing you, they came off worse.”

  “You don’t know me.” And she didn’t want to think about how well he’d once known her. She didn’t want to think about the way he’d touched her, kissed her, and made her feel alive. “So why are you back in the area?” Brittany tried to remember what Nik had said about his friend. “You’re living in Bar Harbor?”

  “No. I have a client who has a place at Bar Harbor. I’m living on Puffin Island.”

  It was the worst news possible. “You’re living here now?”

  “Is that going to give you a problem?”

  It was going to give her a big problem.

  After their relationship had gone south, she’d retreated to Castaway Cottage and watched the sun rise and set over beautiful Shell Bay. With the help of her grandmother, and later her friends, she’d pieced herself back together. She’d traveled the world, but still regarded Puffin Island as her home.

  Her home, not his.

  Finding him here was like discovering a fly on your food. It felt contaminated.

  “We haven’t seen each other in ten years, Zach. You’re not part of my life and I’m not part of yours. I don’t give a damn where you live.”

  As long as it’s not on my island.

  “You’re sure?” His gaze was steady on hers. “Plenty of women would be bearing a grudge.”

  “Because you walked out on me ten days after our wedding?” She managed a laugh. “You did us both a favor by ending it when you did. Instead of throwing my whole life away, I threw away a few weeks. I don’t begrudge you a few weeks, Zach.”

  “It was a whole summer.”

  “I wasn’t counting.” She’d counted every day. Every hour. “And talking of counting, my friend is paying you big bucks to fly me to the island so let’s do it. I’d hate for him to fire you.”

  “I don’t work for him, I work for myself. I decide when I fly. I pick the jobs and the people.” Something flickered in his eyes. “Taking orders isn’t one of my strengths. You should know that.”

  She did know that. And she no longer cared enough to make excuses for his bad behavior.

  The details of his past were hazy, and that haze had succeede
d in fueling the rumors. Rumors of an abusive childhood, of a life where the law turned up at the door more often than the mailman, of a boy who had moved from one place to another, never sticking. Those rumors had flown around the island and a few people who had never before locked their doors had started locking them whenever Zach had shown up as part of the scholarship program at Camp Puffin.

  He’d come back every summer and stayed the whole time. As a result he became a familiar figure on the island.

  His background had made him a suspect for every crime committed, something that had outraged teenage Brittany, who had a strong sense of justice and believed everyone was innocent until proven guilty. It had frustrated her that he’d been indifferent to people’s unflattering assumptions.

  Even when he’d finally moved in with Philip and Celia Law, he still hadn’t been entirely free of suspicion.

  “I’m tired,” she croaked. “It’s been a long journey, so why don’t you do whatever it is you do to make this thing fly and take me to Puffin Island.”

  For a brief, unsettling moment she thought he was going to say something else. Then he handed her a headset, turned and strolled to the pilot’s seat, casual and relaxed.

  Brittany tried to relax, too.

  The sooner he took the controls, the sooner this whole awkward encounter would be over.

  Except that now her life was in his hands. As someone who liked to be in control of her own destiny, it didn’t feel good. It was hard to forget what he’d done with her heart when she’d trusted him with that.

  She remembered overhearing Philip telling her grandmother that Zach was the most gifted pilot he’d ever taught, but that his brilliance could easily slip over the line into reckless and wild. He was fearless, or maybe it was just that an unspeakable childhood had set his bar for fear higher than most people’s.

  Exhausted, her wrist throbbing, Brittany swallowed. She knew all about reckless and wild. She’d been both those things when she’d been with him.

  Watching him slide into the pilot’s seat, she felt her heart bump hard against her ribs.

  He’d said he’d fly the devil as long as he was paid, but she knew the devil was already in the plane.

  And he had his hands on the controls.

  All the characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author, and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all the incidents are pure invention.

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  Mills & Boon, an imprint of Harlequin (UK) Limited, Eton House, 18-24 Paradise Road, Richmond, Surrey TW9 1SR

  SUMMER FLING © Sarah Morgan 2007

  Single Father, Wife Needed

  ISBN: 978-1-408-93744-0