by Linz, Cathie
Luke was wiping down the bar when Walt walked into Maguire’s the next day, shortly after noon. It was the first time the mayor had stopped by since Luke had returned to Serenity Falls six months ago.
“I’ve asked RJ to resign,” he abruptly informed Luke.
“If you’re asking me if I want to take his place on the town council, the answer is no.”
“That’s not why I’m here.”
“No? Then did you come to see the mural for yourself?”
“No. I came here to thank you for letting me know about RJ’s dealings regarding the waterfalls. I had no idea. I do wish you’d told me privately instead of in front of the entire town at the last meeting—”
“The entire town wasn’t there,” Luke stated.
“You know what I mean.”
“We haven’t exactly been on close speaking terms.”
“No, I realize that. You and Billy appear to have hit it off, though.” Walt sounded a bit resentful of that fact.
Luke shrugged. “I just showed an interest in his life. Do you have any idea of what sort of things he likes? It sure as hell isn’t football.”
“Is that right? What makes you an expert on kids?”
“I’m not. But I know what it takes to be a bad seed, and I see that happening with Billy. So just talk to your kid, mayor. You might be surprised what you learn.”
“Your father would never have painted Maguire’s red.”
“Exactly.”
“So you did it to get back at him.”
“I did it because I wanted to.”
“And you always do what you want, no matter who it hurts? You know people are talking about you and Julia.”
“People are always talking about something in this town.” Luke refused to feel guilty. Julia hadn’t said she loved him again. They were just two consenting adults having great sex.
Telling himself that somehow no longer convinced him it was true. The sex was great. But something else was going on here and that freaked him out. He’d never been with a woman who made him feel the way she did. Making love to her wasn’t enough. He wanted to protect her, to take care of her.
When he’d first seen her standing by the library’s pond in her Bo Peep costume, he’d never anticipated that she’d have this kind of effect on him. She made him wish he was some sort of superhero from one those comic books Algee sold. The kind that could make good on his promises.
Not that he’d made any to her. Not aloud anyway. But she was still basically a picket-fence kind of female, despite her new good-girl-gone-bad persona. And he was still a rolling stone.
He was her way of thumbing her nose at propriety. He’d painted Maguire’s red as a gesture of rebellion. Going to bed with him was her gesture of rebellion.
Luke didn’t even realize that Walt had left the building, that’s how consumed he’d been with his own thoughts about Julia.
Maybe Algee was right. Maybe Julia was Luke’s weakness.
Or maybe he was hers.
“Are you nervous?” Pam asked Julia as they waited at one of Philadelphia’s top-notch eateries for Adam Kemp to show up.
Julia nodded. “I think I ate half a bottle of Tums last night. Thanks for coming with me,” she added.
“No thanks are necessary. I think Luke was a bit ticked off that you wouldn’t let him come.”
“I didn’t want him punching Adam if he said something wrong.”
“I may not have as mean a right hook as Luke, but I took some tae kwon do lessons at the Park District last year. So if you need protecting . . .”
Julia laughed at the image of her petite and perky friend taking on Adam. “I’ll keep that in mind if I need backup.”
“There he is.” Pam pointed to the silver-haired man walking in the entrance. The maître d’ rushed over to him, greeting him with marked deference and quickly escorting him to their table.
“Which one of you is my supposed daughter?” Adam Kemp stood there looking from Julia to Pam and back again. “You.” He pointed to Julia. “It’s you.”
“So I’ve been told.”
Adam frowned. “You don’t sound like you believe it.”
“Neither do you.”
“Something we both have in common.” Adam took a seat. “Well, ladies, what are you having? The prime rib here is excellent. Really one of the very best in the country. It’s not every day a man hears he has a daughter. Lunch is on me.”
“You make it sound like this is just another business deal.”
“How do you want me to sound?”
“I don’t know. More human.”
“I can assure you, I’m very human.”
“Weren’t you surprised to find out you had a grown daughter? This is my friend Pam, by the way. Not that you asked.”
Adam nodded his acknowledgment of the introduction and then answered Julia’s question. “Yes, I was surprised. But life is a constantly evolving situation. You make adjustments or you fail.”
“A constantly evolving situation? You sound like Angel.”
“Your mother and I really have little in common.”
“So I’ve been told.”
“She raised you to be like her, I suppose.”
He was only with her a few minutes and already he sounded disappointed in her. Julia tried not to be upset, but this entire conversation was extremely unsettling for her. Apparently not for him, however. “You suppose wrong. She raised me to think for myself.”
“I hear you’re a librarian.”
“That’s right.”
“In a regular library?”
What did he think? That she worked in a nudist library? “Serenity Falls Public Library.”
“Serenity Falls, huh? One of my subsidiaries was investigating a business opportunity there. But the deal fell through.”
Great. Her father had been involved with trying to ruin the town’s scenic pride and joy—the waterfalls. She’d forgotten that incident at the town meeting but now recalled that Luke had said Kemp Enterprises had talked with RJ about the project.
But right now, Adam sat across the table from her, looking entirely too much like the PR photo on the back of his book. She wanted to shake that bedrock confidence of his. “Angel says you’re ruthless.”
He was totally unfazed. “She says you’re interested in information. What do you want to know about me?”
“What do you want to know about me?” she countered, playing for time.
“I already know a great deal about you. I had you investigated. There’s a file on my desk with all the details.”
“Then why ask me what library I worked at?”
Adam shrugged. “I didn’t recall all the details.”
“Right.” His answer stung. “A little detail like a daughter might get in the way of your big-business decisions.”
“Not really. I try to keep my personal life separate from my professional life.”
“How tidy. I really can’t picture you and my mother as a couple.”
“We got together. It was nice and then it was over. End of story. Now let’s order.”
He did so for both Julia and Pam.
Then he asked Julia, “Do you have your mother’s aversion to wealth?”
His question caught her off-guard and without a quick answer.
“Money is better than poverty, if only for financial reasons. That’s a Woody Allen quote, but it’s true,” he continued. “If I’d known about you when you were a child, you wouldn’t have wanted for anything. I’d have made sure of that. You would have gone to the best boarding schools, gotten the best education, had the best opportunities.”
He used the word best a lot. She noticed that when reading his book, which she’d picked up at a local bookstore the day before. That and the words take control. He’d used those a lot in the book as well. Take control of your subordinates. Take control of your life.
Julia had always liked control, but since meeting Luke, she’d learned that losing control coul
d bring more happiness than she’d thought possible.
“I take my responsibilities seriously,” Adam added.
Julia always had as well. But listening to him go on about the need to deliver successful results in life left her feeling very unsettled. Because that list of things Adam had said he could have given her were all material things. But maybe that’s all he had to offer. Too bad it wasn’t anything she really valued.
“Hey, sexy, want a ride?”
Julia turned at the sound of Luke’s voice. She hadn’t imagined it. He was there. Leaning against his big, bad Harley. Wearing those black jeans and T-shirt he’d had on when he’d first roared into Serenity Falls. Only now he was outside the restaurant in Philadelphia. Adam had already left. Julia had taken some time to compose herself in the ladies’ room afterward, unsure why she’d gotten all teary-eyed. Lack of sleep, stress, disappointment—there were lots of possible reasons. “What are you doing here?”
“You really are gonna have to stop asking me that.”
“Luke’s here,” Julia told Pam, who’d just come through the revolving door and joined them.
“I see that. It’s okay if you want to go back with him,” Pam said.
And so it was that Julia found herself on the back of Luke’s Harley, her arms wrapped around his waist, her skirt hitched up above her knees, her legs pressed against his, her cheek pressed against his warm back.
She loved this man with every fiber of her being. He’d come all the way to Philadelphia and waited for her just to be certain she was okay. Surely that meant he felt something for her?
As they rode home, Julia closed her eyes and imagined the two of them together forever. Luke running Maguire’s and grumbling about Adele’s bossiness. Her becoming library director and firing Alice. Them having children who’d grow up safely in Serenity Falls, enjoying everything that was good about living in a small town. A boy with Luke’s blue eyes and a girl with her own hazel eyes. Their daughter would be able to wrap Luke around her little finger.
They’d buy a bigger house. He’d teach their son to throw a football. She’d read to their children. So would he. Their home would be filled with love and laughter and books and happiness.
Julia’s earlier dissatisfaction with today’s first meeting with her father was replaced with the warm glow of her love for Luke. It didn’t matter who her father was. That was her past. Her future was with Luke.
As they roared into Serenity Falls, Julia felt such a sense of homecoming. This was where she belonged. Here, in this peaceful town with Luke.
Which was why she blinked at the brand-new For Sale sign clearly displayed in front of Maguire’s when they pulled up.
“Look, someone put up a sign by mistake,” Julia said.
That’s when Luke said the words that shattered her dreams. “It’s not a mistake.”
Chapter Eighteen
Julia reached out for something stable to hold onto. The only thing handy was one of the city’s quaint iron lamp-posts with a cheerful Welcome Spring banner fluttering from the top.
Her legs had been trembling since she’d gotten off the Harley—not because of the ride, but because of Luke’s words. Maybe she hadn’t heard him correctly. “What do you mean?”
“I want to dump this place. You knew I never liked it here. I’ve been in limbo waiting it out. I had to stay or lose the money . . .”
“So this is all about the money?”
“Yeah, it’s about the money,” he drawled. “Not all of us discover out of the blue that we’re related to billionaires.”
Luke saw the hurt take hold in her eyes and it killed him. But it was time he faced facts here. He was a broke, burnt-out former FBI agent. He was no great catch by any stretch of the imagination. And not a white-picket-fence, putting-down-roots, buying-a-Berkalounger kinda guy.
He wasn’t doing her any favors by letting her build a dream world around him. He was not hero material. She could do so much better. He had to make her see that, for her own good. And so he continued on in the same vein. “I never said I’d stay here. You knew that. The terms of my father’s will were simple. To inherit this place, I had to stay six months. Well, honey, it’s been six months to the day.” He was deliberately blunt.
Seeing the tears she blinked away tore him up inside. So did the pain and confusion in her voice.
“Why did you come get me in Philadelphia? Why not just let me come back and find the sign on my own? Or were you deliberately trying to rub my nose in it?”
Going to get her had been a mistake. He’d been worried about her. And the truth was that Luke had told his lawyer when he’d first heard about the will and its terms to put the place on the market the minute the six months was over with. The For Sale sign hadn’t been there when he’d left earlier that day.
But it was a “sign” indicating it was time he moved on. Luke had gotten in much too deep here, much deeper than he’d expected. Maybe if her dad had been a laid-off plumber or something, maybe then he’d think differently. Maybe not. He’d never been good at commitment. Had never learned to trust the concept of long-term plans.
Until now. Until Julia.
But that didn’t change the fact that his life was still a mess while hers was taking off. Adam Kemp could give her things Luke couldn’t. And Serenity Falls could give her the stability she’d always wanted.
How could he compete with a billionaire and a contender for Best Small Town in America?
What could he offer her? A life on the road? She had grown roots here, loved it here, had family here.
He’d never answered her last question, but she didn’t seem to notice. Instead she said, “I thought you’d changed.”
Her words hit him the wrong way. “Big mistake.”
“I see that now. Why didn’t you say anything to me before this? You never told me you were going to sell. Didn’t you think I deserved to know?”
“I’m really not good at this relationship stuff.”
It was nice, and then it was over. Julia remembered her father saying that about him and Angel. And now here she was, hearing Luke basically tell her the same thing.
“So you’re ready to move on, is that it?” Her voice was choked with emotion and the strain of refusing to cry in front of him.
“Affirmative.”
“Alone.”
Luke nodded. “It’s what I do best.”
No, what he did best was break her heart into a million pieces.
“Come back later,” Luke growled at the man who walked through Maguire’s front entrance.
The crusty old attorney who’d worked for his father wasn’t intimidated. Instead, he was all business. “I can’t do that. Your father was very specific in his instructions that I was to give this letter to you the moment the six-month period was over. And that you were to read it before the terms of the will would be considered fulfilled.”
Eager to get this mess over with, Luke ripped open the envelope.
Luke, if you’re reading this it means that I’ve kicked the bucket and you’ve completed the six-month requirement of my will. I wanted you to come home again and knew this was the only chance of that happening. Some people say you can’t go home again. I’m not one of them. I know you blamed me for your mother’s death, and you know that I blamed you. We were both wrong. I’m not the kind of guy to get all mushy, so I’ll just say that life is shorter than you think, and the years go by without you even realizing it.
What, you were expecting some brilliant words of wisdom from me? I don’t have ’em. I could tell you to keep Maguire’s, but that would probably just make you sell it. So all I’ll say is good-bye.
Tommy Maguire
Luke crumpled the letter into a ball. Even at the end, the old man couldn’t sign off as “Dad.”
At least he’d gotten one thing right. Luke had blamed him for his mother’s death. His father had never insisted she see a doctor. One of them might have found her heart condition and saved her. That’s what th
e childhood Luke had always thought. Now the adult Luke wasn’t so sure.
Either way, it was time to let go of the past and lay those old ghosts to rest. There was no changing things now.
Having fulfilled his responsibilities, the lawyer made a hasty exit but was soon replaced by an infuriated Adele. “I come into work and find a For Sale sign out front.” Her hands were clenched into fists, as if she wanted to take a swing at him. “You couldn’t tell me beforehand?”
“I couldn’t tell anyone. My father’s idea, not mine. Blame him.”
“You’ve spent enough time blaming him.”
Luke didn’t even wince at the blow. It was a truthful statement. He realized that now. “You’re right.”
“If you knew all this time that you’d be leaving, why did you hook up with Julia? I thought things were serious with you two.”
“Because I’m a no-good bastard.”
“I’m not letting you off that easily. You want to know what I think?”
“Not at all.”
“I’m going to tell you anyway.”
“I had a feeling you would.”
“I think you’re afraid. I think you’re scared spitless.”
“Of what?”
“Of what you’ve got with Julia. Of the fact that you’ve fallen for her. Fallen hard.”
“You’re crazy.”
“Am I?”
“And even if you were right, it wouldn’t make any difference.”
Adele fixed him with a stare. “And why’s that?”
“She could do better.”
“Than a former FBI agent?”
Now he was the one who fixed her with a stare, one of his narrow-eyed ones that got people to talk. “How did you know?”
“Your dad told me.”
This came as a total shock to Luke. “He knew?”
“He paid a private investigator to check up on you. Make sure you were still alive.”
“He didn’t say anything about that in the letter he left for me.”
Adele shrugged. “Your dad was a hard man to figure out. A hard man, period. But he was proud of you in the end.”