With every flash inside his head, Ethan had also gotten a sense that the man had been intent on taking her life that night, as if he had been sent there for that very purpose.
But why? What had she done? What had she seen? The questions nagged at him.
Ethan was fully aware that even if he did break down and confront her with all of his questions and suspicions, she’d simply pull away.
It would put an end to their easiness together.
And he found, he simply couldn’t do it. The cop in him was tempted.
But the man just wanted the woman. Period. Any way he could get her.
Chapter 15 Book 2
One day after Hayden and Nick had spent the entire morning poring over the farm’s books, Nick ran his fingers through his hair and said, “A dairy farm isn’t as easy as it looks. In fact, this is a lot more complicated than I originally thought. To stay organic we have certifications we have to maintain.”
“I know. Fran told me there’s a long list of specifications we have to meet. I had no idea there was so much to growing organic vegetables,” Hayden said with a laugh. “Are we making progress here, Nick? We only have ten more days before Will and Fran abandon us.”
“It’s like cramming for an exam. But we can still rely on Silas and Sammy. And thanks to Marty and Ben, they have the packing and delivery schedules down to an art. They’ve been working here almost two years now and Will has shown all four of them the fertilizer methods, as well as the limit on the pesticides to use. You know, Will and Francine did agree that if we had questions after they get to Tulare, we can always call or e-mail them.”
“That’s fine, Nick, but a garden isn’t going to grow because of anything I find out in an e-mail.” She sighed audibly. “What if I don’t possess the slightest hint of a green thumb? What if I kill every plant you own, in spite of Silas and Sammy’s direction? Have you read up on that powdery mildew stuff? It’s scary. Even Sammy said it’s tough to get rid of once it takes hold.”
Nick chuckled. “I see I’m not the only one with a huge chunk of doubt. We’ll do the best we can, okay? This is new ground and we’re sure to make a few mistakes along the way.”
“Jordan seems to think it’s going well.”
“Jordan is an eternal optimist. Speaking of Jordan, I was wondering if you’d mind babysitting Hutton for me. Jordan’s birthday is the week before Halloween. I’d like to take her to San Francisco for an overnight trip, get her away to a five-star hotel where she can relax, do nothing but indulge herself. That way, she won’t have to think about guests for twenty-four hours. If you’ll agree to take care of Hutton for us, I’ll see to it you don’t have to worry about guests staying that day.”
“Sure, I’ll babysit. But why don’t I ask Margie for a Saturday night off. That way you guys could leave Saturday morning and make a weekend out of it. You could even stay until Monday night or Tuesday morning. Your choice. Give you more time alone together, more downtime for Jordan to unwind. I don’t have to be at the Diner until Tuesday afternoon.”
“You’d do that?”
“Nick, if you don’t know by now, I’d do just about anything for you and Jordan, then I’m a failure as a friend.”
Nick laughed. “Aww, I like you too. But Margie might be upset.”
“Margie will get over it. Besides, despite the woman’s gruff exterior she’s a marshmallow on the inside. She’s a bit of a romantic. She goes through more romance novels than a junkie goes through crack. Who would have thought? But it’s true. She and Max have been together as a couple for at least a decade. That’s longer than some marriages last.”
“Margie and Max? This town is a continuous source of surprise in the couple department.”
“Isn’t it though? Murphy and Carla Vargas can’t keep their hands off each other whenever they come into the Diner for lunch. Same goes for Wally and Lilly. And Janie Pointer is sweet on Flynn McCready.”
Nick’s eyes went wide. “Janie, the hairstylist, and Flynn?”
“Yep, hot and heavy.”
“Look, I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t mention anything to Jordan about the trip. I’d like to surprise her.”
She put her thumb and forefinger together and held them to her mouth, gave a little twist as if she were turning a key. “Not to worry. It’s in the vault. If you plan to leave that Saturday you’ll miss the Homecoming parade though. It’s all the high school girls can talk about, that and the Homecoming dance.”
“Let’s see, I’ve only been in Pelican Pointe since last winter and already I’ve seen more parades than I ever did in my entire life. Hutton gets a kick out of them though. But she’ll never know she missed the Homecoming parade.”
“I could take her. If you remove her car seat from the SUV, leave it so I can put it in the Mini, we could go.”
“That’d be fine. And just so you know, I plan to mention the trip to Ethan. It’s okay by me if he stays out here while we’re gone. In fact, I’d prefer it. Leaving you and Hutton here alone, I don’t think is a good idea.”
She laughed and playfully punched him on the arm. “Why Nick, it’s like you’re the big brother I never had.”
He shot her a brief grin before turning serious. “I love The Cove, but it’s a long way from town. If Ethan can’t stay out here at night while we’re gone, then I may have to rethink leaving you and my daughter alone.”
“Look, I won’t say I don’t think of the guy who wants me dead every now and then, but I think I’m off his radar. You really think of her as yours, don’t you?”
He didn’t have to ask to know she meant Hutton. “Absolutely. I mean I know she’s Scott’s, but she couldn’t be more mine.” But then he caught what she’d said. “Did you say dead? Hayden, I really wish you would tell Ethan who it is. I realize you’re trying to...” He scratched his chin. “I’m not sure what you’re trying to do, but isn’t it better to be honest with Ethan? I know you two are…involved with each other.”
She grinned at the way he phrased that. “And you? You want me to be honest with you?”
“Frankly, if you told me, I’d go straight to Ethan with the details.” When he eyed the hurt on her face he explained, “Out of concern for your safety, Hayden. Not only that, I believe that honesty between two people is first and foremost. Without that you have nothing. In this case you’re keeping something that could be detrimental to your safety. Look, when I first got here, I wasn’t upfront with Jordan about a lot of things. I had issues, mostly dealing with Scott. I wasn’t honest and it could have cost me Jordan. When I think about that now, about how I could have screwed up the most important relationship I’d ever had, I don’t want to see this person put some kind of a wedge between you and Ethan down the road. I speak from experience. I got lucky with Jordan, she’s the exception. I just don’t want you making the same mistakes I made.”
“Well, when you put it like that, I’ll think about it. I’ve been talking to him, you know.” When she saw the confusion in his eyes, she corrected the misconception. “Scott. Not Ethan. I go out to the cemetery whenever I can spare a minute. We have long talks. If someone passed by, they’d more than likely think I was insane, sitting there in front of his headstone on the grass talking to myself. But going out there, talking to him is somehow―comforting.”
Nick shook his head. “You’ve obviously made a connection to him.”
“Yeah. I haven’t told Jordan. It upsets her. And what with her being pregnant and all, I think it’s better if I keep this to myself.”
“She’s upset that Scott doesn’t bother with her.”
“I know. He says she’s blocking him because she’s so angry about being out here so long alone. Despite how crazy that sounds, I like him, Nick. It’s hard not to.”
“Well, Scott always did like to talk. Think of it this way, if nothing else, it’s cheap therapy.”
Later that morning, Hayden caught sight of Will Foley sitting on the tractor pulling a load of newly picked pumpkins down t
he long driveway to the roadside fruit stand. Suddenly a light bulb went off. She decided they might do a lot more business if they turned the fruit stand into a pumpkin patch like she’d seen a lifetime ago back home.
When she mentioned it to Will, he took off his ball cap, scratched his head, and said, “Not a bad idea. Might increase sales at that. I’m surprised Frannie didn’t think of that before now.”
After talking Will into delivering more bales of hay and all the wooden crates he could find, Hayden set to work. It took most of the morning, but by noon, she’d made a couple of life-sized scarecrows out of the old jeans and tattered shirts she’d found among the boxes of Edmund Taggert’s clothing Fran had planned to donate to the Salvation Army. As Hayden stuffed hay into the jeans, she decided that maybe using his old clothes, in some eerie way Mr. Taggert could still feel part of the place while Nick and Jordan took over running it.
She shook her head. She couldn’t help wondering what was with her lately. Since meeting and talking to Scott, she’d definitely gotten sentimental about the dead lately.
Once she got the scarecrows set up on each side of the front counter, she started to work on arranging the pumpkins on the ground and then on the various levels of hay bales. Realizing she needed flowers to make the display pop, she wondered if Jordan would mind if she cut some of her sunflowers to use for decoration.
She had just decided the entire plants would work better when her prepaid cell phone rang. One glance at the digital readout told her it was Sydney. “Hey, Syd.”
“Hi ya, sis. Got a few minutes between patients to chat. How’re things out west? Still playing farm girl?”
“You are so cruel. And yeah, right now I’m setting up the roadside fruit stand for Halloween.” She wasn’t about to update her sister with the details of sleeping with the local sheriff’s deputy. That knowledge might send Sydney completely over the edge.
“Geez, Em, oops, I mean Hayden, you’re really settling in there. You know, back in your teens you used to be so creative. It wasn’t until you got to college you left that side in the dust for good to go for the moneymaking side of life.”
“Most of the time life requires the moneymaking side.”
“Don’t I know it? Look, I bugged the real estate agent a couple of times this week before I got an answer. It seems the interested buyer has up and disappeared. He’s not returning her phone calls and it seems the number he gave her is no longer a working number. I thought I should let you know the deal fell through.”
Hayden’s heart sank. “Somehow, I knew it was too good to be true.”
“I’m sorry. I know how much you want to get rid of that place, bad memories and all. Look, I’ve got to run, a guy just came into the ER with a screwdriver stuck in his head. Construction worker I bet.”
“Ouch.”
“You hang in there and stay out of trouble. Okay?”
Hayden ended the call more than a little bummed. She had counted on the sale going through. Getting back to setting up the pumpkin patch, she decided The Plant Habitat would have plenty of sunflowers already growing in good-sized pots this time of year. She needed several with giant stalks at least two or three feet in height to put some definite pizzazz into the whole fall look. What her scarecrows needed other than a bunch more pumpkins and gourds were the flowers to balance out the total presentation.
Heading back up the path to the farm to get her car, she put the bad news behind her. Instead she needed to take a run into town and buy Halloween decorations.
Wheeling her cart up and down the aisles at the nursery, she weighed the selections of blooming fall flowers. Who knew there would be so many more choices than simple sunflowers or chrysanthemums? Drawn to the four-inch pots of orange and yellow daisies, she checked the little plastic tag stuck inside the dirt to see what kind of plant it was and how difficult it was to keep alive.
Deciding she could take care of the drought-tolerant Helenium, she added three to the sunflowers already on the cart and was in the process of picking up a tray of crimson-spotted toad lilies when she looked up and saw Ethan heading her way.
Her heart did a little flutter at the thrill of seeing him in the middle of the day.
“Saw your Mini in the parking lot.” The woman was buying herself enough flowers to decorate a float in the Rose Parade. Why hadn’t he thought to do that for her? Isn’t that what a good boyfriend did? Was he the boyfriend? When was the last time he’d been anyone’s boyfriend? They were sleeping together. They were a couple. Every time he went anywhere in town lately someone invariably always stopped him to ask something about Hayden. Was she settling in all right? Was she working that night at the Diner? Wasn’t she learning how to cook? They always assumed he had the answers. And of course, he usually did.
Hell, half of Pelican Pointe already treated them like a couple. He could certainly crack open his wallet once in a while to give the woman in his life a bouquet of flowers.
At that moment, he realized he wanted to be the man in Hayden’s life. Without waiting for an opening, he moved in, covering her mouth with his, right there in the middle of the trailing clematis.
“What do you say after you get off work Saturday night I take you over to Santa Cruz for some dinner and dancing afterwards? Go out on a real date.” And he would stop by the florist and pick her up a dozen roses. “At one time you mentioned you wanted to see the area, the boardwalk, and the beaches. We didn’t get to do that on my birthday.”
She ran her arms up his back. “That sounds great. But we’ve already been out on a real date.” She thought back to the hours and hours of making love on the island. “And look where that got us.”
He shot her a grin. “As I recall, I got into you is what I did.”
“And bragging about it too.”
“Absolutely. So what do you say? There’s a fantastic restaurant that sits out over the water. We’ll get there too late to watch the sunset, but the place serves great seafood and it’s upscale enough so you can wear that blue dress, the one that shows off your legs.”
“What, no seedy dive this time where all the waitresses happen to be fans of yours?”
“Hey, I grew up there, it’s my stomping ground.” No way did he intend to revisit his bartending days at Spikes.
“Okay, it’s a date. Pick me up at nine-thirty. I’ll bring a change of clothes. That way, I can get dressed at your house.”
As he nibbled her ear, he said, “If you do that we’ll more than likely never leave the bedroom.”
“Oh no you don’t, no getting out of a real dinner date. I’m holding you to eating out at a nice restaurant.”
Walking behind Hayden, he kept his eyes locked on the sway of her hips. He pondered how much time they had before she had to start her shift at the Diner. One glance at his watch told him they had forty extra minutes―for a lunch break. “Let’s get this show on the road. Time’s wasting,” he muttered as he grabbed the cart and pushed it toward the checkout.
Even though Hayden didn’t spend as much time at Promise Cove as she had before Ethan, she still paid rent and wanted the grounds near the garage apartment to look as tidy and neat as the rest of the place. In her opinion, the walkway leading from the studio to the courtyard needed some color. And she wanted to surprise Jordan.
This morning, she’d brought over two trays of lavender seedlings and almost as many marigolds from the greenhouse at the farm. Before starting her gardening though, she went back to her car, pulled out the tray of purple blue-eyed daisies she’d found yesterday at the nursery and carted them over to the bare patch of dirt next to Jordan’s still-blooming periwinkles.
She hoped the purple would not only complement the blue pearl of the already flowering beds but also fill up the space where the summer bachelor’s button had long ago succumbed to the chilly nights of fall.
Pulling on her gardening gloves, she took out her little spade and started digging in the loose soil, something she’d lately discovered extremely cathartic.
“You don’t have to do that, you know.”
Hayden forced herself to take a calming breath. She hoped she hadn’t jumped at Scott’s voice. It had been several days since she’d “talked” to him and that had been out at the cemetery. Today was the first time he’d plopped down anywhere near her while at the B & B. But then she hadn’t been spending that much time out here.
“I liked picking them out. I might even like growing them if given half the chance. I spent so many years unhappy in my job. I think I’m learning to like myself again. Flowers are part of that, so is the farm, settling into a new place, a new job. My sister reminded me that when I was younger I had a creative side and gave it up once I got to college to make money.”
“We all have to give up things we enjoy doing in order to earn a living, make money.”
“It seems I went in that direction and lost myself though. That’s how I ended up with Jeremy. I remember going on probably twenty-five interviews right out of college. He was the only one who made me an offer. Six figures right out of college. I remember wondering at the time why he would offer me so much. I guess now I know. I admit the money went to my head.”
“Then find yourself again. Find what makes you happy. Ethan makes you happy.”
Her lips bowed. “He does. But I was talking about money and careers and jobs. None of which made me happy. Nick says I should level with him, tell him about Dochenko.”
“Honesty is always the best policy. Most people won’t put up with dishonesty in a relationship.”
“Did you ever lie to Jordan?”
“Not outright. At least not that I remember. I might’ve exaggerated a few things though. I see that now. Might’ve put an overly optimistic spin on the town, too. But then I wanted to come back here and raise my family, live in the house I grew up in, make the house into a business where I could stay home with my kids. I wanted Jordan to share in all of that and be as excited about this place as I was.”
Pelican Pointe Boxed Set Books 1 - 3 (A Pelican Pointe Novel) Page 52