by Kevin, Lucy
She wondered what Brian looked like now. Probably as gorgeous as ever, she mused with a pang in the center of her chest.
Two figures came around the corner toward her. Morgan assumed the dark-haired girl was Natalie Fields. She was wearing glasses, carrying a folder and managing to look about as serious as was possible for a seventeen-year-old girl to look. Morgan had asked Emily to recruit kids with an interest in science on the basis that a lot of makeup production was chemistry and the horticulture involved in gathering the ingredients would involve plenty of knowledge of biology.
Natalie certainly fit the bill, and her internship application and high school achievements made it sound like she was a future Marie Curie in the making. Not only was she a straight-A student, but she’d also taken extra-credit biology and had written a very well-researched paper on environmental gardens. With luck, that would make her the perfect assistant when it came to helping to design and cultivate the old Walker plot for the project. The only question mark Morgan could think of was whether the girl would mind leaving the classroom and getting her hands dirty in the garden.
The boy walking beside Natalie was at least a foot taller, with youthful, good-looking features and his hair cut short. Clearly, Tad Burrows was going to be a great help in the brawn department as they farmed the garden. Emily had told her that Tad was the football team's star kicker. His grades, while far from awful, weren’t exactly in Natalie’s league, which made him a little hard to figure out. For Natalie, being Morgan’s intern made perfect sense. It showed colleges that she was serious about a scientific career, gave her experience to bring to employers, and helped her to make contacts in the makeup world if that was what she wanted to go into later. Tad, on the other hand, had clearly been focusing on football so that he could get an athletics scholarship. Nothing in his application suggested that he had any previous interest in gardening or science.
She was about to say hello and introduce herself when a third figure came walking around the corner...and Morgan's breath caught in her throat.
She’d been wrong. Brian wasn’t as gorgeous as ever. He was better looking than he had been before. He still had the muscular poise of an athlete, and his hair still fell in that unruly, boyish mess, but his features were more rugged now with a wiser, and definitely more confident, edge to his appearance.
For several seconds, Morgan couldn't manage to do anything but stare at him. She could have looked into those deep-blue eyes practically forever, and judging by the way that Brian was looking back at her—
Natalie moved to stand right in front of Morgan and thrust a hand out at her. “It’s such a pleasure to meet you, Ms. Walker. I’ve been looking forward to the chance to work with you ever since I heard about the opportunity. I watch your segment on TV whenever it comes on, and I just loved what you did with the makeup on that zombie movie you did last year. I mean, the way you made them look half-dead and really good all at the same time was amazing, and I'm just in awe of you and all that you've accomplished so far.”
Tad shook her hand, too. “Thanks so much for this opportunity, Ms. Walker. We're really excited about working with you. Aren't we, Coach Russell?”
Brian finally smiled at her, and for all that he'd changed, it was exactly the smile Morgan remembered. One that melted her from the inside out.
“It’s good to see you again, Morgan.”
“It’s nice to see you again, too, Brian.”
Just that quickly, seven years disappeared as sparks jumped between them again. Sparks that were even hotter and wilder than they had been before.
CHAPTER THREE
My God, Morgan was beautiful.
Morgan had been a pretty girl, but now she was every inch a stunning woman. More worldly. More confident. Wearing designer clothes, her gorgeous blond locks styled into glossy perfection.
But despite those changes, it was her eyes that struck him most. There was still the same restlessness there. The same need to find something bigger. Something more. It was one of the things he'd loved about her...even though he'd also known that one day it would be precisely what would pull them apart.
“Are there any celebrities who look, well, normal without their makeup on?” Natalie was asking Morgan as they stepped into Brian’s office.
Morgan laughed. “I can't name any names, but yes, there definitely are. Most of the time, the image you see is just the finished product, one that takes quite a lot of time and professionals to create.”
“Who’s the most famous person you’ve worked with?” Tad asked next.
Morgan looked a little tired, Brian thought, even though she was answering the kids’ questions brightly enough. He had always been able to spot the fatigue in her movements, the slight darkness under her eyes. Obviously, she hadn’t managed to snatch one of the afternoon naps she'd always loved so much when they were kids. Morgan had been able to fall asleep almost anywhere. She’d fallen asleep in the library when they were supposed to be studying, in classes when no one was watching, even occasionally in the corner at a party. Once during a family picnic when all of the other Walkers had been bustling around, Morgan had fallen asleep beneath a corner of the red-checkered tablecloth. Her sisters had liked to joke that she had to be part cat to curl up and sleep anywhere like that.
He'd always thought that they’d been right. After all, Morgan was not only beautiful, graceful and tender…she was also far too fiercely independent to ever want to remain in one spot for very long.
“There's something I don't totally get,” Tad said. “How did you get to be famous when you're just doing makeup for other people?”
“Tad!” Natalie exclaimed. “Ms. Walker does amazing work, not just with normal people like you and me, but with stars, too. She's the best in the business!”
“I know that,” Tad said, his face turning a little red as he belatedly realized he'd put his foot in his mouth. Especially in front of the girl that he clearly had a major crush on. “I just don’t understand—”
“How that translates to fame?” Morgan finished for him. “I’m not sure I understand it myself, some days.” She laughed again, and the sound warmed every part of Brian that had been cold for the past seven years. “I was very much in the background as a makeup artist until I started doing the TV makeover segments and a few of my online how-to videos went viral. I’m just glad it did end up working out like that, though, or I might not have such a good job now.”
But was she truly glad that she was famous now? Because as they headed through to Brian’s office, maybe most other people wouldn’t have seen it—it was obvious that neither Natalie nor Tad did—but being the focus of their awestruck questions was obviously making Morgan uncomfortable. There was that note of tension under the surface that Brian had always been able to spot. Morgan was doing her best to answer the kids’ questions, but it seemed to him that having to play the celebrity wasn’t quite as easy for Morgan as it would have been for someone who had truly been chasing fame rather than adventure.
Brian could remember that look well, the way she'd closed up a little bit every time someone had made a big deal about her being a Walker when they were kids. From the “I know your sisters” comments, to the looks she got from those on the Peterson side of the old island feud, to the tourists who had treated her as if she were one of the island’s attractions.
But then, maybe the difference with her fame as a makeup artist was that it came out of doing what she loved, whereas the Walker family fame simply lumped her together with her sisters and tied her down to the past. And Brian knew as well as anyone how little Morgan liked being tied down.
“Nice office,” Morgan said, looking around the small space that Brian occupied when he wasn’t in a classroom or out on the field coaching. It was a little disorganized at the moment with stacks of books along one wall, football plays written up on a board at one side, and enough assorted piles of paper on his desk that it was hard to see the wood beneath. “It's great that you're the football coac
h,” Morgan added while Natalie and Tad found space to sit.
“I also teach science,” Brian explained, since she had to be wondering why he was involved with her interns. “Your internship falls under the science department, and since one of our interns is also a football player, I was the obvious point of contact for you on this.”
Actually, he’d volunteered for it. Not that anyone else on staff seemed to mind. Even Morgan’s sister had been surprisingly okay with it. Probably because she knew how interested Brian was in seeing Morgan again. After all, her sisters had been almost as upset as he was when Morgan left the island immediately after graduating high school.
“Mr. Russell is the best science teacher ever,” Natalie said with the same enthusiasm she’d used greeting Morgan. “I’ve learned so much in his classes.”
“Students like Natalie make it very easy for me to do my job,” Brian said. It sounded like the kind of thing a teacher was expected to say, but really, it was the truth. Odds were that, with or without his help, Natalie would eventually work her way into the top echelons of science. In fact, Brian wouldn’t be too surprised if, twenty years from now, she was picking up the Nobel Prize for some discovery. She was the kind of kid who seemed to live inside her books and her brilliant mind. All Brian had to do was point her in the right direction from time to time. One really good thing about this internship was that he hoped it might coax her out of the library once in a while.
Tad…well, he was a little more work. Tad was a smart kid, but he definitely wasn’t the kind of student Brian would ordinarily have expected to get involved with a project like this. That his star kicker had signed up said quite a lot about just how big his crush on Natalie was. Especially since his eyes hadn't left the girl's face since they'd come into the office.
Brian wasn’t sure if Natalie had even noticed that Tad was interested in her when practically any other girl in the school would have jumped at the chance to go out with the football team’s star. Clearly, Tad didn’t believe in making life easy for himself, either with the internship or with his crush.
Funny, Brian thought, it was a lot like how he'd always felt around Morgan. Because instead of falling for one of the island girls who had no urge whatsoever to leave for the city, he'd willingly given his heart to her when they were kids.
And now, seven years since he'd last seen her, one look was all it had taken for him to realize that he was just as head over heels in love with Morgan as he'd been back in high school.
“Brian?” Morgan began to reach for him, but pulled her hand back at the last moment. “Is everything okay?”
Knowing the last thing he could do in front of his students was blurt out his love for her, he nodded and said, “Your assistant sent over some waivers for everyone to sign.” He rooted through his stacks of paperwork until he found them. “We also have one for you about not holding the school liable for anything to do with the project, along with the state education forms to make the internships official for Natalie’s and Tad's transcripts.”
“Wait a minute,” Morgan said as she frowned at the school's internship forms. “It says here that the supervisor must be present on all excursions.” She looked up at him, her eyes such a beautiful blue that he needed to grab on to the desk to steady himself. “Are you really planning to be with the three of us every single time we work together on my project?”
“I think the idea is to have some supervision for the students, make sure everything’s going okay, and have some continuity with my science class.” Brian worked to make the plan sound as natural—and as casual—as he could. “Plus, in the event that something were to go wrong, I will be able to step in and help out immediately. Not that I think anything’s going to go wrong, obviously.”
Morgan pressed her lips together at that, and Brian couldn’t help remembering the sweet yet sinful sensation of them against his own. Her lips had tasted so delicious every time they'd kissed, the flavor of her lip gloss changing as often as her mood. She'd treated makeup as a means of self-expression, the way someone else might use paint or music. She had always been an artist, one with really, really beautiful lips that he'd dreamed of kissing again for seven long years...
Somehow, Brian managed to turn his focus back to the papers they each needed to sign and the schedule his students needed to keep to fit in all of their activities. “Practice starts in five minutes, Tad. You should probably head out now that the contracts are signed.”
Tad looked a little startled by the reminder. He’d obviously been watching Natalie instead of the clock. He really had it bad.
Brian knew exactly how he felt.
“Thanks for the reminder, Coach. And thanks again for this opportunity, Ms. Walker.” He turned to the girl beside him, wearing his heart entirely on his sleeve. “Bye, Natalie.”
After giving him a friendly wave, Natalie told them, “I need to go, too, unfortunately. I’ve got an experiment running in the science lab.” Clearly, she wished she could stay to produce Morgan’s entire makeup line right there and then.
“When we have more time together,” Morgan said, “I'd love to hear more about what you're working on at school.”
The girl looked thrilled. “Oh my gosh, I would love to talk to you about things. Anything, really, since you've seen and done so much.”
And then, for the first time in seven incredibly long years, Brian and Morgan were alone together again.
“Don’t you have to head out to the football field, too?” Morgan asked.
“Nope, one of the assistant coaches is running today's practice.”
Brian racked his brain to think of something he could say to Morgan that would get her to stay, even just a few minutes longer. But standing this close to her muddled up his brain and turned it to mush. Just the way her kisses always had.
But Morgan wasn't turning to leave. Instead, she was looking at him with an expression on her face that he couldn't quite read. “Do you want to go and get a drink?”
Her question was so sudden that it took Brian completely by surprise. It was the very last thing he’d been expecting.
And the very best.
“I'd love to.”
CHAPTER FOUR
As they walked the short distance to the local hangout on Main Street, Morgan tried to think of things they could talk about that wouldn't end up circling back to their teenage romantic relationship. She hadn't intended to ask Brian to have a drink with her, but once the papers had been signed and the kids had walked away, she'd realized she wasn't ready to walk away from him. Not yet. Not when he looked and smelled so good. Not when his smile was so sweet and so sexy.
And not when she'd finally realized just how much she'd missed him all these years.
Given that they were going to be working alongside one another every single day for the next several weeks, she had spontaneously decided that the best thing they could do was go for a friendly drink to show that they could get along without their past getting in the way. A simple “I’m not pining over you and you’re not pining over me” drink. It was the right thing to do. The adult thing to do. After all, they weren’t hormone-driven, angst-ridden kids anymore.
They walked in silence for a couple of minutes before they reached the Seaman’s Pub. It was mostly full of locals and the marine biology crowd, who came over to do research on the whales and the waters around the island, and played up the maritime image with nets and pictures of the island’s whale “regulars” on the walls. It was strange to think that she and Brian had been eighteen the last time they'd gone out together and hadn't been old enough to set foot inside the pub.
“How is your mother doing?” Morgan asked.
“She’s great now, completely over her illness. She’s living in Seattle now and loves being in the city.”
“So she's happy?” Morgan had always liked Brian’s mother and had been really sad when she'd gotten sick midway through their high school years. Brian had always done such a good job of taking care of his m
om that it had been just one more reason to love him. At the same time, she was surprised to hear that Mrs. Russell wasn't on the island anymore, because that meant that Brian was living here without any family at all.
“She's very happy, actually. My dad and I were the big island lovers, not her.” He looked at Morgan, and in his eyes she read his acceptance of that fact. Just the way he'd always accepted it about her.
Brian bought them drinks while she looked for a table. She tried to find a spot where they'd have plenty of space, but after he returned with the drinks she quickly realized that due to a couple of biologists who were loudly discussing approaches to underwater photography at the next table, they would have to sit quite close to each other if they wanted to actually be able to hear each other talk.
“How have the makeover segments been going?”
“Really well,” Morgan said. “Especially when I'm working with someone who is on the verge of making a big change in their life and I can see what a difference the makeover makes to them. That's when it feels like I've done something really great.” There weren't many men who she believed would understand that, but Brian had always understood more than anyone else. And despite their years apart, something told her he still did.
“I loved that makeover you did awhile back in Idaho when you helped the girl get ready for her prom.”
Maybe Morgan should have been surprised that Brian's favorite makeover segment was the same as her own, but she wasn't. Not when they'd always been able to finish each other's sentences—and thoughts. Truly, the only thing that did surprise her was that Brian watched her on TV at all. Clearly, he hadn't been nearly as intent on blocking her out of his life these past seven years as she had with him. It was just that it had hurt so much every time she thought about him...
Belatedly realizing he was waiting for her to respond, she said, “I loved working with Charlene. Not just making her beautiful for her big night, but convincing her that she is beautiful, wheelchair and all.”