by Lea Nolan
Jack hung in with Beckett and WFG, not just because he had a vision for the company. Beckett was the only family he had, and vice versa. For better or worse, Jack and that bastard were stuck with each other. Fate really was a cruel bitch.
But none of Jack’s bullshit made for polite breakfast conversation, especially if he wanted to maintain the pleasure of Raven’s company. He sensed she wouldn’t approve of his sending a quarter of his newly acquired workforce to the unemployment office and slashing the benefits of the ones who remained.
Jack set his fork down and sat back against the booth. “I had to get my head straight about a few things. Work stuff. Family stuff.” Because if he didn’t find some way to compartmentalize his guilt, the next time he walked into work, his heart might seize in his chest.
“When you say family, do you mean . . . a wife?” Raven looked genuinely scared to hear his answer. He kind of liked that.
“God, no. That’s long over with.”
The divorce was his fault. Beckett and her father were business colleagues, and they’d thought their kids’ merger would be good for business. He’d loved Alannah but hadn’t been in love with her. Their youth and inexperience weren’t enough to see them through the rocky first few years of marriage. He should have known better, but as usual, he’d followed Beckett's lead and ended up hurting Alannah in the process.
“How about kids?”
He shook his head. “None of those.”
Raven exhaled. “So, parents, then.”
Jack nodded. “Something like that.” Because he wasn’t up to explaining the whole sordid, fucked up tale.
“How about you?” he asked.
“No exes, no kids, no parents, just two sisters.” She rattled it off so quickly it almost sounded clinical.
“That’s tidy.”
She shrugged. “Just the facts.” There had to be a lot more behind those cold, bare facts, but he wasn’t about to go poking around if she wasn't sharing.
“So, what do you say? We ride out the weekend together but separate, in our own corners?” He smiled.
She assessed him, weighing his offer. “Okay. You do your thing. I’ll do mine.” She reached out a hand, and he shook it.
“Deal.”
They were nearly finished with breakfast when a police officer entered the diner. Jack watched as he exchanged a few short words with Claire, then picked up a glass from a newly vacated table and struck a fork against its side. The chiming sound quieted the din and caused all eyes to focus on him.
“Hey, everyone, can I have your attention? We just got word that the weather coming in late tonight into tomorrow is likely to be more severe than expected. On top of last night’s water, you know what that means.”
The diner regulars moaned.
“What does it mean?” Jack asked Raven.
“Lower Main Street is liable to flood,” she said.
“How bad is it, Chief McMullen?” a middle-aged man asked.
“Looks like a nor’easter, Ed. It’s just a projection for now. We won’t really know until it gets closer.”
“This is why we need to replace our seawall,” an older woman in a prim yellow jacket said.
“Well, Edith, the bond never passed, so we don’t have the money. That’s why we need to resort to other measures. I’m looking for volunteers to fill sandbags at the library starting at eleven. We don’t want that building to flood again.”
The police chief provided a few more details, then left with a care package from Claire.
Raven checked her phone. “It’s almost eleven. I’m heading over to the library. You can find your way back, right?” She scooted out of the booth.
“No need. I’m coming with you,” Jack answered, then unfurled himself from the bench. His legs screamed their thanks to be set free finally.
“Why?” Raven looked shocked that he’d assist her community. Should he take that as an insult? He wasn’t completely heartless. He’d helped plenty of people in need. Though his aide usually came in the form of a fat, tax-deductible check, rather than manual labor.
“Those sandbags won’t fill themselves,” Jack answered.
“There’ll be plenty of locals who pitch in. This is your weekend away. You’re supposed to read books and watch movies.”
“They’ll be there after the sandbags are filled,” Jack said.
“You don’t have to do this.”
“But I want to.” And he actually did. How strange. “Besides, someone has to make sure you don’t break your ankle in those pretty shit kickers.”
She scoffed. “I work in heels higher than this.”
Jack raised a brow. “Shoveling sand?”
Raven waved him off. “I’ll be fine. Just watch me.” She sauntered ahead of him, heading toward the diner’s front door, giving him a prime view of her exceptionally fine ass.
“Oh, I will.”
Chapter 7
It was one thing to admire a man’s body. It was another to watch as he put his beautiful muscles into action.
Raven had had plenty of opportunities to do just that. As soon as she and Jack got down to the beach, the guys in charge of the sandbag operation took one look at Jack and put him to work. They humored Raven by letting her work alongside him. The two were part of an assembly line of more than a hundred volunteers that bagged sand on the beach, then passed it up the line until it reached the library at the bottom of Main Street.
The view from Raven’s vantage point was spectacular. As soon as someone had handed Jack a shovel, he’d shed his jacket. Twenty minutes later, he’d stripped off his sweater, leaving him in just his long-sleeved T-shirt that stretched in all the right places over his broad shoulders and thick biceps. Every now and again, when he bent or stretched to scoop a new shovelful of sand, the hem of his T-shirt lifted just enough for Raven to catch a peek of his toned torso. What she’d glimpsed did nothing to dissuade her from her Superman analogy. Jack had a magnificent physique, and it moved like a well-oiled machine.
While Jack’s body was built for hard, manual labor, Raven’s was not, as evidenced by the charley horse in her left calf and the blister forming between her thumb and forefinger. Filling sandbags was hard, grueling work, especially in high-fashion street boots (damn Jack for being right about that), but the discomfort was worth it. The library was one of the island’s most precious jewels and needed protection.
Several hours into their volunteer shift, Jack’s shovel stilled, and his cautious eyes settled on her. “You okay? How about a break?” He was barely out of breath, which was so not fair.
Dear God in heaven, yes.
Raven ran three miles a day yet felt like she was about to collapse. She forced a smile. “No, I’m good.”
“Would you mind getting me some water, then?”
Raven glanced at the nearly full bottle at his feet. He didn’t need any water, but he’d asked for some to give her an excuse to rest, even for just a couple of minutes. Just this once, she’d allow it.
She grinned, for real this time. “Be right back.”
Raven made her way to the table where volunteers were handing out drinks and snacks.
Madeline Connors, the head librarian, greeted Raven with a warm hug. “I’m so happy to see you. I didn’t realize you were coming to the island this weekend.”
Madeline was Smith’s mother and Wren’s soon-to-be mother-in-law. When the Donovan girls were young, they had spent much of their summers at the library, and Madeline had been a steady presence in their lives. What the girls didn’t realize was that Madeline was even more important to their father, Francis. The two had carried on a secret love affair, which only ended because Francis refused to remarry, believing his daughters wouldn’t forgive him for replacing their mother. Madeline was a kind, beautiful woman who deserved to be loved, but Francis hadn’t been the right man. He’d never talked about his feelings, but Raven and her sisters believed that loving—and losing—had hurt him too much the first time. He couldn’
t risk doing it again.
Of all the lessons her father had taught her, that one had stuck the most.
Shaking off the pain of the past, Raven focused on the present, and answered Madeline’s question. “It was a last-minute trip.”
“I see you brought a friend.” Madeline gestured toward Jack, who was back at work, shoveling faster than before.
“He’s Lark’s friend,” Raven answered.
“You could’ve fooled me. I saw the way he looks at you.”
Madeline had an overdeveloped sense of the romantic. She was the one who’d introduced all three Donovan sisters to romance novels and encouraged them to find their own happily ever afters. She’d even helped orchestrate Smith and Wren’s reunion after they’d broken up.
But Madeline was wrong about the prospects for Raven and Jack. He was handsome and had the most magnificent body Raven had ever seen. He might, as Lark swore, even be a nice, trustworthy guy. Raven knew for certain he was an excellent kisser. But all those truths didn’t amount to a hill of coffee beans for one simple fact: Raven didn’t date because she wasn’t looking for love. It didn’t fit into her life and wasn’t part of her future.
Raven laughed. “Your matchmaking meter is off. Jack and I only met last night.”
Madeline smiled. “Okay.”
When Madeline got like this, it was best to go with the flow and not fight her.
Raven drew a deep breath. “Anyway, we were at the Shipwreck when they asked for volunteers. I couldn’t keep Jack from jumping in.”
“I’m grateful to him. I don’t know what we’ll do if the library floods again.”
“Is there anything else I can do to help? Maybe at the library?”
“I’ve got a team moving books to the second floor. It’s just a quick fix. I worry about the next storm and the one after that. All the coastal areas are flooding so often these days. I’m not sure how the library will survive in the long run.”
“Mrs. Johnson mentioned a seawall when we were at the Shipwreck for breakfast?”
Madeline shook her head. “The only one is too low and crumbling. Everyone wants a new one, but no one wants to vote for the bond to pay for it. We can’t even agree to put it on the ballot.”
“I see.”
“Short of that, we’ll need to look into moving the library to higher ground. Of course, that’ll mean off of Main Street.”
“I’d hate that.” The library was part of what made downtown such a community gathering place.
“Me, too.” Something caught Madeline’s attention, and her eyes lit with laughter. “Looks like your friend—sorry, Lark’s friend—has found a friend of his own.”
Raven whipped her head around to see just who might be chatting up Jack. She was surprised to see a little black and gray ball of overgrown, matted fur barking at his ankles. Jack attempted to shoo it away, but each time the creature retreated, it skittered back, its tail wagging like a metronome.
The other volunteers laughed each time Jack tried and failed to command the tiny beast that wasn’t tall enough to reach his knee.
“That’s a dog, right?” Raven asked.
Madeline laughed. “Poor little thing. Not all God’s creatures can be beautiful.”
“Whoever owns it should be ashamed of themselves. They need to take better care of it.”
“Judging by the looks of it, there may not be an owner,” Madeline said.
“That’s so sad.” Raven bid her goodbyes to Madeline, then grabbed three water bottles and an empty coffee cup, and headed back to Jack.
“Hey, I see you’ve got a new buddy,” Raven said. As the dog came into closer view, the words inside her head popped out of her mouth unbidden. “Oh, wow.”
The dog was even more homely than she’d thought. The fur on top of its head was coarse and uneven, its eyes bulged, and a pink tongue hung out the side of its narrow, toothy mouth.
Jack sank his shovel in the sand and wiped his brow. “This thing won’t leave me alone.”
She handed him a bottle. “It’s your magnetic personality.”
“Yeah, that’s it.” He took the empty coffee cup, then knelt and emptied some water into it. The dog lapped it up like it hadn’t drunk for days, and its stump of a tail thumped with gratitude. Jack refilled it twice more until the dog had its fill. “There you go, little guy. Now go find your family.” Jack rose to his feet and pointed his long arm down the beach.
The dog sat on the sand, head cocked, and stared lovingly up at Jack.
“He’s not listening to you,” Raven said, delighting in the obvious.
“I can see that.”
“Go on, honey. Go find your momma.” Raven flicked her wrist and pointed in the opposite direction down the beach.
The dog rose to its feet and yapped. Raven didn’t speak dog, but if she had to guess, the pup had just told her to stick it.
“Wow, he’s a sassy little one, isn’t he?”
“Only to you.” Jack grinned.
“Then I guess you’re stuck with him.”
Jack shook his head. “Impossible. I am not a dog person.”
Just then, Hunter McMullen, the chief of police, appeared on the boardwalk. He stood on a bench and sounded the siren on his megaphone to get the crowd’s attention. “Great work, everyone. We’ve got more than enough sandbags to protect the library and town hall. The last nor’easter that blew through here brought two feet of water into those buildings. Our sandbag wall should withstand at least six feet. You should be proud of yourselves, Heron Harbor. Now I know you’ve all worked up an appetite, so as a thank you, Boardwalk Pizza and Fries has donated lunch for all the volunteers. Come and eat!”
As Jack and Raven headed toward the restaurant, his phone rang. He pulled it from his pocket. Jack’s expression hardened. “Sorry. I’ve got to take this. I’ll catch up with you.”
Turning his back to her, he stepped out of earshot, followed by the little matted dog who lay down at his feet. Raven watched as Jack’s body language shifted. His stance turned rigid, almost aggressive. He didn’t look like the same man she’d spent the morning with.
“Okay. I’ll see you later,” she murmured, even though he couldn’t hear her, then spun on her heels and walked away.
“What is it, Kiara?” Jack snapped into his cell.
“I’m sorry to bother you, boss,” Kiara answered.
His next-in-command knew better than to interrupt his weekends of solace. Ninety-nine percent of Jack’s life was devoted to work. No matter what was needed, no matter the time of day, he was on it. But after the dirty deeds were done, he needed a little goddamn time to himself. So whatever had prompted this call better be a bona fide nuclear meltdown.
“This better be good.” Jack turned around in the sand and nearly tripped on the little dog who had curled up behind him. He watched as Raven strode toward the boardwalk. There was a slight hitch in her gait, probably from working in those damn boots he’d warned her not to wear.
The more time he spent with the dark-haired beauty, the more interesting she became. He longed to be with her now, headed toward reward pizza, not being reminded of his fucking job and the reason he’d come to this island in the first place.
“We’ve got a problem with our new partner.”
Jack’s jaw tightened. “What else is new? We’ve had problems since day one with these people.”
“This is a new wrinkle. She’s afraid to pull the trigger.”
He chuffed out a hard laugh. Of course. Everyone liked to talk big until it was game time. Then they turned into whiny little piss ants and choked. Well, she wanted the ball. He’d given it to her. Now it was time to play.
The dog sprang to its feet and barked.
“It’s just a fucking email. Why the cold feet now?” Jack picked up a flat stone about three inches long and tossed it down the beach. The dog raced after it.
“They’ve never required anything similar in the past. She thinks it’s a bridge too far, especially after
yesterday’s . . . adjustments. She hadn’t anticipated the extent of the blowback she’s received.”
“Then she isn’t very bright.” Jesus, how stupid could some people be? His new “partner” was all too happy to bask in the glory of victory but couldn’t stomach the gory battles that preceded it.
Too fucking bad. She wanted to play in the big leagues; she had to learn to take the hits. He needed her to do this one simple thing. After that, he didn’t care if he never heard from her again.
The dog returned with the rock and dropped it at Jack’s feet. Great. Now he’d started a game he didn’t want to play.
Kiara sighed. “She’s threatening to delete all the email addresses.”
Jack had expected this sort of thing would happen eventually—he just didn’t think it’d be so soon. Normally his first reaction would be volcanic, complete with him spewing sulfurous brimstone and colorful expletives. But he was on a mini vacation, so he decided to keep his blood pressure in check. Still, his new partner needed a little tutorial on the nature of their business association.
Jack drew a deep, cleansing breath of ocean air. “You tell our friend that as a minority partner, she doesn’t have a choice. She does as we say, or we’ll bar her from the building. Her presence there is merely a courtesy. And if she so much as deletes one email address, I will have her arrested for destruction of property.”
The dog whined and looked from the rock to Jack, and then back to the rock.
“She’s going to throw another tantrum,” Kiara said.
“Another?” Jesus, who the hell had he gotten into bed with, metaphorically speaking? If the return on investment weren’t so high, he’d seriously be regretting his decision. But his instinct told him they’d make a mint, and his instinct had never steered him wrong.
Impatient for Jack to toss the rock again, the dog barked. To shut it up, he grabbed the rock and threw it harder this time. Hopefully, it’d go so far, the dog would find someone else to bond with.