Boyfriend By Mistake

by Elana Johnson

  Olympia sniffed and stepped back. “Sorry to interrupt.”

  “It’s fine,” she said. “We’re just hanging out. It’s nothing serious.” Maybe she’d been thinking of kissing him tonight. But she couldn’t now, not when she’d just said they weren’t serious.

  Chapter Ten

  Shawn watched Lissa hug her sister, and the older woman in the professional pantsuit walked away, straightening her hair and looking around. Liss stood still for a few moments, and then she turned, already searching for him.

  He lifted one of the sausages he’d collected from the pick-up window, and she started toward him, those tan legs making his blood run hotter with every step. “Sorry about that,” she said, accepting the cardboard tray with her sausage in it.

  “It’s fine,” he said. “Everything okay?”

  “Yes.”

  “What was she upset about?”

  Lissa looked over her shoulder in the direction Olympia had gone. “She’s had a rough time of things lately,” she said, facing him again. “And she thought you were playing me.” She lifted her sausage to her lips, taking a great big bite of it. A few onions and peppers fell back into the tray as she tried to smile and chew at the same time.

  “I’m not playing you,” he said.

  She finished and swallowed. “I know that.” She nodded toward the entrance to the park. “Let’s go.”

  Shawn gestured for her to go on ahead, and she did. He fell into step beside her, his curiosity nearly choking him. But he wasn’t going to ask again. He and Lissa were getting along for once, and he wasn’t going to rock the boat.

  “Favorite ice cream flavor?” he asked her, hoping they could pick up their game where it left off.

  “Oh, come on,” she said, nudging him with her elbow. “You know that one.”

  “Hey, it could have changed.”

  “It hasn’t.”

  “Cookies and cream is so boring, though,” he teased.

  “Well, we can’t all like spumoni or pistachio,” she said, her tone dry.

  He laughed, pulled out a couple of bills to pay for their entrance to the dog show, and they started toward the arena where the agility course had been set up. A cheer went up from the crowd, and Lissa hurried forward, turning backward as she danced on her toes.

  “Come on, we’re going to miss it.”

  Shawn chuckled as she reached for his hand and they jogged the last few steps to enter the stands. She led them to some seats near the end of the course, and she handed the cardboard tray to Shawn when she finished, as if he was the designated holder of trash.

  He honestly didn’t care. Watching the dogs complete the tasks was exciting, and sitting beside Lissa was enough to keep his blood pressure near the top of the charts.

  “I hope Rafael wins,” she said, her eyes on the chart on the other end of the field.

  “There are still a few dogs left,” he said, wishing he’d gotten a drink with his sausage. Because all this yelling for canines had really made him parched.

  The next pup came out, and it moved fast. “Uh oh,” Shawn said. “I’m rooting for this one.”

  “Oh, come on,” Lissa said, bumping him with her shoulder. “You can’t be a fair-weather fan. I’m rooting for the underdog.”

  “Well, Magic is going to cream him.” He stood and started clapping, cheering for Magic as he raced up the ramp and hit the mark exactly right. “He’s amazing,” he said.

  “Sit down.” Lissa pulled on his shirt. But Shawn went on cheering, and Magic crossed the finish line ahead of Rafael’s time.

  Shawn whooped, and when he sat down next to Lissa she gave him a sour look. “Don’t be a sore loser,” he said, threading his fingers through hers. She laughed and leaned her head against his shoulder.

  In the break between dog runs, she said, “Okay, big dream you haven’t done yet.”

  “Run a marathon.”

  She accepted his answer and looked at him for his question. “Same question,” he said. “Big dream.”

  “To own my own fish shop.”

  He turned fully toward her, the moment between them very real and very vulnerable. “Really? I would’ve chosen the bakery for you.”

  “Nah,” she said. “I love the boat. I love fishing. If I could, I’d buy that little storefront next to the flower shop. You know the one right on the corner as you come into town? And I’d sell my catch there every day.”

  “Then what would your family do for fish?”

  “They can buy it from me.” She laughed, and Shawn smiled at her. She may have tried to play things off lightly, but he knew she really would fish every morning and stand behind that counter with the iced catch in front of her, ready to sell to whoever came through the door.

  “My turn,” she said. “Favorite song.”

  “Finding Roots,” he said.

  “Country? Really?”

  “Hey.” He shrugged. “It’s better than that classical stuff you listen to.”

  “It is not. And that classical stuff is very peaceful when I’m out on the boat in the morning.”

  Shawn snorted, and then he squeezed her hand. “What are the chances I can join you on the boat one morning?”

  She sobered, and Shawn liked the fun, playful version of Lissa, and this more serious one as well. “You want to come out on the boat at three in the morning?”

  “Sure, sounds fun.”

  “You never thought it sounded fun before.”

  “Yeah, well, I was seventeen before,” he said, a touch more bitterness in his voice than he intended.

  The next dog came out of the gate, and he was a streak as he ran down the field. “Oh, Magic is going to lose,” Lissa said.

  Shawn thought she was probably right, as this dog hit every turn exactly right—until the cones. He zigged and zagged—and missed a flag.

  A collective “ohhh,” went up from the crowd, and the dog corrected itself and continued on. Shawn couldn’t help cheering along with everyone else as he finished the course, and he still barely came in after Magic.

  “Phew,” Shawn said as if he really cared which dog won this contest. “That was close.”

  “I get up at three,” Lissa said out of nowhere. “Leave at three-fifteen. If you’re late, you get left behind.”

  Shawn smiled to himself. “What does one wear when shrimping at three-fifteen in the morning?”

  “Whatever one wears to bed,” she said with a smile.

  “Oh, come on,” he said. “I’m pretty sure you don’t wear pants to sleep, so that can’t be true.”

  She gasped, and Shawn laughed, and she hit his bicep. “I wear pants to sleep.”

  “Uh, is that why you wouldn’t get out of bed this afternoon when I showed up?”

  “That was a nap,” she said. “And you’re scandalous.”

  He shook his head, chuckling. Shawn couldn’t help his fantasies, but he didn’t speak them out loud. “I’ll put pants on when I wake up,” he said.

  She scoffed, and the last dog shot out of the gate. Shawn watched, cheering despite himself, and Trixie won the whole thing with a perfect performance.

  Lissa was still talking about the dogs as Shawn walked her up the sidewalk to her cottage. She opened the front door and Dodger and Pirate came sprinting out, both barking as they did. They ran off into the darkness, and only the weak porch light illuminated him and Lissa.

  “Thanks for a great night,” she said, finally facing him. She kept her hands tucked in her back pockets as she smiled coyly at him.

  He didn’t move a muscle. “What are the chances of us having some of the fun I want to have tonight?”

  “Oh, you want a kiss, is that it?”

  “A man can dream.” He ducked his head, as all of his dreams lately had featured Lissa.

  One hand landed on his chest, and that was a very good start to this new fantasy. But then Lissa ran her fingers along the side of his face, and back into his hair, and he realized this was no fantasy.

  S
he came halfway, and Shawn put his arms around her and closed the distance between them, this kiss far superior to any of the others they’d shared. She matched his movement, seemingly just as excited to kiss him as he was her, and because of that, he pulled away long before he wanted to.

  “Was that a mistake?” she whispered, both of her hands behind his neck as she practically hung on him.

  “Not even close,” he said, dipping his head to kiss her again.

  When Shawn woke, he could barely pry his eyes open. He couldn’t believe Lissa did this every day, seven days a week, all year long. He knew she didn’t take days off. Such a thing would mean higher costs as the restaurant bought their fish from a commercial establishment for the day. And if there was anything the local island restaurants prided themselves on, it was fresh fish caught daily.

  He realized that his alarm was not going off. But something had woken him. Something like a chime or a ring.

  His phone flashed with a blue light, and he reached for it at the same time it rang. That was the sound he’d heard, and he saw Jason’s name on the screen, along with the numbers 2:11.

  “Two o’clock in the morning,” he grumbled as he unplugged the device and swiped on the call.

  “Yeah?” he asked.

  “Good, I woke you,” Jason said.

  Shawn didn’t see how that was good, but he didn’t argue. “What’s going on?”

  “There’s been some vandalism over at the build site. I need you to go check it out.”

  “Okay.” Shawn got out of bed and looked down at the gym shorts he wore. Did he really need to put on a suit to go out in the middle of the night? Deciding against it, he simply pulled on his shoes, grabbed the keys to the motorcycle, and headed out.

  The engine made such a roar in the quiet night, and Shawn felt bad as he navigated the sleepy streets to the high-rise hotel the Tremmel Group had been building for four months. It was only about three stories high right now, but it was supposed to be fifteen. No one on the island had liked it, so the vandal really could be anyone.

  A police officer met him and asked, “Are you Shawn Newman?”

  “Yes, sir.” He pulled out his wallet and showed his ID. “My boss said there was some vandalism? He wanted me to find out everything I could.”

  “Back here.” The cop led him into the structure, where there were plenty of unfinished walls, plastic hanging over things, and the scent of dust and metal hanging in the air.

  The hair on Shawn’s arms stood up as he navigated through the dark maze, his creep-o-meter pinging off the charts.

  “There,” the cop said, pointing to where another officer stood with the construction team lead. Shawn had met with Ron the first day he’d come to town. The two men shook hands, and Shawn looked at the words spray painted in red on the cement.

  Stop building.

  You’re ruining our beach.

  “What area of the hotel are we in?” he asked.

  “This is going to be the kitchen,” Ron said. “The ovens will go here. You can see the drains for the dishwasher and sinks and things.” He aimed his flashlight on the ground, though it wasn’t so dark that Shawn couldn’t see them.

  “Do we have cameras or anything on the build site?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Any leads?” he asked the cops.

  “The only other thing we found was this.” The first cop led him over to the outside door. “This door was locked, but it’s clearly where they entered from.” He indicated the metallic marks that looked like someone had clawed back the door with something strong.

  The police officer went outside, and there, on the other side of the door, sat a single red heart, neatly painted around the door handle.

  Shawn pulled in a breath, but he told himself that anyone could’ve done this. Just because there was a heart here didn’t mean one of the Heartwood family had done this. Besides, the only options in that family were women, or a seventy-year-old man who liked to fish.

  He gave himself a mental shake. None of Lissa’s family had done this. They couldn’t have.

  At the same time, he knew he wasn’t going to be making a three-fifteen launch time on her fishing boat, and he quickly pulled out his phone to text her that he couldn’t make it that morning.

  Exhaling, he turned around in a circle. “Did you search out here?”

  “What do you think we’d find?” the cop asked.

  “I don’t know.” Shawn took a few steps away from the door. “The item they used to get it. A spray paint can. Something.” There only seemed to be upturned buckets and a lot of construction supplies. A pallet of rebar and bags of cement.

  He turned back to the building, realizing how far he’d gone. The cop stood there, a dubious look on his face. “They’re not going to leave such obvious things behind,” he said. “But I can have a couple of guys search around back here if you want.”

  “Thank you,” Shawn said. “And in every room in the building. We want to make sure there aren’t any other instances of vandalism.” He’d been on other builds that were controversial. This wasn’t the first time he’d witnessed vandalism. He just hadn’t realized such a nasty thing would occur on Carter’s Cove.

  Everything about the island spoke of home to him, and while he’d promised Lissa he’d return to Miami, he’d been planning to go for a day or two and then come back. Just long enough to pack all the essentials in his apartment and put it up for sale.

  He sighed as he lifted his phone to his ear, Jason’s number all queued up.

  “There’s more up here,” an officer called, and Shawn lowered his phone without dialing. This was going to be a very long night, and he was supposed to have the rest of his time in Carter’s Cove as vacation.

  He didn’t think that was going to happen now, and he wished Lissa was awake so he could talk to her about it.

  Chapter Eleven

  Disappointment cut through Alissa when she woke and saw Shawn’s text that he wasn’t going to make it. He hadn’t said what had come up, only that something had. It could literally be anything, from his alarm going off and him chickening out, to him meeting another blonde and going home with her.

  “He didn’t do that,” she told herself as she switched out her pajama pants for a pair of jeans. Shawn had grown and matured a lot in the past couple of decades, and she had to let go of Marcy at some point.

  She filled a bottle with water and headed out onto the porch. She couldn’t help looking down the sidewalk as if she’d see Shawn’s motorcycle there though he’d said he wouldn’t be able to make it.

  The sidewalk remained empty, just like it had been forever at this time of day. He had texted only a half an hour ago, and she thought about calling him as she walked down to Big Blue.

  In the end, she didn’t. He’d texted. She didn’t need to be clingy or jealous or whatever she’d be if she called him. Desperate. Yeah, she didn’t want to come across as desperate.

  “Board up,” she said to the dogs, and they jumped onto the vessel. The engine groaned as she always did before turning over, and Alissa set out into the cove.

  Her mind never moved far from Shawn, and she was surprised at how quickly he’d become part of her normal thought patterns. Of course, that bone-melting kiss last night had certainly helped to establish that.

  She pulled in a good catch that morning, and she got started on the day’s baked goods as normal. Every time a tray needed to be taken out to the storefront, Alissa did it, always searching the patrons for Shawn’s sandy blond hair and wide shoulders.

  Finally, about mid-morning, as she pushed through the swinging door with a tray of carrot cake, she met his eye. A flush filled her face, and she almost dropped the cakes. Harriett helped her steady them and she took the tray to slide it into the refrigeration unit.

  Alissa wiped her hands down her apron, though it was dirtier than her skin. She moved quickly around the bakery case to the table where Shawn sat. “Hey,” she said, sliding into the chair opposite h
im. He wore a suit on a Saturday, and if that wasn’t odd enough, he hadn’t smiled once at her.

  “What’s going on?”

  “I have to go back to Miami early,” he said, delivering the words with careful precision.

  The air left Alissa’s lungs. Something stung behind her heart, but she didn’t know why. She was the one who’d just wanted to “hang out” and “have fun.” She didn’t want serious. Hadn’t they said no strings?

  “Oh,” she said, hoping to give herself a few more seconds to find composure. “For how long?”

  He flipped over his phone as it made a noise and checked the screen. He picked it up and tucked it in his inside jacket pocket, so much like the real estate investor he was. “I’m not sure.” He met her eyes again, finally softening into the man she’d been spending time with this week.

  “I also wanted to apologize in advance.”

  “For what?”

  “There was some vandalism at the hotel my firm is building.” His eyes were so serious they barely looked like they belonged to him. “I had to give the police everyone I thought would have a grudge against us, or the building.”

  His words plowed into her with the weight and speed of a runaway train. She fell back against the chair rungs. “You think I vandalized your building?”

  “Not you, specifically, no,” he said.

  “You think one of my sisters did that?”

  His eyes said no. He even shook his head. But his mouth said, “I don’t know, Lissa.”

  Alissa was not good at hiding her emotions, so she was fairly certain the anger and annoyance mingling inside her showed on her face. “So you turned us in.”

  “I gave the cops your name,” he said. “I expect someone will contact you or Olympia.”

  “My name specifically?”

  “The Heartwood Inn,” he said.

  She leaned forward, pressing her palms against the cool table when she felt so hot. So hot. “Newsflash, you arrogant fool. We don’t care about your high-rise hotel. People come to The Heartwood Inn for a family atmosphere with resort luxury.”