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Beaming, Rose patted his cheek. “You always were a bright child.”
Bright enough to know arguing with his mother would do him no good. The best way to handle this was to grin and bear it.
He opened the bottle of white, set it aside to breathe. He didn’t have anything against Anne, or pretty brunettes in general. But he could, and often did, get his own dates. He didn’t need his mommy setting him up.
“Dad wants to know if the coffee’s ready,” James’s younger brother, Eddie, said as he came through the kitchen door.
“The regular is about done,” Rose said, “but the decaf is going to take a few minutes.”
Eddie grabbed a cup from the tray and reached for the pot. “He won’t know the difference.”
Rose slapped the back of his hand. “If you give him regular, he won’t sleep. And when your father doesn’t sleep, I don’t sleep. Mostly because he keeps me awake until the wee hours of the morning with all his tossing and turning. You’ll give him decaf or I’m sending him home with you and Max tonight.”
“No need for threats. I’ll give him decaf.” He turned to James. “Meg Simpson’s looking for you. Said she wants to discuss us doing an addition at their cottage on the lake next year.”
“She’ll have to wait,” he said mildly, lifting the merlot bottle. “I’m getting my future wife a drink.”
Eddie raised his dark eyebrows. Shorter than both James and their youngest brother, Leo, but broader through the shoulders, he had their father’s muscular build and their mother’s hazel eyes. “Future wife?”
Nodding, James pulled the cork from the merlot. “It’s all thanks to Mom. She got me a girl for my birthday.”
Rose shook her head. “Now, James. Really. A girl?”
“Sorry. Woman.”
Eddie helped himself to a strawberry from the fruit-and-cheese tray Rose was putting together. “She got me a watch for my last birthday.”
“Maybe she’ll get you your very own woman for Christmas,” James said.
Eddie gave one of his reticent shrugs. “A man can hope.”
“Meg Simpson wants to talk to you,” Leo told James as he came in carrying dirty dessert dishes.
“Yeah. I got that memo.”
Leo put the plates in the sink. “A customer wants to talk to you about doing a new job and you’re not racing out there with your handy schedule and charts and whatnot?” He studied each of them, his dark eyes narrowed. “Okay, what’s going on?”
“Mom got him a girl for his birthday,” Eddie said.
“Yeah?” Leo grinned, slow and wicked. “Which one?”
“Kloss’s new painter,” James said. “Tall brunette in a blue dress in the living room.”
Leo and Eddie exchanged a glance then both walked out only to return less than thirty seconds later. “She’s hot,” Leo said. “Excellent legs, nice ra—”
Rose slapped him upside the head.
“Shoes,” he amended quickly, holding his hand over the spot she’d slapped. He stepped out of range. “Really nice shoes. Good choice, Mom.”
“Thank you,” she said, pouring the regular coffee into an insulated carafe. “I’m glad one of my sons appreciates my efforts.”
“Guilt?” James asked. “That’s beneath you.”
Leo smiled, the same smile that had made fools of hundreds of women. Females. Always falling for a pretty face. “If he doesn’t want her, can I have her?”
“Absolutely not.” Rose turned to James. “My goodness, the way you’re acting, you’d think I bought you a Russian mail-order bride and had you legally wed without your knowledge. All I did was invite a lovely, interesting, nice woman to your party. Is that so wrong?” she cried with the dramatic flair he’d come to know and love.
Eddie pursed his lips and, as usual, wisely kept quiet. Leo rolled his eyes.
James showed his appreciation with quiet applause that had Zoe lifting her head, her tail wagging. “That was true Oscar material. Bravo.”
Leo snorted. “I’ve seen her do better. It was lacking something. It needed more...action. Drama. Maybe next time,” he told Rose, “thump your fist over your heart. Gnash your teeth. Rip at your hair. Don’t hold back.”
Rose gave him one of her patented disdainful sniffs. “Everyone’s a critic.”
“Hey, you know my motto—go big or go home.”
“I wish you’d go home,” James said with feeling. He turned to his mom. “And I wish you wouldn’t set me up, especially without asking first. Especially on my birthday,” he added.
Guilt may have been beneath his mom, but he wasn’t above using it himself.
Sometimes a man had to fight fire with fire.
Rose rounded her eyes. “It’s your birthday? Today? Why, that must’ve completely slipped my mind, which is strange as I’m usually good with dates and things. Oh...wait...” Frowning, she pressed her fingertips against her temples. “Is today the twenty-first? Because I’m getting this vague memory of being in labor on this date years ago for...let me see...”
“Twenty-nine and a half hours,” James, Eddie and Leo said in unison.
Rose’s hazel eyes gleamed, but her expression remained as serious as a heart attack. “Yes, that’s right. It’s all coming back to me now. Then again, it’s hard to forget twenty-nine—”
“And a half,” the brothers added.
“Twenty-nine and a half hours of excruciating pain. And that’s not even including pushing you—and your rather large head—out.”
Wincing, feeling more than a little sick to his stomach, James rubbed the back of his regular-size head. And conceded defeat. “I appreciate it. I think. Next year, I’m throwing you a party.”
“The flowers you send every year are more than enough, thanks.” She laid her hand on his arm. “Can’t you give Anne a chance? Just talk to her. Get to know her a bit. That’s all I’m asking.”
He sighed. He knew his mom wanted him settled. Married.
Hell, he wanted that, too. Wanted a family of his own, a wife in his bed, a couple of kids running around his house. He’d always figured it hadn’t happened yet because it wasn’t meant to, but that it would. Someday.
Since he had no control over when, exactly, that day would arrive, he didn’t bother worrying about it. It was useless, and a waste of energy, to fight the ebb and flow of life. Better to focus on keeping your head above water and just ride the waves out.
But maybe, this one time, he could try paddling and get where he was going faster.
Even if his mother was doing the steering.
“I’ll talk to her some more,” he said. What could it hurt? “But I’m not making any promises.”
“No promises. Got it.”
She hugged him. Looking over her head, James glanced at Leo who mouthed, “Sucker.”
James flipped him off.
“Leo,” Rose said as she broke the hug. “Please make another pot of coffee while Eddie and I take these trays out.”
“If you keep feeding people,” Eddie grumbled, “they’ll never leave.”
Rose handed him the coffee tray. “Your unsociable side is showing again.”
“Does he have any other side?” Leo asked.
“God, I hope so.” At the door, she looked back at James. “Don’t forget the wine.”
She swept out of the room, as regal as a queen, as formidable as a Navy SEAL.
“Yeah,” Leo said, rinsing the coffeepot. “And don’t forget the engagement ring.”
James stepped forward, ready to dunk his brother’s fat head under the running water, when his phone buzzed. He took it out, checked the caller ID. And, grinning, answered.
“Well, what do you know?” he said, crossing his ankles and leaning back against the counter. “It’s trouble come to call.”
Sadie Nixon laughed, the light, tinkling sound warm and as clear as if she was standing next to him. “I bet you say that to all the girls.”
“Only the ones who’ve earned it.”
“What’s life without a little trouble?”
“Peaceful.”
“I think the word you’re searching for is boring.”
“With you around? Never.”
“Flatterer. Now stop trying to charm me, I’m on a mission here. Guess where I’m at?”
“Jail?” he asked, earning him a curious glance from Leo.
“After that New Year’s Eve incident in D.C. you made me promise never to ask you to bail me out again, remember?”
“Hard to forget.” He’d left his date—a very friendly blonde—and driven the four and a half hours from Shady Grove, Pennsylvania, to D.C. in a blinding snowstorm. It had been worth it. Being with Sadie was always worth it. “Not jail, then.”
“You’ll never guess—”
“Then why did you ask me to?”
“—so I’ll just tell you....” He was surprised she didn’t tap out a drumroll during her drawn-out dramatic pause. “I’m in Shady Grove.”
“No kidding? You at your parents’ place?” Dr. and Mrs. Ellison had left the party less than an hour ago and they hadn’t said anything about Sadie coming home.
Then again, most of Sadie’s trips to Shady Grove were unexpected. She was like a summer storm—you never knew when she would strike or how long she would stick around. And when she took off on her next great adventure, it was as if you’d been swept up in a tornado, your head dizzy and aching, your thoughts and feelings twirling.
“No, I had a stop I wanted to make first. Say, when did your mom have that stone retaining wall put in out front?”
“Two years ago. Eddie, Leo and I did it for Mother’s—” He straightened. “Don’t move.”
He shut off the phone, stuffed it into his pocket and walked through the house toward the front door. If he happened to glance in the living room, just to see if Leo’s assessment of Anne’s legs was correct—it was—no one could fault him.
And while he had every intention of keeping his word to his mom, he kept walking. But he didn’t want Anne Forbes. No matter that his mother had deemed her future-wife material. What he wanted, what he’d always wanted, was outside right now waiting for him.
He wanted Sadie Nixon.
CHAPTER TWO
THE RAIN HAD stopped, and beyond the Montesanos’ two-story brick home, a crescent moon glowed brightly against the dark sky. In the driveway, parked behind a long line of cars—when Rose Montesano threw a party, she didn’t mess around—Sadie clicked off her phone.
“He’s coming,” she told Elvis, stroking his head, and his eyes squinted in pleasure. “I can’t wait for you to meet James. He’s the best.” The best friend a girl could ever have and the second greatest guy she’d ever known.
The number-one position was reserved for her father, the late, great Victor Nixon. Bigger than life and handsome as sin, he’d done more, seen more and had gotten more out of his thirty years than most people did who lived three times that long. Most importantly, he’d lived life on his own terms, thumbing his nose at his family’s wealth and rigid standards to forge his own path at the tender age of sixteen, following his dreams wherever they took him.
He’d taught her that each day was an adventure waiting to be experienced.
She rubbed a hand over the ache in her chest, just above her heart. God, but she missed her daddy. She still missed him so, so much.
The front door opened and James stepped onto the wide porch and jogged down the stairs.
“I’ll be right back,” she promised Elvis before climbing out of the car.
Holding the top of the door with one hand, she waited while James approached in all his six-foot, darkly handsome glory, his stride purposeful. She knew the moment he spotted her. She never tired of the way his face lit when he saw her, of how, out of all the people she knew and loved, he was the only one who never got frustrated with her lack of planning, her decisions. Never lost his patience with her or tried to change her.
With a whoop of joy, she launched herself at him. His arms came around her, strong and steady. Comfortable. No matter what the circumstances, no matter how she messed up or how fast she was falling, James always caught her before she hit rock bottom.
She could always, always count on James to catch her.
Laughing, Sadie squeezed him tight. Yeah, Shady Grove was where she’d spent the majority of her formative years, the town where she’d first completed an entire school year without the disruption of another move. It was where her mother had grown up, where her mother, stepfather and sister all lived. But it was just a place, just another town.
This, she thought, clinging to her best friend, was home.
“You’re soaked.” Settling his hands on her hips, he pulled back and frowned at the mud on her pants, the wet spot on his light blue dress shirt. “You look like a drowned rat.”
“Oh, James.” She simpered, batting his chest. “You sure do know how to sweet-talk a girl. I’m shocked, shocked I say, that you’re still single.”
“And I’m shocked, shocked I say,” he said in a seriously decent imitation of her, “that you manage to get through each day without causing yourself—or others—bodily harm.”
She lifted her hand to the side of her head. “Who says I didn’t cause any bodily harm?”
He brushed her hand aside and lightly probed the area above her ears, his touch incredibly gentle. The tips of his fingers trailed across the sensitive goose egg. She bit her lip to keep from hissing out a sharp breath.
“What did you do?” he asked.
“I had a little accident—”
“How bad?”
“Not bad,” she told him quickly, knowing how he worried about...well...everything. “I was on Case Boulevard and skidded off the road and hit the pillar holding the Welcome to Shady Grove sign.”
The front door opened, and a couple she didn’t recognize descended the porch steps, lifted their hands in farewell to James before getting into their car.
James walked to the driver’s side of the Jeep. He crouched to study where the pillar and vehicle had, briefly, become one.
“You,” he said, straightening, “are a menace. And a threat to brick pillars everywhere.”
She grinned. How could she not when it was such a James thing to say, his words spoken with so much resignation and fondness? “None stand a chance while I’m behind the wheel.”
“You sure you’re okay?”
“I bumped my head. It’s nothing.” And no way would she tell him she’d momentarily blacked out. He’d insist she go to the E.R. when all she wanted was a hot shower, something to eat and a few hours in his company.
Being with James was always so easy. So relaxed. No matter how long they’d been apart, when they got together again it was as if they’d seen each other the day before. He didn’t lay guilt trips on her if she didn’t call or text him for months on end. He may not understand the choices she made, and he often teased her about her mistakes, but he never judged her. Better yet, he was always the first one to congratulate her on her triumphs.
He believed in her and accepted her for who she was, no questions asked. He loved her without reservations or expectations.
Some days she thought he was the only person who did.
Tears stung the back of her eyes. To hide them from James’s intense gaze, she stretched onto her toes and hugged him again. He stiffened, his fingers digging painfully into her hips as if to push her away.
As if to set her aside.
A crazy thought. James would never do that to her. He’d never be done with her. The mere idea of it was absurd. Irrational.
Inconceivable.
Still, panic tightened her chest, made it impossible to breathe. She squeezed him harder. He sighed heavily, his breath ruffling the damp hair at her temple, the exhalation seeming to shudder through him. He slowly shifted closer, slid his hands around to settle at the small of her back, his warmth seeping through her wet clothes.
A pebble of unnamed emotion lodged itself in her throat and she pressed her face into the crook of his neck and simply held on. She inhaled deeply, and his spicy cologne and the underlying scent of sawdust only made the urge to bawl stronger.
God, she must have hit her head harder than she’d thought. Sure, her life was in the crapper right now, but it was temporary. A rough spot, one she’d eventually get over. “This, too, shall pass” and all of that. Good times and bad times, successes and failures...they all came and went.
And eventually she’d get back to looking at the bright side—but right now the glare was giving her one hell of a headache.
“Hey,” James said, his soft, gruff voice causing goose bumps to rise on her arms. “What’s this about?”
“Nothing.” She cleared her throat and prayed she didn’t sound as needy and unsteady as she felt. “I’m just...I’m really happy to see you.”
She leaned back and studied him. His handsome face was as familiar to her as her own: soulful eyes the color of rich chocolate, heavy eyebrows and shaggy dark hair that had the tendency to curl at the ears and nape. His Roman nose bent slightly right, thanks to his taking an elbow to the face when he went up for a rebound during a basketball game their sophomore year.
Yes, he was the same. Same mouth with the full bottom lip. Same square jaw. But there was one difference....
“What’s this?” she asked, tapping his chin. She had the strangest, strongest urge to leave her fingertips there, to trail them across his dark whiskers, to rub the thick, triangular patch just below his lower lip.
She dropped her hand back to his shoulder.
He stroked his thumb and forefinger across his neatly trimmed mustache and goatee. “Chicks dig it.”
“No doubt.”
Then again, females of all ages dug the Montesano men. James may not have Leo’s panty-melting looks or Eddie’s sexy intensity, but he was handsome, kind and when you were with him, he listened—really listened—instead of patting your head or giving you unwanted advice. A woman could trust him—with her thoughts, her secrets and her heart. He was sweet. Safe.
A good catch, her mother had deemed him way back when he’d been fifteen.
She’d been right. Irene Ellison was always right. It was her third most-annoying trait.
“You’ve never had facial hair before,” Sadie said, musing aloud. “I mean, other than that scraggly thing you tried to pass off as a mustache when you turned eighteen.”
He smiled, one of his easy, warm grins. The whiskers may be new, somehow making him seem harder, edgier than he truly was, but inside, where it mattered, he hadn’t changed.
And thank God for that.
“It might have been a little...patchy.”
“Patchy? It looked like you’d taped a molting caterpillar to your upper lip.”
He shrugged, the movement causing his chest to rise and fall against her inner arms. Tingles of heat pricked her chilled skin.
She stepped back. “I sure missed you, pal o’ mine.”
“I missed you, too. Though I’d miss you more if you didn’t bring mayhem with you every time you came back to town.”
“You know what they say. One person’s mayhem is another’s good time.”
“No one says that.”
“They should. Think I could get it trademarked? I’d make a killing with needlepoint samplers.”
“I thought you were going to make a killing selling organic beauty products.”
Heat crawled up her neck. Thank goodness it was too dark for him to see her blush. “Surprisingly, there wasn’t as big a market for them as I’d hoped.”
And, if she was honest with herself—something she tried very hard to avoid—her products weren’t good enough to be competitive in an already very competitive market. It’d been a whim, one of many she’d followed through on.
“That is surprising,” James said mildly. Bless him, he never bad-mouthed her ideas or told her they wouldn’t work. “So, what brings you to town?”
“I didn’t want to miss your birthday.”
“You’ve missed plenty in the past fifteen years.”
“But I couldn’t miss this year. Such a special milestone.”
“Yes. Turning thirty-four is very significant for most people.” He crossed his arms, the movement pulling his shirt open at the neck, showing a sprinkling of dark chest hair, the strong line of his throat. “What’s wrong?”
“What makes you think anything’s wrong?”
“Because you’re standing in front of me, wet, muddy and bedraggled—”
“Ooh...breaking out the big-boy words. I’m so proud.”
“—which I’m going to guess means you’re flat broke, unemployed or without prospects. Or all of the above. No offense,” he added.
“None taken.”
How could she when he’d pretty much summed up her situation? And quite succinctly, too.
At least he wouldn’t hold any of those items against her.
“Actually,” she continued, “I prefer to think of it as financially challenged, between jobs and open to life’s many possibilities.”
“To each their own.” He stepped closer, gave her one of his searching looks, as if he could see inside her head. Too bad she didn’t let anyone, not even her best buddy, get that close to her. “What can I do to help?”
Those damn tears were back. Here she was, slinking into Shady Grove with her tail and her failure tucked firmly between her legs. But with James, there were no recriminations or smirky looks—oh, man, she really hated those smirky, I-expected-so-much-more-from-you looks.
Her mother was an ace at them.
He didn’t list all the many, and varied, ways Sadie had gone wrong in her life—conveniently forgetting the times she’d been successful. Didn’t insist she’d be happy and fulfilled only if she stopped chasing foolish dreams and married some dentist or lawyer, birthed two-point-five kids and spent the rest of her days locked in a three-thousand-square-foot Cape Cod house, complete with inground pool, gourmet kitchen and white picket fence. He didn’t expect her to stay in Shady Grove.
Didn’t expect her to follow in her mother’s footsteps.
Irene had given up her freedom for security. She’d traded in spontaneity and excitement for schedules and monotony, had tossed aside her independence for a life of entitlement, one she hadn’t even earned. She’d settled.
Sadie never would. She had too much of her father in her. Would rather die than to be...ordinary.
And James knew it. He knew her, better than anyone.
She squeezed his forearm. “Thanks, but right now, all I want to do is get into some dry clothes, have a huge piece of your birthday cake and then drown my sorrows with a bottle of wine.”
“I think we can manage that.”
“I’ll get my bag.” As she passed the passenger side, Elvis, previously lying across both front seats—the better to spread his muddy paw prints around—sat up, his ears perked. Sadie let him out and he raced to the front of the Jeep, his body vibrating. He barked three times, sounding like some vicious beast ready to tear a man’s arm off and use it as a chew toy, then sniffed the ground, lifted his leg and peed on her front tire.
James blinked. “There was a dog in your car.”
“Sherlock Holmes has nothing on your deductive powers.”
“You got a dog?” he asked, sounding as shocked as if she’d hog-tied good old Sherlock and painted his toenails bright pink.
The strap of her bag slung over her shoulder, she shut the rear passenger-side door. “Sort of.”
“Is that like when you sort of had a job as Bill Gates’s personal assistant?”
“I told you, Bill and I had a real moment at that restaurant. We clicked.” She linked her hands together to show her and Bill’s connection. “He probably misplaced my number, that’s all.”
James’s snort made her think he didn’t believe her.
“I never pictured you with a pet, especially one that big.”
“He’s not technically mine. I found him.”
“What do you mean, you found him?”
“I’m not sure how to make that statement clearer. He was in the middle of the road, I swerved to avoid hitting him, hit that stupid sign then went back and found him on the side of the road.”
“You went back to rescue a stray dog? By yourself?” James asked, incredulous. Worried. Well, it was one of the things he did best. “What if he was rabid?”
She and Elvis exchanged an amused look—okay, so it was definitely amused on her end. As if he’d understood every word they’d said, Elvis hung his head and slunk over to James, where he sat and lifted his paw quite adorably.