Love Sign

Shelby told Jake, wounded.

“I am. On you,” he admitted.

“Oh, Jake!” she murmured, defensiveness melting as she saw it from his point of view. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. You’re the one with the hole in your heart.” Hunkered down beside her chair, Jake tucked a curl behind her ear, traced the tear track and then her bottom lip with the flat of his thumb.

Shelby trapped his hand with both of hers. But it was a poor defense mechanism, for he let her keep it, leaned in and stole a kiss. It sparked heat lightning across the stormy expanse of her heart. Fiercely, she blinked tear-shine, crowded out rational thought and kissed him back.

SUSAN KIRBY

has written numerous novels for children, teens and adults. She is a recipient of the Child Study Children’s Book Committee Award, and has received honors from The Friends of American Writers. Her Main Street Series for children, a collection of books that follow one family through four generations of living along the famed highway Route 66, has enjoyed popularity with children and adults alike. With a number of historical novels to her credit, Susan enjoys intermingling writing and research travels with visits to classrooms across the country.

Love Sign

Susan Kirby

www.millsandboon.co.uk

For in Him we live and move and have our being.

—Acts 17:28

To Levi

You’re a patient sounding board

a storehouse of ideas

and a constant source of joy.

What more could a mother ask?

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Epilogue

Letter to Reader

Chapter One

Shelby Taylor awoke ahead of her alarm. She slipped out of bed and onto her knees. Words were slow to come, but time spent with God quieted her hurting heart. She rose to turn off her alarm and open the drapes. The bedroom window of her third-story Lake Shore Drive apartment overlooked Lake Michigan. A kiss-me red sunrise splashed rosy hues over whitecaps, gulls and bobbing sailboats. Shelby dawdled, combing her fingers through short red-gold tangles and admiring God’s artistry as if it were an ordinary Saturday and as if time were a luxury she could afford. But her calendar told a different story. She flipped the page to July, covering the unnecessary reminder of what was not going to happen this last weekend in June.

Shelby plugged in the coffeemaker, showered, then swung her closet door wide. White satin and lace spilled out and tickled her in the ribs. She stood clutching a damp towel, waiting for the aftershocks to subside. She should do something with the dress. But what? Shelby retreated to the kitchen, braced herself with coffee and returned to the closet. She skimmed past the wedding gown and retrieved a streamlined skirt and silk blouse.

Patrick Delaney, a corporate attorney, had been a part of her life for three years. Shelby had come to appreciate him as a realist who knew his limitations. Until he called off their wedding with only a week left on the clock.

Shelby didn’t plead or storm or try to bury him in guilt. An only child with busy parents who were intent on not spoiling her, she had been conditioned at any early age to hold back the little actress within. “Scenes” belonged in childhood plays and daydreams and storybooks.

It was a lesson that served her well as an editor, as a writer and even as a jilted bride. While juggling wedding cancellations and a nightmarish problem with an author who was threatening a lawsuit because she didn’t like her book cover, Shelby had hugged the small consolation that someday, this week of horror would provide grist for the mill. That, God’s grace and the promise of the only thing she hadn’t canceled—weekend reservations at Wildwood—had kept her going.

Chosen initially as a honeymoon getaway, Wildwood was a downstate bed-and-breakfast with cozy cottages off in the pines. She prayed it would prove the perfect hideaway to the plot her new novel, which hereto was not stewing so well.

Shelby lifted her eyes to the shelf on the wall facing her computer. Her Bible was there, and five teen novels with her own name on the binding. If not for the meat-and-potato necessities of the real world, she would be writing full-time.

Shelby packed light and pulled her game face from her cosmetic bag, beginning with sunblock. Hazel eyed and fair skinned, she burned easily if she spent much time outdoors. While that hadn’t been a problem in some time, her new laptop computer gave her options, sunshine among them. Feeling more composed, more focused and better equipped to cope, she donned a pair of trendy platform sandals and pearl earrings. Shelby finished her coffee standing up before stuffing projects from work into an oversize book bag. Anesthesia, should her own fiction fail her.

A fresh breeze whisked through Jackson Signs South. It diluted the blended odor of dust, engine grease, sweeping compound and banner ink. Jake Jackson hit the remote. The overhead chain-driven door shuddered up the track. Jake shifted the fifty-foot ladder truck into gear, then braked for his twelve-year-old niece, Joy, who blocked his way with her skinny arms outstretched.

He cranked down the window. “You trying to get run over, blondie?”

Straw-haired and freckled, Joy wrinkled her nose at the outgrown nickname. “Just checking your brakes. Is Mom around?”

Jake jerked his thumb toward the back room where his oldest sister, Paula, was bending neon. “Thought you’d be in the field.”

“Mr. Wiseman never showed up. We waited an hour.”

“Something must have kept him.” Jake anchored the stack of service orders on the seat beside him with a phone book. “Move it or lose it, kiddo. I have a bank job waiting.”

“How about a ride home?” Joy asked.

“Okay,” Jake agreed. “Update your mom first, and let’s go.”

Joy flung her hoe on the back of the flatbed crane truck, trotted into the neon room and was back in short order. “Can we swing by the sign first?”

“What sign?” Jake played dumb.

“Dad’s sign.”

Jake was concerned over Joy’s johnny-come-lately fascination with her absentee father, Colton Blake. Fifteen years ago Colton’s image had gone up on the billboard on the outskirts of Liberty Flats after Wind, Water and Sky Outdoor Gear chose him for their advertising campaign. Clad in jeans, flannel, leather boots and a distinguishing red voyager cap, the Voyager, as Colton was dubbed, had become a North American icon in the intervening years—all due to that one billboard image of him paddling a canoe along a wilderness stream.

“Satisfied?” Jake asked as they cruised past.

“Thanks,” Joy said, attention riveted on the bigger-than-life portrait of the father she had never met. “Uncle Jake?” she began. “Dad has a right to know about me, don’t you think?”

“It’s not my call,” replied Jake.

Joy flopped against the seat. “You’re a big help.”

Jake took her mood shift in stride. She had been underfoot since she could crawl. But then with Colton gone and her mother sharing the sign company partnership, where else would she be?

The interstate highway gave way to a fair-size city 150 miles south of Chicago. Shelby spotted a bank from the off-ramp. A lighted message board spelled out generous savings rates—the decimal point was missing.

A sign truck turned into the lot just ahead of her. It rolled to a stop and parallel parked at the curb in front of the bank. The driver cut the motor and climbed out, a lanky, wide-shouldered, long-waisted man in jeans and T-shirt, dark glasses and a baseball cap.

Shelby circled the lot once before finding a space. She searched her shoulder bag for her traveler’s checks, only to remember they were in her suitcase.

The sun was hot and climbing as Shelby opened the trunk. She grabbed her suitcase, returned to the front seat to retrieve her traveler’s checks from within, then locked the car, leaving the suitcase on the seat with her laptop.

The sign serviceman was up on the back of the flatbed truck raising his hydraulic ladder as Shelby approached the curb on the heels of a heavyset fellow in painter’s garb. “Better buy CDs. The rates are about to take a dive,” the sign man called to the painter.

“Go home, Jake, you old spoiler, you,” replied the grinning painter, then held the door for Shelby.

Waiting in line, Shelby’s attention strayed inward to that place where stories were born. First, a name. Something catchy for the heroine. She entertained a dozen possibilities in the time it took to cash a traveler’s check and let herself out again. The ladder on the sign truck stretched to the roof of the building. Shelby cut around the truck, off the curb and onto asphalt.

“Look out, lady! Stay back!”

Shelby pivoted to see the sign truck’s hydraulic ladder swing away from the building, leaving the sign man on the roof, waving, shouting a warning. Alarmed, Shelby leapt back onto the curb and watched the unmanned ladder sweep the air twenty feet above the parking lot. All at once, the boom toppled. It came down like a limb in an ice storm and unbalanced the truck. The truck tilted, then fell over on its side. The boom crashed into Shelby’s car with a stomach-turning crunch of steel and shattering glass.

When the dust settled, what lay beneath the crane more closely resembled a crumpled soda can than a car. The air fizzed out of a tire, rupturing the caught-breath silence. Shelby wheeled around, tipping her face to the sign man hunkered at the edge of the roof.

“It’s never done that before,” he said, peering down at the damage. “Some kind of malfunction…”

“You or the crane?” Shelby cut in.

“Toggle switch, I’m guessing.” He shifted to his feet and planted his hands on narrow hips. His sunglasses and the brim of his cap shadowed a tanned and wary demeanor. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what else to say.”

It was a car, not a human being. Or a relationship squashed like a bug. As Shelby struggled with herself, the young man palmed his cap and dived tanned fingers through short-clipped sun-bleached chestnut waves. “I hate to ask. But could you help me down?” he ventured. “There’s a rope there—fell off the deck.”

“Deck?”

“Truck deck,” he amended, pointing.

Shelby cast the less-than-stable-looking truck a doubtful glance. “It won’t roll over on me, will it?”

“It shouldn’t.”

Peachy. The rope had fallen on the pavement when the truck spilled over. Shelby gripped her purse under one arm and picked up one end of the rope.

“Can you throw me one end?” Sign Man called from the roof.

Shelby gave it a go. The rope uncurled like a striking snake. It climbed half a story, then dropped and nipped her on the noggin. Her second effort was better, but unsuccessful. She put her shoulder bag down on the curb.

A pickup truck pulled into the parking lot. The man inside assessed the situation and climbed out. “Anyone hurt?” he asked.

“Just my car,” said Shelby ruefully.

“Here, let me,” he said, and took the rope.

Relieved, Shelby backed out of the way and dusted her hands.

The man coiled the rope a few times and tossed it skyward. Sign Man caught it and anchored his end. The muscles in his arms bunched as he eased himself down the rope and to the ground.

He was thirtyish, clean-shaven with strong shoulders and tall enough so that Shelby had to look up. The sunglasses still screened his eyes. He pressed his lips together, and dimples emerged then went into hiding again as he shifted his attention to the man who had come to their aid. With tanned and capable hands, he slipped the sunglasses from his face and into his T-shirt pocket as he thanked the Good Samaritan.

“The hydraulic lever stuck. I figured the crane would circle around and come back to me,” he explained. “I didn’t think about it jerking the truck over.”

“Did you set your outriggers?” asked the other man.

“Just on the driver’s side. I know better. I got distracted and broke my own rules.” Sign Man’s glance shifted to Shelby. His eyes, a striking blue, enhanced prominent cheeks. His jaw sloped to a nicely carved chin that jutted slightly as he asked, “Are you in a hurry to get someplace?”

“No. Not now,” replied Shelby.

“I’ll call one of my men and get this truck upright,” he said. “Then I’ll see what we can do about getting you wherever you’re headed.”

“Wildwood,” she said.

“Vacationing?” he asked.

Shelby nodded, and glanced at the Good Samaritan who was walking away. Sign Man noticed, and called after him, “Thanks, man.”

The man waved and drove away in his pickup truck.

It wasn’t long until a second sign truck pulled into the lot in answer to Sign Man’s phone call. With the help of the crane, the truck was soon upright and the boom off Shelby’s car.

Sign Man retrieved Shelby’s purse from the curb on his way by. “Here you go,” he said. Faint creases tugged at the corners of his morning glory eyes. “I’m Jake Jackson.”

“Shelby Taylor,” she returned.

Jake started to offer his hand, then checked the impulse. He turned up a grease-smudged palm and asked, “So how upset are you?”

“I’m sorry I snapped at you.” Lamely, Shelby offered, “It happened so fast.”

“Kind of caught me off guard, too.” He spared her further apology and glanced back at her car. “I’ll call my insurance company, see if they can get you something to drive,” he offered.

Jake called on his cell phone and returned with word that his insurer would send an adjuster out. “He’ll see about a loaner car once he has taken some pictures and squared away the paperwork. Like I said, I’d be happy to give you a lift if you don’t want to wait on him.”

At a loss as to how else she was to reach the cabin at Wildwood, Shelby accepted.

“Need anything from the car?” he asked.

“My laptop and suitcase from the front seat. Grab my cell phone, too, would you? Oh! And my book bag, please. It’s in the trunk,” she said, and gave him her car keys.

Jake jerked a thumb in the direction of the bank lobby. “May as well wait inside where it’s cool,” he said.

Thoughtful, as saboteurs went, noted Shelby as she retreated to the lobby. He wasn’t long. Her suitcase swung from one hand, her laptop from the other. He retrieved her cell phone from his shirt pocket. Their fingers brushed as it changed hands.

“Can you get along without the book bag? I didn’t have any luck popping the trunk lid,” he said.

Reluctant to leave unpublished works behind, Shelby wondered aloud, “Could we pry it open?”

“I thought of that. But the adjuster may want to snap his pictures before we tear into it,” he said.

Conceding his point, Shelby followed him to his truck. He checked the oil, then wiped his hands on a towel that lay in the seat. Except for some scraped paint and a broken side view mirror, the truck appeared sound. The engine coughed a time or two en route to the sign shop. But they covered the short distance without incident.

Shelby’s gaze swept twin steel buildings, a hodgepodge of equipment emblazoned with the Jackson name, and a graveyard of old signs.

“It’s a family business,” Jake explained. “We have a shop south of here at Liberty Flats. Wildwood’s just a few miles farther on. Hope I haven’t fouled up your vacation too badly.”

“It’s a working one, anyway.” Shelby accepted his help out of the truck. He had a steady hand. Durable fingers, a callused palm and a measured grip. She turned to collect her things.

“Let me.” Jake reached for her suitcase and laptop.

Shelby followed him to a sporty four-wheel drive vehicle and stowed her things behind the seat while she climbed in.

“There’s a bookstore nearby. You want to pick up something to read?” he asked as they got underway.

Realizing he had misunderstood about the book bag, she said, “Thanks, but it isn’t leisure reading. The bag contains manuscripts.”

“You’re a writer?” Jake winced as she conceded as much. “Can’t say I’d want to leave my life’s work in the trunk of a wrecked car.”

“It isn’t mine.” Seeing his confusion, Shelby explained, “I work full-time for Parnell Publishing, and write part-time. What will they do with the car?”

“Have it towed, I suppose. I’ll phone the insurance company again and explain about the manuscripts. They could take it to my shop. It’d be easier for you to access than at a salvage yard.”

Jake made the call while waiting for a light to change. Traffic flowed once more. He resumed their conversation. “What is it you do at Parnell?”

“I’m an editor.”

“Really! Can’t say I’ve ever met an editor.” Jake threaded his way along busy streets. “What kind of books does your company publish?”

“We do a variety of nonfiction titles—self-help, how-tos, food and cooking titles, home and family, travel and guidebooks. That sort of thing,” said Shelby.

“And your part-time writing—is that for Parnell?”

“No. I write romance mysteries for young adults.”

“Is that right?” His smile deepened, his eyes reflecting a sunny twinkle. “Thomasina’s a real fan of romance novels. Out at Wildwood,” he added. “She and her husband Trace have transformed that old farm into a real cozy vacation retreat.”

“I’ve heard nothing but good things about their business,” said Shelby as Jake took the interstate south out of town. “I look forward to meeting them.”

“You’ll have to stick around a couple of weeks, then. They left for the southwest two days ago for their third wedding anniversary.

“Oh.”

“How about you? Are you married?” he asked with a glance from those vivid blue eyes.

“No.”

“Seeing someone?”

“No.” The word to Shelby’s own ears, clanged like a metal gate. She twisted the strap of her pocket book, and fell silent.

They passed the next dozen miles in silence. Jake flipped the air off as they exited the interstate, trucked past the Voyager billboard, and rolled down the window as they skirted Liberty Flats.

“Too much wind? I can roll it up,” offered Jake, as the breeze riffled Shelby’s short curls.

“No, don’t. It’s fine,” she said and lowered her window, too.

Jake stole a sidelong glance, admiring the wind in her hair and sunlight dancing on flawless skin. But he couldn’t remember when he had seen such a soft round face look so long and weary. His carelessness had complicated her vacation plans, big time, that went without saying. He thought about apologizing again. But then, what good did that do? They hurtled along the country road a few miles, then Jake slowed for Wildwood Lane.

Shelby draped her arm out the window, letting the air blow through her fingers. In the air there was a fragrance of green growing things and of sun-warmed earth. She breathed deeply, filling her lungs with clean country air, willing the stone to roll off her heart. Time, that’s what she needed. Anonymity in which to lick her wounds until she had ceased to flinch at words like marriage and anniversary.

The lane ended in front of a two-story farmhouse. The house, freshly painted, gleamed like a pearl amidst blooming gardens and barn-red outbuildings. Reprieve was so close, she could almost taste it.

“Go on and get squared away. I’ll bring your things,” Jake offered.

The path to the front office was bordered by a bright tangle of nodding flowers. Inside, flowerpots filled the office windowsills. Trailing plants spilled from the pots onto a battered drop-leaf table. There was a coffee urn and cups and glasses and iced lemonade beading a carnival glass pitcher. Shelby pushed the bell. Chimes rang through the house. She helped herself to a glass of lemonade. A young woman came in response to the bell. “May I help you?” she asked, her hoop earrings jangling.

“Yes, I have reservations.” Shelby gave her her name.

The woman sat down at the computer and hit a few keys. When she lifted her yes again, her smile had faded. “I’m sorry. But I don’t seem to have any record of it,” she said.

Shelby set down the half-drained glass of lemonade to retrieve the confirmation number from her checkbook register where she had written it on the day she and Patrick finalized their honeymoon plans.

The young woman typed in the number. Frown lines creased her forehead. “You’re marked out.”

Startled, Shelby protested, “There must be some mistake.”

“Forgive me, you’re right, it wasn’t you.” The young woman turned from the screen to a lined tablet. “It was a man who called to cancel. I wrote it here somewhere.” She ran a finger down to the middle of the page and looked up again. “Patrick Delaney.”

The name washed over Shelby in a bone-skinning tide. Tears threatened. She batted them back, struggling to make mental adjustments. “If the cottage has been rented, a room will do.”

“I’m sorry, but we’re booked here at the house, too.”

Jake was a dozen steps from the house when the front door spit Shelby out onto the garden path. Her cream-colored silk blouse and a fitted skirt molded nicely to feminine curves.

She was almost upon him before she saw him and skidded to a stop. Clouds darkened her eyes. She pressed her full lips together. A pulse hammered at her smooth, white temples.

“There’s been a mix-up. I hate to ask, but could I please have a ride back to town?” she said, and reached for her laptop.

Her effort to keep it together as the morning went from bad to worse put a commiserating knot in Jake’s gut. But her guarded facade warned him against a barrage of questions. He passed her the laptop. Fumbling to take the suitcase, too, she shifted her pocketbook and reached for the suitcase handle.

“Go on, I’ll bring it,” said Jake quickly.

She nodded and turned toward the drive. Jake watched the hem of her skirt trail over tall flowers that sweetened the path. She crossed crushed rock, climbed into the Jeep and settled there, hugging her laptop. Jake rubbed an uncomfortable sensation in his chest, then set her suitcase down and went inside.

“’Morning, Annie.”

Antoinette Penn smiled a welcome from behind the desk. “Hello, Jake. If you’re looking for Trace, he’s not here.”

“I’d heard they’d taken off,” he said and took off his cap. “What happened with Shelby Taylor’s reservations?”

“A guy called this morning and canceled the reservations,” explained Antoinette.

“But if she made the reservations…” began Jake.

“For all I know, they made them together,” Antoinette interjected. “Honeymoons are usually planned that way.”

Startled, Jake blurted, “Honeymoon? She’s getting married?”

“Not anymore. He called it off. That’s the reason he gave for canceling.”

Shelby’s fragile state fell in place like a key fitting tumblers. “So what’s she doing here?” he asked.

“I don’t know, Jake. All I know is the honeymoon cottage is taken.”

Jake swung around and looked out the window. Shelby’s slim arms were still wrapped around her laptop. He had done all he could. And yet…Jake shifted his feet. “How about a room here in the house?”