“Do you ever think of our baby?”

“Addie.”

“Do you, Skip?”

He looked away, sighed, turned back. “I’m so glad you asked. So glad. There’s something I need to tell you.” He lifted his eyes and a chill skimmed her spine.

“Do you know something? Do you know where she is? Is she all right?”

“Addie…Oh, God, how to say this…Addie, she’s here in—”

“Here?” She tore her hand away, grabbed his arm. “What do you mean here? Where?” Her fingers clutched his T-shirt. “Who—?”

“It’s Becky, Addie.”

“No, I mean our baby. The one I…we…”

His eyes didn’t waver. Those honey-gold eyes she had loved when she was fifteen, sixteen, seventeen.

Until he’d deserted her.

MILLS & BOON

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Dear Reader,

Two summers ago, I traveled to Bowen Island for a weekend writing retreat. A twenty-minute ferry ride from the mainland, the island harbors a small village with eclectic shops, restaurants and bed-and-breakfasts, while its rural interior hosts small farms of livestock, fruits and vegetables. In contrast, million-dollar homes dot the western shores. But what struck me most was the serenity the island offered.

And so an idea evolved about a fictitious island, which became my new miniseries HOME TO FIREWOOD ISLAND, in which three sisters—Addie, Lee and Kat—make peace with their pasts by finding happiness on their little island home.

Their Secret Child is Addie’s story, and first in the series. I hope you enjoy her journey as she reunites with her high school sweetheart.

Mary

PS—For upcoming details about Lee’s story, next in the series, check my Web site at www.maryjforbes.com.

Their Secret Child

Mary J. Forbes

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MARY J. FORBES

grew up on a prairie ranch where the skies were broad and blue, the hay fragrant, and the winters cold and snowy. Today, she lives with her family in the Pacific Northwest where she teaches school, writes her stories, nurtures her garden, and walks or jogs in any weather.

For R, V, K & J—

Love you all!

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

Epilogue

Chapter One

Today she would see him again—the first time in thirteen years.

Thirteen years. And she’d counted every one.

Not because of him. Never because of Skip Dalton.

If she’d thought of him at all in that span of time, it was because someone mentioned his name in passing or because Dempsey Malloy had loved to watch football.

But she was no longer married to Dempsey and football hadn’t crossed her TV screen in over a year.

Truth be known, little crossed her TV screen these days. Any leisure time she had, she utilized by sewing, baking or caring for her bees—when she wasn’t teaching or tutoring. And then there was her mother, who’d decided last spring to cut back her hours at the hair salon, which meant this summer Charmaine called her every “free” day and asked, “Whatcha doing?”

No, the thirteen years Addie had counted had been for another reason—a logical decision her father termed it.

Logical.

Forget emotion. Forget tears. Forget the hole in her soul that some nights threatened to kill her.

Decisions didn’t cater to the weak-minded. Decisions meant logic—and Addie Malloy lived logic.

For a fleeting moment, her work-scarred fingers trembled at her left earlobe and she nearly dropped the tiny golden sunflower dangling on its fine chain.

God, why had she listened to her parents all those years ago?

Because you were a coward, Addie. Just as you are now, shaking in your boots, knowing you’ll see him again. Shaking like a little scaredy-cat.

Clamping her bottom lip, she pushed the earring post firmly into place and uttered a sigh of relief when it was done. Should she add a bit of mascara to her stubby lashes? Her sisters, Lee and Kat, always demanded she should wear makeup, that mascara would augment her eyes, make them fab-u-lous.

But this wasn’t a date and she wasn’t going for Skip Dalton.

Stepping back from the bathroom mirror, she checked her face, her strong tanned arms, the yellow sundress that was a hand-me-down from Kat. It would have to do. She would have to do. Money wasn’t a commodity on the island, especially Firewood Island with its two thousand souls, the majority of whose heritage heralded from the hippie sixties.

And as keeper of 480,000 bees she fit right in with the island’s agriculturalists and minifarms, or “hobby farms” as some had the audacity to call them. Maintaining and nurturing twelve hives year-round wasn’t a hobby. It was damned hard work.

She pulled her unruly hair—dirty blond hair, she’d always thought—into a thick knot on her head, shoved in four long pins to hold the mass in place and ignored the flyaway strands creeping free around her face. Not her best attribute, her hair. No, that would be her mouth. Her downfall at sixteen—and again at twenty-two.

Closer to the mirror, she scrutinized the absence of lines, creases or thinning. Thank God. Thirty-one and holding. Her lips remained full and feminine and youthful and…a little wanton. Maybe even sexy if she applied a trace of pink. She would not let him think she’d been kitchen-bound these past years with a passel of kids clamoring around her ankles.

Her heart lurched. You don’t need a houseful, Addie. Michaela embodies every one of your dreams.

Still, she couldn’t stop the ache that stabbed her chest. Thirteen years of memories bleeding out of a black mist like a herd of fire-snorting dragons. God, why today of all days?

She knew why—Skip Dalton.

Forget him! You did it before, you can do it now.

Right. That’s why her heart hammered and a flush spread up her neck. Don’t be an idiot. He won’t recognize you, anyway.

Holding tight to that notion, she shut off the bathroom light and stepped into the hallway.

In her daughter’s bedroom, seven-year-old Michaela sat on the floor, changing the apparel of three of her ten Barbies.

Her little sneakers were on the wrong feet again, and her left sock was missing. Addie noted the clothes Michaela had pulled on: a yellow T-shirt that was inside out and pink shorts. These days, neon pink and sunshine-yellow were prize contenders in her tiny fashion world. And she’d attempted to snap four pink barrettes at precarious angles into her dark ringlets.

Addie forced herself to remain calm, not to rush in, crush her baby to her heart, drink in her child’s scent. “Ready to see Gram, honeykins?”

“’Kay.” Scooping the dolls into her arms, her daughter scrambled to her feet and caught Addie’s hand.

“You’ll have tons of fun making cookies with Gram.” Gently, she swung their hands. “Better than what Mommy’s having at the high school and that boring party.”

“Yeah.”

She wished her little girl would talk more. The school psychologist was trying, but it would take months of patience and a variety of strategies, Addie knew, before her baby would come out of the funk she’d fallen into with Dempsey’s departure fourteen months ago.

Outside on the wooden stoop shaded by three western hemlocks towering over her turn-of-the-century carriage-style house she hesitated a moment and looked down her long lane and across the road. A big new house stood almost completed and barely visible amidst the lush growth of red cedars, ash, Douglas fir and Garry oaks. Painted white with green trim and shutters, the building jutted up two stories, showcasing a turret at one end and a massive stone fireplace at the other. An expansive wraparound porch enclosed the entire structure like a small moat.

Observing the construction for the past two months, Addie had heard rumors in the village of Burnt Bend about the owner. Some rich guy, they said, looking for a summer place.

If he was rich, why hadn’t he built on the water where he could moor his yacht? Why here, on a piece of property dense with woods and creeks, and down a rural road out in the middle of nowhere?

Well, it wasn’t her affair. She didn’t care who lived in the house, as long as they minded their own business and the quiet returned. She was tired of the hammering and sawing, the constant buzz of power tools, the coming and going of trucks. She wanted the peace of the woods again, the song of birds waking her at dawn, the deer visiting her backyard.

With a sigh, she looked down at her daughter. “Go on, honey, get in the truck while Mommy locks the door.” On the faint, early August breeze, Addie heard Charmaine’s cynicism: No one locks doors around here. Why do you?

“Because, Mom,” she whispered, watching Michaela climb into the Dodge Dakota, “I don’t trust Dempsey.” Though she’d never tell Charmaine Wilson that. Her mother favored Addie’s ex-husband, thought he should have time to sort things out in his head, to “find himself.” Which was what he’d told Addie the day he walked out of their lives. According to Charmaine, Dempsey was just a “mixed-up kid.”

Interesting turn of phrase for a man of forty-two. But not surprising, coming from a mother who had told Addie thirteen years ago to “grow up” when she’d found herself pregnant in high school.

With the divorce from Dempsey finalized last January, Addie had moved to her dad’s “homestead” house—three miles from Burnt Bend—and installed new locks. She had no intention of letting her globe-trotting ex back in her life or her house.

Today, however, she wanted to install a dead bolt. On her heart.

She would need it when she watched Harry McLane transfer his three-decades-old title as coach of the high school football team to Skip Dalton, his former student.

And her first love.

Skip Dalton. Back to stay. Back where she’d no doubt run in to him at the post office, the coffee shop, his mother’s grocery store. Skip Dalton, hero on the mainland, and now on Firewood Island. Again.

She couldn’t win no matter how hard she tried.

The school gym and the grounds out the side doors were crowded with students, current and past.

People had come from places as far away as San Francisco and Cheyenne to honor the coach for whom they had cheered and/or run yards, caught field passes and scored touchdowns on the Fire High football field. Thirty years of history had happened between those posts and on those bleachers. Skip should know. From the field, he had waved and grinned at the girls sitting in those bleachers.

And that, unfortunately, had been the start of his history.

He stood beside Coach at the door, greeting folks he hadn’t spoken to in thirteen years. People he’d last seen as kids, and who now had kids of their own. Some former schoolmates had gained weight. One guy was bald, while three were salt-and-pepper gray.

But the girls, the women—he had to blink a couple times to recognize even the smallest familiarity. Not until they’d said their names had he remembered. Ah, yes, Alicia Wells and…was that Francie—aka Fancy Torres? And Elise Haply and…

He regretted not recognizing the women the way he did the men. ’Course, he’d played ball with twenty-five of the guys during his high school years, shared locker jokes, showers, training techniques, victories and losses but, hell, he’d dated damn near as many girls back then.

Admittedly, at one time or other, he’d likely dated every woman standing around today chatting, laughing and sipping punch. Many—when their eyes collided with his—gave him cool, distant looks. No, they hadn’t forgotten his cocky attitude as quarterback of Fire High.

Today, they likely detected the I don’t remember you in his eyes when he looked their way or was introduced to them. That had to hurt, to know they’d been about as important to him as the socks on his feet.

Not something he was proud of. Hell. If history could be rewritten, he’d erase his entire senior year and begin again.

To right the wrongs he’d done to her.

For that chance, he’d give up his nine years of pro ball.

But the past was gone and all he had at the moment was what he could do for his old high school. Give something back the way he hadn’t been able to for Addie.

“Skip, you remember Cheryl Mosley?” Beside him, Coach McLane touched the elbow of a tall brunette. “She married Keith Bartley. Remember Keith, our water boy? Cheryl’s head of our science department and will be splitting eleventh-grade chem with you.”

Skip nodded to the woman. Fortunately, he’d completed his science degree before going pro. While football had been his love, he’d known it could die in a second on the field. And it had two years ago with a damaged left shoulder from a downward drive by a linebacker of the opposing team. So here he stood, suit and tie intact, counting his lucky stars in more ways than one to be taking over Coach McLane’s chemistry classes and the football team.

Smiling, he shook the woman’s hand. Cheryl. Yeah, he remembered her. She’d led the cheerleaders in chants and dance steps at every game in his days on the Fire High team.

He had dated her for five months. The longest relationship he’d had on the island. Before he met Addie Wilson.

Addie, whom he had yet to see.

She’s not coming, a taunting little voice whispered in his ear. Why should she? You dumped her. Left her high and dry. No, make that big and alone.

“I look forward to working with you, Skip,” Cheryl’s voice hauled him back into the celebration. “We’ll have to get together before school starts for some planning. Now that Coach is leaving,” she said with a sad smile, before turning her gaze back to Skip,

“we’ll need to make some changes in the science department.”

He had no idea what changes she meant, but she stated it with such chilly professionalism, that all he could do was nod a second time. “Sure, anytime. I won’t be in the phone book yet, but Coach’ll have my number.”

Moving away, she issued an indifferent, “Great. Meantime, welcome aboard.”

“Thanks.”

When she’d gone, another took her place and so it went—staff, former students, parents of attending students, kids already on the football team. One after the other, they patted Coach on the back, wiped tears over the old man’s retirement…and greeted Skip with lukewarm enthusiasm. The adage that women have long memories pricked like a thorn.

He had no illusion to the length of Addie Wilson’s memory.

An hour later, the stream entering the gym thinned as the chairs filled and it was time for the presentations and announcements. Principal Jeff Holby introduced Skip as a member of the school staff before Coach McLane slung an arm around his shoulder and took the mike.

“I’m thrilled,” the retiring teacher said, “to be passing the torch onto such a fine young man as Skip Dalton. He grew up on Firewood Island, attended its schools and went out into the world to make a name for our little spot on the map.” Grinning at Skip, he continued, “As a quarterback in the NFL, no less. Doggone it, but that makes me mighty proud.”

A few whistles shrilled, with a spattering of applause. More for Coach’s delight, Skip knew, than for his meritorious career.

“After thirty years,” Coach went on, “I can’t think of one person more suitable to take over for me.” Stepping back, he held out the keys to the locker rooms and coaching office. “Skip, these are yours now. Make the team yours. Make the wins yours. We’re behind you every yard and run of the way.”

This time the crowd’s applause rang to the rafters. The words Coach McLane were chanted throughout the room for almost five minutes, before they shifted slowly to Coach Dalton.

And that’s when he saw Addie.

She stood at the back of the gym, on the periphery of a group that had come in late. She wasn’t clapping and chanting, but instead she leaned against the wall with her arms crossed, a purse slung over a shoulder…and watched him. He couldn’t help grin. The din ebbed into the distance, and it was all he could do not to jump off the stage and stride across the room.

He wanted to see her up close. He wanted to touch her hand, her soft tawny hair and look into those summer blue eyes. Say her name…

And what…? Beg forgiveness? Tell her what you’ve done, why you’re here, what you hope to achieve?

Concerning her, what did he hope to gain?

The question had burned Skip’s brain since he’d made the decision ten months ago to relocate back to his hometown. At the time, he hadn’t consciously thought about the answer. Hearing of Coach McLane’s retirement, he had called the school, talked to Coach, then Principal Holby and later, the school board. Each had jumped at the chance of having him procure the position of Fire High’s senior coach, and before he gave it an ounce of thought, he’d signed a five-year contract.

For his daughter, first and foremost.

His gaze slipped to where twelve-year-old Becky sat in the front row, blue eyes sparkling as she offered a thumbs-up. His chest hurt with a love he couldn’t fathom. God, every time he looked at the girl, he couldn’t believe his luck in finding her—and getting her back.

The only regret Skip had was for the loss of previous years. But this was now and, dammit, the girl deserved a kind and loving home, a great school and community, but most of all, a family to whom she could attach a sense of belonging.

In Skip’s mind that was achievable on Firewood Island with Addie.

Though he’d have to tread with care there.

Oh, yeah. From what he’d heard through the gossip mill in the two days he’d been back, she was a woman of independent means. And a loner.

Looking at her across the gym, he could imagine that stubborn tilt to her chin. The one that said, I’m here for Coach, not you.

Finally the applause died. Skip said a few words of gratitude and appreciation, then the ceremonies were over. Time to work the crowd, chat up his goals for the upcoming year and hope to introduce his daughter around.

And meet Addie. Before all else, introduce Becky to Addie.

His daughter waited at the bottom of the stage steps. “You were great up there, Dad. They’re gonna love you as coach.”

Her confidence bowled him over, never mind how easily “Dad” slipped into her sentences. When he explained his relationship to her ten months ago, Becky—desperate for family—had taken the news and change with a faith that had broken his heart. Skip hoped that same faith would withstand the test when he told Addie about her daughter.

He put a hand on his child’s shoulder. “We’ll see, honey. I didn’t leave here on the best of terms, remember?” In small increments over the past months, he’d explained as much as he could about himself. But not about Addie. No, that part of his history he hadn’t the guts to disclose. Yet.

“So you’ve said.” Becky’s smile was the moon. “But, hey, once you win a game, the town’ll be so happy to have you.”

Skip chuckled. “We can only hope. Want a hot dog?”

They headed for the side doors. Over Becky’s dark head, Skip searched the room for Addie, for that pretty yellow dress, but she was nowhere to be seen. Had he imagined her in the rear crowd? Probably. She’d been on his mind for months.

Since he’d found Becky.

Admit it, Addie’s been in your head since you left thirteen years ago.

For half his life, she had been in his nightmares, and his dreams. Well, it was time. Time to come full circle.

Determined, he touched his daughter’s elbow. “Let’s go scrounge up some food.”

They walked into the island’s sea-scented sunshine.

Sometimes, it amazed Addie that five people had once slept, ate, laughed, opened birthday and Christmas presents, fought over bathroom privileges and closets and clothes…and survived in the cramped six-room structure in which her mother still lived.

Pulling the truck into the dirt lane of her childhood home on the outskirts of town, she thought of her sisters Lee and Kat living elsewhere on the island. Of the three, Addie visited their mother almost daily; Lee was frequently off island in her plane and Kat was tied up with the Country Cabin, her bed-and-breakfast.

As to their fathers, well, they were another story.

Addie’s died two years ago and Lee’s had left when she was a child. And Kat’s…No one knew who or where Kat’s daddy was, or if he even lived.

Mom’s closet secret. That’s what Kat called Charmaine’s unwillingness to reveal the past.

“What’s the point? It’s done and gone.” Their mother’s favorite battle cry whenever one of them pressed for the name.

Done and gone. Well, Mom, Addie thought, here’s a news flash. Sometimes done and gone comes back to bite you in the butt.

Skip Dalton was a living example.

Standing at the back of the gym, seeing him for the first time in more than a decade, hearing that smooth, deep voice…God, she’d been a teenager again and he the school jock, the team quarterback, the college student come home for Christmas. The boy kissing her under the school bleachers, touching her in places no one had touched, taking her virginity in his pickup truck on the shore of the island’s Silver Lake, and finally…making a baby with her. In this house, in her old bedroom, thirty feet from where she sat this minute in her aged truck.

Pushing off the memories, she opened the door and jumped down. Time to get her child and go home and let Skip Dalton go to whomever wanted him. Which likely would be half the women on the island.

Addie released a soft snort. He’d best take care because those women now had husbands.

And that stopped him before?

Climbing the steps to her mother’s door, she shook her head. Not according to the sports commentators. Wasn’t it four years ago that Skip dated a woman recently separated from her husband—not divorced, separated—and the man had come after him with a shotgun?

Yes, Addie remembered Dempsey talking about it while he watched a game, and laughing about Skip Dalton looking a “little green around the gills” when he was interviewed about the incident. Addie hadn’t watched the interview; instead she’d walked into the kitchen to clean out the dishwasher. The last thing she needed was Skip Dalton’s face filling the TV screen and Dempsey giggling over the whole tasteless affair.

So goes the life of the rich and fabulous, she thought, knocking on her mother’s door.

A moment later, it opened. Charmaine stood on the threshold and Addie blinked back Skip Dalton’s image.

“Hey, Mom.” She stepped into the familiar entranceway with its cabbage-rose mat and wooden bar of coat hooks on the wall. The scent of chocolate-chip cookies permeated the air; grandma and granddaughter had been busy the past hour. “How’s my baby?”

“Fine.” Closing the door, Charmaine scrutinized Addie’s face.

“You look as if you’ve seen your father’s ghost.”

“I wish.” She moved down the tiny hallway and into the living quarters where Michaela crawled under a blue blanket held in place by several books between the sofa and coffee table. Three Barbies and a Ken lay on the carpet near the “house” entrance. Addie tugged gently on her daughter’s leg. “Hey, button. Ready for home?”

Michaela peeked from under the coverlet. “C-c-can I s-s-stay?” Brown eyes pleading, she crouched farther under the blanket tent. Addie understood. Her child had built the house and now wanted playtime.

Kneeling on the floor, she took her daughter’s hands. “Speak slowly, honey.”

“Can…I…stay?”

“Gram has some stuff to do this afternoon, Michaela.” Addie wasn’t sure of her mother’s commitments, but she needed to feel the security of her own house. She needed to know that her world wasn’t about to turn upside down now that Skip Dalton was back.

Michaela pouted. “But…I want…to…play.”

“I know, button. Maybe we’ll come back tomorrow, okay?” Addie held out a hand, signaling the matter was done.

The child gathered the dolls into her pink knapsack and climbed to her feet. “’B-bye, Gram.”

Charmaine tucked a packet of cookies into her granddaughter’s small hand. “These are for you, but Mom will give you permission when you can have one.”

“’Kay.”

She kissed Michaela’s hair. “See you later, darlin’.”

As Addie ushered her daughter out of the house, Charmaine whispered, “What happened at Harry’s retirement party that’s got you in a dither?”

“Nothing. The new coach was introduced and Harry got the token plaque and gold watch. End of story.”

“Was Skip Dalton there?”

Addie turned to Charmaine as Michaela scrambled into the truck. “Don’t act as if you didn’t know, Mom. The paper carried the announcement twice.”

Charmaine’s eyes narrowed. “Did you talk to him?”

“No.”

“But you saw him.”

“I saw him.”

Questions burned in Charmaine’s eyes. What did he look like? Is he still handsome? Were people impressed? Has he changed? Ten thousand questions that meant nothing—and everything.

“I have to go.” Addie moved down the steps.

“Addie…Your father didn’t mean for you to be so hurt over…it.”

It. A tiny word for the life-changing events that occurred the second Cyril Wilson began brainwashing his daughter to give up the man she loved, and then later to give up their baby.

She turned, faced her mother. “Do not go there, Mom. I know why Dad pushed so hard. He didn’t want his precious daughter dragged into the trailer trash bin.”

Charmaine’s eyes widened, her mouth fell open. “Oh, Addie. That wasn’t it at all. He wanted you to have a chance, he wanted—”

“Exactly. He wanted. Whatever he wanted he got.”

Her mother came down the steps. “That’s just not true.”

“Isn’t it?”

“Your father did what he thought was best—”

“For who? Me? You? Our family? Don’t kid yourself. Dad was into saving face in this town. You know it, I know it. Lee and Kat know it. Everyone knows except you. When are you going to own up to that fact?”

“You’re letting Skip get to you, Adelina, and he’s not worth it.”

Addie scoffed a laugh. “He must be worth something. At one time he was the best quarterback in the league.”

Her mother cast a sideways glance. Guilt probably. Well, Addie no longer cared how Charmaine felt. Throughout the past decade she’d grown a prickly spine, one Dempsey had walked into a time or two.

“Were your sisters there?” her mother asked.

“I didn’t see them. I left the second Coach got his gold watch.”

Charmaine sighed.

“What? Did you expect me to hang around, bump into Skip and then throw out a welcome mat?” Her eyes narrowed. “God, Mother. You did.” Addie opened the truck’s door. She couldn’t get away from this conversation fast enough.

“You’ll be teaching at the same school,” Charmaine pointed out.

“Which I do not look forward to.”

“Why don’t you try breaking the ice first? Maybe talking to him will help with the issues you’ve kept inside.”

“Issues? When Dad pushed me to sign those papers, I wanted to die. Die, do you understand?” Issues, indeed.

“M-M-Mommy,” Michaela called anxiously from inside the truck.

“Look, I’ll see you later.”

Charmaine hurried forward. “What’re you going to do about—”

“Absolutely nothing. The man means zilch to me.” She got in, turned the ignition—and left her mother in the driveway.

Nothing, zilch, nada. Remember that, Addie.

Skip Dalton was a pebble in the road of her life. Easily kicked aside. Then why are you so annoyed? And worried.

Chapter Two

The following Monday, Skip drove his Toyota pickup down the wooded driveway leading to his new home and parked beside his Prius. Yesterday, the movers had brought all the furniture; today he and Becky would arrange and unpack the boxes.

Standing in the morning sunshine, he grinned across the truck’s hood. “Well, Bean. This is it. This is home now.” Skip hoped the girl would like the house, the island, the school she’d be attending after the Labor Day weekend in a few weeks. He watched her gaze at the structure gleaming in the morning light, her mouth slightly open, eyes as round as pizzas.

“It’s amazing. I’ve never been in a house this big. Is it just for us?”

“Just us.” For now. He couldn’t predict the future, but he hoped he and the lady across the road could eventually become friends for Becky’s sake. After that…who knew?

“Look,” he said, embarrassed suddenly by her awe. It was, after all, just a house. One of three he owned, and not the biggest. “If you want to scout around, I’ll start inside. Come in when you’re ready.”

Her expression was grateful. “I’d like that. It’s so quiet here. I never realized it, but I like the sound of…”

“Nature?”

“Yeah.” The word blew out on a little huff as she observed an American goldfinch pick at the bark of an old Garry oak in the front yard.

Skip smiled. “The island may be small, honey, and a good portion may have burned to ashes in 1892, but it’s all grown back, including the wildlife, so enjoy it.” Happy to let her explore the premises, he walked up the porch steps to open the front door.

For the first time in over a decade he had come home.

Becky wandered around the property. The air was so fresh and clean and the trees were incredibly green and grand and gorgeous. As if she stood in Narnia during summertime.

She wanted to pinch herself to make sure she wasn’t dreaming. Was it only ten months ago that her dad found her?

It seemed like yesterday. And forever.

Man, her real dad…

He was so cool. Kind and patient and just plain nice. And he occasionally called her Bean ’cause she was growing like a bean sprout, he said. When she thought of her other dad…Skip was so different than…him.

She was glad Jesse, as she’d begun to think of him, was in the Walla Walla prison. She swallowed back the ache in her throat at the thought of her mom. Becky couldn’t believe she’d been gone almost four years. She tried to picture the woman she’d loved so much.

Mom, with her soft blond hair and sweet smile.

Mom, reading to her just before bedtime.

Mom, helping with her homework.

The images swam across Becky’s mind…Except her mom seemed hazy, the way a person looked standing in a really thick fog. And when she tried to remember her mother’s voice, there was nothing, not a single word.

Maybe it was best this way. Maybe forgetting her mom’s face would help her forget the horror of that day.

She swung around and realized she’d almost walked into the forest. Jeez, Becks. Focus on this life. Your new life. Don’t think of then.

Hurrying to the front yard, Becky saw the road they’d traveled coming from the village. Across it, up a long dirt trail was a green cottage, and on its stoop sat a child.

They had to be the neighbors. Maybe the family had kids her age. Like one of the girls she’d met last week at the retirement ceremony.

Eager to begin new friendships, Becky walked down her dad’s driveway and across the road.

“Hi,” she called as she went up their lane.

The kid wore a pink top and shorts. Above each ear was a dark pigtail that hung down her skinny arms. She looked about six or seven. And a little scared. As she got closer, Becky said, “I’m Becky, your new neighbor.”

The girl had big brown eyes. Her mouth worked, but nothing came out. Becky plopped on the stoop next to a row of Barbie dolls.

“Hey.” She picked up a queenlike version. “I had a Princess Barbie a long time ago. But then my mom died and I had to move and I lost Princess.” Becky rocked the doll, humming a little tune. The child gave her the sweetest smile she’d ever seen.

“What’s your name?” she asked.

“M-M-Michaela.”

Becky acted as if she heard stuttering all the time. “Pretty name.”

The kid’s smile showed two missing front teeth. “M-M-Mommy n’ me are g-g-gonna check the b-b-bees. Wanna c-c-come?”

Bees? Becky looked around. “There’s a hive somewhere?”

“Uh-huh. Mom s-s-sells the honey.”

“Ohhh. You mean, she has those white bee boxes?”

Sunshine dipped into the girl’s eyes, making them as gold as honey. “I can…ask…Mom…if you…can…come see them.”

“Hey, that’d be cool.”

The door behind them opened. “Michaela?” A skinny woman in jeans and blue t-shirt looked down at them.

The child scrambled up to grab the woman’s hand. “Mom, this is B-B-Becky. She’s our n-n-neighbor.” She pointed. “Over there.”

Becky got to her feet. “I didn’t mean to trespass, ma’am.”

“You didn’t.” The woman had a soft voice. Her hand stroked her daughter’s curly pigtails and for a second Becky remembered her own mother’s fingers sifting through her hair in the same way.

“B-B-Becky likes Princess best, j-j-just l-l-like me.”

“Slow down, button.”

Becky smiled. “I get nervous meeting new people, too.”

The alertness in the woman’s face eased. “I’m Addie Malloy.”

“I’m Becky Dalton.”

Ms. Malloy’s eyebrows crashed. “You’re Skip Dalton’s daughter?”

“Yes.” Was that bad? “Do you know him?”

The woman stared at her for so long Becky shuffled her feet. Then Ms. Malloy looked toward their house and her eyes got really cold. “Yeah,” she said. “I know Mr. Dalton.”

Oh, man. Their neighbor didn’t like her dad. Why? She started to back away. Had she heard about her past? Becky wondered. No, her dad would never tell. “I should go. My dad’s probably wondering where I am. It was really nice meeting you. ’Bye, Mick.”

“It’s Michaela.” Frost hung in the woman’s voice. “She doesn’t like Mick.”

“Oops.” Becky couldn’t stop a nervous giggle. “Sorry.” Leaving the pair standing on the sunny stoop, she hurried down the path among the trees.

Sheesh. Wasn’t that always the way? A cute kid with a mean mother…Poor girl. Becky knew what it was like to live with a parent who wasn’t kind or friendly. Yet, Ms. Malloy had seemed kind, patting the girl’s hair. But maybe that was for show. Maybe she was why Michaela stuttered. Maybe the girl was dying for friends, but Ms. Malloy didn’t want people hanging around. Becky peeked over her shoulder.

The steps were empty.

She broke into a run.

Skip put his shoulder into the shove that slid his sleigh bed into place. He wanted the bed facing the windows across the hardwood. That way, first thing every morning he’d look straight into the stand of evergreens circling his property. Almost done with arranging the bedroom furniture, he heard the front door open.

“Dad?”

Dad. A shiver darted through Skip. He still had a hard time accepting how easily his daughter had taken to him. Twelve years she’d been under someone else’s care. His own flesh and blood. What an idiot he’d been to allow such a precious commodity to be handed over to strangers. What had he been thinking to listen to his father’s rants about one-in-a-million chances and how Skip needed to stop feeling sorry for something that wasn’t his fault?

Except it had been his fault. He’d been nineteen, Addie only seventeen when he’d gotten her pregnant that Christmas. Much as he hated the truth, he had forfeited his child for a mere chance. He could push the blame onto his father until the cows came home, but the fact was, at the end of the day, he’d made the choice.

If he could erase the past, if he could just begin again, give Becky a new childhood, one with him and possibly Addie…

All the ifs in the world won’t change a damn thing, Skip.

“Dad?” She thundered up the stairs.

“In here, Bean,” he called. He started the nickname within days of seeing her for the first time, a tall, gangly girl with his dark hair and long, narrow feet.

She flung around the doorjamb, her cheeks flushed. “I met the neighbors across the road. Ms. Malloy and her girl, Michaela.”

Ah, hell. Skip crossed the room. “Becky, next time let me know before you leave the property, okay?”

“Why? Is there something wrong with them?” She cut a glance toward the window.

“No.” Only thirteen years of abandonment by him. “We live in the country and I’d rather you didn’t go somewhere without telling me.” He tried to soften his anxiety with a smile. “It’ll keep me from worrying.”

“Jesse never cared where I went.”

Jesse Farmer, her adopted dad. “I’m not Jesse, honey.” He brushed the too-long bangs from her eyes. “Look, I’m still learning the family thing, so bear with me, okay? If I’m a little paranoid it just means I need to know you’re okay.” That no one is hurting you anymore.

With a shrug she wandered to his clothing boxes stacked near the closet’s open door. Peering inside, she said, “I don’t think we’ll be friends with them anyway.”

“No?”

“Ms. Malloy isn’t…very friendly.”

“In what way?” Had Addie slammed the door in Becky’s face?

Another shrug. “She seems…uptight. Maybe it’s because her daughter stutters and stuff.”

He’d heard about Addie having another child, one from the man she divorced seven months ago.

“How do you know she stutters?”

“She was sitting on their front step when I went over, and we were chatting about her dolls when the mom came outside.”

“Oh.”

Becky looked over her shoulder. “The little girl’s really cute—and shy. And she has these big brown eyes. I think her mom is overprotective because of the way she talks.” Suddenly, her face brightened. “Hey, maybe we can ask them over for dinner in a couple days and—”

“Whoa, whoa.” Skip brought up his hands. “Let’s take it one day at a time, Bean. We’ve got a lot to do around here first.” Primarily, he needed to get reacquainted with the lady in question.

“How about we wait a few days, see where we’re at with the unpacking.” He inclined his head toward the door. “You haven’t even checked out your room yet.”

Which told him how much neighbors and friends meant to his daughter. The “friends” she’d had in the trailer park in Lynnwood—where her family had lived—Skip wished she’d never met.

Becky rushed into the hallway, bent on her assignment. “Which room is mine?”

He leaned in the doorway. “There are four, so take your pick.”

“I can? No way!”

He watched her dash into each, listened to her “oohs” and “aahs” as she toured their confines, until in the last and farthest from his room, he heard, “This one! I’m picking this one.”

He was grinning when she poked her head from the doorway. “Is that okay?”

“Yup, it’s yours. And so are these boxes.” He walked to five piled in the corridor, hoisted two into his arms. When they had carried them in, he said, “Have at it, honey. Decorate it any way you want.”

She flung her arms around him in a quick, rare hug. “Thanks, Dad.”

“My pleasure.” He walked to the doorway. “You going to be okay for a bit? I’d like to wander over and introduce myself to Ms. Malloy and her daughter. Might as well find out now if I’ll need to plant a twenty-foot wall in front of my house.”

Her eyes were apprehensive. “Really?”

Skip laughed. “Just kidding, Bean.”

“Oh. Want me to come?” She looked longingly around her room.

“No. You have fun. I’ll be back in two shakes.” He started down the hallway.

“Dad?” She peered around the doorjamb.

“Yeah.”

“Don’t let Ms. Malloy scare you.”

“Why? Is she ugly?” From what he’d seen across the school gym last week, she looked as he remembered. Petite and pretty.

Becky shook her head. “Her eyes are mean.”

He couldn’t imagine it. Addie had the prettiest, bluest eyes he’d ever seen. And they gazed at him every day from Becky’s dear face.

All through lunch, the memory of Skip’s daughter smiling at Michaela dug like a sliver into Addie’s thoughts. He had a daughter who looked like him. Who was almost the age their child would have been. Wasting time had obviously not been a priority in Skip Dalton’s life. How incredibly dumb she’d been to presume he had mourned the loss of their child. Instead, he immediately found someone else and—She slammed the last rinsed lunch plate onto the drying rack and bit her tongue to keep from screaming.

Some rich guy looking for a summer place. Too late she associated the chitchat in Burnt Bend regarding the house in the trees across Clover Road….

He had been that guy.

Such a fool she was, keeping her head in the sand, shunning gossip. She hated it at seventeen when she found herself pregnant, and she hated it today, but sometimes, dammit, she should listen. On rare occasions that grapevine fed vital information.

A laugh welled in her throat—before anger, dislike and hurt surged forth. Damn him.

He would have known she lived within shouting distance. He would have investigated his neighbors, the area surrounding his land. A successful and affluent man like Skip Dalton would have taken precautionary steps before moving into a community, especially a rural community where trees and three-hundred-yard driveways concealed houses from view. He was money now. Barrels of money.

“Mommy?” Michaela spoke at her side.

Cool head, Addie. Your daughter is all that matters. “What, angel?”

“Can I lick s-s-some honey off a s-s-spoon after we check the b-b-bees?”

“Oh, button.” Addie cupped her child’s face, kissed her silky hair. “You bet.” And just like that the hurt in her heart eased. “Go to the washroom, then we’ll head out.”

“Yay!”

Smiling, she watched the child run from the kitchen. Michaela loved honey—such a natural source of nourishment—and, amazingly, was not afraid of the hives.

Michaela, she thought. Her baby, her reason for living.

Two minutes later, she led the way down the path to the wooden honey shed where she kept their “spacemen” suits, as Michaela called the white coveralls they wore to attend the hives, and where, in an hour, she would be melting the wax off the honeycombs with a hot knife before running the honey.

For years, Addie’s father operated eighty hives, but Addie’s main responsibility was Michaela. Added to that was the high school where she’d begun teaching again after her divorce. So last winter, she had reduced the apiary to twelve hives. Eight on a red clover field three miles down the road, and four on a neighboring cucumber-squash patch. Although she harvested the bulk of the honey the first week of August, the clover bees would continue to produce until Labor Day.

She was stacking the fresh frames—combs in which bees produced harvestable honey—when Michaela darted for the shed door. “Mom! I f-f-forgot F-F-Felicity.”

Chuckling, Addie handed her daughter the house key. “Can’t have that, button. Don’t forget to lock up when you come out.”

From the time Michaela was old enough to come along, Addie had set the rule that only one doll came for the trip when they went to see the bees, and that doll remained secured in the truck’s cab away from the insects.

As Michaela rushed down the path toward the back door, Addie headed for the pickup with their coveralls and gear: hive tool, smoker and the last stack of fresh frames.

That’d be so cool, Becky Dalton had told Michaela when she asked if the girl wanted to see the hives thirty minutes ago.

How old was she? Eleven, twelve? What did it matter?

A lot, dammit!

He’d moved on without a second’s thought after telling Addie how much he loved her, and that nothing short of death would keep them apart. Lying rat. God, how could she have been so stupid?

“Arrgh!”

Rehashing the memories, she wanted to scream and stamp her feet.

A thought had her stumbling. What if he’d gotten a college girl pregnant around the same time he and Addie—

Oh, God. Her heart hurt. How often had she stood at the edge of that game field over the years and looked up at the bleachers? And remembered.

Remembered sitting among the hundreds of cheering students, watching the boy in the black-and-gold Fire High uniform take charge of his team.

How many times had she wondered if their baby had his eyes or mouth or those crazy elongated lashes? Whether she was tall or short, dark or blond? If she had his runners’ legs?

Most of all, she wondered if the child knew how badly Addie had wanted her. And failed her.

She threw the gear into the bed of the truck harder than necessary, then reached down to the stack of frames on the ground. Forgive me, little one.

A shadow fell across her face. From the corner of her eye she caught sight of a pair of ratty men’s sneakers.

“Hello, Addie.”

Her heart slammed her ribs. His voice. So familiar and at one time so beloved. She couldn’t move, couldn’t move an inch. He’s here was her only thought. Right here.

Slowly she rose; turned.

He stood two strides away, hands shoved into the pockets of a pair of tan cargo shorts. He’d always been tall, but today, this moment, thirteen years after, he loomed over her five-foot-four stature.

On occasion she had glimpsed his face on TV, noted the transformation of boy to man. Where once he held girls in thrall, today he undoubtedly did the same to women. Not because he was handsome, but because he exuded an elemental roughness manifested by those hewed cheeks and jaw, those dark brows, that hawkish nose.

A breeze riffled the flip of brown hair on his wide forehead and a memory speared up. There was a time she had trailed her fingers through that lock. A time she’d loved its texture.

“It’s been a long while,” he said when she continued to stare.

She gathered her scrambled thoughts. “What do you want, Skip?”

Imperceptibly, his shoulder lifted. “Just to say hi.”

“And now you have.”

“I’m…um…” He looked around her front yard. His eyes were still that rich honey color, she noticed. Full of deep, dark mystery.

On a gesture to the big house she watched rise from the earth over the past three months, he said, “My daughter and I moved in across the road today.”

Disregarding her pattering heart, she picked up two supers—square boxes housing the honeycomb frames—and carefully set them inside the truck.

“Yes,” she said. “I noticed the moving trucks earlier, and…Becky met my daughter.” She couldn’t help emphasizing my. His daughter looked like him, the way Michaela looked like Dempsey. But, dammit, no matter how the cards fell, Michaela was her daughter.

My daughter. Mine.

Leaning down, he grabbed the second stack of honey frames. “I know. That’s why I came over. I wanted to make sure she didn’t cause trouble.”

So. This visit wasn’t to reacquaint them or introduce his family to hers. He was here to make sure he wouldn’t be considered a lousy parent for having an intrusive daughter.

How like Skip. His name suited him after all. Skipping town thirteen years ago and now skipping back without a qualm, without a single concern that he’d nearly killed her with his brush-off.

Did he even care that she’d suffered twenty-three hours of labor, that she’d died a million deaths when they whisked her baby away in the time it took her to inhale a single breath?

Do you know I still wonder where she is?

“I have work to do,” she said, seizing the frames from his hands. “And you have your family to go back to.”

His wife, no doubt, would be wondering what he was doing across the road at the neighbor’s house. The neighbor dressed in thready jeans, a long-sleeved T-shirt and old leather boots. On a blistering hot day.

“It’s just Becky and me,” he said. “And she’s fixing her room. You know how girls are. They…They fuss over…” He stepped back when he saw her eyes narrow. “Stuff.” His hands found his hip pockets. “Addie, I…”

She shook her head. “No. This is not old home week. I do not want you coming around here, Skip.” Telling me about your child, your life. His mouth opened and she held up a hand. “It’s not up for discussion. You made your choice long ago. Let’s leave it at that.”

“I’m sorry.”

She released a sharp laugh. “For what? For coming back to the island? For walking up my drive? For your daughter showing up on my doorstep?”

He blinked. “For everything.” His throat worked a swallow. “From the beginning.”

If he didn’t leave soon, she’d throw a loaded box of honey frames at his head. “Please, go home. Go back to your…mansion, to your…whatever it is you do.” On a mission, she marched to the honey shed for another load before she realized she’d finished and had locked the door.

Never mind, she’d find something else inside.

Shortening his stride, he kept an easy pace beside her. She had read about his shattered shoulder, the one ending his star-hung career despite five operations.

She damn well wouldn’t feel sorry for him.

“Addie, we’re going to be neighbors. For a long time. I’m not moving. Can’t we put the past behind us?”

Whirling around, she looked up into those mellow eyes with their silly stretchy lashes. “Now, there’s an idea. Can you tell me how it’s done? How do you forget the past, Skip? You’re a whiz at it, aren’t you? Is it one of those twelve baby-step procedures?” She hated being catty, but the last thing on her radar was this man’s feelings.

Again, the long-lashed blink. “You’ve changed.”

“Damn right I have. It’s called growing up.” She rammed the key into the shed’s lock, flung open the door. “You should try it.”

“You think my life’s been a barrel of laughs?”

She heard the pinch of anger. “I don’t give a flying rat’s rump about your life. As long as it doesn’t interfere with mine, we’re good to go.”

He stopped in the doorway, succinctly blocking a portion of natural light. Reluctantly, she noticed his nut-brown hair needed a good trimming.

He said, “I understand you teach at Fire High.” The anger was gone, replaced with a softness she did not want to examine.

From a shelf, Addie selected four more supers with honey frames. Red clover meant a high volume of blooms and extra work for her miniature buzzing charges. Maybe she would need additional frames after all. About to march back out the door, she paused. “Why did you build across the road?”

“The land was for sale.”

“There were at least three properties along the shoreline you could’ve bought. People with your money buy water views. They don’t do Little House in the Big Woods.”

“I like the woods.”

“Not good enough.” She pushed past him, into the sunshine.

“What do you want from me, Addie? Blood?” Though his shoulder sagged imperceptibly, he took the supers out of her arms. Her heart twisted. He had no business helping her, and certainly not with a permanent injury. He went on, “I’ll gladly give it to you if it makes you feel better. But it won’t change things for us. It won’t—”

She stopped. “Us? There is no us, Skip. There was never an us, not even when we were dating. You made that perfectly clear when you left.” When he’d told her, I need to try, Addie. I need to try and make the big leagues. Don’t hold it against me. And she hadn’t. What she couldn’t understand was the way he disregarded their baby. He hadn’t wanted to accept the responsibility for a child he’d helped create. Even as he told her, I’ll be back for you. We’ll do this together. That’s what hurt. He hadn’t returned. And for that she would never forgive him.

Of course, now it was all clear.

He’d had another woman in the wings. Same old Skip.

Biting back the ache in her throat, she walked to the truck. Michaela sat on the front stoop with Felicity, the American Girl doll, against her chest.

“Want to get in the truck, puddin’?” Addie said. “We’re leaving now.”

Lips working to release words, the child looked to Skip.

Addie set the supers on the ground and hurried to her daughter. “What is it, button?” Had Michaela heard them arguing in the shed?

She glanced over her shoulder at the man loading the pickup’s bed, his arm muscles delineated and tanned in the sunlight. Once those arms had held her. Once they had kept her safe, made her feel wanted.

God, what was she doing, mooning over Skip Dalton’s muscles?

She turned to her child. “Slow and easy, angel,” she whispered. “Slow…That’s my girl. Nothing’s going to hurt you.”

Addie watched her daughter’s gaze dart to the side, before she felt Skip crouch beside her. His knee brushed her calf muscle and shot heat into her blood. Keeping her smile in place, she prayed her eyes were calm. She did not want Michaela recalling any unpleasant Dempsey memories.

“Hi, Michaela,” Skip said softly. “I’m Becky’s daddy. Remember Becky who came over today from the house across the road?”

The child’s eyes were anxious as she looked at Addie.

“Slowly, baby,” she whispered. “It’s okay. Skip’s our new neighbor. He’s…He’s not here to hurt me. He came to meet us.”

Beside her, Skip shifted so his position left a small gap between them. “That’s right, Michaela. And when Becky gets her room all fixed up, she’ll show it to you. With your mommy’s permission, of course.”

“I l-l-like B-B-B-Becky,” came her tiny voice.

Addie swallowed hard. “I know you do, button.”

“C-c-c-can s-s-s-she come over t-t-to play?”

“Maybe one day.” She brushed aside her daughter’s wispy bangs. “Ready to go to our bees?”

A quick head bob.

“Come on, then.” Taking Michaela’s hand and ensuring she stood as a buffer to Skip, Addie walked to the truck’s passenger door.

When she’d buckled her daughter in place, she went around back to retrieve the remaining supers, but Skip had completed the job and was slamming up the tailgate.

“How long has she been stuttering?” he asked, and instead of curiosity or repugnance, she heard a parent’s gentle concern.

Her heart battled. She did not want him concerned. She did not want him to be gentle or genuine or kind. She wanted him to be the Skip Dalton she remembered. The one who chose footballs and adulation over diapers and 2:00 a.m. feedings.

Still, she considered. She could make up a story, or tell him to mind his own affairs. After all, she owed Skip Dalton zip.

On a long sigh, she decided to go with the truth. Best from her than the grapevine. “It started when she was learning to speak, but it worsened when her father walked out on us last year.”

She held his gaze. The way you did.

One large hand rubbed the back of his neck. “I’m sorry.”

Sure. She shook out her keys. “Goodbye, Skip.”

He simply looked at her. Then, nodding, he said, “See you around,” and headed back the way he’d come, down her narrow dirt lane to his big house winking its white walls through a lace of green wilderness.

Chapter Three

The village of Burnt Bend hadn’t changed much since Skip was a kid. It was still half the size of a football field with one main drag offering island residents Dalton Foods—his family’s store—a barber shop, a post office, a gas pump, a coffee shop, three restaurants, Saturday flea markets, a movie theater and Burnt Realty. If he walked a hundred feet, he’d be at the water’s end of Main, and the marina where the ferry docked.

Parking his pickup in a slot near the dinky little hardware store where he’d worked when he was sixteen, Skip cut the engine. He wondered what his mother was up to in her store down on the corner. What she’d do if he walked Becky into that office above the food aisles.

He looked across the cab at his daughter in her tattered jean shorts and pink hoodie, and smiled. Not today, he thought. But soon. First, she needed to get acquainted with Addie. His mother would have to wait. The last thing he wanted was family overload.

“Ready to check out the mailboxes?” he asked. For Becky’s sake, he wanted the Island Weekly delivered to his rural route address. It still surprised him that a child her age enjoyed reading the paper.

“And a birdhouse?” Her blue eyes glinted.

“And a birdhouse,” he agreed as they climbed out of the truck. Truth was, there wasn’t much he could refuse when it came to those Addie-eyes.

“Hey,” she said. “There’s Ms. Malloy and Michaela.”

Skip looked across the street. Sure enough, Addie and her daughter stood on the sidewalk in front of the library, watching them.

He lifted a hand.

Towing Michaela behind her, Addie turned toward the building.

Skip pocketed his keys. Did she remember their rides around the island in his old Chevy pickup? The way she’d snuggled against his side, laughed in his ear?

“Michaela,” Becky called.

The little girl waved before going inside.

“I’m going over to say hi.”

Before Skip could stop her, Becky dashed across the pavement. “Be right back,” she hollered, jogging to the library door.

Heaving a sigh, Skip jaywalked after her and told himself those four years in foster homes had initiated a fierce independence in his little girl, an independence to which he had yet to adapt.

The library had once been a military store. Low ceilings, wooden walls and floors, small windows that allowed a minimal allotment of natural light. The familiar scent of Murphy’s soap, wax and books hit his nose the instant he stepped inside. The rooms hadn’t changed. It was as if he’d checked out a novel yesterday, when he was eighteen and was still favored in the circle of football, Friday-night games and girls.

Except, he wasn’t eighteen, he was thirty-three. And a father to an almost thirteen-year-old. A man with a shoulder that one day would likely attract arthritis.

In the children’s corner he spotted Addie kneeling on the floor with Becky and Michaela. Heads bent together, both girls had several books scattered between them.

Addie’s eyes lifted at his approach. “Skip.”

Naturally she wouldn’t make a scene with her child and Becky this close, but just the same he caught the edge she spun on his name.

“Addie.” For the first time, he noticed she wore running gear: black shorts, yellow breathable shirt, yellow visor cap and a pair of gel-cushioned ASICS jogging shoes. His eyes went to the curve of her tawny ponytail; she looked Becky’s age.

“Hey, Dad.” Grinning, his daughter held up two small novels.

“Michaela can read chapter books already. Isn’t that great?”

“That’s terrific, honey.”

Murmuring to Michaela, Addie rose to her feet.

“We’ll be fine, Ms. Malloy,” Skip heard Becky respond.

Addie touched the smaller child’s hair before stepping around the pair and walking to where he stood.

Her eyes—storm-blue eyes—beckoned him across the room to the fiction section. There, well out of earshot of the kids, she faced him. “Are you here to check out some books?” Why did you follow me into the library? her eyes asked.

“My daughter wanted to say hello to your girl,” he said.

“Oh.” She blinked.

“Look, Addie—”

“No, you look, Skip. I know we’ll be seeing each other in town. Except for the very rich living on the water, the island hasn’t changed much over the years. You probably read the stats on Burnt Bend’s welcome sign.”

“Population one-thousand and eight-nine?” he asked, and felt a corner of his mouth lift. “By my calculations, it’s shot up a count of eighty-four since I left.”

“Laugh all you want. The point is it’s a small place, a small island. People know each other. They talk. Get my meaning?”

He sobered. “And you don’t want them talking about us.”

“As I said—”

“Yeah. I know. There is no us.”

“No.”

Her eyes captivated him. Once, long, long ago, he’d whispered that he could have drowned in her eyes. Clichéd, he knew. Truth was he had drowned in her soul. Until his father had yanked him out and kicked him to shore.

Skip took a deep breath. “Addie, can we call a truce? What happened thirteen years ago…We can’t bring that time back, can’t revert to the past.” Her eyes hardened. Dammit, he was saying it all wrong. “Look, what I mean is, if I could, I’d go back. I’d change it all. You were every—”

“Excuse me. My daughter’s made her choice.” She stepped around him and joined Michaela and Becky at the front counter. Several minutes later, the girls said goodbye and the Malloys left.

“Dad?” Becky whispered. “What’s going on?”

He pretended to study titles on the shelves. “Nothing.”

“Yes, there is. Something’s up between you and Ms. Malloy. I can tell.” His daughter’s eyes narrowed. “You know her, don’t you? From when you lived here. Did you go to school together or something?”

Or something. He wouldn’t lie. “I’ve known her since we were kids. But, I’d rather not talk about it right now, okay?”

“Sure. Whatever.”

He exhaled a lungful of air. “It’s…um, complicated, Bean.”

“No worries,” she said, and shrugged. “No sense crying over spilled milk. That’s what Jesse always said.”

Skip didn’t want to discuss her adopted father. However, he admitted, “He was right. Did you choose a novel?”

She held up a copy of Forever In Blue and he chuckled. She loved the “traveling pants” series. Last month she’d devoured Girls in Pants. “Which one is that?”

“The fourth. And I’m getting this one, too.” She held up a copy of Birdhouses You Can Build In A Day. “Then we can have baby birds every year.” Her smile dazzled him.

“Fine.” He selected a novel without reading the title or the author before heading for the checkout counter. “We need a couple of library cards,” he told the librarian, the same woman who had ruled the books in the building during his high school days. She’d been ancient back then, too.

“Well, now,” she said, her eyes sharp and keen. “Skip Dalton. Heard you were back in town.”

“Yes, ma’am, Ms. Brookley.” And before she could allude to something unsavory, he added, “This is my daughter, Becky.”

The old woman’s eyes widened. “You don’t say. What grade will you start in September, Becky?”

“Seventh.”

“You good in math?” The old lady typed their names onto the cards.

“Yeah. I mean, yes.”

“Then you’ll have no trouble with Ms. Malloy. She’ll be your teacher.” The librarian cast Skip a censured glance, one he read clearly: You’ve got nerve coming back here with your kid after leaving Addie to give up hers.

Three minutes later he filled his lungs with tangy ocean air as they walked from the musty room and the old lady’s scorn into sunshine.

“Let’s see what kind of mailboxes they have at the hardware store,” he said, and started for the store across the street.

“Dad,” Becky began, “I want to know what’s up with you and Ms. Malloy. And don’t say nothing. I saw the way she was looking at you.”

“And how was that?”

“Like she wanted to bite your head off.”

And then some. “It’s a long story, Bean. One day I’ll tell you, I promise.”

“Why not today?”

“There are some things she and I need to work out first, okay?”

They crossed the street and walked down the sidewalk.

“Was she like your girlfriend in high school?”

Grinning, he tugged gently on her ponytail. “Persistent, aren’t you? I’ll tell you all in good time.”

“She’s a runner, you know.”

“I saw that.”

“She runs three times a week with her sisters. Did you know she has two sisters living here? Michaela’s so lucky to have aunts.”

“Michaela tell you all this?”

“Yep. And other stuff.”

“Such as?”

His daughter laughed. “No way. I’ll tell when you tell.”

“Like I said—”

“You’ll tell me when the time’s right.”

“Smart girl. Now, let’s find us a mailbox.”

“And a birdhouse?” Becky tossed a saucy look as she pushed open the door of the store, tinkling its bells.

“One birdhouse coming up.”

Anything to keep questions about Addie out of his daughter’s radar range. The girl was far too perceptive. Ah, just own up, Skip. You aren’t ready to disclose that part of your past yet.

Nor would he contemplate the possibility that, since he’d moved within a short jog of Addie’s door, his feet might be getting a tad cold.

Sweat ran down Addie’s ribs and spine and between her breasts. Today she led her sisters. Usually it was Kat, then Lee, then Addie. But after seeing Skip at the library, she needed to push harder than ever. She needed to outrun the memories.

Right, and when has that ever happened? You even married a man who resembled Skip. Dark hair, honey eyes.

God, she’d made so many foolish, foolish decisions.

In a groove now, she paced herself, breathing through her mouth and lengthening her stride, yet maintaining a slower pace. Wednesday was always their long run, nine miles around Silver Lake in the middle of the island, while on Monday and Saturday they ran the ocean shoreline.

Initially, it had been Addie and her middle sister, Kat, outrunning stress and grief. Lovely, dark-haired Kat, who’d lost her husband in a boating accident while Addie still had nightmares over her lost baby, never mind her problems with Dempsey.

Then their eldest sister Lee returned, lugging a heart full of baggage to the island, and running had become as necessary as water to the trio.

“So,” Lee said, coming abreast with Addie. “Where’s the fire?”

“No fire.” She kept her eyes on the forested trail ahead.

“Yeah? At this pace we’ll be finishing the lake run in twenty minutes, not our normal ninety.”

Addie checked her watch as they passed the ancient sequoia. Seven minutes too fast; she slowed her pace.

Behind them, Kat asked, “This about Skip Dalton?”

“What about him?” Lee asked.

Addie said, “Kat thinks because he’s moved in across the road from me I’m running to escape.”

“Are you?” they asked in unison.

“No. Where he lives is not my concern. What he does is not my concern. Who he does it with is not my concern.”

“Really?” Kat’s chuckle drifted between Addie and Lee.

“You seem to be mighty vocal about the whole thing for him not to be your concern, honey.”

“Did you see him today?” Lee asked as they emerged from the woods and started down the path along the lakeshore. “Is that why you’re upset?”

“I’m not upset.”

At least not anymore.

Not since they’d begun their run. In the library she believed Skip had deliberately tracked her down, but then Michaela told Addie on the way to Charmaine’s house that Becky had wanted to say hi and get a library card.

Addie couldn’t fault the girl. She was polite and kind, and Michaela liked her. A lot. Which scared Addie. Her daughter hooking up with Becky meant Skip and Addie were doomed to each other’s company.

Beneath her feet the ground was spongy, the track easy; in her lungs the air was fragrant with pine and moss and lake water. She had trekked this trail with Skip when she was fifteen. He had kissed her here when she was sixteen, and around the next bend seven months later he had made love to her for the first time under a soft August moon, in the back of his pickup.

“I wish it was a bed,” he’d whispered. And she’d whispered in return, “I’m glad it’s just you and me and the moon.”

Silly romantic fool, that’s what she’d been.

“Addie?” Lee’s voice plunged her back to the present. “’Fess up. What gives? You’ve been a bear with a sore paw for more than a week.”

“Fine.” Before they made the bend and The Spot, she slammed to a halt. “Here’s the deal. I’m scared.”

Lee yanked the bandana from her thick, curly red ponytail, and wiped her neck. “Of Skip?”

“Yes, of Skip.”

Kat, always the hugger, put her arms around Addie. “Honey, why on earth would you be scared of him?”

Lee rolled her eyes. “Not of him, of herself.”

“Is that it?” her middle sister asked.

Addie nodded. “He’s right across the road. I’ll not only see him at school, but I’ll see him when I’m home. I’ll see his car in his driveway…or him doing something in his yard—building mailboxes and birdhouses—”

“Birdhouses?” her sisters parroted.

“Becky told Michaela they were getting a birdhouse today.”

“Why is that scary?” Kat wanted to know.

“I don’t know.” Hands on her hips, Addie hung her head and blew out a breath. “Because it’s homey. It means they’re staying.”

“But you already knew that, Addie.” As eldest, Lee had learned early to be the logical one. “You knew when he took on Coach’s job.”

Both sisters studied her.

“You still have feelings for him,” Lee observed.

“Not at all.”

“Oh, Addie.” Kat, the peacekeeper, the nurturer.

Backing away, Addie held up her palms. “Don’t start with the ‘Oh, Addie.’ I’m over him, all right? I haven’t thought of Skip Dalton in years.” She turned to run the trail again.

“Sheesh, you’re just like Mom,” Kat called after her.

“Mom’s got nothing to do with this,” Addie retorted.

“Yes, she does.” Lee was on her heels. “You won’t own up.”

Own up. The way Charmaine wouldn’t own up about Kat’s father. “This is hardly the same,” Addie said. “I know who Skip Dalton is.”

“But,” Lee said, “you’ve never accepted your feelings where he’s concerned. You’ve shoved them into the back closet. Just like Mom.”

Just like Mom. No way. Addie ran toward the trail’s bend, the bend where he’d told her he loved her, that he would never leave her, that one day they’d be two old people rocking on the porch, watching sunsets. And when she reached the curve, when she might have stumbled, she ran harder, faster, escaping what she believed buried for thirteen years….

That Lee was right.

Standing on her back stoop, Addie called for Michaela. No response. She hurried to the honey house in case her daughter had gone there. The child liked sitting on the wooden floor in a sunny spot playing with her dolls, and Addie suspected it had to do with the waxy-honey scent and quiet warmth. “Michaela!”

The door was closed.

Worry spiking, she rushed inside the building. Empty.

Where was she?

Running to the front yard, she called again. Then stopped when the sound of hammering echoed through the late-morning air.

Hadn’t he finished building over there yet?

And suddenly she knew where her daughter had gone. The birdhouse.

The one Becky described to Michaela last night on the phone—already they’d exchanged numbers. The one the girl had convinced Skip to buy following the library trip two days ago and their discussion about tree swallows nesting in Addie’s backyard.

Quickly, she walked down the path shaded by evergreens and birch, and across the road. At the end of his driveway, a spanking white mailbox stood on a clean-cut wooden post. The mailbox he’d purchased while she jogged with Lee and Kat.

Across each metal side the name DALTON had been stenciled in black block lettering, and for a second, she couldn’t breathe.

A strong name for a headstrong man.

He’d always done what he wanted, what he deemed necessary for his profession. Once, she had loved his name. Written it a hundred times in her school notebooks and carved it into a tree along with her own in the woods behind her mother’s house.

A.W. + S.D. enclosed in a heart.

Stupid. A stupid girl with silly dreams and impractical hopes.

Today, she was a woman of independence, living under the rule of pragmatism and common sense—she hoped—and Skip Dalton had neither.

She walked down his graveled drive, her mind on retrieving her daughter, whose giggles erupted from behind the white-and-green house.

Michaela and Becky were attempting cartwheels on a grassy patch several yards from the wide-lipped back porch, while Skip read the instructions to what appeared to be the celebrated birdhouse. Pieces of cardboard lay scattered on a stone walkway in front of the porch stairs.

Addie stared. The scene appeared almost ruthless. Skip the family man—a father with two girls—working in the yard, fixing things. All they needed was a dog lying in the sun, thumping its tail.

And a woman—

Addie refused to let the thought gel. Refused to think of the woman connected to Skip through his child. Refused to wonder who and why—

“Mommy!” Spying her, Michaela ran forward. “Me ’n’ Becky can do cartwheels!” She grasped Addie’s hand. “Come watch, Mommy.”

At her child’s shouts Skip turned his head and his dark gaze streaked through her like a hot wind. She remained where she stood. “It’s time to go home, button. We have to check the bees.”

Michaela shook her head, her lips working her thoughts. “B-b-but I want to s-s-stay with B-B-Becky.”

“It’s all right, Ms. Malloy.” Becky walked over. “Mick can stay with us until you get back. Can’t she, Dad?”

“Absolutely,” he agreed. “She’s welcome anytime.”

Mick. Hadn’t she told the girl a week ago Michaela hated the nickname? Dempsey used to call her Sticky Micky when she stuttered. Except today, her daughter seemed at ease and happy with the butchered version.

“Please, Mommy. I wanna s-s-stay with them. I wanna do m-m-more c-c-cartwheels. B-B-Becky’s t-t-teaching me.”

“Michaela.” Addie knelt on the grass in front of her child.

“You can come back another time, okay?”

Her daughter’s bottom lip poked out. She shook her head, swinging her long dark pigtails. Tears plumped in her brown eyes and clung to her lashes.

“P-p-please, Mommy,” she whispered. Her little arms wrapped Addie’s neck. “Becky’s my f-f-friend.”

Oh, God. How could she refuse? This preteen, this child of Skip’s, had offered something Michaela sorely lacked: camaraderie.

He walked over to where Addie knelt with Michaela in her lap.

“She’ll be safe with us, Addie.” His deep voice seeped into her pores. “Count on it.”

Count on it. The way she’d been able to count on him when he’d said, This was not my choice.

“I’m not counting on anything.”

Rising to her feet, she hoped her eyes conveyed exactly what she meant. She hadn’t depended on a man in a long, long while. She wasn’t about to start now. And definitely not with Skip Dalton.

“I understand,” he said, and she saw he’d connected the dots.

Becky interjected, “So can Mick stay, Ms. Malloy?”

“Please, Mommy.” Michaela leaned against Addie, tear-streaked face upturned.

Becky’s my friend. “Honeykins, I…” Would rather you find someone else. But who? Last year, some of the first-grade kids had teased her about stuttering. Becky was different. Kind and sweet and genuine. “All right.”

“Goody!” Michaela rushed to her newfound pal and grabbed her hand. “I get to stay, B-B-Becky.”

“Yep. Want to go in and get a Popsicle?”

“Mom,” Michaela yelled. “I get to have a P-P-Popsicle!”

“I heard, love. Only one, okay?”

“Uh-huh, or my tummy g-g-gets sick.” She skipped at Becky’s side as the pair went up the deck steps and into the house.

Addie glanced at Skip. “Do you have a pen? You’ll need my cell number in case something happens.”

“Nothing’s going to happen. The girls will be right here with me.”

She hoped her look was direct. “It’ll make me feel better if you had my number.” She frowned at the sound of “my number,” and added, “For safety reasons.”

“Fine.” He removed a small notebook and carpenter’s pencil from his hip pocket. Among ciphers and construction sketches, he wrote in his left-handed script, Addie-Cell and the number she recited.

“Thank you.” She turned toward the lane. “I won’t be long.”

“Addie.” Massaging his left shoulder, he walked with her around the side of his house. “It’s good the kids get along, don’t you think?”

She continued down his driveway. “It doesn’t mean we’ll be friends, Skip, so don’t read anything into it.”

“I’m not. I just wish…”

Halting midstride, she gazed up at him—at those honey eyes, that two-day beard, the too-long hair edging out from under his ballcap. “What? That we’ll be friends? That the past didn’t exist and I didn’t hate you for what you said and did?”

She saw him swallow before he looked away and wished she could recall her words. She hadn’t meant for him to know her grief, her hurt. And if she were honest with herself, neither had she meant to hurt him.

She resumed her mission, bent on her house, truck and bees. An hour and she’d return for Michaela, to have a chat with her daughter about crossing roads and going to the neighbor’s house without permission.

Michaela had to understand the gravity of her actions, of stranger-danger. One day her life could depend on it.

“Addie.” She heard his voice through a haze of worry and frustration.

With a sigh, she turned. He stood twenty feet up the driveway.

“Bee sting,” he said softly.

Bee sting. His code when they were teenagers, whenever she fought with her father and cried over his strict regimen, his harsh and opinionated philosophy. The words had helped her put things into perspective. Bee stings were ultimately worse than arguing with a parent.

As she gazed at Skip, she understood. Having him as her neighbor or having their children like each other was not as bad as an allergic reaction that squeezed air from windpipes—his windpipe.

Clamping her bottom lip at that memory, she turned for home, grateful he’d been a survivor that day. Because no matter what she believed about the past, nothing compared to seeing a twelve-year-old boy writhing on the ground, fighting for his next breath.

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