Beach Reads Box Set

by Madden-Mills, Ilsa

  “From Mr. Duffy next door. He lets me water his dog and he tells me about when he was fighting all the pirates before the war.”

  “Which war?”

  “The Civil War.”

  I make a mental note to ask my ex-wife if she’s aware of what Tucker’s doing when he’s playing outside. She’ll probably tell me Mr. Duffy’s a harmless old man, but Tucker can’t always tell the difference between reality and a good story, and I don’t want him getting made fun of at school for talking about his neighbor the vampire pirate hunter.

  I hate not being close enough to go see his teachers and just be there for those minutes after school when he talks about his day.

  One more year.

  Just one more year.

  “Keys?” Ellie says to me.

  “I locked the door.”

  She points to my SUV. “So I can drive.”

  “No.”

  “That wasn’t a question.”

  “This is my car.”

  “I have control issues.”

  She’s got that stubborn look Beck gets when he’s determined that we’re going to play poker until he wins. And she’s not overtly setting any guilt trips, but she doesn’t have to.

  She doesn’t fucking have to.

  I approach and dangle my keys between us. “I’m backseat driving.”

  She smirks. “Of course you are.”

  But she still takes the keys.

  I hold the ring steady until she makes eye contact again. “That’s my kid you’re driving,” I add softly.

  She holds my gaze without flinching. “Noted. Now, if you don’t want me stealing this thing, you better get in.”

  Tucker’s already in the backseat strapping into his booster seat, so I settle into the passenger seat.

  Feels weird to be on this side of the car.

  But I think I owe her.

  She might not realize it yet, but she owes me too.

  And since we’re here together, she’s going to pay up.

  Chapter Five

  Ellie

  Shipwreck smells like fried oysters, cannon fire, and dirt. People in pirate costumes stroll along Blackbeard Avenue while locals leap out from behind barrels and out of the local shops to challenge tourists to swordfights.

  It’s glorious.

  I tell Wyatt and Tucker to go on about their business, that I’ll get a ride back with a friend, but because Wyatt is Wyatt, he insists on walking with me from the parking fields at the end of the main drag toward Crusty Nut, which has the best fried pickles and banana pudding in all of Virginia, and yes, I have sampled every banana pudding in Copper Valley, and a fair number up in the DC metro area too, so I can say with absolute certainty that Crusty Nut’s banana pudding cannot be beat.

  Also, if you don’t like banana pudding, I’m happy to eat yours. You can have my Twizzlers.

  “Tucker, have you ever seen the inside of a pirate ship?” I ask as we pass Scuttle Putt, the miniature golf course at the edge of the park. The entrance to the payment shack is shaped like the bow of a ship, complete with a mermaid figurehead above the door.

  Tucker slows.

  Wyatt scoops him up and puts him on his shoulders like he’s light as a feather. “We’ll check it out later.”

  “Why are you doing this?” I murmur. “I don’t need a fu—freaking escort. I’m fine.”

  “Your brother would kick my ahem if I didn’t get you back safe and sound to his house tonight, and we both know it.”

  “I know everyone in town, and I’ll get a ride. Go away.”

  “Not until I see who’s driving you home.”

  I pause outside Crow’s Nest, the local bakery, as I spot the owner just inside the open door, wiping down tables in a pirate costume, complete with eye patch.

  Just as he’s supposed to be. “Hey, Grady. You ready?”

  I smile, and he smiles back, and for the first time since Wyatt walked in on me in the bathtub, I know tonight’s going to be okay.

  “You bet, hot stuff. Give me two seconds to toss this rag.”

  Wyatt looks at me.

  Then at Grady, who’s six solid feet of dependable, adorable muscle and dimples, topped with a thick mop of dark hair that even his hairnet can’t fully contain.

  “What the f—fudge is going on here?” he growls.

  “Just picking up my date. Who will also drive me home.”

  “Your date.”

  “Mm-hmm. Like I said, go about your business.”

  Cooper, Grady’s brother, strolls out of the bakery and rubs my hair. Not because he’s older than me, but because he’s taller than me. “Still heartbroken you didn’t pick me, Calamity Ellie.”

  “You’re unreliable,” I reply, earning a laugh.

  “Dad. Dad,” Tucker whispers reverently while Wyatt continues to glare. “Daaaad.”

  “I’m still handsomer,” Cooper points out.

  I pretend to study him, then shake my head. “Nah.”

  He puts a hand to his heart like he’s wounded. “Aah, Ellie. What’s a guy gotta do to get your affections?”

  “You have to pick up your phone when she calls, idiot,” Grady tells his brother as he steps outside, sans the hairnet under his pirate hat. He offers me an arm. “Shall we, Calamity Ellie?”

  “Who the hell are you?” Wyatt snarls.

  “He’s—” I start, but I’m suddenly squished in a bride-scented hug with a fake parrot smashed into my face.

  “Ellie! There you are. Why aren’t you answering your phone?” Monica demands. She’s dressed to the hilt as a pirate captain, with her honey blond hair tied back in a low ponytail under her pirate hat.

  “It’s recovering from a swim,” I tell her.

  “Daddy and Miss Ellie took a bubble bath together!” Tucker announces as I pull back.

  Monica’s hazel eyes dart from me to Wyatt to Tucker up on Wyatt’s shoulders, going round as a pirate steering wheel by the time they’re back on me.

  Grady drops his arm and takes a step back, brows raised, a slow smile spreading like he’s coming to a conclusion.

  Shit.

  Shit on a cannonball. This is not how today is supposed to go.

  Behind Monica, Patrick, tall, blond, and usually affectedly bored, narrows his eyes like I’m still his business. “A bubble bath? Together?”

  “They were all covered in bubbles,” Tucker says with a giggle.

  I laugh too, way too high. “And isn’t it dinner time?” I interrupt, because I am not going to dinner solo with my ex-boyfriend and his perfect girlfriend and once again, Wyatt Morgan is screwing up my life. He’s going to ruin my carefully crafted date routine with Grady for the week. “We should get down to Crusty Nut before the parade starts.”

  The crowd’s getting thicker, so I’m not wrong.

  But Monica, Jason—her fiancé, who’s dressed like a first mate but usually looks like a surfer—Patrick, and his girlfriend, Sloane, don’t move.

  “You’re dating again?” Patrick asks, again like it’s his business.

  “Dude, I didn’t realize,” Grady says, backing away while Cooper shakes with silent laughter at his brother’s expense.

  “Wyatt and I are friends,” I say lightly in a tone that leaves my answer open for interpretation.

  Wyatt lifts a brow at me while holding onto Tucker’s legs, because whatever we are, we’ve never really been friends. More like people with opposing personalities who sometimes cross paths in social circles since my brother has always thought he could do no wrong.

  But if he’s screwing up my fake date for the week, he’s going to be something other than my friend.

  “Why doesn’t your friend join us for dinner?” Patrick says tightly, and that’s right, you dumping asshole, I have men fighting over me.

  Sloane angles closer to him. “They’re not in costume,” she points out.

  Like all of us, she too is dressed like a pirate. Her costume has red-and-black striped pants loose around her thighs but fitted
to her calves, a white blouse, and a leather strap over her shoulder holding her scabbard and fake sword. A matching bandana covers her hair, and she’s sporting skull and crossbones earrings.

  Patrick’s costume is nearly identical, except he’s missing the earrings.

  And I can’t say a thing, because I would’ve dressed us in matching pirate costumes too.

  “Grady was coming with me for dinner,” I say, “because Wyatt and Tucker have never seen the pirate parade, and Pop’s less likely to harass Grady if he’s with us. Wyatt, really, that’s an amazing spot to watch the parade. Tucker will love it. And wait until you see Pop. Pop Rock? Grady and Cooper’s grandpa? He dresses up like Blackbeard every year. It’s glorious.”

  I point desperately to a minute space between a lamp post and a family of six right at the curb.

  “Wyatt…Wyatt Morgan?” Monica asks.

  And I’m done. Totally, completely screwed. My master plan for a fake boyfriend this week is unraveling before my eyes.

  So I do the only thing I can to save my pride in the face of disaster.

  I link my arm through Wyatt’s. “It’s new,” I whisper, telling my best friend of ten years a bald-faced lie that will undoubtedly kick me in the lady nuts very, very soon. Like as soon as Wyatt opens his mouth and bucks away from me. “And I didn’t want to take away from his time with Tucker this week.”

  There’s a muscle working in Wyatt’s jaw, but his gray eyes aren’t glaring.

  Nope, they’re shifting into neutral. He disentangles himself from my arm, but then wraps his tightly about my shoulders, which is a little awkward with Tucker up on his shoulders, but he manages anyway. Because he’s Wyatt.

  Of course he can hold a kid and me.

  “I don’t share,” he says with a pointed look at Grady.

  Cooper has a coughing fit.

  “Dad,” Tucker howls, kicking Wyatt in the pec. “That’s Cooper Rock.”

  “I’m free tonight, Ellie,” Cooper says. He winks at Wyatt.

  “And you’re staying free,” Wyatt replies pleasantly.

  Too pleasantly.

  Like he’s bantering with Beck and the guys.

  “Wyatt Morgan?” Monica repeats again.

  “I know that name,” Patrick says with a frown.

  I shrug and put on what I hope is an embarrassed smile, rather than the mortified dread I’m feeling at the farce I’m going to have to pull off all fucking week if I don’t want to be the fifth wheel for my best friend’s wedding to my ex-boyfriend’s brother. “You know what they say about that line between love and hate.”

  Monica’s hazel eyes are so wide under her feathered pirate wench hat that she’s in danger of losing an eyeball. “Well, yeah, I mean, I always suspected as much, but…oh my god, Ellie! I’m so fuc—freaking happy for you!”

  She tackles me in a hug, babbling about needing all the details while I reel a little, because what the hell does I always suspected as much mean?

  “Monica, seriously, this is your week. Wyatt and I are just…we’re taking it slow. He doesn’t really care if Grady comes to dinner with us.”

  Wyatt’s grip—yep, he’s still holding on, despite Monica trying to strangle me with a hug too—tightens so hard that if my shoulders were walnuts, they’d be walnut butter. “Yes, I do.”

  “DAD, THAT’S COOPER ROCK!” Tucker hollers.

  Cooper, who no longer has any shot of anonymity, steps out from behind his brother to offer Tucker a fist bump. “Give it up, little buddy. You like the Fireballs?”

  Tucker nods solemnly while he looks at his fist. “Dad says loyalty’s important, even in the face of great loss.”

  Cooper pounds his heart twice with his fist. “Dang straight. Your dad’s a smart guy.”

  “You’ll get ‘em this year,” Tucker declares.

  Cooper winces. Grady winces. Half the street winces.

  Since Chicago won the World Series a few years ago, Copper Valley’s pro baseball team has taken over as the sport’s most lovable losers.

  And they’re embracing the title with gusto this year.

  “They will, won’t they, Tucker?” I say.

  “They really will.” He beams at me like we’re going to be best friends, and I think he could be right.

  Monica’s frowning. “I don’t know if Crusty Nut can fit two more people at our table.”

  “It’s okay,” I tell her quickly. “Tucker will love the parade so much more from right here. He can’t catch as much booty if he’s up on the balcony with us. Wyatt’s okay with this, aren’t you, honey?”

  I lift my eyes to his, and that’s a mistake.

  Because he’s promising me a lot of retribution in that colorful gray gaze. And if you think gray can’t be colorful, you’ve never pissed off a gray-eyed man.

  “Looks like I have to be,” he replies.

  “But you have to join us for lunch tomorrow,” Monica announces. She squeezes my hand. “Oh my god, Ellie, I always thought this might happen.” She throws herself around Wyatt too, and the parrot wobbling on her shoulder, stitched to her pirate captain costume, pecks Tucker’s bare calf. “You better be good to her, or I’ll slice your nuts off with my pirate sword and tie a cannonball to your ankles and shoot you over the mountains.”

  Tucker gasps.

  “She’s teasing,” Wyatt tells him quickly.

  Monica smiles.

  It’s an ugly smile.

  I like it.

  Wyatt smiles back.

  It’s a tight smile.

  My life is going to be hell as soon as I get back to Beck’s place tonight.

  “Can you drive me home?” I ask Monica. “Tucker has an early bedtime.”

  “Of course!” she squeals.

  Patrick’s still glaring.

  And since Patrick’s glaring, Sloane the wonder nurse is also glaring.

  Only Jason, Monica’s laid-back fiancé who’s been watching all of this with an amused smile, is still blissfully unaware of all the weirdness.

  It’s remarkable that Patrick and Jason share genes, because that’s the only thing they have in common.

  “You’ll drive safely,” Wyatt informs Monica.

  She rolls her eyes at him. “First one to the hospital. I got it.”

  He finally releases his grip on me.

  “Go on, get that spot,” I tell him. “Tucker, you’re going to love the parade.”

  “Can we all have a bubble bath tonight?” he asks.

  “No,” Wyatt and I answer together.

  The adults lining the parade route all chuckle with Grady, Cooper, Monica, and Jason. “You are adorable,” Monica informs Tucker. “We’re going to be good friends this week.”

  She’s not going to see them at all this week if I have any say in it.

  Far better to have a boyfriend who’s an amazing single dad from afar than to have to put on a show for my friend and my ex-boyfriend anyway.

  Maybe this will work out after all.

  “Enjoy the parade,” I tell Wyatt. “I’ll see you back at the house.”

  His lips twitch, because Wyatt and I don’t do see you later.

  We never have.

  As kids, we’d part on me shouting shut up and let me do it my way to his fine, do it your way and lose, you crazy buttwipe. As adults, there’s less shouting, but generally more eye-rolling.

  Until that last time.

  Over Christmas.

  He bends down and kisses my cheek. “I’ll miss you, schmoopsy-poo.” Quieter, he adds, “And we’re discussing this later.”

  “I’ll miss you too,” I say breathlessly.

  Monica loops her arm around mine and tugs gently, prodding me into falling into step beside her.

  Well, limp.

  These shoes were a terrible idea.

  I give Grady a quick, “Sorry about that,” over my shoulder, but he just grins and waves me off.

  “Good to see you happy, Ellie.”

  I don’t look at Wyatt.

 
I can’t.

  “Why didn’t you ever tell me he was hot?” Monica asks, because she came into my life after Wyatt was already gone in the military, and I realize with a start that she’s never actually met him.

  “Most of my life, I didn’t look at him that way,” I answer honestly.

  “I’m gonna need this bubble bath story.”

  “I’m sure it’s nothing you’ve never done yourself,” I reply.

  “Your leg hurts, doesn’t it?”

  “What’s pain when I look like a million Spanish galleons?”

  She rolls her eyes, then glances back.

  I look back too, and spot Wyatt buying a foam sword for Tucker from a passing street vendor.

  Except he’s not buying just one.

  He’s buying two.

  He swings Tucker down, squats and holds his sword in the ready position, and then staggers in mock pain as Tucker gets him in the gut.

  “Right,” Monica murmurs, fanning herself. “Not hot at all.”

  That’s right.

  He’s not hot at all.

  I just have to pretend he is.

  It’s only four days. And barely a few little lies.

  It’ll all be just fine.

  Chapter Six

  Wyatt

  I don’t like leaving Ellie in Shipwreck, but she’s a grown-up, she’s with friends, and one of the guys from the bakery—Cooper? Hell, I haven’t kept up with the Fireballs this year—came out to chat for a while during the parade, and while I won’t admit it to Ellie, he passed my gut test.

  Seems like a decent guy.

  So does his brother, Grady, who apologized again for the mix-up and told me I was a lucky guy.

  So she has good people looking out for her in a safe small town, and she’ll be okay.

  But after I read six bedtime stories with Tucker, promise we’ll go miniature golfing and try to dig up pirate treasure and look for the hidden peg leg that’s supposed to come with a treasure of its own tomorrow, and hug him tight because it’s so damn good to be able to hug him—video chat and phone calls aren’t the same, and now that he’s starting soccer and baseball, there’s less time to talk—I head to the living room to wait for Ellie to get back.