When You Find Love

by Willa Blair

  Table of Contents

  Excerpt

  When You Find Love

  Copyright

  Dedication

  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

  Epilogue

  Don’t miss Ian and Lara’s romance in WAITING FOR THE LAIRD.

  A word about the author…

  Thank you for purchasing

  Also available from The Wild Rose Press, Inc.

  “How bad is it?” Caitlin did her best to ignore her reaction to Holt’s unexpected grin—there was no reason why it should make her insides melt. She was too cold for that nonsense. Instead she turned her foot from side to side, but she could only see bloody sand, not the cut.

  “I don’t think it needs stitches.” Holt brushed sand from his feet with his socks, then slipped on his shoes. “But you’ll need to let it heal before you run your next marathon.”

  “No problem then. I don’t have one scheduled until…oh, never.”

  He handed her shoes to her. “Okay, up you go.” He had her up in his arms before she had time to object that she could probably wrap the injury in her socks and walk on the toes of that foot.

  Secure in his arms, Caitlin decided she’d keep her mouth shut. Being snuggled against his body, warmed by his heat, was worth a small cut on her foot. She couldn’t believe standoffish Holt taking care of her like this. “Do ye often rescue damsels in distress?”

  He snorted and shrugged off her question. But he held her close and gazed at her, his pupils dilated and expression heated in a way she couldn’t mistake. Her back warmed beneath his hand as he carried her toward the house.

  Then he looked away. “I don’t often get the opportunity. Women nowadays want to rescue themselves.”

  Another reason to be glad she hadn’t insisted on walking.

  When You Find Love

  by

  Willa Blair

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental.

  When You Find Love

  COPYRIGHT © 2019 by Linda Williams

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author or The Wild Rose Press, Inc. except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  Contact Information: info@thewildrosepress.com

  Cover Art by Abigail Owen

  The Wild Rose Press, Inc.

  PO Box 708

  Adams Basin, NY 14410-0708

  Visit us at www.thewildrosepress.com

  Publishing History

  First Fantasy Rose Edition, 2019

  Print ISBN 978-1-5092-2932-1

  Digital ISBN 978-1-5092-2933-8

  Published in the United States of America

  Dedication

  For my readers,

  who know the best time of your life is

  when you find love

  Chapter One

  Silicon Valley, December, Present Day

  Holt Ridley frowned at his executive assistant as she placed a stack of correspondence on the exact center of his desk, a certified letter displayed prominently on top.

  “Another one?” He stood and flipped quickly through the rest of the stack while he told her, “You can return it and any others that arrive from this law firm.” He proffered the letter.

  When she didn’t take it from him, he looked up, surprised.

  She shook her head. “Sir, I’m afraid that won’t stop the inquiries.”

  Holt shrugged. “They can send all they like. I’m not interested.” He tossed the registered letter into the trash receptacle next to his desk.

  “That’s not going to work, either…”

  Holt sighed. The doggedness that made her an excellent executive assistant did have its drawbacks. She wouldn’t stop until she said what was on her mind.

  “Why not?”

  “A Mr. Thornton is waiting for you in the outer office.”

  “Thornton as in—”

  “Barclay, Thornton, and Barclay, yes.” She held out a heavily embossed business card.

  Holt took it and gave it a glance, then added it to the trash along with the letter from the man’s firm. “Send him away.”

  “I tried, but he won’t budge. He threatened to make camp in the reception area,” she said and added air quotes, “if that’s what it takes to get a few moments of your time.”

  Holt glared at the coffered ceiling above him in frustration. “That bad, huh?”

  “He won’t leave until he sees you.”

  She was very good at reading people—another reason she’d been with him for years—so if she thought Mr. Thornton was prepared to wait him out, the man would not relent. Holt sighed and shrugged. “Send him in, then. We can’t have a squatter in our outer office.”

  Not wanting to give this Mr. Thornton the opportunity to sit down and thereby prolong their meeting, Holt stayed on his feet.

  The lawyer, when he entered, was not the bulldog in a thousand-dollar suit Holt expected. He was slight and graying, wearing something off-the-rack and entirely too warm for the local climate.

  “Mr. Ridley.” He glanced aside at the visitor’s chair and then straightened his thin shoulders. “You’re a hard man to reach.” Thornton plowed on before Holt had the chance to ask him what the hell he was doing in California after sending interminable official correspondence that Holt ignored. “Your lack of response has forced me to come to you directly. Your great-aunt’s estate cannot sit unclaimed forever.” Holt detected a hint of a British accent, but even without it, Thornton’s phrasing gave away his homeland, as did his carefully neutral expression.

  “As far as I’m concerned, it can.” Holt wondered how Thornton wound up a partner in a Long Island law firm. “You’ve made a long trip for nothing.”

  The man had to be exasperated, but his face remained calm, his demeanor unruffled. “On the contrary, Mr. Ridley. I’ve brought your great-aunt’s last will and testament, along with papers for you to sign. I hope we can conclude my business amicably, sir, because I also have with me a summons from the district court of Suffolk County New York that I have been authorized to serve should we fail in our discussion.”

  Holt frowned. “On what grounds?”

  Thornton’s expression didn’t change. “Abandonment of historic property. The house known as Hampton Dales is on the register of historical places in the county. I understand from your great-aunt that the contents, family heirlooms and such, are even more valuable than the house and property overlooking the Sound.” He cleared his throat and continued, “Which are quite valuable themselves. She left it all to you, sir.”

  “I don’t want it.” His mother had been treated so badly while there, she became certain the place was cursed. Even if she’d only dreamed up a curse, he had enough bad memories about that estate to keep him on a therapist’s couch for the rest of his life.

  “Nonetheless, the will is binding on you.”

  “Then I’ll sell the place.” And good riddance.

  “You may do that, sir, after ninety day’s residency.”

  “What?” The sudden urge to sit down swamped Holt, weakening his knees. He fought it.

  “Your great-aunt stipulates in her
will that you occupy the property for three months before selling it, interrupted only by necessary and reasonable—short—periods which I must approve. She anticipated your antipathy and took measures to ensure you did not reject her bequest without due consideration.”

  Holt’s hands balled into fists. He flexed them open at his sides then forced himself to leave them there. He refused to cross his arms protectively over his chest. “That’s impossible. My home and my business are here. I cannot spend months on the opposite coast, no matter what my great-aunt’s will demands.”

  Thornton set his battered briefcase on the visitor chair, opened it, then pulled out three folded documents covered in craft paper. “Her last will and testament for your signature as heir,” he said, ignoring Holt’s objections and placing it on his desk. “A copy of tax assessments, surveys, blueprints of the house, and a preliminary inventory of its contents—with no valuation applied to said inventory,” he continued as he added a thicker bundle beside the first. “Per your great-aunt’s instructions, I have retained an expert in British antiques and antiquities to do a thorough assessment and valuation of the contents. Said expert will arrive tomorrow and be cared for by the estate’s staff, a Mr. Farrell and Mrs. Smith.” The last bundle he retained. “This is the summons with which I hesitate to burden you.” He gestured at the documents he’d placed on the desk. “Dealing with those would be simpler.”

  Like anyone, Holt hated being ignored, but he held onto his shredding temper. The man had come a long way to give him something valuable, even if it held no value for Holt. “You can take them all with you when you leave,” he said as politely as he could manage.

  Perversely, Thornton laid the summons on Holt’s desk alongside the other packets. “Mr. Holt Ridley, you are hereby served and required by Suffolk County to appear in court to determine the disposition of your great-aunt’s bequest.”

  Holt gestured toward the door, a clear invitation to vacate his office. “My lawyers will see about that.”

  Once Thornton left, Holt dropped into his plush, leather swivel chair and leaned back. He glared at the pile of documents on his desk, the summons on top. His great-aunt had caught him neatly in the sticky strands of her web. After the way she’d treated his mother, he couldn’t imagine why she was giving him the estate, and it was too late to ask her. Guilt, perhaps? Or was he her only living heir? He’d been too irritated at the intrusion and the reason for Thornton’s visit to think to ask. But his lawyers could find out easily enough.

  If he didn’t sort this out, he was headed for weeks more of meetings about his aunt’s estate. After dealing with his former fiancée, Helen Conroe and her lawyers for the last six months, the idea made his belly ache. He’d recently learned an expensive lesson when Helen tried to seduce him into a partnership with her. It didn’t take long before he realized she wanted Ridley Communication’s proprietary algorithms more than him. When he ended their relationship, he never imagined she’d sink to industrial theft, but she wasted no time infiltrating his company. When her man got caught leaving with Ridley company secrets, Holt had the employee arrested and took Helen to court.

  Holt knew Helen would keep coming after his company. She’d made it personal. He wasn’t ready to sell. He’d turned down friendly offers in the past. Still a white knight with deep pockets could help him fight her off.

  He eyed the documents that Thornton left.

  Perhaps he’d been too hasty in tossing the lawyer out of his office. Thornton had mentioned cash reserves and investments available only when Holt took possession of his great-aunt’s estate. The amount of those funds had not been specified, but even so, selling the English antiques from the old place seemed a sure-fire way to raise a lot of capital. The house and property were worth millions according to Mr. Thornton and to Holt's mother before she died, but adding the contents could be worth enough to improve his cash flow and attract a trustworthy—and temporary—investor. He hoped they were right about the value of the estate.

  The documents were precisely where Thornton had placed them on the visitor side of Holt’s desk. He regarded them as one might regard a toxic spill, with reluctance to approach or touch them. Yet he couldn’t let his antipathy for his mother’s relative override his good business sense. Those documents led to a resource only he could use, even if it meant spending three months across the country on Long Island.

  Holt hadn’t thought to ask, and Thornton hadn’t mentioned what happened to the estate in the event Holt answered the summons and outright refused the bequest. Well it didn’t matter. He wasn’t going to refuse it. He was going to use it.

  He picked up the phone and told his assistant to book a flight.

  ****

  Caitlin Paterson stared out of the taxi window. On her first trip to the States, she was headed east from the Islip airport to a private estate in the Hamptons. So far, she’d seen miles and miles of pine trees and cars. She looked forward to arriving at her destination, if only for a change of scenery.

  Still she couldn’t complain. The Ridley estate’s solicitor, rather lawyer as they were called here, had offered quite a generous stipend to catalog the contents of what he described as a seaside cottage owned by the recently deceased, Mrs. Amelia Ridley, who left everything to an heir in California. Caitlin hoped her contact at the National Museum who’d recommended her for the job was right about its scope and potential value. Added to her recent work assessing a hidden cache of Jacobite treasures, it could cement her professional reputation and guarantee selection for her dream position in Inverness at the Highland Museum.

  That would make the uncomfortable trip worthwhile. She enjoyed flying about as much as she enjoyed visiting the dentist. Why allow oneself to be launched into the air and stuck in a seat too narrow and too close to the one in front of it for the average human, much less a lass as tall as she, for six or seven hours? Bored with the passing scenery, she let herself dream of a leisurely sail across the Atlantic, complete with one’s own stateroom, gourmet meals, interesting dinner companions, and, when one desired, glorious solitude.

  And icebergs, rough seas, and motion sickness for a week, she consoled herself.

  As the taxi pulled up the long tree-lined approach, Caitlin’s stomach sank. The lawyer’s description had not done this place justice. She had done her research, she had. Nothing she’d learned about the Ridley family or this estate in the little she could find online prepared her for its sheer size. She’d never seen a cottage like the one before her now. It might be as big as Cairn Dubh. Depending on what she found inside, she could be here for months.

  The taxi stopped at the front portico, a massive white semi-circle that fronted the stone and stucco edifice. “That’ll be one-hundred and forty-six dollars, miss,” the driver told her as he opened his door.

  He got out, opened the trunk, and began unloading her bags while Caitlin dug through her purse for a credit card, mentally subtracting the fare from the advance she’d been given to make the trip. It seemed quite high, even discounting the conversion rate from Scottish pounds to dollars. And she couldn’t forget the tip. Americans expected a tip, right?

  The front door to the estate opened, and a dapper older gentleman dressed in a dark suit and bow tie approached. He had a word with the driver, picked up Caitlin’s bags, and turned.

  “Sir, where are ye going with those?”

  The driver opened her door and stepped back. “He took care of everything. Just follow him inside.”

  “Oh, very good.” Caitlin stuffed her wallet back in her purse, and after looking around to make sure she wasn’t going to leave something behind, she got out. “Thank you,” she mumbled and headed up the steps, barely aware when the taxi pulled away.

  The gentleman waited for her at the front door, a confection in beveled glass set in wood painted white to match the portico’s trim. “Welcome to Hampton Dales,” he announced without offering his hand. “Also known as Ridley House. I am Mr. Farrell, in charge of this property for the
Ridley family. You may dispense with the title and call me Farrell.” He opened the front door, gestured her inside, and again, picked up her bags. “If you’ll allow me, I will show you to your rooms, and later, give you a tour of the house.”

  He sounded like a bloody English butler minus the accent. She heard some New York in his speech, calling on her recollection of American cop shows she’d seen. He didn’t sound like Ian’s wife, Lara, so not from California like the heir. Caitlin managed a polite nod before she responded. “Thank you, Farrell, I’d appreciate that.”

  She entered but had to pause in the high-ceilinged foyer to admire a sparkling chandelier. “Waterford?”

  “Yes, miss. I apologize for the lack of seasonal decorations, but given the circumstance this year…”

  “Of course. Such a celebration would seem out of place.”

  “Thank you for understanding. Now you must be tired from your trip. Follow me.”

  Farrell led her to a suite of rooms larger than her flat at home, including a sitting room, a bedroom, and a privy that reminded her of the huge Roman baths in the English city of Bath, complete with luxurious towels, scented soaps, and a plush robe. If it included a kitchen and a telly to watch her favorite TV shows, she would never have to leave it.

  “I trust this will be suitable, miss.”

  “Of course,” Caitlin replied, still intent on studying every aspect of her new surroundings.

  The sitting room included a wood-burning fireplace, now cheerfully warming and illuminating two facing wing-back chairs upholstered in what looked to be butter-soft suede the color of cream. They were anchored by a navy blue leather sofa, broad and deep enough for her and at least two other people to relax comfortably.

  An ornately carved four-poster large enough to be a cricket pitch, with a mountain of pillows at its head, dominated the bedroom. Farrell then showed her a walk-in closet that included a built-in chest of drawers, a wealth of shelves, and its own time zone.

  “I believe this will do nicely,” Caitlin managed to say. “I didn’t bring enough with me to use a fraction of this space.”