by Reese Ryan
Dakota’s eyes stung, and her heart felt as if it might burst. She kissed him, her arms looped around his neck.
“I love you, Dex. And maybe one day I’ll take you up on your offer.” She held back a smirk in response to his sudden look of panicked confusion. “At some point, maybe I’ll decide to return to my career in broadcast news. But I’m not ready to leave Holly Grove Island just yet.”
“You’re staying on the island?” Dexter’s eyes lit up, then he wrapped her up in a tight hug. “Baby, that’s fantastic. I couldn’t be more thrilled, and I know that your dad and Sin will be, too. I can’t wait to tell…” He paused suddenly, frowning. “But then that means—”
She held up a hand. “Before you say anything, I’ve been thinking about my job situation now that working at the resort is off the table. Let me show you something.”
Dakota climbed off of Dexter’s lap and grabbed her phone. She opened up an app and handed it to him.
Dexter read the screen carefully, then raised his gaze to hers. A wide smile spread across his face. “You’re starting your own marketing and communications consultancy?”
“Yes!” she said, giddy with excitement. “Ever since our meeting with some of the local business owners and then the presentation to the town, I’ve had several requests for help with marketing, PR, and event brainstorming from local businesses. So I’ll start working with people here and then branch out from there.”
“Babe, that’s brilliant. I’m thrilled for you.” He pulled her onto his lap and kissed her again.
“I’ve been able to save a little while I’ve been working for the resort,” she said as he kissed her neck, the short whiskers of his beard tickling her skin. “I realize that it will take a little time for me to build the consultancy to a sustainable level. So, I’ll put some feelers out for work here or off-island in the meantime.”
His chuckle vibrated against her collarbone, where he was trailing kisses. “Don’t worry, babe.” He kissed her jaw. “Got a comfortable savings to tide us over, just in case.”
“Us?” They were really doing this—officially making a go of this relationship.
“Us.” He repeated the word as he gazed up at her. The dreamy, content smile on his face made her heart swell in her chest and butterflies flutter in her belly. “You and me, Dakota. For as long as you’ll have me, which I hope is a mighty long time. Because we’ve got a lot of time to make up for.”
They were a couple now. We and us were words she’d have to get accustomed to using.
She smiled at Dexter—a blur through the tears that filled her eyes and slid down her cheeks. They’d been given a second chance at making a life together. This time they weren’t naive kids who had no idea what life was really about. The time they’d spent apart had shown them both what was important in life. Who was important. Family. Friends. And someone who loved you unconditionally, even when you screwed up.
“One more thing. Promise me that from now on, we will always be completely honest with each other.” She studied his handsome face. “No matter what.”
“I promise. You’re the girl I let get away. The one woman I could never get out of my head. I loved you then. I love you now. And I will always, always love you, Dakota.”
“I love you too, Dex.”
She kissed him, her chest swelling with the deep affection she felt for him and with the unexpected contentment of being back on Holly Grove Island. Dakota was exactly where she belonged; surrounded by the people she loved in the place that would always feel like home.
Epilogue
Thanksgiving
Dakota felt like she, Lila Gayle, Sin, and Dexter’s mother, Marilyn, had been cooking for at least three days straight in preparation for Thanksgiving, only to have the crowd of friends and family they’d invited to her father’s house for dinner devour it in what felt like mere minutes.
They’d prepared a baked turkey, a fried turkey, and a ham. There were scalloped potatoes, sweet potato casserole, baked macaroni and cheese, corn bread dressing, green bean casserole, and honey buttermilk dinner rolls to complete the carb overload. The dessert table overflowed with sweet potato pie, apple pie, blackberry and peach cobbler, and of course, Dakota’s favorite—lemon meringue pie.
Nick and Dexter had borrowed Nick’s mother’s dining room table to help accommodate their guests: Oliver and Lila Gayle, newly engaged and planning a simple, outdoor Christmas Eve wedding ceremony in the gazebo on the town square; Dakota and Dexter; Dexter’s entire family—including his brothers and their wives and children and his father, James, whom Dex was working on forging a closer relationship with; Lila Gayle’s eldest son, Daniel, who’d moved back to town and was renovating the bait shop himself; Sin and her parents, Terri and Troy; and Nick and his parents.
Her sister, Shay, and her husband had stayed in California to celebrate Thanksgiving with his family, but she’d promised to come home for their father’s wedding to Lila Gayle on Christmas Eve.
“Hey, beautiful.” Dexter slipped his arms around Dakota’s waist and kissed her neck from behind while she stood at the sink scrubbing dishes from the mountain of pots and pans. She’d gotten a head start on the kitchen while everyone else played cards or hung out together. “Can I talk to you for a minute?”
Dakota relaxed in the comfort of Dexter’s embrace and inhaled his subtle cologne. They’d been together officially for three months. But Dakota would never tire of the hugs and kisses they shared.
Dexter had been appointed as the permanent director of operations at the HGI Resort at the end of ninety days. And the resort group’s management staff had been so impressed with the two festivals she’d developed for HGI and the way she’d handled community relations with the island’s residents that they’d engaged her as a consultant to work with both the Myrtle Beach and Holly Grove Island Resorts.
Though she spent a few nights a week at Dexter’s place, she officially still lived here with her father—until he and Lila Gayle got married in a few weeks on Christmas Eve. Then she would be moving into Dexter’s condo.
“Sure. What’s up?” She turned around. “Looking for a spades partner?” She nodded toward the ruckus coming from the dining room, where there were rise and fly games of both spades and bid whist going on. “If so, let me wash a few more of these dishes first.”
“There’s something I want to show you.” A sexy smile curved his sensuous lips and a mischievous grin lit his dark eyes.
Dakota gasped and punched him in the gut playfully. She leaned in and whispered so that only Dex could hear her. “I am not sneaking up to my room for sex with you in a house full of people, Dexter Roberts.”
“Noted.” He chuckled. “But that isn’t what I want to show you. Not this time.” He waggled his eyebrows and laughed. “But after you see what I want to show you, you might at least want to make out with me a little.” He chuckled.
Dakota shook her head. Whatever Dex’s surprise was, she was grateful for a reason to abandon the dish of baked-on macaroni and cheese that was ruining her nails. Maybe soaking it would help.
“Sure.” She grabbed a dish towel and dried her hands. “Lead the way.”
Dexter slipped his hand in hers and led her toward the back door. He grabbed their jackets off a hook by the door and helped her into hers. Then they stepped outside in the cool, crisp November air. The chilly wind whipped across her face, and Dakota could see her breath in the air.
She rubbed her hands together and blew on them. “I’m assuming there’s a really good reason for us to be out here freezing our buns off?”
“I assure you that there is.” He took her hand again and led her to the front of the house. They stood out in the street in front of the pale-pink clapboard house with white trim. Light glowed from all of the downstairs windows, but the windows on the second and third floors were dark. Dex spread his arms out, his face brimming with excitement. “What do you see?”
Okay, I’ll bite.
“My dad’s plac
e.” She pulled her jacket around her more tightly as the wind blowing off the Atlantic Ocean whipped down Cypress Lane. “The house I grew up in.”
“Exactly.” He pointed. “And now that your dad and Lila Gayle are getting married, the place will be empty.”
“My dad plans to update the place and add it to his list of rental properties.” She frowned. It made her sad to think of strangers making themselves at home in the lovely old Victorian that had been the setting for so many special memories in her life and in her relationship with Dexter. But it made sense for her father to either sell or rent the place. It would be a shame for it to sit empty.
Her father had suggested that she buy the place to keep it in their family. But as a brand-new business owner, she couldn’t afford it just yet. So she’d suggested that her father rent out the property for a year or two. By then she’d be able to make the purchase.
“What if he didn’t rent the place? What if he sold it to us instead?” Dex asked excitedly.
“Us?” She wished she could take back the word as soon as the light in his eyes dimmed in response to it. She pressed her hands to his chest, lifted onto her toes and pressed a quick kiss to his lips. “I mean, I’m interested in keeping the house in our family, of course. But with my consultancy being so new—”
“That’s why I suggested that we buy it together.” He grinned, pressing another kiss to her lips. “I’ve been looking to expand my real estate holdings and it would be a really great investment. More importantly, think how great it would be to raise our children here in the same house where you and your sister grew up.”
Dakota stared up into Dexter’s dark eyes. Her belly fluttered and her knees suddenly felt weak. It warmed her chest that he was willing to make such an offer.
“Dex, that’s incredibly sweet of you, and I appreciate the offer. But I honestly couldn’t ask you to do something so generous for me.” She clutched at his jacket.
“You didn’t ask,” he said. “I offered. Because this is something I really want to do for you, but also for us. Please,” he added before she could object. “Let me do this for us.”
Dakota turned to look at the house that had been synonymous with home for the entirety of her life. The house that still held memories of her childhood and of her mother. Memories of growing up with Shay, playing hide-and-seek, and sliding down the original wooden banisters.
She and Dex were only a few months into their renewed relationship, but they’d already talked about getting married the following year. And about wanting to start a family. She wanted her children to have a connection to the home that had been in their family for four decades.
“It would be amazing, wouldn’t it?” she mused, already thinking of ways they could update the place and make it their own while honoring its history and connection to her parents.
Dakota turned back to look at Dexter’s wide smile, his eyes dancing with excitement.
“Say yes, Dakota. Please.” He leaned in and kissed her forehead.
She bounced on her heels, her pulse racing and a throaty laugh erupting from her lips. Dakota nodded excitedly. “Okay, yes. Let’s do it.”
He whooped with excitement, lifting her off her feet and swinging her around, both of them laughing before he kissed her again.
Dakota couldn’t be happier. She and Dexter had been given a second chance at love right there on Cypress Lane. In the town, on the street, and in the very house that had always meant so much to them.
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About the Author
Reese Ryan is an award-winning author of romantic fiction with captivating family drama, surprising secrets, all the feels, and a posse of complex, flawed characters. A panelist at the 2017 Los Angeles Times Festival of Books and recipient of the 2018 Donna Hill Breakout Author Award, Reese is an advocate for the romance genre and diversity in fiction.
A Midwesterner with deep Southern roots, Reese currently resides in semi-small-town North Carolina, where she’s an avid reader, a music junkie, and a self-declared connoisseur of cheesy grits.
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ReeseRyan.com
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For a bonus story from another author that you’ll love, please turn the page to read
Kiss Me at Sweetwater Springs by Annie Rains.
If Lacy Shaw could have one wish, it’d be that the past would stay in the past. And with her high school reunion coming up, she has no intention of reliving the worst four years of her life. Especially when all she has to show for the last decade is how the shy bookworm blossomed into…the shy town librarian. Ditching the event seems the best option until a blisteringly hot alternative roars into Lacy’s life. Perhaps riding into the reunion on the back of Paris Montgomery’s motorcycle will show her classmates how much she really has changed…
Chapter One
Lacy Shaw looked around the Sweetwater Springs Library for the culprit of the noise, a “shhh” waiting on the tip of her tongue. There were several people reading quietly at the tables along the wall. A few patrons were wandering the aisles of books.
The high-pitched giggle broke through the silence again.
Lacy stood and walked out from behind her counter, going in the direction of the sound. She wasn’t a stickler for quiet, but the giggling had been going on for at least ten minutes now, and a few of the college students studying in the far corner kept getting distracted and looking up. They’d come here to focus, and Lacy wanted them to keep coming.
She stopped when she was standing at the end of one of the nonfiction aisles where two little girls were seated on the floor with a large book about animals in their lap. The shhh finally tumbled off her lips. The sound made her feel even more like the stuffy librarian she tried not to be.
The girls looked up, their little smiles wilting.
Lacy stepped closer to see what was so funny about animals and saw a large picture of a donkey with the heading “Asses” at the top of the page. A small giggle tumbled off Lacy’s lips as well. She quickly regained control of herself and offered a stern expression. “Girls, we need to be quiet in the library. People come here to read and study.”
“That’s why we’re here,” Abigail Fields, the girl with long, white-blond curls, said. They came in often with their nanny, Mrs. Townsend, who usually fell asleep in the back corner of the room. The woman was somewhere in her eighties and probably wasn’t the best choice to be taking care of two energetic little girls.
“I have to write a paper on my favorite animal,” Abigail said.
Lacy made a show of looking at the page. “And it’s a donkey?”
“That’s not what that says,” Willow, Abigail’s younger sister, said. “It says…”
“Whoa!” Lacy held up a hand. “I can read, but let’s not say that word out loud, okay? Why don’t you two take that book to a table and look at it quietly,” she suggested.
The little girls got up, the older one lugging the large book with both hands.
Lacy watched them for a moment and then turned and headed back to her counter. She walked more slowly as she stared at the back of a man waiting for her. He wore dark jeans and a fitted black T-shirt that hugged muscles she didn’t even have a name for. There was probably an anatomy book here that did. She wouldn’t mind locating it and taking her time labeling each muscle, one by one.
She’d seen the man before at the local café, she realized, but never in here. And every time he’d walked into the café, she’d noticed him. He, of course, had never noticed her. He was too gorgeous and cool. There was also the fact that Lacy usually sat in the back corner reading a book or
people-watching from behind her coffee cup.
What is he doing here?
The man shifted as he leaned against her counter, his messenger bag swinging softly at his lower hip. Then he glanced over his shoulder and met her gaze. He had blue crystalline eyes, inky black hair, and a heart-stopping smile that made her look away shyly—a nervous remnant of her high school years when the cool kids like him had picked on her because of the heavy back brace she wore.
The brace was gone. No one was going to laugh at her anymore, and even if they did, she was confident enough not to find the closest closet to cry in these days.
“Hey,” he said. “Are you Lacy Shaw, the librarian here?”
She forced her feet to keep walking forward. “I am. And you are?”
He turned and held out a hand. “Paris.” He suspended his hand in midair, waiting for her to take it. When she hesitated, his gaze flicked from her face to her hand and then back again.
She blinked, collected herself, and took his hand. “Nice to meet you. I’m Lacy Shaw.”
Paris’s dark brows dipped farther.
“Right,” she giggled nervously. “You didn’t need me to introduce myself. You just asked if that’s who I was. Do you, um, need help with something? Finding a book maybe?”
“I’m actually here for the class,” he said.
“The computer skills class?” She walked around the counter to stand behind her computer. “The course instructor hasn’t arrived yet.” She looked at the Apple Watch on her wrist. “It’s still a little early though. You’re not late until you’re less than five minutes early. That’s what my mom always says.”
