She squared her shoulders. “You need to call off the party.”
He laughed. “No kidding, beautiful.”
Her eyes narrowed. “My name is not ‘beautiful.’”
“No. It’s Ava, isn’t it?” His brow quirked questioningly. When she didn’t immediately confirm it, he took the task upon himself. “Ava Emerson in the flesh.”
Ava Sinclair. Oh, how longed to throw that in his face and watch his smirk melt away. Instead, she tried a little damage control. “Guilty. Ian let me crash here while he was on his press tour. I’m not allowed to go out in public yet. Spoilers and all that.”
“Awfully nice of him.”
“I thought so. I really needed some place to hide out until Pirate’s Plunder says I can go out in public. Austin was not an option.” She watched a little doubt flicker through his all-knowing countenance. “Ian should be back any minute now.”
Justin shook his head. “He’s with my sister. She’ll keep him busy for an hour or so while I set things up.”
“For the party that isn’t going to happen? I don’t think so.” Mercifully, her phone rang. Ian’s gorgeous mug appeared on the screen. Dropping the knife on the counter, she grabbed her phone. “Hey, there—” She swallowed the word “honey.” “You have a visitor.”
Alarm filled his voice. “A visitor?”
“Goes by the name of Justin Holden. Walked right in like he owned the place. I told him how you were kind enough to let me crash here, since Pirate’s Pludner says I can’t be out in public yet.”
“Why is he there?”
“Something about a surprise party for you.”
“I’ll call him right now.” Ian hung up.
“He’s going to call you,” Ava explained even as Justin’s phone began to ring.
“Ian, what a surprise.” Just walked out to the patio area, closing the door behind him.
She pulled in a steeling breath. “Oh, this is bad.”
She kept an eye on Justin as he finished his conversation with Ian. Justin immediately called someone else. Her phone rang. She answered it on the first ring. “Ian, where are you?”
“I’m almost home. Justin should start calling around to tell folks the party is off. He promised not to tell anyone you’re there.”
Relief filled her. “How did you manage to get him to agree to that?”
“I promised to stay away from his sister.”
“Oh.”
“I’ll be there in thirty seconds.”
“I’m timing you.” She hung up just as Justin stepped back inside with his phone still pressed to his ear.
“What do you mean you couldn’t keep him there longer than a few minutes? How am I supposed to set up for a surprise party if he’s on his way home?” He caught Ava’s gaze and winked. “Well, we’ll just have to cancel it.”
Oddly enough, she relaxed a little until his gaze flickered over her again. She crossed her arms over her chest. Where was Ian?
“No, I mean it. If he’s busy or tired, it won’t be fun for him. Let’s just reschedule. I know. Ok. I’d better get out of here. Love you. Bye.” He ended the call. “There you go. One surprise party canceled as ordered.”
She chanced a small smile. “I appreciate that.”
“My pleasure.” He leaned his hip onto the kitchen island. “So… How long have you and Ian been married?”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Ava stared at Justin in disbelief. “What?”
“Your left hand. It’s kind of hard to ignore the bling.”
She stared down at her hand. Her engagement ring and wedding band glinted damningly in the light. Worse yet, Ian’s wedding band was still securely on her thumb where she’d placed it for safekeeping. There was no explaining that away—at least not believably.
The front door opened, and Ian stepped inside. His gaze went from Ava to Justin to Ava’s hand, then back to Justin. The resignation on her face must have given away the futility of the situation for Ian reached out a hand to her. She took it, and he pulled his into a one-armed embrace. Pressing a kiss into her hair, Ian offered a proud little smile. “Well, Justin, it seems you’ve met my wife.”
She gave Justin a threatening look just this side of playful as she leaned into Ian. “He almost met one of your butcher knives first.”
Justin let out a short laugh. “She isn’t kidding. I think I saw my life flash before my eyes.”
“That-a-girl, Ava.”
Justin rolled his eyes. Crossing his arms, he frowned. “Well, this certainly changes things. Does Emily know?”
“No.” Ian’s firm voice brokered no argument. “Everything about my relationship with Ava needs to stay quiet until after the Treasure Hunter season finale. No one can know. No one can talk about it. It can’t leak.”
“Interesting.” Indiscernible thoughts flickered across Justin’s face. “I guess you’ll have no problem staying away from Emily then.”
“I have no plans to seek her out. However, she seems to want to renew our friendship, so that could complicate things.”
Ava glanced up at Ian. “For real? She wants to be your friend after everything that’s happened?”
Ian shrugged. “I guess I’m a good friend.”
“And Emily has trouble letting go,” Justin added. “That’s why I wanted to know you’d do your part in steering clear of her. She needs to move on. Especially now.”
“Agreed,” Ian said quietly. “So you’ll keep our secret for now?”
Justin was quiet for a second, then an amused smile tilted his lips. “Mums the word. I’ll let you lovebirds get back to it. Nice to meet you, Ava.”
“Nice to meet you too, Justin. And, thank you.” Ava waited until the door closed behind Justin to melt onto the nearest chair. “He scared me out of my wits. Who else has a key to this place?”
Ian locked the door as if that would help. “That was the only extra besides yours.”
She hugged her arms around her waist. “Well, you should get it back or change the locks.”
“Duly noted.” He searched her face in concern. “I guess it must have been pretty unnerving for him to just walk into the house like that.”
“Yeah, I was cleaning out the refrigerator, and he just sort of appeared in the kitchen with me.” She gave a little shiver, then bit her lip. “Do you really think he’ll keep our secret?”
“He said he would. We may not always see eye to eye, but he’s a man of his word. I trust him.” He tilted his head toward the living room. “Come on. Maybe you can help me make sense of what just happened with Emily.”
They settled on the sofa together and she listened intently as he recounted his walk on the beach with Emily. Ava’s contemplative silence filled the room for a long moment before she finally said, “I’m so glad she’s able to walk again. It’s sweet that she finally has a dog.”
A smile quirked his lips. “And…?”
“And… You do realize that it’s entirely possible that she’s still in love with you right?”
A startled look crossed his face. “What? There’s no way.”
“She was planning a welcome back party for you.”
“So?”
She gave him a disbelieving look. “Your ex-girlfriend, who publicly broke up with you after what was probably a humiliating moment for her, was throwing you a welcome back to my life party. That doesn’t strike you as odd?”
His brow furrowed slightly at that. “I doubt it was a ‘welcome back to my life’ party, more like a ‘welcome back to the family’ party.”
She stilled, realizing that despite the emotional distance he’d put between himself and the Holdens, that had to be what he’d been hoping for. “Maybe so, but you also have to remember that you haven’t really been one of the family to Emily. You were the object of her love, her desires, and her hopes, since she was sixteen. That’s been what now? A dozen years or so.”
He shook his head in dis
belief. “I still can’t believe she liked me for that long. It’s so weird. It’s like all of my memories have been turned on their head. So many little things make sense now.”
“Did she say she was over you? That those feelings were gone?”
“No. Not explicitly.”
“Hmm.” That was the first thing Ava would have wanted an ex-boyfriend to know if she had an ex-boyfriend. “And her brother said she has trouble letting go. He also said that you being married would change things. It doesn’t change anything between you and Justin or Rick or Jane. So why should it change anything between you and Emily unless she still has feelings for you?”
He groaned. “But, it doesn’t make any sense. Why would she after everything that happened between us? I mean, I came back half expecting her to hate me. How is this even a possibility?”
“Well, she does have half the country telling her how perfect y’all are for each other. That has to be at least a little confusing.”
“Not for me.”
She gave him a doubtful look. “If we weren’t together yet and half the country was saying you definitely had a chance with me, wouldn’t you want to believe them?”
“Yes.” He grumbled.
“There you go.” Seeing how much it seemed to bother him, she placed a comforting hand on his knee. “Hey, I’m just speculating, connecting the dots. You tell me. What do you think?”
“I don’t know.” He slid his fingers through his hair. “She might have been… very slightly… flirtatious. I’m not sure. There was a lot happening. She was walking, and she wanted to be friends. I was confused and trying to figure out how to get back home to you. I don’t know. I need some time to process it all, and I don’t really want to think about it right now.”
“Ok. Well, on the positive side, at least you know you still have a job.”
“Yeah.”
She glanced around to take in Ian’s home. “I guess that means I’m moving here.”
Surprise filled his voice. “It does?”
“Sure. You have a home and a career here. I don’t have either anywhere at present, so this makes the most sense right now. Assuming you get your house keys back, of course.”
He laughed. “I’ll make sure of it.”
“Good.” She bit her lip thoughtfully. “I guess I’ll have to see what kinds of jobs they have for historians around here.”
“You know you don’t really have to work, right? I can support you if you’d rather not.”
“That’s sweet of you to offer, but I would probably drive myself batty without something meaningful to occupy my time—especially since we don’t have kids.” She paused, then cautiously asked, “You don’t have kids, do you?”
“No, I don’t have kids.” He rolled his eyes. “I would have told you if I did.”
She held up her hands. “Just trying to learn more about the stranger I married.”
“Stranger?” He caught hold of her upper arm and tugged her forward until she fell on top of him. “So I’m a stranger, am I?”
She pushed away from his chest. “An awfully familiar one at that.”
He let out a laugh, but didn’t release his hold on her arms. Instead, his gaze traced her features, looking awfully pleased with himself and with her. She shook her head slightly. “How am I supposed to think with you looking at me like that?”
“You aren’t.”
She gave in and collapsed on his chest. “I can’t move here until I tell my parents about us. I think I need to do it in person.”
He stilled. “Ok. When?”
“As soon as possible. Hopefully, by the end of the week. And, I should probably do it on my own.” She didn’t think they would say anything hurtful about Ian. If they did, she didn’t want him to hear it. “That way, they’ll be over the shock of it by the time they meet you. They’ll be able to focus on how wonderful you are. Are you ok with that?”
“Yes, whatever you think is best.”
She lifted up enough to look at him. “Will I meet your dad?”
He glanced away, his jaw tightening. “Eventually. I’ve never introduced anyone to him. I always brought girls to the Holdens, which was all kinds of complicated in retrospect.”
“No pressure.” She sighed. “Ian, I hate to say this, but I can’t stay here. Now that everyone knows you’re back in town, anyone could drop by.”
He was quiet for a moment. “Runaway with me.”
“What?” She sat up to look at him.
“I don’t have to report in to work until Monday. That gives us the whole weekend. We’ll drive toward Austin, spend the night somewhere nice and lonely, then get you settled at Emerson House. What do you say?”
She smiled. “I say, how fast can you pack?”
R
Ava hurriedly tucked her denim shirt into her high-waist black jeans, then stood in front of the full-length mirror in her bedroom at Emerson House. “Does this look ok? Not too casual?”
Laurel, her twenty-five-year-old cousin, surveyed her with a thoughtful frown. “It should be fine if you dress it up with accessories.”
Ava grabbed a silver necklace with a teal pendant and a pair of matching earrings. “I can’t for the life of me find my black Dior heels. I must have lost them in the move.”
“Oh… I might have borrowed them.”
Ava laughed and pinned her cousin with a knowing look. “‘Might have?’”
Laurel gave her a guilty smile. “They’re in my room. I’ll be right back.”
While Laurel’s light footfalls faded down the staircase from the loft, Ava grabbed her own cell phone from the nightstand. A message waited from Ian. It read, You’ve got this!
She responded. I sure hope so. T-20 minutes until mom arrives.
He replied immediately. Do you want me to call you?
in 10 minutes? Laurel would be leaving in five minutes to drive back to Victoria, so Ava would have some privacy. Her cousin had been in town on business for the past two days and had managed to be present when Ian had dropped Ava off at Emerson house. The introduction had been more than a little awkward. With all of the press surrounding Ian and the whole scandal about him having two girlfriends, Laurel hadn’t hidden the fact that she was suspicious of Ian’s intentions.
Ava had really hoped her cousins would be an easy win for her and Ian as a couple. This was not a good start. Why did everything have to be so complicated? The answer wasn’t on the third finger of her left hand. She’d left her engagement ring and wedding band with Ian for safe keeping. Still, it felt like an invisible brand.
As did the fact that she was most definitely a married woman. She paused to look in the mirror. Would her mother somehow be able to tell that Ava wasn’t… Well, that she’d—
“Found them! I think they’ll go perfectly with the outfit.” Laurel handed Ava the shoes and watched as she stepped into them. “You look great. I’m sure Aunt Clara will approve. I really don’t understand why you’re so nervous about this. She’s your mom. It’s just lunch.”
Ava blinked, then stared at her cousin. “Just lunch?”
“Yeah, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” Ava finally said. It was just a lunch where Ava was going to do her best to declare her independence, get out of as much campaigning as possible, tell her mom that they needed to rethink all of the scheduled events, lay the ground work to introduce Ian and the fact of her marriage. Her stomach roiled. “I think I’m going to throw up.”
Laurel rushed over to grab a trash bin. “Are you serious?”
Ava swallowed hard, nodded, shook her head. “I’m probably just hungry. I didn’t eat breakfast. I’ll just grab a quick snack.”
“Do you want me to stay?”
“No. No, that’s ok. I’ll be fine.” She grabbed her phone, then headed downstairs. Her heels announced her progress from the finished suite in the attic, past the second floor with the rest of the bedrooms to the main floor of the house.
Laurel followed, concern ringing in her voice. “What is going on with you? You’ve been acting so oddly since you got back.”
“Of course, I am. For all intents and purposes, I spent almost a month in the seventeenth-century. I’m bound to be different.”
“Different is fine, but are you really ok?”
“I’m better than I’ve ever been.” Her phone rang. She and Laurel glanced down as Ian’s name popped up on the screen. “I should take this.”
Laurel nodded, but couldn’t quite hide a frown. “I’m going to head out. Call me if you need anything?”
“Will do. You too!” She gave Laurel a hug, then answered the phone as her cousin strode toward the front door. Ava ducked into the master bedroom in search of more privacy. She didn’t bother to say hello, but instead cut right to the chase. “I may be panicking. Slightly. Maybe more than slightly.”
The warm comfort of Ian voice filled her ear. “I know. Take a deep breath and sit down for a minute. You’re going to be ok.”
“I am. I’m going to be ok.” She sat on the bed.
“Deep breath.”
She pulled in a deep breath, then another. Her heart rate began to slow. Desperate for something else to focus on, she asked, “How was your first day back at work?”
“Good. Surprisingly without drama.”
“I bet the producers weren’t happy with that.”
“I think they’re waiting for something to boil over.”
“Will it?”
“No idea. It’s like I’m living in an alternate reality or something. On the surface it seems like everything has been reset to how it was before the accident, before Emily kissed me, before the big break up. How can that be real?”
“I don’t know.” She let herself fall back onto the bed and closed her eyes. “I wish you were here.”
“I wish I was too.”
She tried to resist, but she couldn’t help asking, “How much do you miss me?”
“Ava,” he warned. “Don’t. Don’t make me answer that. I’m trying to be strong here.”
Beyond the Tide Page 32
