by Skye Taylor
Rick mumbled something Will couldn’t hear, but Sam’s comment about the date stopped Will in his tracks. If Bree was married, why was she going out on a date? Surely Sam wouldn’t talk that way about his own father.
“She thinks I need a new father,” said Sam, as if answering Will’s unspoken question. “Like I need a dork for a father. I have a father. He just happens to live in Heaven is all.” His last words ended on a hiccough.
Rick wrapped his arm about Sam’s shoulders.
Bree was a widow. And Sam had lost his father. Will’s heart suddenly ached for both of them—the boy he’d been working with for over two months who still grieved for his missing dad and the woman whose pretty face had clouded over when called Mrs. Reagan. How long ago? he wondered as he pushed open the first of the two doors to the outside.
He’d almost reached the top step outside when he remembered the notice. He turned back and snatched one of the tear-off tabs with the phone number for the apartment for rent.
How could he not have known about Sam’s dad?
BREE TOOK ONE last bite of her Alfredo and then followed it with a sip of wine. Bob Cahill droned on about his newest client, a bigwig with offices in Wilmington and Raleigh and a huge and complicated tax return. Bob was clearly bursting with pleasure about the deal. It was probably why he’d decided to treat her to dinner at the country club instead of the local diner.
Bree glanced about the posh interior of the restaurant with its thick, sound-swallowing carpets and snowy white table linens. This was so not her kind of place, but Bob thrived here. She was happy for his success. Happy that he was feeling on top of his little world at least, but he’d been going on about this guy for the entire meal. Maybe by the time coffee was served he’d get past it, and Bree would get an opening to bring up her big question.
Her big favor, actually.
Sam had come home from his last Cub Scout meeting with a Pinewood Derby kit, and it was still sitting on his desk untouched. Up to now, none of Sam’s activities had required expertise she didn’t have, but she’d taken one look at the small square block of wood and knew she was out of her league. Sam needed someone with more know-how than she possessed to help him create anything with a chance of making it to the end of the track, never mind having a chance to win. It was a guy sort of thing, and Bob was a guy.
Bob liked Sam. He made an effort to draw him out in conversation when they were together and had taken him to a baseball game once, but perhaps asking Bob to help with a model race car was pushing things. Bob was a nice guy, but he’d never been married. Never had kids. Maybe spending time helping an eight-year-old with his scouting project wasn’t something Bob would enjoy all that much.
It might be pushing things in more ways than one. While Sam had not been all that enthusiastic about Bob’s attempts to engage him, Bree wasn’t certain where her own relationship with Bob was going.
She’d started dating him because Sam had arrived at an age where boys began to need a male influence in their lives, and perhaps it was time for her to consider letting another man into hers. Someone safe. Someone who wouldn’t end up breaking her heart.
They had met at the Jolee Historical Society meeting right after she joined the group. They clearly had at least one thing in common—an interest in preserving history, specifically the history of Tide’s Way and the Jolee Plantation. Reserved and easygoing, a CPA with a reputation for reliability, Bob was unlikely to get involved in the kinds of things that got people hurt or killed. He was a gentleman, maybe a little old-fashioned and chauvinistic, but in a courtly sort of way that made her feel appreciated.
The waiter came and began clearing their dishes. He asked if they would like to see the dessert menu. Bob agreed without consulting her. A sudden image of her late husband’s taut six-pack abdomen flitted into her head followed just as quickly by another unexpected recall of Will’s trim, flat stomach, obvious even beneath his bloused scout leader’s shirt. She shook her head to dispel the images and forced herself not to dwell on the soft roll of flesh that spilled over the edge of Bob’s belt. It wasn’t like he was grossly overweight. Just a little soft.
Will Cameron had looked anything but soft, but she had no business thinking about Will Cameron’s tall, sexy body. Or anything else about him beyond his role as den father to her son. She knew next to nothing about him or what kind of a man he was.
Bob ordered them both a slice of warmed peach pie with vanilla ice cream and coffee. He folded his hands and looked earnestly at her.
“You’ve been awfully quiet. How’s the new position at Kett’s going?”
Her job at Kett’s was going well. Really well. She loved the challenges and the people she worked with, but she knew Bob thought women were best employed as secretaries, not program managers. Although he’d never said it in so many words, he’d given her the impression that when women worked at all, it should only be from necessity. A true lady would be far more concerned with making her husband’s home his castle than making a name for herself in a man’s world. Another reason she’d begun to question her relationship with Bob and where it might be going.
“It’s going okay.” She took a deep breath and hurried on before she could change her mind. “But I was wondering. I have a favor to ask. I . . .” She hesitated.
“A favor?” Bob urged helpfully.
“Sam needs someone to help him with his Pinewood Derby racer.”
Bob frowned. “What’s a Pinewood Derby racer?”
“Weren’t you ever a Boy Scout?”
Bob shook his head. “I was in the math club.”
Didn’t seem like the two were mutually exclusive, but Bree didn’t say so as she launched into an explanation of the Pinewood Derby. “It’s a really big deal for the Scouts. Each boy has to make his own race car from the kit, and then they have a big race day.”
“From a kit, you say?”
The waiter returned bearing pie and coffee. Bree sat back and waited for him to finish serving.
“Have you ever done anything like that?” she asked.
Bob’s eyebrows rose. “No. But I’m sure I can figure it out if it’s a kit like you say. I’d be glad to help Sam. I’d be especially glad to help him out for his mom’s sake.” He reached across the table and laid his hand over hers.
Bree wanted to pull her hand free but didn’t. “Thanks. I appreciate it.”
Bob patted her hand and then drew his back to attend to his pie. “Sam needs a man in his life. So does his mom.”
ALONE IN HER room, Bree stepped out of her skirt and reached for a hanger. The look in Bob’s eyes when he’d walked her to her door and repeated his comment about Bree needing a man in her life made her uncomfortable. His obvious insinuation had caught her off guard, and the feeling of unease grew stronger as she reviewed the evening and tried to remember if she’d said anything to lead him on.
She liked Bob, but she didn’t know if she was ready for their relationship to go where he seemed to be headed. Bob didn’t light any fires in her that needed quenching. Which should be a good thing considering she didn’t want her heart getting broken again. But neither was she eager to become intimate with the man. She wasn’t into sex without at least some passion. Maybe all that was needed was a little more time before she felt that kind of desire, but Bob didn’t appear to need more time. Tonight he had definitely been sending out signals that he’d like to share her bed and possibly a whole lot more.
What would it be like to become Mrs. Robert Cahill? To have a nice, safe husband who would come home every day at the same time and never once give her a reason to worry, either over his safety or his fidelity? Although passion had not yet been part of their relationship, if she was to become his wife, there would be intimacy and perhaps more children. She would like more children. She would enjoy the busyness of a growing family and the comfort
of sharing her nights with someone again. So, maybe Bob didn’t fill her with the heady desire Ed had once evoked in her, but he would be good to her, and she wouldn’t be so alone. She should be happy with that, shouldn’t she?
Without invitation, the lean, powerful image of Will Cameron as he’d stood in her doorway with one hand on Sam’s shoulder, apologizing for being five minutes late, totally eclipsed the picture of Bob standing in the same doorway angling to kiss her good night. A kiss she let him have but hadn’t been able to muster any enthusiasm for.
All she could think of now was the ice cream sundae Will had thoughtfully brought for her and the admiring look in his sky-blue eyes that had nothing to do with either apologies or ice cream. What would Will’s mouth feel like if he’d been the one doing the kissing?
Chapter 2
WILL WHISTLED AS he pulled into his brother’s driveway. Not that it had been a particularly whistle-worthy day on the whole, but that morning he’d woken with the most glorious hard-on. An occurrence he was sure had everything to do with the lovely Mrs. Brianna Reagan and the way she’d looked at him when he’d presented her with an ice cream sundae the night before. It had taken a very long, cold shower to convince Little Will to stand down so Big Will could get dressed for work. But the sense of impending adventure had lingered, brightening his otherwise business-as-usual workday.
He turned the motorcycle off and swept his leg over the back. Kicking the stand down, he headed toward his brother’s main kennel building, then detoured and followed a newly beaten dirt path around to the far side to check on the progress of Ben’s new Paws for Heroes project.
Will’s identical twin Ben, older by just minutes, was his best friend and closest to his heart of all his family. Sometimes Will felt like they were two halves that should have been one whole. Everything Will wasn’t Ben was. Will admired his brother and sometimes wished he could be more like him.
Among other things, Ben had more patience than any man Will knew. He’d waited years for the woman he’d fallen in love with to grow up. Ben’s sons were typical boys and often up to mischief, yet Ben never seemed ruffled. His calm good sense brought about the desired results without ever raising his voice.
That patience showed in the career Ben had chosen as his life’s work, too. He raised and trained dogs for police work. Something that took endless hours of patient repetition and calm strength. Ben’s new project was training dogs rescued from shelters to become service animals for veterans suffering from war-related injuries, both physical and emotional.
At the moment, their baby brother Jake’s construction company was nearly finished with building the home where the veterans would live while they were being paired with their dogs and learning to rely on them. While that had been going up, Ben had visited dog pounds in half a dozen cities and adopted eleven dogs, some of mixed heritage and some purebred, and all of them were now being groomed to become service animals.
Will loved dogs and hoped one day he’d live in a place he could have one of his own, but he’d never have the patience Ben had for such intensive and demanding training. If he ever did get a dog, Will was sure the animal would be in charge, sleeping on his master’s bed and sprawling on the couch, totally unconcerned with any human companion’s comfort. It would probably be some big goober of a dog with a lolling tongue and half a brain devoted to chasing a tennis ball and licking the face off anyone who got close enough.
Will looked up to admire Jake’s plan. Nobody could fault either his brother’s design or the setting. The six-bedroom house that would eventually accommodate up to ten veterans at a time was set far back on the property. A porch wrapped about two sides facing the marsh and the coastal waterway beyond. Sunrises here were incredible and the scent of the ocean a constant presence. A quiet, peaceful place for men struggling to forget the horror and noise of war.
Acquiring this particular tract of land was another example of Ben’s patience. The property, nothing but a ruined skeleton of a house and overgrown fields, had come on the market while they were still in college, but Ben had immediately pictured his forever house located there. He’d borrowed the down payment from their father and worked two jobs to pay both tuition and a mortgage. Ben loved Tide’s Way, the close-knit community, and living near the sea, and it hadn’t mattered how long it took to build his own place, another seaside home like the one he’d grown up in.
Will thought about his own life and the contrast between he and his twin. Unlike Ben, when Will decided he wanted something, he was eager to have it happen as soon as possible. Like the apartment he’d just put a deposit on. And the reason he’d chosen that particular place.
His current abode, the upper half of a duplex on the outskirts of Wilmington, had been perfect: close to the station he worked out of, reasonably close to his family in Tide’s Way, not too far from the closest beach, and with plenty of space. There was a shed for all his various sporting equipment, parking beside the garage to accommodate the trailer the NC Highway Patrol had issued to go along with his motorcycle, garage space for the motorcycle, and driveway space for the cruiser and his Jeep. He’d probably never have considered moving if the old man hadn’t decided to live with his son and sold the property to a family who needed it all.
Ideally, Will should have sought out another accommodation that suited his unusual garaging requirements, but that would have been before he’d met Brianna Reagan, discovered she was a widow, and seen the advertisement for a short-term rental in her building.
That flicker of quickly hidden interest in her eyes last night had not only haunted his dreams, but kept returning to his thoughts during the day. For several breathless moments, he’d felt like he could stare into Bree’s mysterious whiskey-colored eyes forever. Except there was so much else to admire besides the intriguing eyes. In a world where so many blonds came from a bottle, Brianna Reagan was naturally blond. He’d swear to it. Of course it would be even more fun to prove it beyond doubt. Her ash blond waves were thick and shining, the kind of hair a man ached to run his fingers through or feel tickling his bare skin. And then there was her body.
“You going to stand there gaping at a half-finished house forever?”
Jerked from his pleasant daydream, Will turned and grinned at his twin. “Jake’s doing a mighty fine job.”
“Did you expect anything less?”
Will shook his head and then glanced down at the half-Lab dog at his brother’s side. “Is he on the job, or can I pet him?”
Ben gave the command that was permission to socialize. “Say hello, Booker.”
The chocolate-colored dog raised a paw for Will. His tail wagged, sweeping an arc in the dusty path, and his butt looked like he was having a hard time keeping it planted.
Will squatted, grabbed a handful of fur on either side of the dog’s face, and shoved his nose up against Booker’s. “Good dog, Booker. You’re going to make a fine companion.”
“You didn’t come over here to admire Booker or the house, I’m betting. So what’s up?”
Will straightened. “I just put a deposit on a new apartment, so it looks like I’ll be out by the date the old man gave me after all. Just one problem. I need a place to park my trailer and motorcycle. And some of my other gear as well. I was hoping you could make room for it.”
Ben raised his eyebrows. “You don’t need the bike where you’ll be living?”
“I’d rather not leave it outside in a lot shared by everyone else in the development. The trailer—I’m not allowed to leave in the lot at all.”
“Plenty of space here.” Ben swept an arm out, taking in the entire property. “Got room in the garage for the bike, too.” Ben turned to head back toward the house. “Can you stay for supper?”
“I thought you’d never ask.” Will punched his brother on the shoulder.
“So why this particular apartment? Won’t it be
kind of a pain hustling all the way over here every day before going to work?”
“It’s not all that far, actually.” A totally unexpected heat crept up Will’s neck. “It’s just down the street, across from Joel’s Diner.”
Ben stopped walking and looked at Will with one blond eyebrow raised. “The same place Sam Reagan and his mother live?”
Will nodded.
Ben grinned. “And you’ve just met Bree.”
“I met her before,” Will tried to defend himself. “At Jake’s wedding.”
“But you’re just now noticing her.” Ben grinned and turned back toward the house. “Wait ’til I tell Meg.”
BREE HATED IT when she had to work late. It meant dashing home to meet the bus, grabbing Sam, and dragging him back to the hotel to do his homework while she finished up whatever event she was working on. But today was different. A new, potentially good client was winding up their first conference at Kett’s. Her first big affair in her new position, and she was pleased that it had all gone so well.
“Hey, beautiful!”
Bree looked up, her heart jumping into her throat. It steadied quickly. The voice, which for a moment, had sounded so much like Will Cameron’s, was not his after all. Maybe it was only because she’d been thinking about Will just moments before. She’d tried to banish thoughts of Sam’s scout leader in the busyness of her day but hadn’t succeeded.
“Sorry. Not politically correct, I know.” The man standing in her doorway grinned, totally unapologetic. “I just wanted to thank you for everything. It went well. Largely thanks to you and your staff. And because you did such a great job, we’re ready to book our next mini-conference here in six months. How soon can we set dates?”
Bree opened the events scheduling book and flipped forward six months. “Same number of people? Same room?”
