by Lucy Gage
“What changed your mind?” Nina asked, head tilted.
He wrapped his arms back around Meg. “I read her letters, finally. A letter came in the mail yesterday and it made me look in the box of my stuff from Afghanistan.”
“So you got the letter? I wasn’t positive I had the right address.”
“You sent him the letter?” Meg asked, incredulous, sure it had been Charlie.
“Yes I sent him the letter. It was about time he got it. You made sure he had all the rest and he needed to know how you felt the day he woke up. I was tired of watching you cry reading that letter night after night and having it do you no good. If it didn’t help him remember, then at least it wouldn’t make you cry all the time.”
Neil turned Meg around to look at him. “You cried all the time?”
She shrugged. “If I wasn’t working.”
He hugged her tightly. “I’m so sorry, Meghan.”
“You didn’t do it on purpose, Neil.”
“Oh, shut up and let the man apologize, Meggie. Just because it wasn’t on purpose doesn’t mean he didn’t hurt you. Isn’t that what you’ve been telling me this past year?”
Meg blushed. She was right. Meg had said the same thing about what had happened between Nina and Liam for most of this past year. Nina still hadn’t gotten over Liam, even though she insisted that she wasn’t in love with him.
“Fine. I accept your apology.”
“Good. Now, are we going to the beach? I haven’t been to the beach on the east coast in a year.”
“If you really want to go, sure, we can still go.”
“Well hurry up and get ready or we won’t get a spot,” Nina said, giving Meg an annoyed look.
“I was ready.” Meg gave her a look that said, DUH, how did you not notice I’m in a bathrobe and Neil is wearing his underwear? What do you think we were just doing?
“Oh. Well. Get ready again.”
“Let me grab my pants so I can get my bag from the car. And, uh, is it okay if we stop by the hotel and pick up Owen on the way?”
“Owen came with you?” Meg asked. “Why?”
“Who is Owen?” Nina asked.
“Neil’s best friend and roommate on post. Why is he here? Do you need a babysitter?”
“He insisted because Danny wasn’t going to be around. Just in case you rejected me and I lost it. I think he wanted to find some new hot chicks to hook up with, honestly. He’s scoured the beaches near base a lot since he broke up with his girlfriend last fall.”
“Is he hot? Because if he is, then he might look like my boyfriend and I’m not sure I want him messing up my game…” Nina joked.
“I’ve seen pictures. He’s hot. You’ll like him. He has brown hair, but he’s more like Rob than Liam. Except he has muscles like Neil.”
“Pretty-boy football player? Not really my type, Meggie.”
Meg laughed. “Don’t worry about your type. Neil wasn’t my type, either,” she said as he came back wearing only his pants with his boots untied. Yum. God, was he delicious. She had missed staring at his body in person. He kissed her cheek as he walked out the door, saying he’d call Owen to get ready.
“My God, he’s sexy,” Nina said with a note of shock in her voice.
Meg laughed again. “Yes he is. And he’s mine. If you think Neil is hot, you’ll like Owen. Really, he’s pretty sexy himself. Neil once sent me a picture of the two of them at the beach with their surfboards. The boy has a great body. If I wasn’t head over heels in love with Neil, I’d probably want him for myself. He’d be a great palate cleanser.”
“Still on that track, are you?”
“Do what you have to do for yourself, Nin. I know it would have been nearly impossible for me to even think about sleeping with anyone else as long as Neil was still breathing.”
“So…was the magic still there?”
“Oh, yes. No doubt about that. Better, actually, because now I’m even more in love with him than I was a year ago.”
“Did he get you to…”
“Yes, he did. More than once. And let me tell you, after a year of being celibate, it was pretty damn amazing.”
Neil came back inside. “Owen said he’d be ready when we get there. I’ll go change. You going to put your suit back on, Meghan?”
She blushed. How was it that he could always make her blush? “Yes, I’ll be there in a second.” Nina looked at her, amused. “We don’t do quickies. Not all of us can get off in minutes.”
“Sure. Like you wouldn’t let him do you again right now even if you don’t have time to get off.”
“Maybe. I’ll get dressed so we can leave. We’ll be out in a few minutes. The food is in the fridge if you want to pack the cooler. See what else you can find in there. We’ll have two hungry men to feed and I didn’t plan for that. And switch everything to my car. It’s bigger.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Meg laughed as she went back to her bedroom. When she stepped into the room, she found Neil naked, ready to slip on his shorts. Oh, to hell with an orgasm, she wanted him again now even if she didn’t have time to get worked up enough. It had been far too long without him.
“Don’t you dare get dressed yet,” she ordered, dropping her robe.
“No, ma’am. Where would you like me?” he asked as he came up behind her and palmed her breasts as he kissed her neck.
“Oh, too many places,” she moaned. “Throw me on the bed and take me hard and fast, Captain Murphy. Drop and give me 20.”
“I don’t know if it’ll take 20…”
“Then give me what you’ve got…”
**********
Luck favored them with a parking spot at the beach, despite the time of day. With an outgoing tide, the beach appeared less crowded. They chose a place to sit and set up for the day. After a half-hour, Neil looked at Meg and tilted his head like he wanted to take a walk.
Meg said to Nina and Owen, “You two keep each other company. We’re going for a walk down the beach. We’ll be back later.” Neil grabbed her hand and they were off.
They headed toward the surf and once they were out of hearing distance, Meg said, “Trying to encourage the two of them to hook up?”
“They’ll be fine on their own. That’s not why I wanted to go for a walk.”
“Oh? It’s not like we can sneak off and get naked together. And I don’t know about you, but sex in the north Atlantic isn’t my cup of tea, even in August.”
Neil laughed. “No, sweetheart, I wasn’t thinking about jumping in the water for a quickie. Besides, you don’t usually do quickies and we already had one this morning.”
She wiggled her brows. “Oh, yes, we did.”
“I’m trying to be serious. Are you going to let me?”
“What’s wrong? Did you change your mind and decide you don’t want to get back together?”
“No, Meghan. I didn’t change my mind for a second. Remember when I gave you the letter before I left Portland?” She nodded. “Do you remember what I told you in that letter?”
Meg’s heart began to race. Yes. She read that letter all the time. He had said he would ask her to spend her life with him. She had prayed regularly that he’d remember.
“Yes. I remember,” she whispered.
He stopped her, got down on one knee, took her left hand in his right. Her breath hitched when he pulled a ring out of his pocket with his left hand and said, “Meghan Eve Miles, I have loved you since I was fourteen and I can’t imagine spending one more day without you by my side for the rest of my life. Will you marry me?”
Meg started crying as she nodded. “Yes. Yes, I’ll marry you, Neil. I love you. I love you so much.”
He slipped the ring on her finger – how it could be a perfect fit, she had no idea – and when he stood, she threw her arms around him and kissed him passionately. When they pulled away, foreheads touching, she said, “I have been praying since the day you woke up that you’d remember.”
“I’ll never forge
t again, I promise. I love you, Meghan. I’m so happy you’re mine.”
“I’m yours. Forever, Neil. I’m yours.” She finally looked at the ring, and said, “How did you know I always secretly wanted a ring like Duchess Kate’s hand-me-down?”
“I know you better than you think. You’re a hopeless romantic.”
She smiled. Yes, he certainly did.
Dear Reader,
While writing Back to December, I crafted many scenes where Emily interacted with her boyfriend, Josh and her sister, Annie. If you’ve read that story, you know that most of those scenes did not make it into the final version. And yet, given the revelation at the end of the story, I had to explain how Josh and Annie became a couple. Life is rarely so simple as it seems, and I knew there would be a story behind their relationship.
By the August publication of Back to December, I knew I had a series on my hands, one which would focus on the three Ward Sisters and their closest friends. As I began to develop each of the plots and wrote more of the stories, the ultimate arc of the series revealed itself to me, so I knew where we’d end up and where we started. But in between, so much occurs. Once Liam and Jenna’s story happened and we learned about Meg and Neil, the next logical step eventually became Annie’s and Josh’s story.
So, without further ado, here’s the teaser chapter of their story, This Year’s Love. If you wanted to know how Emily’s sister and her ex could not only date behind her back, but could get engaged so quickly, this is where you’ll get your answers. They may or may not surprise you. But the story won’t end with the events of Charlie’s wedding. They’ll take us past that point, where we’ll explore the part of the story that most romances overlook – what happens after the Happily Ever After moment? In the case of Josh Ricker and Annie Ward, getting together might be the easy part. Staying together could prove more difficult. Enjoy!
All my best,
Lucy Gage
This Year’s Love
Ward Sisters Series Book 4
Second Edition
Lucy Gage
©2014 by Lucy Gage
All rights reserved
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, businesses, events and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Prologue
Bangor, Maine, Christmas, nineteen years ago…
A thunderous applause echoed through the auditorium, rumbling onto the stage where Annie stood next to her older sister, Emily, taking a bow. Their ballet class had just completed a holiday production of The Nutcracker’s Waltz of the Snowflakes. By the response of the crowd, it had been a huge success. Hurrying off-stage to make room for the next number, Annie ran into her mother’s waiting arms. Gail Ward loved to be a part of this whole experience and volunteered to help backstage at every performance.
“Oh, girls! That was fabulous! I’m so proud of all of you!”
“Thank-you, Mommy,” Annie said.
“Thanks,” Emily added, “but we have to change. Annie has her Hip-Hop routine and I have tap up soon.”
“Of course. I’ll see you back here for your next numbers. Emily, darling, help your sister.”
“Yes, Mom.”
As Annie scurried away with her sister to the dressing area, she said, “Why are you mad?” She knew her sister – her best friend – well enough to know that Emily was annoyed.
“I’m tired of this, Itsy. If Miss Betsy would let us take classes and wouldn’t make us perform so much, I’d be happy to dance, but I hate performing. I’m telling Mom that I’m not doing it after this year.”
“You’re not going to be in recital this spring? We already ordered costumes!”
“Oh, I know. I can’t get out of it now, because Mom will never let me after the fortune she paid for my costumes. But I’m refusing after this year. I’m telling her tonight.”
Annie switched into her brightly-colored Hip-Hop costume, with its funky, multicolored beret, baggy white pants trimmed in the same neon, and a neon-green top that draped over her white leotard.
“I don’t know if I want to dance if you don’t, Emma Bean.”
“You should dance if you love it, Itsy. I do love dancing, but I hate this stuff. We’re on number three of five for both of us. It gets old.”
Annie shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t mind, I guess. But dance won’t be as fun if you’re not doing it, too.”
“Well, you do what you want, but I’m telling Mom tonight that I’m done after this year. I want her to have until September to get used to the idea. She won’t give up without a fight, and I’m not backing down. I might as well start fighting back now.”
“Are you sure, Emma Bean?”
Emily helped Annie don her beret before she put the feathered clips in her own hair and grabbed the tap shoes she wasn’t allowed to wear until she got backstage.
“Positive. Let’s go. You have to be on stage in ten minutes.”
Annie nodded sadly. Dancing was one of the few things she did with her older sister that didn’t involve their neighbor, Meg.
Her sister’s best friend, Meghan Miles, had been in their lives constantly for as long as Annie could remember. But while Meg loved to dance with them in the yard, she’d long said that she had no desire to perform and refused to take lessons with them after the first year.
Annie suspected that Emily’s new attitude was Meg’s doing. At nine, Emily was suddenly very insistent about being her own person and not doing what their mom wanted. And their mother loved dance.
She’d already failed with her youngest child, Charlotte. At the age of four, Annie’s little sister had insisted her name was Charlie and had refused to participate in dance again. Though she wasn’t a true tomboy – she did like her Barbies and playing dress-up – she liked to play in the dirt and run around with her best friend, Meg’s cousin Nina. Annie often felt like the fifth wheel when Meg and Nina were around, which was all the time. Meg’s mother had been babysitting Nina for years.
Now, Annie had one less thing to do with Em and Charlie.
As she assembled backstage with her Hip-Hop class, her mother walked along the line and encouraged the girls. When she arrived at her own daughter, she said, “Chin up, back straight, and smile, dear.”
At the age of eight, she’d been in dance for five years. She knew the drill. You left everything but your performance off the stage. Her sadness about Emily abandoning dance didn’t belong in her routine.
With five classes each week, summer dance camp, Christmas performances, spring recital, numerous parades and the occasional event, Annie was a seasoned pro. She assumed her performance face, straightened her back, squared her shoulders, lifted her chest and raised her chin. Seconds later, they took their places behind the curtain and the show went on as planned.
That night, Annie listened as her mother argued with Emily in the room next door about quitting dance. Despite her mother’s tendency to forgo loud arguments and confrontation, the voices carried through the wall. Gail was not happy about Emily’s decision.
Though Annie wanted to join her sister, because she wanted to be like her, she did love dance. The truth was, at those times when she felt like a fifth wheel, the one person who could make her smile was her mother. Even if she didn’t love dance, Annie couldn’t be the one to finally take it away from her mother.
She knew what the other girls said – she’d heard them talking about her sometimes – that she was kissing her mother’s butt. Though she hated that they said those things, she needed her mother in the times when her father came home from traveling and spent all his time either running around with Charlie, or reading with Emily. He only paid attention to Annie when he sat in the audience to watch her dance.
So if dancing meant that Annie was kissing her mother’s butt or seeking Daddy’s approval, she didn’t care. It connected her to her parents, and that was th
e one time she felt like she really mattered to both of them. Being the middle child – when your older sister butted heads with your mother and your younger sister had challenged their parents every step of the way – meant that Annie didn’t make waves, even when she wanted to do it.
This time, she really didn’t want to rock the boat. She liked this boat. She loved being on stage and performing. It was the one thing she knew she did well.
**********
St. Roy, Maine, late spring, nineteen years ago…
The brilliant, spring sunshine warmed his face as it crested the horizon. Time to be done fishing and head home for school. Nothing made him happier than to fish at the river before school on a spring morning. It was like being on vacation every day.
He hooked his lure into the guides on his pole and wound the reel until it tightened the line, closed and latched his tackle box, then wiped his hands on his jeans. Swatting at a black fly that had tangled itself in the blond curls at the nape of his neck, he shook his mop of hair, trying to ward off the little buggers. They were early this year. Time to start moving to avoid being eaten alive before breakfast.
Josh walked along the railroad tracks, thinking about the fish he’d caught this morning. It hadn’t been anywhere close to as big as the striper he’d gotten on his fishing trip with Uncle Jerry last summer, but it was huge compared to the smelts they’d fished on the Kennebec this winter.
Ice fishing was fun when you drilled a hole and set traps, then rode snowmobiles around the lake to pass the time while you waited for a bite. But sitting there with the older guys, who drank beer and played cards in the ice shack, well, that wasn’t quite so exciting when you were eight. Maybe he’d appreciate it when he was older.
Or maybe not.
Still, they were good memories of fishing with his uncle and cousins, who lived down near Augusta. He could hear his cousins laughing, felt the cold in his fingers and toes, could even smell the wood smoke from the stove.
