“Seriously? You didn’t think I would want to know that Ben Kilpatrick is back in town?”
The knife slipped from her hands and she narrowly avoided chopping the tip of her finger off. A greasy, angry ball formed in her stomach.
Ben Kilpatrick. The only person on earth she could honestly say she despised. She picked up the knife and stabbed it through the lemon, wishing it was his cold, black heart.
“You’re joking,” she said, though she couldn’t imagine what her sister would find remotely funny about making up something so outlandish and horrible.
“True story,” Devin assured her. “I heard it from Betty Orton while I was getting gas. Apparently he strolled into the grocery store a few hours ago, casual as a Sunday morning, and bought what looked to be at least a week’s worth of groceries. She said he didn’t look very happy to be back. He just frowned when she welcomed him back.”
“It’s a mistake. That’s all. She mistook him for someone else.”
“That’s what I said, but Betty assured me she’s known him all his life and taught him in Sunday school three years in a row and she’s not likely to mistake him for someone else.”
“I won’t believe it until I see him,” she said. “He hates Haven Point. That’s fairly obvious, since he’s done his best to drive our town into the ground.”
“Not actively,” Devin, who tended to see the good in just about everyone, was quick to point out.
“What’s the difference? By completely ignoring the property he inherited after his father died, he accomplished the same thing as if he’d walked up and down Lake Street, setting a torch to the whole downtown.”
She picked up the knife and started chopping the fresh tarragon with quick, angry movements. “You know how hard it’s been the last five years since he inherited to keep tenants in the downtown businesses. Haven Point is dying because of one person. Ben Kilpatrick.”
If she had only one goal for her next four years as mayor, she dreamed of revitalizing a town whose lifeblood was seeping away, business by business.
When she was a girl, downtown Haven Point had been bustling with activity, a magnet for everyone in town, with several gift and clothing boutiques for both men and women, restaurants and cafés, even a downtown movie theater.
She still ached when she thought of it, when she looked around at all the empty storefronts and the ramshackle buildings with peeling paint and broken shutters.
“It’s his fault we’ve lost so many businesses and nothing has moved in to replace them. I mean, why go to all the trouble to open a business,” she demanded, “if the landlord is going to be completely unresponsive and won’t fix even the most basic problems?”
“You don’t have to sell it to me, Kenz. I know. I went to your campaign rallies, remember?”
“Right. Sorry.” It was definitely one of her hot buttons. She loved Haven Point and hated seeing its decline—much like old Mrs. Anglesey, who had once been an elegant, respected, contributing member of the community and now could barely get around even with her daughter’s help and didn’t remember whether she had paid for items in the store.
“It wasn’t really his fault, anyway. He hired an incompetent crook of a property manager who was supposed to be taking care of things. It wasn’t Ben’s fault the man embezzled from him and didn’t do the necessary upkeep to maintain the buildings.”
“Oh, come on. Ben Kilpatrick is the chief operating officer for one of the most successful, fastest-growing companies in the world. You think he didn’t know what was going on? If he had bothered to care, he would have paid more attention.”
This was an argument she and Devin had had before. “At some point, you’re going to have to let go,” her sister said calmly. “Ben doesn’t own any part of Haven Point now. He sold everything to Aidan Caine last year—which makes his presence in town even more puzzling. Why would he come back now, after all these years? It would seem to me, he has even less reason to show his face in town now.”
McKenzie still wasn’t buying the rumor that Ben had actually returned. He had been gone since he was seventeen years old. He didn’t even come back for Joe Kilpatrick’s funeral five years earlier—though she, for one, wasn’t super surprised about that since Joe had been a bastard to everyone in town and especially to his only surviving child.
“It doesn’t make any sense. What possible reason would he have to come back now?”
“I don’t know. Maybe he’s here to make amends. Did you ever think of that?”
How could he ever make amends for what he had done to Haven Point—not to mention shattering all her girlish illusions?
Of course, she didn’t mention that to Devin as she tossed the tarragon into the lemon juice while her sister continued speculating about Ben’s motives for coming back to town.
Her sister probably had no idea about McKenzie’s ridiculous crush on Ben, that when she was younger, she had foolishly considered him her ideal guy. Just thinking about it now made her cringe.
Yes, he had been gorgeous enough. Vivid blue eyes, long sooty eyelashes, the old clichéd chiseled jaw—not to mention that lock of sun-streaked brown hair that always seemed to be falling into his eyes, just begging for the right girl to push it back, like Belle did to the Prince after the Beast in her arms suddenly materialized into him.
Throw in that edge of pain she always sensed in him and his unending kindness and concern for his sickly younger sister and it was no wonder her thirteen-year-old self—best friends with that same sister—used to pine for him to notice her, despite the four-year difference in their ages.
It was so stupid, she didn’t like admitting it, even to herself. All that had been an illusion, obviously. He might have been sweet and solicitous to Lily but that was his only redeeming quality. His actions these past five years had proved that, over and over.
Through the open kitchen window, she heard Rika start barking fiercely, probably at some poor hapless chipmunk or squirrel that dared venture into her territory.
“I’d better go,” she said to Devin. “Rika’s mad at something.”
“Yeah, I’ve got to go, too. Looks like the Shelter Springs ambulance is on its way with a cardiac patient.”
“Okay. Good luck. Go save a life.”
Her sister was a dedicated, caring doctor at Lake Haven Hospital, as passionate about her patients as McKenzie was about their town.
“Let me know if you hear anything down at city hall about why Ben Kilpatrick has come back to our fair city after all these years.”
“Sure. And then maybe you can tell me why you’re so curious.”
She could almost hear the shrug in Devin’s voice. “Are you kidding me? It’s not every day a gorgeous playboy billionaire comes to town.”
And that was the crux of the matter. Somehow it seemed wholly unfair, a serious Karmic calamity, that he had done so well for himself after he left town. If she had her way, he would be living in the proverbial van down by the river—or at least in one of his own dilapidated buildings.
Rika barked again and McKenzie hurried to the back door that led onto her terrace. She really hoped it wasn’t a skunk. They weren’t uncommon in the area, especially not this time of year. Her dog had encountered one the week before on their morning run on a favorite mountain trail and it had taken her three baths in the magic solution she found on the internet before she could allow Rika back into the house.
Her dog wasn’t in the yard, she saw immediately. Now that she was outside, she realized the barking was more excited and playful than upset. All the more reason to hope she wasn’t trying to make nice with some odiferous little friend.
“Come,” she called again. “Inside.”
The dog bounded through a break in the bushes between the house next door, followed instantly by another dog—a beautiful German shepherd with classic markings.
She had been right. Rika had been making friends. She and the German shepherd looked tight as ticks, tails wagging as they raced exub
erantly around the yard.
The dog must belong to the new renters of the Sloane house. Carol would pitch a royal fit if she knew they had a dog over there. McKenzie knew it was strictly prohibited.
Now what was she supposed to do?
A man suddenly walked through the gap in landscaping. He had brown hair, but a sudden piercing ray of the setting sun obscured his features more than that.
She really didn’t want a confrontation with the man, especially not on a Friday night when she had been so looking forward to a relaxing night at home. She supposed she could just call Carole or the property management company and let them deal with the situation.
That seemed a cop-out since Carole had asked her to keep an eye on the place.
She forced a smile and approached the dog’s owner. “Hi. Good evening. You must be renting the place from Carole. I’m McKenzie Shaw. I live next door. Rika, that dog you’re playing catch with, is mine.”
The man turned around and the pleasant evening around her seemed to go dark and still as she took in brown sun-streaked hair, steely blue eyes, chiseled jaw.
Her stomach dropped as if somebody had just picked her up and tossed her into the cold lake.
Ben Kilpatrick. Here. Staying in the house next door.
So much for her lovely evening at home.
Copyright ©2015 by RaeAnne Thayne
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REDEMPTION BAY by RaeAnne Thayne,
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ISBN-13: 9781460384435
How to Marry a Doctor
Copyright © 2015 by Nancy Robards Thompson
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Table of Contents
Back Cover Text
Introduction
Dear Reader
Title Page
About the Author
Dedication
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Excerpt from Redemption Bay by RaeAnne Thayne
Copyright
How to Marry a Doctor (Celebrations, Inc.) Page 18
