Back to the Lake Breeze Hotel

by Amie Denman

  Alice couldn’t help herself. She stepped toward him, close enough to touch his silk tie.

  “But you did.”

  “I’m not afraid anymore,” Nate said, slipping an arm around Alice. “The only thing I’m afraid of is losing you for the second time.”

  “I love you, Nate. I never stopped.”

  “I love you, too, and I’m not saying that cautiously. I love you with dangerous, wild, and totally reckless hope for our future.”

  The crowd assembled for the party broke into spontaneous laughter, and Nate didn’t flinch at the sudden attention.

  Alice laughed and kissed him, relishing the feel of his lips that were so familiar and finally hers for good. She pointed to his face on the screen, the large image exposed to the entire room. “I know.”

  EPILOGUE

  NATE LEANED OVER and whispered in Alice’s ear. “Nice job planning this wedding.”

  Alice smiled, enjoying his lips brushing her ear and sending out sensations of excitement and happiness. “It’s the wedding of the year.”

  Nate wrapped an arm around Alice as they waited for the ceremony to begin. The Starlight Point ferry pulled away from the dock in downtown Bayside and sounded its horn. It was the first weekend in May, and the park was slated to open in only seven days for what they hoped would be a blockbuster season.

  “This is fun, and they got lucky with the weather,” Nate said. The spring breeze had a little chill, but the sun shone on the bay and the water was calm.

  “June, Evie and I had a backup plan,” Alice said, “but it wouldn’t have been as much fun as this.”

  All the guests—forty of them—had been instructed to park downtown and get on the one o’clock ferry. Ken, their long-serving captain, who’d retired from the navy, would chart a course around the Starlight Point peninsula while the ceremony took place. The ferry would then dock at the Starlight Point Marina for an afternoon reception of cake and champagne at the marina restaurant.

  “Here they come,” Alice said. All the guests turned toward the back of the boat, where Virginia and Henry were walking down the aisle, arm in arm. They touched each bench seat on their way, for balance, Alice thought, and also to connect with their guests.

  Every person invited was special to the engaged couple, their families and Starlight Point.

  The ferry slowed to a crawl and rocked almost imperceptibly as the bride and groom stood before their guests. Henry wrapped an arm around Virginia’s waist and held her tight. He wore a black suit with a crisp blue tie. Virginia wore an ivory dress with a matching jacket. The minister stepped forward and asked the bride and groom to face each other for the reading of the vows. Alice waited and held her breath.

  “Is that the look?” Nate whispered to Alice as Henry turned to Virginia and smiled.

  “Wonder-eyes,” she whispered back. “I knew we’d see it today.”

  While the sunshine sparkled on the blue water, Virginia and Henry pledged their love and faithfulness to each other. Jack and Augusta, pregnant with a son due later in the summer, sat in the front row with their daughter, Nora. June and Mel joined them with Ross and Abigail, who wore a pink dress matching her cousin Nora’s. Evie cradled her baby boy, named after his grandfather Ford, with Scott at her side. The other guests were mostly full-time employees of Starlight Point with some of Virginia and Henry’s friends in the mix. Henry’s pilot friends from his years with the airline had come. Virginia’s friend Judy and her new husband, Mike, sat across from Alice and Nate.

  Second chances, Alice thought.

  “Are we next?” Nate asked Alice as Virginia and Henry kissed.

  “I’d kiss you anytime.”

  He smiled. “You know what I mean. Our wedding. I’m waiting for you to name the date.”

  Alice’s heart raced. She and Nate had talked about getting married and were officially engaged—again. She toyed with the band of her diamond ring while she considered her answer.

  “My sister is getting married in June,” she said.

  “And?”

  “And we’re really busy in the summer with our jobs at the Point.”

  Alice watched the hired waiters fill champagne flutes for a toast as the ferry approached Starlight Point. She waited for them to get to her row of seats while she imagined her wedding to Nate for the hundredth time.

  “I’m not a wedding planner,” Nate said, clinking his glass to hers, “but I do have a great idea for ours.”

  They were interrupted by a toast from Jack in honor of his mother’s wedding. Wisely, Jack kept it short, and everyone cheered and toasted the new couple.

  “The train,” Nate said. “We’ll just have to be careful with the guest list to make sure no one fights and jumps off.”

  Alice laughed. “How about while ice skating this Christmas? I think we’ll make the rink twice as large this year based on last year’s response.”

  “I’ll marry you anywhere and anytime,” Nate said.

  She closed her eyes and kissed him. The boat rocked gently and she tasted champagne and sweetness.

  “This summer,” she said. “On the beach in front of the Lake Breeze Hotel. We’ll have a reception in the rotunda. I didn’t tell you, but I did pencil in two possible dates with the wedding planner at Starlight Point. I have connections.”

  Nate smiled. “I’ll practice my wonder-eyes.”

  She laughed. “You don’t have to. You’re doing it perfectly right now.”

  The Starlight Point ferry rounded the tip of the peninsula, champagne flowed, and all the wedding guests looked forward to wedding cake and a summer of carefree days.

  * * * * *

  Check out previous books

  in Amie Denman’s

  STARLIGHT POINT STORIES

  miniseries, available now

  from Harlequin Heartwarming:

  UNDER THE BOARDWALK

  CAROUSEL NIGHTS

  MEET ME ON THE MIDWAY

  UNTIL THE RIDE STOPS

  Keep reading for an excerpt from ALWAYS THE HERO by Anna J. Stewart.

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  Always the Hero

  by Anna J. Stewart

  CHAPTER ONE

  DEPUTY MATT KNIGHT sat at his desk and stared at the divorce papers that had taken him three years to have drawn up. He stared at the black on white print, the familiar words blurring behind tired eyes.

  “Just sign the thing already.” Even as he muttered to
himself, his fingers tightened to the point of going numb. What on earth was stopping him? It wasn’t as if divorce was some big taboo these days. He certainly wasn’t holding out hope for a reconciliation. How could he when his soon-to-be ex had made it perfectly clear—well before Matt’s discharge papers from the army had been processed—that she’d moved on. There was no ill will. There were no feelings at all. It only made sense. If he was serious about moving on with his life, serious about becoming a father to an abandoned troubled teen, it was time to cut ties and start over.

  His stomach knotted. Signing his name was the right thing to do. For everyone. And yet...

  If only signing the decree didn’t mean admitting he’d failed. Matt had spent a good portion of his thirty-two years determined to avoid anything close to failure. He couldn’t shake the deadening sensation that writing his name only proved his father right.

  He leaned forward, set his jaw. How messed up did he have to be to give credence to anything his long-dead father would have thought, especially when it came to what constituted failure? It was time to make this final break and move on with his life. If he didn’t owe that to himself, he certainly owed it to Kyle Winters. What kind of example would he be setting for the kid if Matt couldn’t put his own past aside? Besides, there were bonuses to starting fresh.

  Bonuses like Lori Bradley.

  His lips curved as an image of the lush, generous, quiet brunette with eyes as green as spring grass appeared in his mind.

  The tip of the pen hovered.

  “You can stare at that piece of paper as long as you want.” Deputy Oswald “Ozzy” Lakeman’s voice drifted across the small station house. “Whatever it says, it’s not going to change.”

  Matt clicked his pen shut, tossed it onto the desk. He sat back in his creaking spring-loaded chair and swore he heard his divorce papers laugh at him. He looked over and found Ozzy grinning at him before he snapped his teeth through one of those mini carrots he’d been munching on of late.

  “I thought you were taking Fletch’s patrol this afternoon,” Matt said.

  “I am.” Ozzy leaned back and looked up at the station clock. He clicked his tongue. “Still have a few minutes to bug you. How am I doing?”

  “At bugging me? Stellar performance, as always.” The banter came easily, as it had when he was in the army. The soldiers he’d served with had been his friends, his family. At times, he had to shake off the guilt that he had a new family now, a new group of friends while his fellow grunts... He swallowed the bitterness and grief.

  Chances were Ozzy appreciated the downtime as much as he did. With Butterfly Harbor’s annual Monarch Festival less than a month away, the entire township was flitting around, prettying up store windows, touching up paintwork, finalizing sponsorship plans and making certain the soon-to-arrive tourists were given the best show possible when it came to the Pacific Coast tourist town.

  Everyone was too busy to get into much trouble save for the occasional parking and noise ordinance violations. That was just fine with Matt, but he’d lived long enough—and hard enough—to know the quiet wouldn’t last. “Do we have an ETA on when Luke’s back in the office?”

  “Chief’s due back tomorrow morning according to Holly,” Ozzy said, referencing the owner of the Butterfly Diner and their boss’s wife. “We should have a full house again now that Fletch has returned from his honeymoon. Oh, hey, Jasper.” Ozzy glanced up at the teen hobbling out of the bathroom on crutches. “I unearthed a new box of files that need to be digitized. When you’re caught up.”

  “On it.” Jasper O’Neill clicked his way over to the desk they’d given him last month and dropped into his chair. “Can’t wait to be off these things.” He leaned over and set the crutches against the wall before logging back on to his computer.

  “It’s been almost six weeks.” Matt couldn’t believe that much time had passed since the teen had nearly gotten himself killed playing amateur detective. That Jasper had been the prime suspect in the string of increasingly disturbing break-ins and vandalism had been a driving factor. The kid hadn’t done himself any favors by dressing like death and taking pleasure in making people feel uncomfortable. But when the smoke cleared, the sheriff and his deputies had decided to take Jasper on. The boy’s determination and cleverness couldn’t be ignored. The part-time position with the police department allowed him to continue with his forensics studies, stay out of trouble and earn some serious résumé references.

  “Only ten days to go.” Jasper swiped his hand over too-long bangs that covered dark eyes. “Then you guys will have to start taking me on patrol with you.”

  Matt grinned. “We’ll see about that.” Personally, Matt was hoping Jasper would be up for renewing his friendship with Kyle. Jasper could be a good influence on him.

  Matt pushed his chair back, stretched out his prosthetic leg and waited for the gentle click that, had he not left his actual leg on a dirt road in Iraq, would have felt like a muscle easing into place. “With Luke and Fletcher both out, I guess that means I’m on deck for the town council meeting tonight.” Matt barely resisted the urge to groan. What a way to spend a Friday night. He’d seen the setup coming for weeks; his coworkers’ planned absences that would ensure he’d be the one to make the final push for the sheriff’s department’s contribution to the Monarch Festival. The annual fall event was, at least until the new butterfly sanctuary was built, the town’s biggest claim to fame—and its biggest tourist draw. From the Butterfly Diner, to Harvey’s Hardware, to the Flutterby Inn, businesses were snapping up sponsorships and initiatives like nobody’s business.

  While his boss and fellow deputies agreed they needed to participate, they’d also decided to focus on a job that would be of benefit beyond a week’s worth of events and activities. He pinned Ozzy with a determined, hopeful stare. “Unless you’d like to—”

  “Not on your life.” Ozzy held up his hands as if shielding himself from a radiation blast. “Not on my life. Not on anyone’s life.”

  Jasper chuckled as he tapped away on his keyboard.

  “As long as you’re sure,” Matt mumbled. “You could at least come with me.” It made sense. Despite living in Butterfly Harbor for almost three years, Matt was still considered a newcomer. Before becoming a deputy, he’d mostly kept to himself having moved here alone after his separation. Not that he hadn’t piqued his neighbors’ curiosity, but he kept his private life private. As far as anyone in town knew, he was an unencumbered bachelor. Ozzy, on the other hand, had been born and raised here, which meant everyone knew his business. “I could use the backup.”

  “No offense, but the only way I’d voluntarily attend the Mayor Hamilton show is if it was a direct order from my boss.” Ozzy visibly shuddered. “Lucky for me, that is not you.”

  “But you’re good at throwing me under the bus,” Matt said.

  “Yep. You don’t have a history with Gil.” Ozzy ducked his round face out of sight at the mention of the mayor. “And it’s not as if he’d take anything I have to say seriously anyway. I know what he thinks of me.”

  Matt flicked his thumb across the stack of divorce papers as anger simmered low and hot. “And what’s that?”

  “That I’m a drag on the department.” Ozzy flinched as if speaking the words out loud hurt. “Word is he’s planning on instituting physical fitness requirements for all of us in the department. Like what they do over in Durante.”

  “I bet Luke will have a thing or two to say about that.” When Ozzy didn’t respond, Matt prodded deeper. “Is that what all this diet stuff’s been about, Oz? You worried about keeping your job?”

  “No.”

  “Oz.” Matt used the same tone with the younger deputy that he had with new recruits. Granted, Ozzy wasn’t about to walk into a war zone, but sometimes the same medicine worked on different ailments. “What’s going on?”

  Oz shook his head. “It’s
not a big deal, Matt. You know how Gil is.”

  “Yes, I do.” One of the reasons Matt wasn’t overly fond of their mayor. If it wasn’t for Ozzy’s tech know-how and efficient computer skills, they’d still be typing on Selectric typewriters and stuffing the wooden filing cabinets to the point of overflowing. “I’ll tell you something right now, Oz. If you’re looking to lose weight to appease anyone other than yourself, it won’t work in the long run. Short term, maybe.”

  “I know. At least I’m feeling better.” Oz shrugged in that casual way he had of trying not to call attention to himself. “And I’m up to a mile-and-a-half run in the mornings. Well, I can do that much without wanting to puke. Mostly.” He looked at the carrot in his hand. “I’m getting really sick of these things, though.”

  Personally, Matt was surprised the deputy hadn’t turned orange. “Don’t let anyone else determine how you live your life, Oz. You want to lose weight, you do it for yourself. Not because some jerk like Gil Hamilton’s bullied you into it.”

  “Word,” Jasper muttered.

  “I hear you.” Ozzy nodded. “And I know you’re right. Anytime I think about quitting, I remember that day Charlie got trapped in the caves down at the beach. I should have been able to help Fletcher more than I did. They both could have drowned.”

  It wasn’t the first time Ozzy had made mention of the near-catastrophic event. There also wasn’t any mistaking the hint of self-loathing and disappointment that came with letting the people you care about down; or worse, believing you had. That day had been rough on all of them; the idea that eight-year-old Charlie might never have made it out of those caves if it hadn’t been for her now stepfather’s actions and the support of most of the town still made his gut clench.

  “No one believes you let anyone down.” Matt chose his words carefully. “Not Luke, not Fletcher and not me, who by the way, took three times as long getting down the beach as you did.” He slapped his hand against his prosthesis. “If we don’t blame you, there’s no reason to blame yourself.”