by Marie Force
“That’s because she’s way out of your league,” Riley said, smirking.
Kevin laughed. “So far out of my league, it’s not even funny. But she loves me anyway. All I can say is be patient, son. The best things in life happen when you least expect them, and if Nikki is hesitant, it’s probably for good reason.”
Riley nodded in agreement. He hoped that someday she’d share with him the reasons for her hesitant nature.
“Keep showing up and showing her that she can trust you,” Kevin said. “That’ll mean everything to her.”
“Thanks, Dad.”
“Any time. I’m always here if you need me.”
“I know, and I’m really happy for you and Chelsea.”
“Thanks.” His gaze found the woman who would soon be his wife. “I’m pretty damned happy for us myself, even if I’m hoping I can do this fatherhood thing justice at my age.”
“You’ll be great. I have no doubt.”
“That means a lot to me. Thankfully, the baby will have a youthful mother and brothers to pick up my slack.”
“There won’t be any slack to pick up. The baby will be as lucky as Finn and I are.”
Kevin gave Riley a one-armed hug and kissed the top of his head. “Thanks,” he said gruffly. “Your support and approval make all the difference.”
Riley swallowed the lump that suddenly appeared in his throat. Everything had changed, but all he cared about was his father’s happiness. Chelsea made him happy. That was enough for Riley.
When Nikki returned, Riley asked if she was ready to call it a night.
“I think I am. I’m suffering from a bit of jet lag with the time difference.”
“No problem. I’ll talk to you tomorrow, Dad.”
“Yes, you will. Nikki, it was a pleasure to meet you.”
“You, too, Kevin. Congratulations again.”
“Thank you. I hope you’ll come to the wedding with Riley. We don’t stand on formality around here. Everyone is welcome.”
“I’d love to come if I’m still here. Thank you.” They waved to Chelsea as they left the bar and bundled up before stepping into the frigid winter air.
If I’m still here. Four words had Riley reeling as he helped her into the truck and then closed the door to jog around to the driver’s side. In the short time they’d been inside the Beachcomber, the temperature had dropped significantly. The cold helped to give him something to think about besides his worries about her leaving.
“Is it even colder than it was before, or is it just me?” Nikki asked.
Riley glanced at the temperature on the dash. “Ten degrees colder than it was earlier.”
“Brrr.”
“Smells like snow.”
“I’ve never understood when people say that. What does snow smell like?”
“When we get to your place, I’ll show you.” He turned up the heat and directed the truck toward the island’s north end.
“So, your dad is getting married and having a baby.”
“How about that?”
“I know how hard it is to see your parents moving on with other people. You don’t have to pretend otherwise with me.”
He glanced at her before returning his gaze to the dark road. “That’s good to know.” After a long silence, he added, “It helps that you get it.”
“I remember what it was like to realize that the family you’d known was gone forever, replaced by something that’ll never completely replace it.”
“That’s it,” he said softly. “Exactly. I’m truly happy for my dad, but…”
“You grieve the loss of your family.”
“Yeah.”
“You don’t say much about your mom. Do you talk to her?”
“Occasionally. Not as much as I did before everything happened.”
“You’re angry with her, and with good reason.”
“At the end of the day,” he said, “what went down between them is truly none of my business.”
“But it still involves you. In that way, it’s very much your business.”
“I guess so.”
“I remember when my parents first separated and how I wondered if we would still have birthday parties or vacations or any of the things we’d had when they still lived together.”
“Did you?” he asked.
“Yes, but it was never the same again. Someone was always missing, and after we found out my dad had other kids, our feelings for him changed. My mom wasn’t great about keeping the dirty details away from us. We knew far more than we should have at that age.”
“As bad as my parents’ split was when it happened, I can’t imagine going through it as a kid and having them fighting over us.”
“Whereas I think it’s probably worse at your age because you thought it wasn’t going to happen to your family.” She shrugged. “It sucks no matter when it happens.”
“It helps to talk about it with someone who gets it. My brother has been sort of weird about it. He acts like he doesn’t give a shit, when I know he does.”
“That’s how some people choose to cope. Jordan was like that at times. It used to drive me crazy that she didn’t want to dissect every detail of what was going on the way I did. I needed to understand it, but I later came to realize she needed to pretend like it wasn’t happening.”
“It’s interesting how two siblings who are close and generally see things the same way can view something like this so differently.”
“Jordan and I were always close but disagreed on more than we agreed on.”
“I suppose that’s true of Finn and me, too. Even though I want to clobber him half the time, I’d still rather hang with him than just about anyone else. It’s always been like that between us.”
“Same with Jordan and me. Half the time, I wonder what the hell she’s thinking, and the other half, I need to know what she’s thinking so I know how to react. It’s going to be weird going through life without her to turn to for input on every little thing.”
“You can still do that, can’t you? She’s only a text message away.”
“Yeah, but she won’t physically be there like she always has been. Even when she and Zane were first married, she spent more time with me than she did with him because they had totally opposite schedules.”
“For what it’s worth, I think you did the right thing stepping away. It’ll be good for you to figure out what’s important to you and for her to learn to run her own life.”
“I agree, but it’s hard to resist the urge to check on her or to check in with her.”
“We’ll keep you so busy here that you won’t have time to wonder what she’s up to.”
“Is that right?” she asked, sounding amused.
“Oh yeah. Gansett is where it’s at, even in the winter. There’s always something fun going on. In fact, tomorrow night, everyone is going to my cousin Janey’s house to hang out. You should come with me.”
“I wouldn’t want to butt in on a family thing.”
“Our family’s not like that. You heard my dad. Everyone is welcome. And it’s a really fun group. All we do is crack up when we’re together.”
“That does sound fun,” she said, sounding wistful. “I always wished for a big family that got along and enjoyed being around each other.”
“Then you’ll love the McCarthys. We’re all about the fun and the hijinks. Mac is forever getting himself into trouble with Maddie and the other women. They played the best prank on the guys a while back by getting them to believe they were bringing in male strippers for Jenny Martinez’s bachelorette party. The guys lost their freaking minds over it, and when they realized they’d been played… That was epic.”
“Oh my God, I love that. How funny is that?”
“The guys didn’t think it was funny at all. Mac proposed they get even by stealing the women’s clothes while they were skinny-dipping during Evan and Grace’s wedding in Anguilla. That went over like a fart in church, with the guys getting the deep freeze i
n the bedroom for the entire week.”
Nikki shook with silent laughter.
“It’s always something, especially when Mac is involved.”
“Has he always been like that?” she asked.
“Pretty much. He’s the oldest of all the cousins, or he was until we found out about Mallory.”
“Who?”
“My uncle Mac had a daughter he didn’t know about from a relationship before he met my aunt Linda. After her mother died, Mallory found a letter that told her where to find her father, and she came here to meet him.”
“Holy crap. That must’ve been a huge shock.”
“It was, especially for Mac, who got bumped out of his prime spot as the oldest cousin. But that hasn’t stopped him from leading the mayhem.”
“How did your uncle handle finding out he had a daughter he never knew about?”
“In typical Big Mac fashion, he took it in stride, made her part of the family and wouldn’t hear of anyone treating her as anything less than a sister and cousin.”
“He sounds like a really cool guy.”
“He’s the best.”
“What about his wife? What did she think?”
“I’m not a hundred percent sure how it all went down, but my aunt Linda has been really great about making Mallory part of the family. I mean, it happened before they met, so it’s not like he cheated on her or anything. He worships my aunt. They’re so cute together. Married forty years and still acting like honeymooners.”
“What must that be like?”
“I can’t imagine it for myself, but they make it look easy.”
“I don’t think I’ll ever get married.”
The statement hit Riley like a fist to the gut, which immediately had him wondering why he would care if she never got married. “Why’s that?” he asked, forcing a casual tone.
“I don’t really believe in it. Can people really be monogamous for their entire lives? Is that even natural?”
“Who knows? I look at my uncle Mac and aunt Linda and think, yeah, it’s definitely possible. They’re crazy about each other after being married forever. But then I think of my parents and yours, and… I can see why you would question it.” He pulled into the driveway at Eastward Look and parked. When he shut off the engine, they were plunged into complete darkness. “Then there’s my cousins. Most of them have gotten engaged or married in the last couple of years, and they’re all happier than I’ve ever seen them since they found that one person. Some of their friends, too. They make a convincing case for lifetime monogamy.”
“Having a front-row seat to my sister’s marriage would make anyone think twice about getting married.”
Riley snorted with laughter. “That might not be the best example of a marriage to emulate. Let me walk you in.”
“You don’t have to.”
“I know, but I want to. If that’s okay…”
“Sure. Thank you.” She met him at the front of the truck, and he ushered her up the stairs to the porch with a hand on her back, a gesture that’d been ingrained in him by a father who’d taught his sons to treat women with respect and admiration. Women make the world go round, boys, he would say, his voice always in Riley’s head.
Under the glow of the porch light, she punched in the four-digit code that unlocked the door before looking up at him. “Thank you for a really fun night. I loved meeting your dad and Chelsea.”
“They loved meeting you, too.” He studied her gorgeous face, wishing he could look at her until he’d had his fill. That was apt to take a while. He wanted to kiss her but didn’t, sensing she wasn’t ready for anything like that. But he acknowledged the ever-present desire that had been with him from the first time he’d laid eyes on her in the midst of a nor’easter last fall.
Back then and in the months after she left, he hadn’t let himself imagine anything more with her, because what would’ve been the point? But with her standing in front of him, he couldn’t deny the powerful attraction and didn’t want to. A strand of her hair blew across her face, and he took a chance by gently tucking it behind her ear.
She seemed to hold her breath while she waited to see what else he would do.
He let his hand drop and noted with satisfaction that she seemed slightly disappointed when he took a step back from her. “Will you talk to your grandmother tomorrow about the renovations?”
Nodding, she said, “That’s the plan.”
“Let me know what she says.”
“I will.”
“I’ll talk to Mac about what’s involved with getting materials.”
“It’s nice of you to want to help me.”
“It’ll be fun.”
“Sure it will,” she said, smiling. “Just what you want to do after full days at work.”
“Helping you will be fun compared to working in that freezing-cold barn with my brother and cousins. For one thing, the scenery is much better here.”
Her face flushed adorably, possibly from the cold, but he preferred to think it was the compliment.
“I’ll text you about tomorrow night?”
“Sure, that’d be good.”
Because he couldn’t help himself, he leaned in and kissed her cheek. “Sleep tight.”
“You, too. Thank you for dinner.”
“My pleasure.” He waited for her to go inside and turn the lock before he jogged back to his truck, wishing with every fiber of his being that he didn’t have to leave her there alone.
* * *
In the morning, after sleeping better than she had in a long time, Nikki took a mug of coffee to her favorite chair in the living room next to a window that overlooked the ocean. Today, the water was gray and stormy, with frothy whitecaps and rolling waves.
As she placed the call to her grandmother in Florida, Nikki was thankful not to be on the ferry today.
“Good morning, my love,” Evelyn said, her voice cheerful and animated as always.
“Morning. Have you already played eighteen holes, done yoga and painted the sunroom?”
Laughing, Evelyn said, “Not quite yet, but I’m well on my way through a rather long to-do list.”
“You exhaust me.”
“Keeping busy is how I stay young, darling. It’s the secret to my longevity. You’re up early.” During the summers they used to spend together, her grandmother had marveled at teenage girls’ ability to sleep half the day away.
“I don’t sleep all day the way I used to, and I haven’t in years, as you well know.”
Evelyn laughed. “I do know that, and I worry about you on that island all alone in the off-season.”
“I haven’t been entirely alone,” Nikki said, being intentionally coy.
“What does that mean?”
“I knew you would pounce on that,” Nikki said, laughing. “Riley McCarthy stopped by the other night when he heard I was back. Last night, he took me to Domenic’s for dinner.”
“Oh, that’s wonderful! I absolutely love the McCarthys. Big Mac and Linda are the most delightful people. Riley is his nephew, right?”
“Yes, he’s Big Mac’s brother Kevin’s son. I met Kevin and his fiancée last night as well. Nice people.”
“This is the best news I’ve had in ages!”
“Simmer down, Gram. We had dinner. That’s all it is.”
“But it has potential, or you wouldn’t have gone out with him in the first place. I know how you think, and I’m sure you’re making long lists of all the reasons why you shouldn’t get involved with him.”
“I’m not doing that.” Much.
“Yes, you are. Instead of focusing on the cons, think about the pros for once. He comes from an excellent, well-respected family. He’s proven to both of us that he’s a hard worker who gets things done and keeps his promises. I’m sure if he’s anything like Mac and Linda’s sons, he’s easy on the eyes.”
Nikki sat back and listened to her grandmother go on, amused as always by her infectious energy.
“Is he?
”
“What?”
“Easy on the eyes?”
“You could say that.” Smoking hot was more like it, not that she’d ever say as much to her grandmother, who’d start planning their wedding before the day was out.
“I want you to listen to me, Nicole.”
“Oh, yikes. You’re bringing out the big guns here.”
“Yes, I am. I’ve sat by and watched you live a cautious, risk-free life for years now, and I’m painfully aware of why you’ve felt that was necessary, but it’s time to move past that and give yourself a chance to experience true love.”
“Whoa, Gram. We went on one date, and you’re talking true love.”
“Do you like him, Nikki? Do you?”
Nikki swallowed the lump that suddenly made her throat tighten. “Yeah, I like him.”
“Will you please, please, please give him a chance? I so want you and your sister to find what I had with your grandfather.” She sighed, the way she often did when speaking of her late husband. “There’s nothing quite like it.”
“Jordan thinks she’s already found that.”
“Oh please,” Evelyn said, scoffing. “Zane is a moron at best and a self-absorbed asshole at worst.”
“Gram! You swore!”
“He drives me to it.”
Nikki cracked up laughing. “He drives us all to it.”
“I honestly cannot believe she went back to him. What has to happen to convince her that he’s not worthy of her?”
“Apparently more than releasing a tape of her most intimate moments.”
“I can’t even… The thought of it makes me want to murder him. Let’s not talk about it. My blood pressure can’t handle it.”
“You’re taking your medication, right?”
“Yes, love, of course I am. I plan to live forever, so don’t worry.”
“I do worry, especially when Jordan does things that make your blood pressure go up.”
“Don’t fret about me. I want to talk about you and the handsome Riley McCarthy, who came running when he heard you were back.”
“It wasn’t quite like that…”
“Wasn’t it?”
“He said he thought of me after I left and was sad that I had gone.”
