Gansett Island Boxed Set Books 1-16 (Gansett Island Series)

by Marie Force

  As she stood frozen in place, he picked up one of the women by the waist and tossed her into the deep end. She came up sputtering and swam after him, clearly seeking revenge as he howled with laughter and tried to dodge her efforts to catch him.

  Elisabeth couldn’t look away from his handsome, smiling face as he dove away from the woman who sought revenge.

  Clearly, he was getting along just fine without her. She forced herself to look away, to stop staring at him like the lovesick idiot she had no right to be. She’d come here looking for closure, and she’d gotten it. He’d moved on. That was good. The thought of him heartbroken and decimated by her rejection was not the image of him she wanted to carry with her into the lonely future that stretched out before her.

  Tears rolled down her face as she turned and walked back to the main road, clutching Ned’s card in her hand. Fumbling with her cell phone, she placed the call. Thankfully, he didn’t ask any questions and told her to wait for him by the mailbox, that he’d be back as soon as he could get there.

  He didn’t express sympathy or anything else that would take her over the edge she was clinging to with her fingertips. Tears slipped from her eyes, and she brushed them away angrily. What right did she have to cry over him frolicking in a pool with two gorgeous blondes? She’d made her own bed. Now she’d have to lie in it alone.

  Chapter 3

  “I don’t feel right leaving Hope to deal with Mom tonight,” Alex Martinez said as David drove him to meet his fiancée at Jared’s house.

  David had gone to the Martinez home to check on Alex’s mother, Marion, who suffered from dementia. She’d had a particularly rough day, and Alex had asked him to come by on his way home to make sure there was no medical reason for her increased confusion.

  “Hope is great with her,” David said. “And you hired her so you could get some relief.”

  “I know, but I still don’t feel right about leaving Hope to manage Mom after the day she’s already had.”

  “You and Paul are still getting used to the fact that you now have help, so it’s only natural you’d feel like there’s something you’re supposed to be doing for your mom. However, tonight you’ve got plans with your fiancée and your friends. That’s what you need to be doing. It’s okay to give yourself permission to have some fun, Alex.”

  “I guess so.” Alex scratched wearily at the stubble on his jaw. “No matter what I’m doing, I feel guilty about what I should be doing. Mom doesn’t even know I’m there most of the time, but I feel like I should be with her rather than at a cookout.”

  “Let me ask you this… In her right mind, what would your mom say to a statement like that?”

  “She’d tell me I’m being ridiculous,” Alex said with a grunt of laughter.

  “There you go.” David had known Marion Martinez—and her sons—all his life, and he had no doubt that Mrs. Martinez would hate to see her sons putting their lives on hold to take care of her. They’d ensured she was well cared for by hiring Hope Russell, a nurse from the mainland, to live onsite to help out with their mother’s care. They continued to oversee all aspects of her medical situation, even with Hope now onboard. “She’d want you both to be happy.”

  “I hate this.”

  “I know. I hate it for you.”

  “What did she ever do to deserve such an awful affliction?” Alex asked with a sigh.

  “Absolutely nothing. That’s the bitch of it.” David took a series of turns that led to Jared’s waterfront estate, where he’d been lucky to score the garage apartment. He loved the place and had enjoyed getting to know Jared this summer. “Is Paul coming tonight?”

  “He said he’d try. He’s got some meeting with the land trust or something.”

  “He’s Mr. Gansett Island, huh?” David said with a chuckle.

  “That he is. I don’t know how he does it all—runs the business, helps take care of Mom and volunteers so much time to the town council and all the accompanying demands. Those council meetings would bore me to tears, but he loves it all.”

  “The town needs people like him to protect what we’ve got here. I’m glad he’s on the job.”

  Alex nodded in agreement. “He’s dedicated. That’s for sure.”

  “How’re the wedding plans coming along?” Alex and his fiancée, Jenny, were hoping to be married in the next couple of months.

  “Not so good. Everything is booked years in advance on this island.”

  “Why can’t you do it at the lighthouse?” David asked. Until her recent move to live with Alex and his family, Jenny had been the lighthouse keeper at the Southeast Light. Now she was managing the retail portion of Martinez Lawn & Garden while she and Alex made plans to build a house next to his childhood home.

  “The town is skittish about the liability of having a wedding out there. Something about drinking and nearby cliffs.”

  David laughed at the disgust he heard in Alex’s voice.

  “As if we wouldn’t take steps to ensure none of our drunken guests pitched off the cliffs.”

  “I’ve had the unhappy luck of tending to a number of people who’ve pitched off our unforgiving cliffs,” David said. “I hate to say the town might have a point…”

  “You would side with them,” Alex joked. “Mac and Maddie offered up their yard, but Jenny doesn’t love that idea. It’s a lot to ask of them.”

  “I’m sure you’ll figure something out,” David said as he slowed to take the turn into the driveway that led to Jared’s estate. A woman standing by the mailbox had him stopping the car. Something about her was familiar. She was tall and slender with silky brown hair that fell just past her shoulders. As he opened the window, he noticed she was crying. “Hi there. Can I help you with something?”

  “Oh no,” she said, wiping the tears from her face. “I’m waiting for a cab.”

  “Have we met?”

  “No, I don’t think so.”

  “You look really familiar to me.” And then he remembered where he’d seen her… in pictures Jared had shared with him and Daisy. She was Jared’s Lizzie, and she was standing at the end of his driveway waiting for a cab. David put the car in park and got out. “I’m David Lawrence, a friend of Jared’s. You’re his Lizzie, right?”

  She gasped and shook her head. “I’m not his anything. I’m Elisabeth.”

  “Have you been to see him?” David asked gently, careful to avoid saying something that would upset her even more.

  “Not exactly. He’s very busy entertaining a couple of beautiful, busty blondes in bikinis.”

  The bitterness in her tone took him by surprise. Busty blondes? Jared had been too busy nursing his shattered heart to entertain anyone until today. Suddenly, he realized who she must be referring to and was forced to hold back a laugh. “Um, I think you might be referring to my girlfriend and his fiancée,” David said, using his thumb to point at Alex, who’d waited in the car.

  To his credit, Alex waved and smiled.

  “Y-your girlfriend?” she asked, her voice wavering as new tears filled her eyes.

  “Yes, my girlfriend, Daisy, and his fiancée, Jenny. We’re meeting them here. Alex and I were detained, so we sent them on ahead to give Jared a hand getting ready for the cookout he suddenly decided to have today after weeks of moping around.”

  “H-he’s been moping?”

  “He’s been heartbroken.” David hoped he was doing the right thing by telling her the truth about what a mess Jared had been. “I know for a fact he’d absolutely love to see you.”

  “He would? Really?”

  “Really. Could I give you a lift to the house?”

  She seemed frozen with indecision as she contemplated his offer. “I have a cab coming to take me back to town.”

  “You could cancel that. If you decide you want to go to town later, I’ll take you myself. No questions asked.”

  “Oh, you will?”

  “Standing offer, but knowing how sad Jared has been without you, I doubt you’ll need to
take me up on it.”

  “He’s sad, not angry?”

  “He’s very sad. I haven’t seen any anger. Doesn’t mean it isn’t there, but all I’ve seen is the sadness.”

  “I hate that I did that to him,” she said softly.

  “You should tell him that. I think it would matter to him.”

  Nodding, she retrieved her cell phone and put through the call to cancel her cab.

  David relieved her of her backpack and held the back door to his car for her. When she was settled, he handed her the backpack.

  “Thank you.”

  “No problem.” David got in the car and sneaked a wide-eyed look at Alex, who’d watched the entire scene unfold. At the end of the driveway, he parked in his spot next to Jared’s sharp-looking black Porsche. Jenny’s car was also in the driveway, behind Jared’s. The three of them got out and followed the sound of voices, laughter and music to the pool area, where Jared was indeed in the midst of a spirited game of beach volleyball with Jenny and Daisy.

  None of them noticed the new arrivals until they walked through the gate to the fenced-in pool deck.

  “Hey!” Jared said. “You made it. Don’t you own a bathing suit, Doctor David?”

  “In fact I do, but I found a friend of yours on the way in.”

  Jared’s gaze shifted from David to Lizzie, who stood between him and Alex. Along with the shock that registered on Jared’s face, David also saw love and longing and knew he’d done the right thing by persuading her to come talk to Jared.

  “Lizzie…” Jared said when he’d recovered the ability to speak.

  “Hello, Jared.”

  Overcome by the sight of her, Jared lifted himself out of the pool and reached for a towel he’d tossed onto a chair earlier. “What’re you doing here?” On first glance, he could see that she was thin, painfully thin, and he was immediately concerned. She’d confessed to a teenage eating disorder, and the thought of her battling that again—maybe because of him—struck a note of fear in his heart.

  “I came to see you.”

  “Why?”

  Lizzie took an uncertain look around at the four curious faces watching them. “I need to talk to you.”

  “We should go and let you guys talk,” Jenny said as she took the hand Alex offered to help her out of the pool.

  “No,” Jared said, never taking his eyes off Lizzie. “We have plans. I got steak. We’re having our cookout.”

  “Jared,” David said. “It’s fine. We can do it another night.”

  Weeks of pain and frustration and more than a little bit of anger boiled to the surface all at once as he stared at the face that had haunted him during forty sleepless nights. “No,” he said more emphatically this time. “We’re having dinner.”

  “I’m sorry,” Lizzie said, taking a step back. “I’ve come at a bad time. I’ll just go…”

  “You don’t have to go,” Jared said more softly. “It would be nice if you joined us.”

  “Oh, um, I don’t want to intrude.”

  “You’re not,” he assured her, terrified at the thought of her leaving before he could hear what she’d come to say. “You’ve met David Lawrence and Alex Martinez. This is David’s girlfriend, Daisy Babson, and Alex’s fiancée, Jenny Wilks. Ladies, this is Elisabeth Sutter. Lizzie.”

  Jenny’s mouth curved into a stunned O.

  “So nice to meet you,” Daisy said as she shook Lizzie’s hand.

  Jared was hardly surprised that the always-compassionate Daisy automatically welcomed Lizzie, despite the fact that she knew the whole ugly story. Jenny was also friendly and welcoming, if a bit more reserved about it than Daisy had been.

  The girls donned beach cover-ups while Jared knotted the towel around his waist. “Let’s get some drinks,” he said as he led the way to the deck where he’d chilled a couple of twelve-packs of beer along with some white wine. “What can I get everyone?”

  The guys helped themselves to beers while Jenny expertly uncorked a bottle of chardonnay that she shared with Daisy. “Lizzie?” she asked, holding up the bottle.

  “She prefers the pinot grigio,” Jared said. “I’ll get it.” His heart beat fast and erratically as he tried to resist the need to stare at her, to drink in the familiar sight of her. He walked inside on shaky legs, his entire body tingling from the shock, the excitement, the need to know… What was she doing here? And why had she been crying?

  David followed him inside. “Are you okay?”

  “I… I don’t know what I am. Did she say anything about why she’s here?”

  “Isn’t that rather obvious?”

  Jared poured himself a shot of top-shelf whisky and downed it before pouring another one. “No. It’s not.” The heat of the liquor traveled through his system, calming his nerves.

  “Alex and I found her out by the road. She’d been here, saw you in the pool with Daisy and Jenny, jumped to a bunch of incorrect conclusions and had called for a cab to take her back to town. I recognized her from the photos you showed me.”

  When Jared realized how close he’d come to never knowing she’d been there at all… And then he remembered the rare moments of frivolity and laughter in the pool. It must’ve looked pretty bad to her, especially in light of his past reputation as a bit of a playboy. That life had ended the moment he’d laid eyes on her, and she knew it. Or she’d known it when they were together. He’d made sure of it.

  “She was crying,” David said. “She’d seen you with other women, and it upset her.”

  “You told her—”

  “We set her straight. My girlfriend. His fiancée. We talked her into coming back with us.”

  “Thank you for that.” Jared let his gaze wander through the kitchen-sink window to the deck where Jenny, Alex and Daisy had included Lizzie in their conversation. She looked slightly less uncomfortable than she had a few minutes ago.

  “We should take off, Jared. You guys have stuff to talk about.”

  “It’ll keep until later. I promised you dinner.”

  “Jared…”

  “I need a little time to get my head together before I talk to her. It would help if you stayed.”

  “If you’re sure…”

  “I’m sure.”

  “By the way, I might’ve let it slip that you’ve been a bit of a mess since you got here. I hope that’s okay.”

  “She may as well know the truth.”

  “Whatever happens, I hope you get what you want.”

  Looking at her sitting on his deck, surrounded by his friends, Jared was no longer certain of what he wanted from her. She’d hurt him badly. He wasn’t sure if he could risk letting her back in—if that was why she’d come—only to have it happen again. “Thanks, man. You and Daisy have been so great. I don’t know what I would’ve done without you.”

  “It’s been fun for us, too. Now, you’d better get out there with her wine or she might think you aren’t happy to see her. You are happy to see her, aren’t you?”

  Happy might not be the right word. Confused, agitated, uncertain… But happy? First he needed to know why she’d come. Then he’d decide how he felt about it. “Yeah,” he said simply. That was all he had at the moment. He uncorked the bottle of pinot and followed David back to the porch with an extra glass in hand.

  Victoria and her charming Irishman joined them a short time later, as did Alex’s brother, Paul, who brought funny stories from his meeting with an elderly island resident who’d talked for two straight hours, without pause, in support of a parcel the land trust had no plans to develop. Jared had offered him a glass of whisky, which he’d accepted gratefully.

  They ate the steak, baked potatoes and salad, swam in the pool, sat by the fire and toasted marshmallows. His friends teased him about how he’d bought every kind of salad dressing offered in the grocery store and how he’d have to eat salad for a year to use them all. Jared took their teasing in stride while he tried to relax and enjoy the gathering, but a humming awareness of Lizzie had him preoccupi
ed as he watched her stare into the fire. She’d participated in the conversation, laughed at Shannon O’Grady’s hilarious quips, eaten a few bites of dinner and had a second glass of wine.

  But Jared knew her well enough to sense she felt as edgy as he did, anticipating—and probably dreading—what would happen after his friends left.

  David stood at ten thirty, extended his hand to Daisy and helped her up. “I gotta work in the morning,” he said regretfully. “I need my beauty sleep.” He turned to Lizzie. “It was really nice to meet you.”

  “You, too. Thanks for… Well, thanks.”

  “My pleasure.”

  Daisy, being Daisy, took it a step further and hugged Lizzie, who seemed surprised but pleased by the gesture. Then Daisy hugged Jared and whispered in his ear, “Good luck.”

  “Thanks.” She was so sweet and so caring and had been a very good friend to him in the last few weeks. At her insistence, Jared had become the “other man” in her relationship with David. She’d forced him out of his cocoon and dragged him along on many a date, which he’d appreciated more than she could ever know.

  “We should go, too,” Alex said. “I’ve got to work in the morning. No rest for the landscapers this time of year.”

  Paul groaned in agreement.

  “Before you go,” Jared said to Alex and Jenny, “I think I might’ve found a place for you to have your wedding.”

  Jenny perked right up and lifted her head off Alex’s shoulder. “Speak to me.”

  “Have you thought about the Chesterfield place?”

  Jenny’s smile dimmed. “That was our first choice, but we were shot down because it’s on the market. It’s not available for events.”

  “I heard it might be getting a new owner and that he’d be amenable to a wedding there.”

  Jenny stared at him, agape. “Did you buy the Chesterfield Estate?”

  “I might’ve made an offer.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you need a place to get married, and it seemed perfect. Have you seen the gardens?”