The Path to Sunshine Cove

by RaeAnne Thayne

  “They’re all lucky to have you,” Nate said gruffly.

  “Thanks.”

  “What you did for my mother. I still have no idea how to thank you.”

  “It was my pleasure, Nate. Really. I loved working on Whitaker House.”

  “I meant saving her life. But the work you did on the house was terrific, too.”

  “I hope Eleanor is able to spend many more years enjoying it.”

  “She will. I’m sure of it.”

  He loved his mother, which was one of the things she found most endearing about him.

  Okay, she found everything about him endearing.

  “I will miss you.”

  The words seemed to have been dragged out of him. They hovered between them, stark and honest.

  Stunned by the intensity of them, she didn’t know how to answer.

  A muscle flexed in his jaw. “I wasn’t going to say anything. I figured I would stand here and keep my mouth shut and watch you walk away. But what the hell. Years from now, I don’t want to live with the regret of knowing that I stayed quiet when I should have spoken up.”

  He stepped forward and gripped her hands tightly in his. “Is there any chance of persuading you to stay longer? Maybe you could do your administrative stuff here.”

  She could. There was no real reason why she couldn’t stay a few more days and then drive straight to Las Vegas from here.

  But that would only be delaying the inevitable, wouldn’t it?

  “You said once that your apartment in the valley is mostly a convenient stopping place between jobs. What if you made Cape Sanctuary your home base?”

  “I...what?” The suggestion was so unexpected that she could only stare at him.

  “You have people who care about you here. Rachel, Cody, the kids.”

  “Yes.”

  “And now you have the Whitakers who all care about you, too. Sophie flat out adores you and of course my mom is crazy about you.”

  What about you?

  She wanted to ask but couldn’t seem to grab the scattered words together to form a sentence. “I know we’re not as centrally located as LA and you would have to drive a little farther to southern places. Or, you know, moving forward, you could take on more jobs in this area of the state to keep you busy or even up into Oregon and Washington.”

  “What are you asking, Nate?”

  “I’m making a mess of this, aren’t I? I’m sorry. I went over and over this in my head last night, trying to figure out the right words.” Before she realized what he intended, he pulled one of her hands to his mouth—the hand that was probably oily from hitching up her trailer—and kissed the back of it, just as if she were some kind of grand lady in a French chateau or something.

  “I’m asking you to take a chance on this. On us.”

  She stared, fear and confusion and a deep ache of yearning swirling around inside her. “There is no us,” she protested. “All we’ve done is kiss a few times. I’ve only been here for two weeks!”

  “I know. But two weeks is certainly long enough for me to realize I’m falling in love with you.”

  She snatched her hands away as if he had pinched them. “You are not.”

  He gave a rough laugh. “I had the same reaction. Disbelief maybe, mingled with no small amount of dismay. I don’t want to fall in love right now. I wasn’t looking for it, believe me. But you drove into our lives with your trailer and your courage and your tough attitude and I couldn’t seem to help myself.”

  She swallowed. “Well, you can fall right back out.”

  “I’m afraid it’s not that easy.”

  Jess could feel panic biting at her. She was wholly unprepared for this. In her wildest dreams, she had never imagined Nate Whitaker professing that he was falling in love with her!

  He couldn’t be. She was all wrong for him. He needed someone soft and kind like Rachel, not a former staff sergeant who lifted boxes and trailered her pickup across the country for a living.

  “I am not the happy-ever-after type of woman, Nate. You knew that about me from the first.”

  “Only because you’ve sold yourself that narrative. That doesn’t necessarily mean it’s true.”

  “Of course it’s true! I’m not my sister.”

  “Agreed. Rachel is a terrific person. But she’s not you. Your lives have been shaped by different experiences.”

  They had spent thirteen years being shaped by the same experiences, though. Experiences that had impacted them in completely different ways.

  She was only now seeing that Rachel hadn’t been untouched by the pain of those experiences, as Jess had somehow thought.

  “You can’t love me,” she said again. The concept was too huge, too unbelievable for her to comprehend.

  He took her hands again and she so desperately wanted to fling herself into his arms and hold on tight.

  “How could I not love you? I love your strength. Your compassion. Your courage. I love the way you can handle yourself in the toughest of situations. I love your fierce loyalty to those you care about. You are the only woman I want, Jess.”

  She remembered that kiss in the waiting room of the hospital, as if she was his everything. She couldn’t be that. Not for anyone, not even Nate.

  She straightened and pulled her hands away.

  “Don’t do this to me. It’s not fair. I told you nothing could happen between us. I made it clear from the beginning. This...this isn’t what I want. I have to go.”

  “Just like that. You’re not even going to consider staying?”

  “I can’t.”

  She looked at the Airstream that she had worked so hard to restore. It represented so much more than just her home. It was the life she had created for herself, the one where she felt safe and needed.

  “I have to go,” she said again. “I’m sorry, Nate.”

  To his credit, he didn’t try to stop her. He only stood watching, his expression closed as she climbed into her truck.

  Oh, she hated this.

  She started the truck and the engine turned right away.

  There was nothing else keeping her here.

  She put the vehicle in gear and pulled away, feeling the tug of the trailer on the engine, like the weight of all she was leaving behind.

  Fighting tears and the heavy ache of impossibilities, she looked in the rearview window only once to find him standing where she had left him, watching after her.

  She wanted to leave town immediately, go as fast and as far as she could, but she had promised Rachel she would stop in at her house one more time before she left.

  How would she endure another goodbye?

  With her throat achy and tight from unshed tears, she drove the short distance to Rachel and Cody’s house.

  At least she found some comfort in knowing she was leaving Rachel in a much happier state than she had found her when she showed up in town two weeks earlier.

  Jess had spent the entire day before with her sister and her family, driving in their minivan through the beautiful national park, and she had been relieved to see Rachel and Cody seemed to have found a new closeness together.

  They held hands most of the day as they hiked on a few short trails. Several times throughout the day, Jess had caught them stealing kisses, as if they were newlyweds instead of a busy couple with three children.

  At Rachel’s house, she knocked and her sister opened the door a moment later, wiping her hands on a ruffled apron.

  “Come in. Don’t mind the mess.”

  It was a mess, Jess saw, with discarded jackets and toys scattered along the hall. The kitchen was worse. Mixing bowls, measuring cups and flour were spread across the island, the sink full of dirty dishes.

  Still, it smelled delicious.

  At the table, Silas seemed to be completely focused
on more flour and a ball of dough in front of him. The flour was everywhere—the floor, the table, even in his hair.

  “Wow. What’s going on here?”

  Rachel made a face. “For some reason, I woke up in the mood to make homemade bread today. Cody loves it and so do the girls. Silas was helping me make the dough and had so much fun with it that I mixed another batch just for him to play with.”

  What a good idea. Silas looked in heaven as he pounded the dough on the table and squished it between his fingers.

  “He seems to be having a great time.”

  “Until we have to clean it up, anyway,” Rachel said ruefully. “I’ve got a loaf of bread for you, if you want.”

  “Thanks. I’ll take it with me.”

  “You’re leaving now?” Rachel’s face fell. She wiped her hands on her apron. “Oh, I wish you could stay longer. Yesterday was so fun.”

  All these people who wanted her to stay. Jess was completely unused to it. “I can’t. You know I have that job in Vegas waiting for me next week.”

  “Of course. Well, it’s been wonderful having you close these past few weeks.”

  “I’ve enjoyed it, too,” she said truthfully. Even with the heartache she knew was only beginning for her, she was glad she and Rachel had at least begun to rebuild their relationship.

  “How’s Eleanor?” her sister asked.

  “I’ve just been to see her. She looks good. Her pacemaker surgery will be at the end of the week.” She paused. “Will you keep me posted on how she’s doing?”

  “Of course. Though you know you could always reach out directly to Nate.”

  Not now. After she had basically done all she could to push him away. She let out a breath, trying not to press a hand to her heart and the ache there.

  “I don’t think he’ll want to hear from me.”

  Rachel frowned. “Why not?”

  At the innocent question, she pictured him as she was driving away, his features set and his eyes shadowed. Their kiss the other night replayed in her mind, stunning and tender and wonderful.

  She was right, wasn’t she? Leaving now was for the best. She wasn’t the kind of woman who could stick around. As hard as it had been to say goodbye to them all today, how much worse would it be if she let herself become completely entangled in their world?

  She would only end up hurting all of them.

  While she might know all of that intellectually, her heart was another story entirely.

  What if she was wrong? What if she had never been the staying sort because she hadn’t yet met the right person she cared enough about?

  All the emotions and regrets she had been working to contain suddenly seemed to trickle free. She could feel a tear leak out and tried desperately to wipe it away before Rachel could see.

  No such luck. Her sister’s gaze intensified.

  “Why won’t Nate want to hear from you?” she asked again.

  Jess wanted to bury her face in her hands and cry. “Because I might have just made the worst mistake of my life,” she whispered.

  Rachel wiped her hands on her cute frilly apron again and came closer to stare at her. “What’s happened?”

  Jess didn’t want to tell her but somehow the words came gushing out and she spilled everything.

  “He said he was falling in love with you? Just like that? How do you feel about it?” Rachel asked.

  “Terrified,” she whispered.

  Only then could she admit to herself that fear was at the core of everything.

  She had faced tough soldiers, learning to drive every vehicle under the sun, dangerous conditions with snipers and IEDs and hostiles everywhere she turned.

  None of that had scared her as much as the idea of giving her heart completely to Nate Whitaker.

  “I...may have feelings for him, too,” she finally said.

  “That’s great. Nate’s a wonderful guy! So what’s the problem?”

  How could she explain to Rachel, who had always been a hopeless romantic, that the idea of love could feel like a trap?

  “I’m not cut out for all this.” She gestured to the kitchen, to the toddler smashing bread dough on the table, to the Instagram kitchen with its gleaming pots and pans and the Families Are Forever sign on the wall.

  “No. You’re not. This is my life, the one I love. You’ve created your own. You’re an amazing woman, Jess. Strong, courageous, kind.”

  Jess swallowed, love for her baby sister seeping through her to heal a few more of the cracks.

  “If Nate wanted a domestic goddess like me, don’t you think that’s the kind of woman he would look for? Instead, he fell for prickly, difficult, wonderful you. You’re the one he wants. A smart woman would jump on that like Freckles on a grasshopper.”

  Jess wanted to believe her. She could picture a life with Nate and Sophie and Eleanor. She wouldn’t have to give up her business. She and Yvette had worked too hard to build Transitions. But maybe she could focus more on helping people in this region so she didn’t have to travel as much. The idea was tempting...and dangerous.

  “What if I turn into Mom?” she whispered.

  There it was. The moment the words were out, she realized this was the fear she hadn’t even dared voice to herself. If she allowed herself to love someone fully, would she turn into her mother, needy, desperate, pathetic?

  “Oh, Jess.”

  Rachel hugged her close. “We are not our mother. Or our father, thank God. Love—real love—doesn’t make you clingy and weak. Just the opposite. It gives you strength to follow your dreams. To stay up all night with a sick baby for days on end. To take on challenges you never imagined with grace and dignity because you know you have someone by your side who will do anything under the sun to help you.”

  Jess closed her eyes, letting the words and the truth of them wash over her.

  She wanted that. So much.

  She might never be the sort of woman who would bake bread in the morning on a whim.

  That didn’t mean she had nothing to give.

  Nate told her he was falling in love with her. She felt the same. Didn’t she owe it to both of them to take a chance, to see if these fragile new feelings could take root and grow into something more?

  If she could take root somewhere and grow into something more?

  “What do I do?” she asked.

  Rachel shrugged. “He wants you to stay awhile longer. Why not? You told me you don’t have to be in Las Vegas for a week. Why not stay here during that time? You could be here for him while Eleanor has her pacemaker surgery and spend a little more time with Nate and Sophie. Then you can go on to your next job and see where things take you from there.”

  She was so very tempted, even as fear still had a tight grip on her.

  No. She couldn’t let the darkness of her childhood determine the decisions she made as an adult. Rachel had moved on and built a beautiful life here in Cape Sanctuary. She and Cody were happy together, even if their life wasn’t always perfect.

  Why couldn’t Jess have that with Nate?

  She wanted it suddenly, with a ferocity that shocked her.

  “Besides,” Rachel said, “I have an ulterior motive to want you to give Nate a chance, especially if it means I could spend more time with you.”

  “That would be a bonus,” Jess said with a smile.

  “Hi, Jess.”

  She and Rachel both jerked their attention to the table where Silas was still happily squishing bread dough. “Did he just say my name?”

  Rachel’s eyes sparkled. “It sounded like it. Si, who’s that?”

  “Jess.” He pointed a glob of dough at her and Jess’s throat tightened with emotion.

  “That’s right! Good job, buddy.”

  “Jess,” he said again. “Jess. Jess. Jess.”

  Each time her
nephew said her name, Jess’s heart seemed to expand.

  She was completely capable of love and here was proof. She loved her sister, Cody, her nieces and Silas.

  Why was she so convinced that she couldn’t be successful at romantic love?

  Nate was a wonderful man. While some part of her might think he deserved someone better, someone more like Rachel, he had chosen her. She would be stupid to walk away from a man like him.

  They would face challenges. She traveled most of the time and didn’t know how to change that. Still, she could spend her off time in Cape Sanctuary with people she loved and there was always video calling, texts and phone calls.

  “I have to go.”

  Rachel’s features fell. “Really? I thought...” She seemed to catch herself. “I understand. Do what you have to do. Safe travels, honey.”

  She shook her head. “No. I have to go back to Whitaker House and see if Nate has changed his mind or if he’s still willing to give me a chance.”

  Her sister gave a short laugh of relief and hugged her hard. “Good luck,” she said. “But I don’t think you’re going to need it. Nate’s no fool.”

  Jess could only hope her sister was right.

  39

  Nate

  “What’s bothering you, darling?”

  Nate turned away from the view of the endless sea out the window of his mother’s room toward the bed where Eleanor and Sophie were playing cards.

  “Nothing,” he lied. “I just have a lot on my mind right now.”

  “I understand.”

  “I can tell you what’s bothering me, if anybody wants to know,” Sophie said. “I miss Jess.”

  “She’s been gone for less than an hour,” Eleanor said with a small laugh. “But I know what you mean.”

  “I wish she could have stayed longer. I want to show her the postcards I get from Japan when they come.”

  “You can always call her, darling. I know she’ll be glad to hear from you.”

  “I guess. It won’t be the same as having her here.”

  He couldn’t do this, stay and listen to his mother and daughter talk about missing Jess. They couldn’t have any idea that he was standing here feeling like his heart had been ripped out of his chest.