Sand Castle Bay. Sherryl Woods
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father. Late at night, though, he couldn’t help wondering if it had been enough. It didn’t help that Jenny’s parents blamed him for everything from ruining Jenny’s life to contributing to her death. He just knew they were looking for any excuse to try to take B.J. from him. That, he thought fiercely, would happen over his own dead body!
As for the rest, well, it was water under the bridge now, he told himself, as he took a deep breath and followed his son. Alerted by Cora Jane that all three of her granddaughters were coming home to help with the storm cleanup, he braced himself for the first glimpse of Emily after all these years.
Inside the water-ravaged restaurant, though, he spotted only Gabriella, looking frantic as Cora Jane teetered on the top rung of a stepladder. Gabi was holding it steady with a white-knuckled grip.
“Cora Jane Castle, what do you think you’re doing?” Boone demanded, wrapping an arm around her hips and lifting her down until her sneaker-clad feet were firmly on the ground.
She whirled around and glared at him. “What do you think you’re doing, Boone Dorsett?” she inquired, her brown eyes flashing with indignation, even as he gave the obviously relieved Gabi a wink.
“Saving you from a broken hip, most likely,” he said. “Didn’t I tell you a long time ago that I’d take care of fixing all the lights whenever they needed it or to have Jerry or your handyman do it?”
“Well, Jerry’s not here yet and my handyman’s nowhere to be found,” she retorted. “And since when do I need you to screw in a few lightbulbs?” Hands on her hips, she tried her best to stare him down. Given their relative size difference, she wasn’t half as intimidating as she obviously hoped to be.
“You could at least have let Gabi do it,” he replied.
She seemed to fight a smile at the suggestion, avoiding her granddaughter’s gaze. “Bless her heart,” she confided in an undertone, “Gabi is scared of heights. She got two rungs up the ladder, and I thought she was about to faint.”
“It’s true,” Gabi replied, an embarrassed flush in her cheeks. “It was humiliating, especially when she went scampering right on up the ladder.”
Thankfully, just then B.J. tugged on Cora Jane’s hand. “Ms. Cora Jane, the power’s back on, right?”
She smiled and ruffled his hair affectionately. “Came on about a half hour ago, as a matter of fact.” She gave him a knowing look. “I imagine you asked because you’re hoping for pancakes.”
B.J.’s eyes lit up. “Uh-huh, but Daddy said not to ask because we’re here to help.”
Cora Jane rolled her eyes. “Well, since your daddy seems intent on taking over the most dangerous chores himself, I imagine I can try to rustle up some pancakes for my favorite customer. You gonna help?”
“Sure. I’ll mix the batter like you showed me last time,” B.J. offered, trailing after her.
Boone watched them go, shaking his head. “I don’t know which of them’s going to give me my first heart attack, but odds on, it’s your grandmother.”
Gabi laughed. “She has that effect on all of us.”
“She told me you and your sisters were all coming home to help put this place back in working order,” he said, hoping he sounded casual, rather than panicked, which was the way just thinking about Emily made him feel.
Gabi gave him a knowing look. “Samantha just called. Emily’s flight landed about an hour ago. They stopped to pick up some things for Emily to wear. Apparently Em was in Aspen when I called her, and the clothes she had with her weren’t suitable for mopping.”
“Aspen, huh?” Boone said. “She gets around these days, doesn’t she?”
Gabi nodded. “Her reputation as an interior designer took off after the remodel she did for some actress was featured in a magazine. Now she’s working on all sorts of celebrity homes in Beverly Hills and Malibu. Last year she renovated somebody’s villa in Italy, and I think this trip was to look at a ski lodge for the friend of one of her regular clients.”
“Sounds glamorous,” he said, a sinking sensation in the pit of his stomach.
Wasn’t that what she’d always wanted, the high life with famous people? Some of their old friends accused her of being superficial and shallow, but he knew better. She’d been trying to fill some empty place in her soul with all the things she thought her simple life in North Carolina had been missing.
He wondered if she still saw that world as fascinating, if she’d gotten to know even one of those celebrities as a friend, rather than as a client. He’d learned a long time ago how much better it was to have a few people he could count on than a thousand acquaintances. The folks who’d been by his side when Jenny was sick and then stuck by him after her death had taught him the real meaning of friendship.
“I’d better go in and check on Grandmother,” Gabi said. She started toward the kitchen, then came back. “I’m sorry, Boone.”
He frowned at her serious tone. “Sorry for what?”
“The way Emily hurt you. She never meant to. There were just things she felt she needed to do. I think she always meant to come back, but then you married Jenny, and, well, you know how things went after that.”
Boone nodded, appreciating the sentiment but determined to make sure she knew it was unnecessary. “I accepted her decision a long time ago, Gabi. And just so you know, I don’t think she ever intended to come back. That’s why I moved on.”
Gabi glanced toward the kitchen and nodded. “Nobody blames you for that. And B.J.’s a great boy.”
“The best,” he agreed readily. “Probably no thanks to me. Jenny was an amazing mother. I think your grandmother’s influence accounts for a lot of that, too, same as it did with me.”
“Don’t sell yourself short.”
Boone watched her go, then sighed. Why was it that all the women in this family thought he was worth something...except the one who’d stolen his heart all those years ago?
* * *
Emily had prepared herself for seeing Boone again. At least she thought she had.
And yet the sight of him atop a ladder, his excellent butt hugged by a pair of worn jeans, his faded T-shirt stretched taut over a broad chest and outstanding biceps, was good enough to give her palpitations. A baseball cap had been pulled low, which made it hard to see his face, but she imagined his granite jaw, dark-as-onyx eyes and dimples were the same.
It had always been amazing to her that a man could be flashing fire hot as a furnace one second, flip a switch to a look as cold as the North Pole the next, and then turn right around and grin with the impish expression of a boy caught with his hand in the cookie jar. Boone Dorsett had always been something of a contradiction, in her opinion.
“Hey, Boone!” Samantha called out, when Emily just stood there, probably slack-jawed, taking in the view.
His head snapped around so fast he might have lost his balance if Emily hadn’t instinctively grabbed the ladder to steady it.
“Samantha,” he acknowledged solemnly before allowing his gaze to settle on Emily. “Emily.”
To her annoyance there was not one tiny shred of a difference in the way he spoke her name, no hint that she was any more special than her sister, that he used to have his hands and that sweetly seductive mouth of his all over her whenever they could sneak away to be together. Seriously, shouldn’t that have called for at least a hint of intimacy in the way he spoke her name?
That was then, she reminded herself sharply. The man is married now. He belongs to someone else.
“What are you doing here, Boone?” she asked irritably.
He held up a lightbulb. “Isn’t it obvious?”
“I