Prologue

      “How long have the Wolfes owned this property?”

      Viviana Remington looked straight ahead rather than glance up at the tall, blond man walking a little too close for her to feel comfortable around him. When she and her brother had decided to sell off eight of twelve undeveloped acres of land on which their ancestral home sat, Giles Wainwright had suggested his developer cousin just might be interested.

      However, when Noah Wainwright walked through the doors of The Falls House and stared rudely at her with his large aquamarine eyes, she’d suddenly felt like a specimen on a slide under a microscope. And he had continued to watch her when sharing a light repast with her brother, future sister-in-law and Giles.

      Viviana concentrated, carefully putting one booted foot in front of the other as she led Noah down the sloping footpath into a valley. It had rained heavily the night before, and the earth was still soaked. She chanced a quick glance at him and would’ve lost her footing if Noah hadn’t caught her arm and steadied her. Viviana shivered, not from fear of falling but from the warmth of his hand and the sensual scent of his cologne. After her last disastrous relationship, she did not want a man to touch, look at or even smile at her. She was just that turned off by the opposite sex. And she did not know why, but there was something about Noah that intrigued her, even though she had a preference for dark-haired men.

      This time Viviana did give him a direct stare. She wasn’t into stereotypes, but Noah did not look like any developer she’d ever seen. She thought he was the perfect prototype for the quintessential California surfer with his long, sun-bleached and shaggy hair falling around his tanned face and neck.

      She felt the runaway beating of her heart against her ribs when he moved even closer. “Thank you.” The two words were a breathless whisper.

      Noah released her arm. “You’re quite welcome. But you didn’t answer my question.”

      Suddenly she recalled what he’d asked her. “One hundred fifty years.”

      Noah whistled softly. “That’s a long time. And you want to sell eight acres of your legacy.”

      “Yes.”

      “Why?” Noah asked.

      “I need the money to make repairs to the main house and update the guesthouses before I reopen the boardinghouse as a bed-and-breakfast.”

      * * *

      Noah stopped and shielded his eyes from the brilliant summer sun as he stared at the verdant landscape with towering trees and wildflowers growing in abandon. This was his second trip to Wickham Falls, a town boasting a population of four thousand permanent residents, and although he found it aesthetically beautiful, it still was much too rural and isolated for his tastes.

      “I suppose that’s as good excuse as any to sell off land.”

      “It’s not an excuse,” Viviana countered, “but a reason.”

      Lowering his hand, he met her eyes. There was something so incredibly sensual about Viviana Remington that Noah found it difficult to draw a normal breath. He knew it was rude to stare, but sitting across from her at the table, he hadn’t been able to pull his eyes away from her black, curly hair framing her delicate face and cascading down her back, her flawless golden-brown complexion, her large and clear toffee-colored eyes, and her full, lush mouth.

      A hint of a smile parted his lips. “Are you willing to sell some of your remaining four acres?”

      Viviana shook her head. “No. The Falls House sits on two acres, the guesthouses on one, and I need the remaining acre in the event a guest would like to book an outdoor event.”

      Noah thought about her brother’s fiancée’s suggestion he either build eight middle-income homes or sixteen moderately priced homes on one or half-acre lots. “I like what I see, but it’s going take some time before I decide which type of structures to design.” Since joining family-owned-and-operated Wainwright Developers Group, he had become involved in the division responsible for domestic sales.

      “You’re going to design the homes?”

      Noah looked at Viviana as if she had spoken a foreign language. “Yes. Why?”

      “I...I thought your focus was being a developer.”

      His