kisses after football games. Pressing her up against the locker after school, feeling her breasts against his chest, pretending to be talking about homework. She’d blush and flush and fluster, but then she’d look at him from under those thick black eyelashes. Teasing him. Emma had loved turning him on, loved the power of it, the fun of it, the joy of it. They’d tempted wicked every which way from Sunday. She’d made him hotter than fire—and far more frustrated.
She’d been shy back then, but there’d been no guile to her, no ability to hold back. For sure there’d been no distance. There’d just been all that honest, helpless young-woman heat in her eyes. The dare-you-to-melt-my-bones look. She’d turned him into putty.
And he’d loved dying from all those hard-ons with no release.
But hell and damnation, if she was engaged, how come she’d still looked at him that way? Unguarded, winsome…as if she were dying to feel those feelings again. With a man. With him.
You’re imagining all this, he told himself—and knew it was true. He was soul-tired, beyond the ability to think clearly. He needed a good night’s sleep—and then he needed to concentrate on his sister.
Not on a woman who was already claimed by someone else.
Three
A few mornings later, Emma stood outside Color with a contractor. She’d been running nonstop, organizing her traditional art show in July, when she’d run into a major maintenance problem.
The contractor hiked up his jeans. “Actually, ma’am, the house didn’t suddenly start to sink on that side. The problem was likely developing over a long period of time.”
“Well, no one noticed it before.” Emma wanted to tear out her hair. A maintenance problem certainly wasn’t news. Two-hundred-year-old houses regularly developed ghastly ailments. If it wasn’t dry rot one year, it was corroded wiring or termites the next. “I just can’t have a big mess right now! Can we put off the work until October?”
“Well, I wouldn’t, ma’am.”
“You call me ma’am one more time and you won’t see October, either,” she said crossly, and sighed. “Okay. Let’s hear the plan.”
“Yeah, well, we’re gonna put up new house jacks. Take down your old porch pillars. Reframe pillars around the new house jacks, but hinged, like, so they’re accessible. That way we could do this slow, push up that second story a smidgeon at a time. Don’t want to crack this pretty foundation, now, do we?”
Emma’s eyes narrowed. He was so twinkly. “But why did the house decide to sink now?”
“Taking a wild guess now…but probably because the house is older than the hills and then some?”
“Easy for you to joke. You’re going to charge me, what, five figures?”
“Yup, in that general ballpark,” he confirmed.
And there was the real rotten apple. Her thirtieth birthday was on August thirty-first—so close now, but not close enough to access the trust fund her grandmother had established for her. In the meantime, she knew her parents would float her the money, but there was always a heavy price tag for those gifts.
To add to the morning’s confusion, Josh chose that moment to poke his head out the back door. “Mrs. Dearborn’s on the phone, Emma—”
“If you don’t mind, just tell my mom I’ll call her back, okay? Thanks—”
She’d barely given the contractor the okay to destroy her spring budget when she noticed a woman pause at the gate of the white picket fence. The woman was so familiar and yet not. Years before, Emma had attended high school with a girl who had curly, waist-length hair; wore wildly unconventional clothes and had an irrepressible rebellious streak. This woman was groomed to the teeth, a grown-up debutante by Eastwick standards in every way, yet there was just something…“Mary?” she called out hesitantly. “Mary Duvall? Is that really you?”
“I was wondering if you’d recognize me,” the woman said.
“As if I could ever forget you!” Emma flew across the lawn to whisk open the gate and draw her old friend into a huge hug, the day’s frustrations immediately forgotten. “I thought you were still in Europe, living the high life. It’s wonderful to see you!”
“You, too, Emma. And God, I could smack you. You’re as beautiful as ever, except…” Her old school friend laughed as she noted the bit of clay under Emma’s fingernails. “What’s this?”
“I volunteer a couple of hours a week at the local grief center, working with the little ones—and I mean really little ones, the pre-K set. I do finger painting with them or drawing or clay. Love it…” She chatted on a moment more, trying to absorb the changes in her old friend. Mary had disappeared right after graduation to go party in Europe. She was an artist, Emma had heard. It was just…unnerving to see her dressed like a dowager going to a tea party when she’d always been so flamboyant and unconventional. “What are you doing in town? Any chance you’re back for good?”
“I have no idea how long I’ll be here. Right now I’m just here for my grandfather. He’s not well. At his age, there aren’t a lot of great choices, you know? But he can’t be alone, so I’m just going to live with him for a while.” Mary motioned to the Colors sign. “The last time I was home, your gallery was just a dream.”
“She’s still my dream,” Emma admitted with a chuckle and then snapped her fingers. “Say, did you bring any work home with you? Anything you’d like me to display? I have a room for local artists, but especially for you, I’d always find a special spot.”
“Maybe. I did bring some work with me. I figured I’d be sitting with my grandfather a lot, so I might as well set up an easel while I was home…. In the meantime, what’s new with you? Married now, kids or anything?”
“Engaged. To Reed Kelly.”
“You’re kidding! Reed, the horse breeder? The racehorses—”
“Yup, that’s him.”
“He was older than us in school, so I didn’t know him well, but I always thought he was such a great guy—”
“He is, he is….” Yet Emma felt a sudden odd itch in the middle of her back. Nothing painful. Just as if a mosquito had suddenly nailed her.
She purposefully ignored it and talked a few more minutes with Mary until she had to leave, and heaven knew Emma had mountains of work still waiting for her. Messages had accumulated in her office—three from her mother. A fund-raiser her mother wanted to attend, a ribbon cutting on a new boutique, a reception for a visiting senator. Nothing Emma wanted to do. All, she suspected, that she’d get roped into. Josh was framing a set of canvases in the back room—stealing her favorite job, or so she teased him.
She’d just run outside to accept a delivery from UPS when she spotted Garrett hiking down the walk of the real-estate office across the way. He turned in the direction of her gallery—probably because his car was parked on Maple—yet he seemed to glance in her direction almost instinctively.
His smile was immediate. His stride quickened. By the time he’d crossed the street, she had the oddest sensation that he’d been taking her in, head to toe. As a boy, he’d always had those bedroom eyes—but teenage boys always had their minds on one thing. It was completely different feeling assessed—and appreciated—by a man who knew women, who knew how much fun—and how dangerous—the right kind of chemistry could be.
She wasn’t usually self-conscious about her appearance, but this was one of her free days. She’d not only started the morning working with little kids but had also expected to spend the rest of the day with boxes and frames and ladders. Her hair was casually pinned up with a simple enamel clip. She was wearing lipstick and her grandmother’s star-sapphire earrings, but that was it for the fussing. Her twills were ancient, her purple shirt too oversize to be