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“You and Diana do have a future together,” Joy continued assertively. “I know Diana will compromise on her end if the two of you just talk it out.”
Nick folded his arms across his chest. “You know what I realized a little while ago?”
“What?”
“I’ve had longer conversations with you than I’ve ever had with Diana.”
It took Joy a second to respond. “When two people are in love they don’t need to do that much talking.”
“Joy, I really would like you to drop this.”
But she would not be deterred. “This is your quandary. You and Diana didn’t talk enough before. Now you have to talk.”
Nick unwound his arms and reached out to place a hand lightly on Joy’s mouth. But she turned her head just then and his fingers got caught in her hair.
Joy’s eyes flew to his face while he untangled his fingers. She gazed at him askance for a second, then went right on. “The way I see it…”
The rest of her speech was cut off as Nick captured her face between his hands and out of aggravation covered her mouth with his. He had no thought of doing what he did next, but he’d caught her with her lips parted, and his tongue went where it wanted to go. Spontaneously his hands left her face to bring her up flush against his chest, locking them together in a full-length embrace.
He felt Joy’s tongue arch in uncertainty. Then her arms found their way around his neck and she made the fit even better by rising up on her toes. The sandals dropped from her fingers, and she was kissing him back.
Nick fought a desire to touch more of her with his hands, but that didn’t stop his enjoyment of her mouth. He had no sense at all of wanting to stop, though he did try for a millisecond to clear his head.
A couple of teenage boys walking by whistled their approval. It was only then that Joy and Nick put an abrupt end to what they were doing.
Joy’s arms dropped flaggingly from his neck. Nick let her body slide back down until her heels met the sand before he let go of her. He stared at her.
Joy stared back. Oh, my! Oh, my! she thought.
“Whoo!” Nick breathed. “Where did that come from?”
Joy eyed him incredulously. Where did that come from?
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I don’t know what got into me.”
“Well…ah.” Joy floundered inanely. “What I mean is…well…It’s the heat…the sun…The sun can make people do crazy things.”
“Right. The sun.” Nick stuck his hands in his pockets. “I thought it was a full moon that did that.”
“Right. That, too. And the sun.” Joy trained her eyes down at the sand. God! She’d been falling in love with Nick while he and Diana had been falling in love with each other. All it had taken was that kiss—that earth-shattering kiss—to make her face the truth.
Joy raised her eyes from the sand, but she didn’t meet his gaze head-on. She kept her focus on one neatly trimmed sideburn. “I should be going now. We’ve talked…and all.”
Was her face as red as she thought it was?
“We’ve talked,” Nicked agreed, suddenly subdued.
Joy started to leave. She got four large steps away, when Nick called her.
“Your sandals,” he said.
Joy came back. They both bent down at the same time to pick up her shoes. Their fingers accidentally touched and their eyes met briefly. With the speed of lightning Joy jerked her hand away. Nick gathered together her sandals and he extended them to her as they both straightened up.
Joy felt she should make one last comment on Diana’s behalf. “I know you’re letting your male ego get in your way. Will you stop being so obstinate and marry my sister!”
With that parting remark she walked away. When she looked back over her shoulder she saw Nick standing at the water’s edge, watching her retreat.
Chapter One (#ulink_36757d27-4e72-5981-9af7-7269237230e5)
“Maxie, I am not playing with you in that pile of leaves,” Joy complained to the huge mutt. She’d been enjoying a lazy Sunday until the dog’s insistence made her go outside.
The mutt pulled at its leash, yanking Joy along.
“Maxie…it’s cold out. Let’s just get to the woods and do what you made me think you needed to do.” She was walking him—though running was probably more accurate—in the rear grounds of the large, rambling house in Greenport where she still lived with her mother and a series of guests during the summer season. Her mother had turned the house into a bed and breakfast after her father’s death three years ago.
Maxie headed straight for the largest pile of leaves on the back lawn and made every attempt to climb to the top of the heap. Joy made every attempt to stop him until she slid on a patch of leaves coated with ice and tumbled into the pile. It was the end of November and the winter-cold air froze any moisture on the ground.
“All right. You want leaves, Maxie,” Joy said, laughing as she lay on her back. She let go of the leash, picked up a handful of leaves and threw them up at the dog.
Maxie barked happily.
“Can I play, too?” a voice asked from behind her.
As Joy looked up, her heart lurched, then quickened to a mile a minute. Nick. In an ungainly fashion, discombobulated as she was by his appearance, Joy struggled to get to her feet. Nick came to the rescue and took hold of her wrists to pull her up. Maxie sprang at him, his front paws ploughing into Nick’s back.
“What the…” Nick uttered, just before he landed indelicately on top of Joy, his thighs straddling her hips.
Lifting himself enough to balance his weight on his elbows, Nick smiled down at her. “Hi, Joy.”
“Nick…” His face was no more than inches from hers. Her heart was beating wildly.
Nick’s smile became a grin. “This kind of feels like where we left off the last time we were together.”
Joy was breathless just looking up at him without that reminder. Not that she needed any prompting to be reminded. “I—I think we should get up.”
A smile still on his mouth, Nick bounced back on his heels. Getting the leverage he needed, he sprang to his feet. Joy grasped his offered hands and got to her feet, noticing that Nick held on to her a touch longer than was necessary.
“What are you doing here?” Joy asked. It was about four and a half months since she’d last seen him. He’d accepted an assignment abroad two days after their morning on the beach. He hadn’t been back since.
“Where else would I be with your sister marrying my brother? They haven’t changed their minds, have they?” He brushed leaves off her shoulders.
“No, they haven’t changed their minds. They’re getting married in three weeks. The reception is going to be here in the house.” Joy was shivering more from her pulse going wild than from the cold. She was bundled up well enough, in a very heavy sweater, the war-surplus pea coat she wore to knock around in and a knit hat pulled down low on her forehead and covering her ears.
“Diana and Kevin didn’t expect you to be able to get back for their wedding.” Joy thought in horror about what she must look like to him. The sweater and coat had to make it seem like she’d added fifty pounds to her frame. And that wasn’t the worst of it. The hat! The hat was the worst. “You’re supposed to be in Europe.”
“I was in Europe yesterday. Now I’m here. I did what I had to do to get back.”
He thought she looked adorable. Her face was all eyes. The hair at her neck was hidden under the collar of her coat. “I wasn’t going to miss my brother’s wedding.” His first inclination had been to show up after the fact, but only because he was concerned that Kevin would be uneasy. Though when Kevin had called to tell him he was marrying Nick’s ex-fiancée, his brother hadn’t sounded uneasy.
Joy gazed up at him suspiciously, her eyebrows getting lost under her hat.
“What’s that look for?” Nick grinned as he picked out a few leaves that had stuck to her hat. He knew what she was thinking. Only she couldn’t have been farther from the truth. He was not in love with Diana. He hadn’t thought about her at all during the past four and a half months. He had thought a lot about the woman standing in front of him right now.
“You’re here to make trouble, right?” Joy nodded her head in emphasis.
“No, I’m not here to make trouble. Scout’s honor. Now do I get to come in out of the cold?” He made a point of flippantly hiking up the collar on his leather bomber jacket. The wind was buffeting her back and ruffling his hair. The cold wasn’t bothering him, but he expected she was freezing, given the way she was doing a little jig from foot to foot.
“Yes, you get to come in,” Joy replied tartly and turned toward the house.
Seeing that she was forgetting her mutt, Nick grabbed the leash and dragged Maxie along as he followed her into the house. Joy went through a back door straight into the inn’s large, homey kitchen. Nick unfastened the dog’s leash and hung it up on a hook near the door while Maxie took off.
Joy quickly yanked the ugly hat off her head, stuffed it in her coat pocket and tried casually to fluff her soft brown hair with her fingers. “Are you hungry?”
“Starved. I didn’t stop for lunch. How about going out with me for something to eat? Did you have lunch?”
“I’ve had lunch.” It was going on four p.m. “I’ll make you a couple of sandwiches. There’s some cold chicken.” Joy unbuttoned her coat and hung it on a peg near the back door. She didn’t feel she’d been able to do much with her hair.
“Cold chicken sounds great,” Nick said, taking his jacket off and hanging it on a peg alongside hers. “Kevin told me Diana’s been staying here till the wedding and that he comes out on the weekend. Did I miss him?”
“No. He’ll be back.” Joy closed the refrigerator door with the side of her hip. She had a platter of cold chicken and a jar of mayonnaise in her hands. “They went to have lunch with my mother at the restaurant that’s doing the catering. They’re still debating about some of the dishes they want at the wedding.”
“How come you didn’t go with them?” He moved to stand next to her at the counter.
Joy looked at him from the corner of her eye. She’d already taken in the lean-hipped fit of his black slacks and the bulky, wheat-toned sweater, that made it impossible not to notice his wide shoulders.
“I’m too much of a junk-food junkie to be on the food committee.” She meant to speak in a joking tone, but his nearness was giving her a case of apoplexy. The words came out flat.
His eyes roved over her profile. “What committee are you on?”
“Wedding attire and flowers.” Joy took two rolls out of a bakery bag on the counter and a knife from a drawer. “And…” She was about to say more but his hand came up to her hair, ending that train of thought. “What are you doing?”
“Smoothing down your hair,” Nick said easily. “Turn around and let me get the other side.”
Joy swung around to face him. She was secretly thrilled by his attention, which was exactly what had her bristling now. “You know what surprises me?”
“What surprises you?” He took the knife she didn’t realize she was still holding out of her hand and put it down on the counter.
“I’m surprised that you didn’t come back when Diana and Kevin first started dating.” Joy watched his gaze drop to her hips as she placed her hands there. For a second Joy wondered if she was intentionally trying to flatten her red sweater so he’d know it was the sweater that was puffy, not her hips.
“Actually I didn’t know Diana and Kevin were dating. The first I heard of them being a couple was when Kevin got ahold of me and told me they were getting married. But I wouldn’t have come back even if I had known.”
My eye! Joy muttered in her head. He certainly had come back quickly enough when he’d found out they were getting married.
“Do we really have to talk about Diana and Kevin?” He smiled. “I’d much rather talk about you.”
“There’s nothing about me to talk about.” Joy turned back to the counter. She picked up the knife and jaggedly sliced open both rolls.
“We could talk about your column. Or we could talk about whether you’ve been affected by the sun or any full moons since I’ve been gone.”
Joy’s face flushed deep red. Was he intentionally trying to embarrass her by bringing up that kiss? “Did Kevin tell you how he and Diana first got together?”
“No and I didn’t ask,” Nick responded disinterestedly.
“Diana needed a lawyer to collect money from one of her clients,” Joy said. “That was three months ago.”
Nick leaned back against the counter. “I assume Kevin got Diana’s client to fork over.”
Joy nodded. Taking a plate down from the cabinet overhead she placed the sandwiches on top of it. “He’s a very good lawyer.”
“No question about that.” Nick took the plate and walked over to the kitchen table in the center of the room.
Joy made a half turn in his direction. “Would you like a beer with that?”
“Okay.” Nick took a seat and stretched his legs out.
Joy came to the table with a glass, a bottle of beer and a bag of potato chips. She placed her bounty down within his reach and then took a seat across from him.
Nick opened the bag of chips, took a helping out and put them on his plate. He passed the bag to her. Joy took a handful of chips out for herself.
She watched him begin eating his sandwich.
He watched her munch on chips.
A stretch without any conversation went by while Joy commanded herself to get her eyes off him. Her command went unheeded.
Nick finished one sandwich. “How are you doing with your column?” He had read them all, having worked out an arrangement with the owner/editor of the Greenport News to have the paper forwarded to him. He’d even spoken to her editor a few times, which was how he’d known the paper was up for sale before any official announcement. He toyed with the idea of telling her that he was her new boss, instead of waiting until tomorrow at the Monday morning staff meeting.
“It’s going okay,” Joy returned. “Nothing all that exciting.” She did have something exciting in the works, but she didn’t want to go off on that tangent now. She was hoping to ease back into the topic of Diana and Kevin. She wanted a more definitive expression from him about his intent.
“You’re the one with the glamorous career,” Joy said, directing the conversation to his globetrotting. She knew he’d been in Russia, Egypt, then Europe during the past four and a half months. She’d hunted out every picture of his that had been published.
“It’s not at all glamorous. Living out of a backpack most of the time means not always showering. And it’s almost impossible to establish any relationships. As soon as I meet someone I’d like to get to know, I’m off to someplace else.”
Joy tipped her head slightly. “That doesn’t sound at all like the way you used to speak about your career.”
Nick shrugged his shoulders.
Joy was surprised by his change of attitude. It was the excitement she used to hear in his voice that had given her the impetus to seek out a similar career for herself as a journalist. She’d just gotten a go-ahead last Friday to take on an assignment in Bolivia, three days after Diana and Kevin’s wedding. She hadn’t told anyone about it yet. She thought it only right that she give her notice in to the Greenport News first.
Joy dabbed up some potato chip crumbs on the table with the tip of her finger. “That part about not getting a chance to really know people you wanted to get to know, did that include women you might have thought of getting serious with?”
“Are you asking me if I was interested in anyone romantically?”
“Was that what it sounded like?” She’d been trying to find out whether there had been any lessening in his feelings for Diana. It wasn’t because she was jealous, she reminded herself.
“That’s what it sounded like,” Nick said, grinning. He poured beer into his glass, then studied her over the rim as he took a deep swallow.
“So were you?” Joy impatiently met the mirthful look in his eyes.
