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His Small-Town Sweetheart
Amanda Berry
BEST FRIENDS…FOREVER Twenty years ago, Nicole Baxter left the only home she knew – and the boy who shared all her secrets. Now she’s back in Tawnee Valley to figure out her next move and cry on her old friend Sam Ward’s shoulder. When Nikki moved away, Sam lost his best friend. The beautiful, elegant woman who returns is worlds away from the tomboy with pigtails and skinned knees she’d once been. And he’s no longer a kid who believes in happy endings. But seeing Nikki again convinces him that they still share the same dream: a future together…
“Sam? Oh, my God. Sam Ward, is that you?”
“Great,” he muttered, “the crazy woman in my tree knows my name.”
Nicole pushed away from the trunk and started down with the use of the rope.
“I wouldn’t use that rope,” he said and moved closer.
“Why not? It got me up here.” Her skirt blew in the breeze and he caught a glimpse of her long legs.
“Because it might—”
Before he could finish the sentence, the rope snapped in two. He rushed forward and grabbed the woman around the waist to stop her from falling to the ground. Her back pressed into his front. Her hair smelled floral and like expensive perfume with rich undertones. It made him want to lean down and draw in more of the scent.
He set her down in front of him. She spun immediately and pressed the length of her body against him and hugged him around the neck, pulling him down to her height. She was at least a foot shorter than him. Even if she was crazy, his body responded to the soft curves pressed into his hardness.
“I can’t believe it’s you.”
His Small-Town Sweetheart
Amanda Berry
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Between walking her Jack Russell-beagle mix, petting her two cats and driving her two kids all over creation, AMANDA BERRY writes contemporary romance novels (thanks to a supportive husband). A Midwest girl stuck in the wetlands of South Carolina, she finds inspiration in her small-town upbringing. A list of her current releases and backlist can be found at amanda-berry.com (http://amanda-berry.com).
To my Little Man and Lady Jane.
When your path is dark know that at the end of it there is light. You two are my light.
Contents
Cover (#u18e7dd5f-5b0d-55ad-bccf-9971ec941f3c)
Excerpt (#uae3dd245-5857-5770-a4f0-e0f442798213)
Title Page (#uc21c8595-8e2f-5ba0-a322-fc3b6b2d78be)
About the Author (#uf33f97fb-3969-5f3f-aaa9-d58c46f42a8d)
Dedication (#ua37f23f6-23a3-59d1-bc83-311413b8d3b8)
Chapter One (#u61ab0dcf-0e7e-5ba2-a37f-de1dad17fc4b)
Chapter Two (#uf23c37cd-3ee2-59fc-b294-4246931e4148)
Chapter Three (#u2a6437c9-df78-5e5d-b4f8-9664bba59b18)
Chapter Four (#ud83a1a3c-c662-53a3-b888-973f67ae4589)
Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#ulink_8f12b202-72fd-5c06-a807-a9d4ac54b314)
At least I’m on the right side of the grass. Better on top than below. Nicole Baxter stood in the last place she’d ever thought she’d end up—the front porch of a farm she hadn’t been to in seventeen years. The fields were lush from the months of spring rain they had received. Even the stifling heat of the Illinois summer hadn’t diminished the crops. With fall approaching, it wouldn’t be long before the fields were stripped of their bounty.
“You all settled in your room?” Her father, John Baxter, joined her on the porch.
“Yes.” She smiled up at him and shifted on her high heels. Probably the last time she’d wear them for a while. “Thanks again for letting me stay here. I swear I’ll only be here for a few weeks. A month, tops. Just until I get back on my feet again.”
“This is your home. You stay as long as you like.” His gaze followed the combine out in the western field. Her twin brothers, Ethan and Wes, were out there working.
“Thanks.” She could argue with him, insist that she wasn’t used to taking charity. That this hadn’t been her home in a long time. That this was only a temporary setback. A few weeks in the uncomplicated town of Tawnee Valley would help her heal from her breakup and find a new job that was ten times better than the one that had been eliminated.
“I think I’ll take a walk.” Nicole stretched her arms over her head and let the heat of the sun melt away her worries. It was only her first day back, and she couldn’t imagine spending it inside, searching the internet for a job. It wasn’t as if she didn’t have time on her hands.
“In those things?” Her father looked skeptically at her three-inch heels.
“I won’t go far. Besides, the ground isn’t that soft.” She flashed him a cheeky grin. “And they match my outfit.”
“You’re going to do what you are going to do, no matter what I say.” Her dad shook his head.
She kissed him on the cheek and stepped off the porch. As she reached the fence gate, she turned and waved at him. Her floral skirt swirled around her knees. While inside the house, her bag was a mess. She’d packed in a few hours, desperate to get out of the apartment she’d shared with Jeremy. Seven years down the toilet because they weren’t “connecting” anymore. Whatever that meant.
It was going to take her a few hours to unpack in her old bedroom. But she was through waiting for stuff. She’d waited for Jeremy’s proposal. She’d waited for a promotion. The only things waiting had gotten her were no boyfriend and no job. And not enough money to stay in LA.
As she walked far enough away that the house disappeared behind a hill, she took in a full breath and spun in a circle. Seventeen years and she still felt most at home here, where she’d played as a child. After her parents divorced when she was fourteen, her mother had taken her to LA, and the twins had stayed with Dad.
Even though this path was a little overgrown now, she followed it, just as she’d traveled it almost every day until she was fourteen.
Best days of her life. She wanted to recapture that time and forget all the crap that came after. Deep in the wooded part of their land, right where it abutted the Ward farm, was where she and her best friend would meet. She headed toward the tree, hoping their creation was still there.
When her heel sank into the ground slightly, she stopped and pulled off her shoes. Her toes curled into the damp grass. It felt wonderful, liberating. How long had it been since her feet had been in grass? As she approached the fence, she looked around. Didn’t her father say that Sam Ward was in charge of the farm now?
A little thrill went through her heart. She went to the post where it was easiest to climb the fence. It wasn’t as easy as when she was a kid, but she got over and wouldn’t be embarrassed if someone saw her do it with her skirt hitched up over her knees. Back then, she’d worn jeans or shorts and a T-shirt that might or might not have been washed since the last time she wore it. Her mother had put her hair into two braids to keep it from getting too tangled. She’d always come home wearing more mud than a hog trying to get cool in the summer heat. Band-Aids covered her knees. Her nails were broken and dirty. A happy little mess.
Now her nails were perfectly manicured. Her knees were smooth and clean with only a few scars from her childhood adventures. Her dark hair flowed over her shoulders, tangle-free with the right products and a straightening iron. Her skirt and blouse were feminine with flowers, the way Jeremy had always liked her to dress. Maybe she should go shopping...
As she rounded a bend, she saw it. After all these years, it was still there. The slab of wood they’d built up in the tree and called a tree house. She stopped in front of the tree and dropped her shoes to the ground. Glancing around and seeing no one, she smiled and grabbed the rope.
* * *
Sam Ward had never minded chores, but he was getting tired of finding damaged fencing along his property borders. John Baxter was usually good about it; if he found it first, he fixed it. But the new guy who’d bought the place to the south loved to drive his four-wheeler in his fields, but not actually keep up the fencing or anything else.
As Sam walked the fence bordering the Baxter property, Barnabus, his big, shaggy dog, trailed along behind him. Suddenly Barnabus lifted his head and gave a sharp bark before trotting into the woods.
Sam whistled, but the dog kept going. Probably a squirrel or something, but it could be a larger injured animal. He had sheep in the field at this time of year, but even a squirrel would be a welcome interruption into the monotony his life had become. Since his recovery from his valve surgery, he had been feeling ten times better than earlier this spring, prior to the operation. The tedium hadn’t bothered him before, but now he felt as if he’d been wasting his life out here all these years. Some days he wished he could just move away and start over. But this was his family’s farm, passed down to him by his parents.
A flash of white in a tree caught his attention. He quickened his pace down the old trail. If that new neighbor was littering on his land, he’d need to have a talk with him. But as he got closer, what Sam saw in the tree made no sense.
A slender young woman in a floral skirt and blouse stood on the platform that had once been his tree house. Her black hair lifted and floated on the wind. As he drew closer, he noticed the high heels at the base of the tree.
“You’re trespassing,” he called up to the clearly insane woman in his tree.
“No, I’m not. I built this place with my own two hands.” She turned and leaned forward against a thick offshoot of the trunk. She had the smile of a garden fairy, full of mischief. He couldn’t tell her eye color from so far away, but he could tell her eyes were light.
“I built that tree house almost twenty years ago.” He squinted as the sun moved to shine into his eyes.
“Sam?” Her voice sounded incredulous. “Oh, my God. Sam Ward, is that you?”
“Great,” he muttered, “the crazy woman in my tree knows my name.”
She pushed away from the trunk and started down with the use of the rope.
“I wouldn’t use that rope,” he said and moved closer.
“Why not? It got me up here.” Her skirt blew in the breeze and he caught a glimpse of her long legs and pink boy-short underwear before he could look away.
“Because it might—”
Before he could finish the sentence, the rope snapped in two. He rushed forward and grabbed the woman around the waist to stop her from falling to the ground. Her back pressed into his front. Her hair smelled floral and like expensive perfume with rich undertones, making him want to lean into her and draw in more of the scent.
He set her down in front of him. She spun immediately and pressed the length of her body against him and hugged him around the neck, pulling him down to her height. She was at least a half foot shorter than him. Even if she was crazy, his body responded to the soft curves pressed into his hardness.
“I can’t believe it’s you,” she said. Her tone made it seem as if she was ecstatic to see him. No one was that happy to see him. She must be certifiable.
She finally pulled away. Maybe she’d finally noticed he wasn’t holding in return. “Sam, it’s me.”
He looked into the crazy lady’s light green eyes. Surrounded by her dark lashes, the green reminded him of spring and new growth.
“You don’t know who I am, do you?” She smiled, and her eyes sparkled. Her lips drew his attention.
Aware of how close they were standing, he took a step back. “Should I?”
“Are you scared I’ll give you cooties or something?” She laughed, and it tickled the air around his ears pleasantly. “I cross my heart and hope to die that I have not been infected.”
When she crossed her heart with her finger, his gaze took in her breasts and waist and hips. By the time he lifted his eyes to hers, she had her eyebrow raised and was watching him with such an intensity that a spark of awareness flowed through him.
“Oh, I think he might have it, folks,” she said in a game show–style voice. “Come on. You never were as fast as I was, but I thought since you grew up so damned tall... When did you get that tall?”
“Nikki?” He couldn’t keep the awe from his voice. The corners of his mouth twitched into a quick smile. This couldn’t be the same tomboy with hair falling out of her braids and dirty jeans. She’d been straight as a rail and proud of it.
She grinned. “I go by Nicole now. Mom thought it sounded more mature, and who was I to argue with her?”
“You left.”
“All right. Apparently it’s going to take you some time to catch up. Yes, my mom and I moved to California when I was fourteen after the divorce. I’m back now. Staying with Dad until I can get back on my feet.”
“Are you sick?” He took a partial step forward, searching for signs of sickness. His own brush with illness was still a fresh wound, though he was almost completely healed.
Her brow furrowed and she shrugged. “No, just having issues with life in general.”
He rubbed his hand over the back of his neck. His brain was still trying to reconcile the beautiful woman in front of him with the rough-and-tumble tomboy best friend he used to know. “What were you doing in the tree?”
She swung around and looked up into the tree. “I wondered if I could still climb it.”
“In a dress?”
She looked at him over her shoulder and smiled. “It’s a skirt. I didn’t think anyone would be out in the field at this time of day. I just remember how many days we spent up there and wondered if I could feel that way again.”
“What way?” He squinted up at the old tree house. “Dirty with splinters in your feet?”
Her laughter made his gut tighten. He wasn’t sure if he wanted to hear it more, or not at all. It made him feel strange.
“Maybe,” she said before she turned back to him and closed the distance between them until her toes were only a few inches from his boots. She put a hand on top of her head and moved her hand toward his chest. “How did you get so tall? We were the same height when I left.”
