Linda Lael Miller Bundle Read Free Page B

get a sitter for the evening.”
    Ivy’s lovely face was alight again. “Great!” she chimed, turning to leave Shay’s office.
    “Wait,” Shay said firmly, stopping her friend in the doorway.
    Ivy looked back over one shoulder, her pretty hair following the turn of her head in a rhythmic flow of fine gold. “What?”
    “Don’t get any ideas about fixing me up with your brother, Ivy, because I’m not interested. Is that clear?”
    Ivy rolled her eyes. “Oh, for pity’s sake!” she cried dramatically.
    “I mean it, Ivy.”
    “Meet us at the Wharf at eight,” Ivy said, and then she waltzed out, closing Shay’s door behind her.
    Shay locked her desk, picked up her purse and cast one last disdainful look at the storyboards propped along the back of her bookshelf before leaving. She tried to be happy about the assignment and the money it would bring in, tried to be glad that the elegant house high above the beach was no longer her responsibility, tried to look forward to a marvelous dinner at Skyler Beach’s finest restaurant. But, as she drove toward Seaview Convalescent Home, it was all Shay could do to keep from pulling over to the side of road, dropping her forehead to the steering wheel and crying.

2
    S hay Kendall looked nothing like her illustrious mother, Mitch thought as he watched her enter the restaurant. No, she was far more beautiful: tall with lush brown hair that fell past her shoulders in gentle tumbles of curl, and her eyes were a blend of green and brown, flecked with gold.
    She wore a simple white cotton sundress and high-heeled sandals and when Ivy introduced her and she extended her hand to Mitch, something in her touch crackled up his arm and elbowed his heart. It was a sudden, painful jolt, a Sunday punch, and Mitch was off balance. To cover this, he made a subtle production of drawing back her chair and took his time rounding the table to sit down across from her.
    Ivy and Todd, having greeted Shay, were now standing in front of the lobster tank, which ran the length of one wall, eagerly choosing their dinner. Their easy laughter drifted over the muted chatter of the other guests to the table beside the window.
    Shay was looking out through the glass; beyond it, spatters of fading daylight danced on an ocean tinted with the pinks and golds and deep lavenders of sunset. Her eyes followed the gulls as they swooped and dived over the water, giving their raucous cries, and a slight smile curved her lips. An overwhelming feeling of tenderness filled Mitch as he watched her.
    He had to say something, start a conversation. He sliced one irate glance in Ivy’s direction, feeling deserted, and then plunged in with, “Ivy tells me that the house I bought belonged to your mother.”
    The moderation with which Mitch spoke surprised him, considering that he could see the merest hint of rosy nipples through the whispery fabric of Shay’s dress. He took a steadying gulp of the white wine Todd had ordered earlier.
    The hazel eyes came reluctantly to his, flickered with pain and then inward laughter at some memory. Mitch imagined Shay as a little girl, playing in that miniature house behind the gazebo, and the picture slowed down his respiration rate.
    “Yes.” Her voice was soft and she tossed a wistful glance toward Ivy and Todd, who were still studying their unsuspecting prey at the lobster tanks. In that instant Shay was a woman again, however vulnerable, and Mitch was rocked by the quicksilver change in her.
    He tried to transform her back into the child. “That little house in back, was that yours?”
    Shay smiled and nodded. “I used to spend hours there. At the time, it was completely furnished, right down to china dishes—” She fell silent and her beautiful eyes strayed again to the water beyond the window. “I only lived there for a few years,” she finished quietly.
    Mitch began to wish that he had never seen Rosamond Dallas’s house, let alone bought it. He felt as though he had