Love on Lavender Island (A Lavender Island Novel Book 2) Read Free Page B

how she liked it. She always tried to be early. It was one of the many business strategies her mother had taught her—to have the advantage of getting settled before the client walked in.
    Ginger had been imparting all this business advice with the hope that Paige would follow in her footsteps. Paige didn’t have the heart to tell her she wasn’t interested. And now, with her mother ill, it was even harder to come clean.
    Her mom had always bemoaned the fact that Paige scrambled around, working clusters of part-time jobs. She currently worked part-time at the Hollywood Film Library, part-time finding roles in commercials, and nights at the corner yoga studio. Her mom would tsk and shake her head, saying Paige should give that up and become the businesswoman she was meant to be—maybe take over Ginger’s event-planning business that catered to celebrities.
    Paige really didn’t want to. She used the acting thing and the Hollywood Film Library as her decoys—everyone knew she loved movies and had been appearing in commercials since she was fifteen. But what she really loved was the yoga studio. She didn’t look like a typical yoga teacher. She wasn’t long and lean, or even particularly graceful. She didn’t go barefoot all the time, wasn’t a vegetarian, and didn’t have a perfect behind. But teaching yoga part-time made her feel whole and fulfilled. The problem was she couldn’t figure out how to transform it into a career that her mom thought justified her college degree, so Paige simply kept quiet. For the time being, she’d help her mother. With the cancer diagnosis, Ginger needed Paige right now.
    Paige pored over the menu and ordered a bottle of red. Her mom was definitely right about this arriving-early thing. Paige was able to calmly read the menu and have a drink to tamp down her Adam jitters. She pictured him again and let out an involuntary sigh. She truly hadn’t expected him to be so . . . normal . Better than normal, really. She thought about the fact that he’d never married. And the rumors that he never left the mountain. Now she wondered about that. What had gone on all those years up here? Had he just lived a solitary life, with his brother and George and a few old ranch hands, and that was it? Working like a plow horse every day and doing nothing else? Sure, he was some kind of land baron now, with all that property he’d inherited, but had the cost for that been a hermit’s life?
    The waiter brought her bottle, and she waited as he poured. She didn’t recognize him. The staff and chefs for the Castle were said to live off the island, coming here for four days at a time and staying in the hotel itself until they were ferried back to their homes in Los Angeles. It was all part of keeping the island’s secrets.
    She sipped the wine, nodded to the waiter, then waited until he walked away so she could gulp down half the glass. As soon as she felt the first buzz of relaxation, she was able to sit back and take in the beauty of the place without her nerves going into overdrive. The dining room was nearly vacant, but her favorite view was outside: those interior island peaks were gorgeous and mysterious.
    After a few minutes, and a little more Zen buzz, she decided she was missing the best views, and some good sun, and asked the waiter if she could move outside.
    After she was reseated among the pine trees that surrounded the flagstone patio, enjoying the scenery and the way the sun danced through the oak leaves across the patio, Adam walked in.
    Paige straightened her back and twirled the wineglass between her fingers, trying to look as unruffled as possible. He was just so ridiculously good-looking—so unfair for a guy she’d hoped would amount to nothing. He’d thrown on a dinner jacket over his blue jeans—to meet the restaurant’s dress code, she supposed—and the effect was disarmingly sexy. He took his hat off as he made his way past the tables, the sun backlighting him, and his