Loving Bailey Read Free

from the big noisy family
who always did what was expected of her, the idea of someone
turning a light on just her so she could shine held a secret
appeal. The fact it was a hot guy behind the spotlight was icing on
the cake.
    There hadn’t been many hot guys in Bailey’s
life, at least not any she’d paid attention to. She dated a little
in high school, but her brothers scared off anyone who started to
get serious. By the time she’d gotten to culinary school, she’d
been too focused on her career to have much of a social life. Then
came the restaurant and for the first two years, she worked so much
she didn’t even have time to think about dating.
    Besides, the only man she’d ever wanted was
Trace.
    She’d been clear about her interest in him.
She dropped armloads of hints and when he didn’t take them, she
started inviting him to dinner. He always found a reason to say no.
He was too busy. Something on the farm needed his attention. After
a while the excuses got so lame, she stopped asking.
    The thing was, every time he turned her down,
he’d do something nice for her. He’d bring her something special –
flowers from the farm or berries, extra fat tender asparagus. Or
he’d take her car down the mountain to get the oil changed. The
last time he brought it back it had been vacuumed, wiped down with
Amor All, and smelled like a tiki lounge, all pina colada and
tropical flowers.
    He did the kind of things her brothers and
dad did. He took care of her, but he wouldn’t date her.
    If he didn’t want her she could maybe let it
go. She’d hate it but she could move past it. Yet for the longest
time, she was pretty sure he did want her. She might be innocent –
a fact she was starting to despise – but she could tell when a guy
liked her. He didn’t look at her like a brother or a friend. More
than once she caught Trace watching her with something she would
have sworn was longing.
    Didn’t matter, she thought, stomping down the
hill toward what was left of the lake. If he was interested, she
couldn’t get him to act on it, so it didn’t matter.
    She passed the lodge and the outside pool
with its cover firmly in place and started to make her way around
what used to be the lake’s shoreline. The red roofed gazebo which
had doubled as a boat dock and where Baby had the “you disappointed
me, too” conversation with her father stood dry and exposed on
pillars growing out of what had become a field.
    She walked around the edge of the lake bed,
imaging what it would be like when it filled again. Since the
remodel, the owners of the lodge had been trying to draw crowds
back to play at the place which had been a resort since the late
1800s. They hosted Valentine’s and holiday weekends along with the
occasional Dirty Dancing themed getaways, but without the lake it
was hard to see how it could be sustainable.
    Putting her restaurant at the top of the
mountain was the most reckless thing she’d ever done. She’d started
to draw a steady crowd of regulars from Blacksburg and even as far
away as Roanoke. The changing menu and exceptional local meats and
produce made Seasons the destination restaurant she’d dreamed of
owning, but traffic wasn’t enough to be sustainable. She had to
sink every dime she had into the restaurant, and she still barely
made ends meet.
    When the lodge filled along with the lake it
could only help her business. Because of the lake or lack of one,
she’d gotten a great deal on the building, but she’d used all her
grandmother’s inheritance to buy and remodel the restaurant. When
she’d opened, everyone assumed the lake would fill again in a year
or two. Almost six years later and it still stood empty.
    Trace’s farm supplied all the local produce
she used and he never hesitated to plant something special if she
asked him. He was a big part of what made the restaurant special.
She wanted him to be part of more.
    Bailey pushed through the brush to get to the
driveway at Newport