Nantucket Romance 3-in-1 Bundle (4 page)

Before Jennifer, there was Tracie, who talked incessantly but never said anything, and Natalie, who only wanted to go out. He’d taken her to DeMarco’s, Jared’s, and Brant Point Grill. He’d taken her to the aquarium, to Nantucket town shops, to Martha’s Vineyard. He hardly saw the inside of his cottage for weeks. Besides, Max didn’t like her.

Lately, he’d had all the time in the world to think, and he found himself yearning for something more. If he could just figure out what.

He pulled into the drive and turned off the ignition. Max stood between the two front seats, paws propped on the console.

Landon exited the Jeep, and Max followed, then trotted toward the house.

Landon’s eyes grazed past the neighbors’ houses, and that’s when his legs forgot how to work.

He felt as if he was trapped in a time warp as he watched her, on her hands and knees, tugging at a weed in the flower bed. With her flaxen hair pulled back into a ponytail, she was a vision straight from the past, and he blinked to make sure he wasn’t seeing things. Was dusk playing tricks with his vision?

No, she was there, and it was Sam. Her movements, the way she brushed wayward strands from her face with the back of her hand. Eleven years ago this summer she disappeared, but he could’ve picked her from a crowd of ten thousand.

He knew all the clichés about kindred spirits and soul mates, but there were no other words to describe what he’d felt for Sam. She was the only girl who’d ever captured him, mind, body, and spirit. The only girl he would’ve died for. Somehow that summer changed everything between them.

But standing here, seeing her now, summoned all the summers before. Thoughtful moments on the pier, lighthearted moments on his dad’s boat. Moments spent absorbing her strength and admiring her tenacity. She’d always drawn him like a blustery wind drew sailors onto the sea.

His eyes never left her form as his feet began a quiet march toward her.

Stupid, stupid weed!
Sam pulled at the stubborn green stalk that jutted out of the ground, her legs straining. Finally, the roots gave way, and she nearly toppled backward onto her rear end.

She’d spent the afternoon cleaning the inside of the house, just for her own sanity. Even Caden had refused to shower in the claw-foot tub until the soap scum had been scrubbed away. Her stepfather had apparently lost the desire for a clean house once his personal maid departed, but at least cleaning was a job she knew.

Sam grabbed a dandelion, wrapped it around her hand, and yanked it up by the roots. It dawned on her as she sat on her knees that she was doing the same task Emmett used to assign her. The thought bothered her, but she reminded herself it was for money this time, not for the whim of her stepfather. Still, a moodiness had enveloped her since their arrival, and the irony that Caden’s moodiness had been replaced by her own was not lost on Sam.

She sat back on her haunches and let the sharp wind smack her face. Seagulls cried, piercing the twilight, and she could hear the distant ebb and flow of relentless waves. Miss Biddle’s flagpole pinged. Her breath quickened, leaving her mouth as dry as sand. She wished she was back in her apartment making mac ’n’ cheese, or having a drink at Brewsky’s, or even scrubbing floors at Havernack, Kleat, and Thomkinson’s.

Sam closed her ears to the noise and plucked another dandelion, tossing it in a heap on the grass. She wondered if she should check on Caden, but she could hear the faint thudding of her bare feet on the back porch. It was getting dark anyway, and she would have to call it quits soon. She gathered the pile of weeds and stood, feeling her leg muscles stretch.

When she turned, she noticed a man’s figure standing a short distance away. She started, then took a step backward, trying to discern his features in the muted light. He was tall and solid-looking. It was odd the way he stood so still, silence weaving a web around him.

Sam was a strong woman, but alarm pumped through her veins anyway. “Can I help you?” Her heart thudded against her rib cage, but she infused her tone with confidence.

He shifted then, tucking his hands in his back pockets. His head tilted sideways in a familiar move that made her stomach feel as if a dozen seagulls were trapped inside.

“It’s me,” he said.

The sound of his voice resurrected a wistfulness for a time that was no more. A time when play reduced the hours between sunrise and sunset to mere moments. A time when companionship validated long silences. A time when safety was as close as his embrace.

Sam had always missed him. Always when she described him to Caden, always when she stood on a Boston pier, looking across the vast ocean, but she hadn’t known the depth of her yearning until now. Hadn’t known the utter darkness of her world until the sudden presence of his light.

Her breath left her lungs, delivering his name. “Landon.”

Four

S
am stared at Landon, the clump of weeds in her hand forgotten. They say when you die, the moments of your life play out like a movie in fast forward, and she knew what they meant now. But she wasn’t about to die. She felt more alive than she ever had, and the reason was the man standing a few feet away.

“Sam. It’s been a long time.” He pulled his hands from his pockets.

For a moment, she thought he would step forward and embrace her, but the years slipped between them.

“Eleven years.” The moment the words were out, she wished them back. Was he remembering the last time he’d seen her, at his brother’s funeral? She spoke quickly as if to run an eraser across her previous words. “How are you?” It was something she’d ask a stranger.

“I’m doing all right. Graduated and came back to the island.”

“Just like you always planned.”

He shifted, and a street lamp flickered on, illuminating the side of his face and casting shadows over the other side. She was acutely aware her own face was in the light now, and she felt strangely exposed. She brushed back the hair that had come loose from her band.

“Just like.” The corner of his mouth tipped.

Time stretched out like the shore along Madaket Beach. She wondered who he’d married, but she didn’t want to know. She wondered if he ever thought about her, but she was afraid to ask.

Sam dropped the weeds, letting them fall at her feet, and brushed the dirt from her hands.

“Where do you live now?” he asked.

She heard the unspoken questions.
Where’d you disappear to elevenyears ago? Why did you leave without a word?
The proverbial elephant was in the room.

“Boston.” She supposed it didn’t matter if he knew where she lived now. She supposed it didn’t matter now if he knew she’d been pregnant when she left the island. So long as he didn’t know who the father was.

He nodded slowly, and Sam knew he was wondering what the draw of Boston was. Her plans, as he well knew, had been to teach tennis for another year after high school to bulk up her savings for college. She was going to take two years at Cape Cod Community College and graduate to a bright future in environmental technology.

Now she was a commercial cleaner living in a neglected apartment with her fatherless adolescent. Wasn’t life funny?

“What are you doing there? What’s your life like?” He aimed a full smile at Sam, and she felt its impact. “I want to know everything.”

His warm eyes tugged at Sam. “I don’t know where to start.” He was too young to have laugh lines, but he had them anyway. His face had matured, time carving the angle of his jawline and the planes of his face.

“Where do you work?”

Sam shrank at the inevitable question. She was a far cry from the person she’d planned to become. Once, she’d planned to change the world. Now she changed toilet paper rolls in corporate restrooms.

“I work for K&D Services, a commercial cleaner in downtown Boston.” She could have stopped there but didn’t. “I clean office buildings.” It came out like a dare.

He searched her face, and she knew he saw right through her. She was silly for trying to pretend she was proud.

“I heard Emmett died.” He cocked his head. “I didn’t think you’d come back.”

She was grateful for the turn in topic, even if it wasn’t her favorite subject. She shrugged. “The house was left to me. I have to clean it out, put it on the market . . .”

“I figured that he would have left it to one of his buddies or something.”

“He probably would have if he’d thought to say so. I guess he didn’t plan on dying yet.” She didn’t want to talk about Emmett anymore. “How are your parents?” Guilt prickled at the thought of them.

A deep bark sounded across the lawn, and Landon turned toward it. “That’s my dog, Max. He’s wondering where I am.”

He looked at her again and picked up the conversation. “My dad is fine. He’s living in New Jersey near his brother. I’m afraid my mom passed away two years after you left.”

The loss must have hit Landon and his dad hard. “I’m sorry.”

He nodded. “Dad didn’t want to stay on the island, so I bought their place. We’re living there now.”

Sam’s ears hung on
we’re
. Of course he was married. Probably had the appointed 2.5 children. And the dog, of course.

Sam didn’t know why she begrudged him that. No one deserved happiness more than Landon; she was convinced there was not a better man alive. It wasn’t like she regretted her singleness. She’d had opportunities to marry, but she knew the grass wasn’t greener on the other side.

Having Landon and his brood living two doors down depressed her. He’d been the only light of her childhood, and even that was being snuffed out.

“Why don’t you come over to the house? We can catch up.”

She’d have to meet his family sooner or later, but she wasn’t willing tonight.

Caden came tearing around the corner of the house. “Mom, when’s dinner?” She stopped when she saw Landon, looking back and forth between them.

Sam swallowed. “Caden, I’d like you to meet Landon Reed.” She forced her eyes to her old friend, but it was too dark to read his expression. “This is my daughter, Caden.”

Caden smiled. “Hi.” Sam was glad Caden didn’t add that Sam had told her nearly everything there was to know about him. Except that Landon had loved her. She’d never told Caden that.

“Nice to meet you.”

Sam wondered what he was thinking. Caden was small for her age, and he might think she was nine or ten. The thought relieved her.

“I’m getting hungry.” Even in the dimness, Sam could see the streaks of dirt on her daughter’s legs and the wet strands of hair alongside her face.

“Shower first, okay? I’ll have something ready when you’re done.”

“All right.” She left as quickly as she’d appeared, leaving an awkward silence in her wake.

“I should go in too. It’s getting late.” A mosquito landed on the back of her arm, and she smacked at it.

Landon took a step backward. “Sure.” He kicked at the grass. “I guess I’ll be seeing you around.”

“Yep.” She gathered the weeds she’d dropped.

“Good night.” He backed away.

“’Night.”

When he left, Sam let out her breath, and her body sagged onto the stoop. Landon Reed. She could hardly believe he’d been standing in front of her just a moment ago. When she’d left the island, she thought she’d never see him again. That was the plan, really, and yet here she was, back in Nantucket. Two doors down from him, just like old times, before everything became so confusing. Before that last summer.

Sam had been eighteen, and the last days of summer bore down on her with the speed of a monsoon. Landon took her out on his dad’s boat for the day, but by evening an unsettling quiet fell over them.

She reeled in her fishing line and secured the hook on one of the pole’s rings. Landon stared out to sea, his gaze cast in the direction of the mainland. Three more days. Her heart did that funny flop that happened every time she thought about his leaving. She set her pole on the floor of the boat and leaned back against the rail, closing her eyes. The boat rocked gently beneath her.

“I’ll be back for Thanksgiving break. It won’t be that long.”

She’d seen him nearly every day of her life. Three months was a lifetime. Of course, it would pass quickly for him. He’d be having fun, taking classes, meeting new people. New girls.

Sam clenched her jaw until it hurt. Why should she care about that? He was like a brother. Closer than a brother. Something in her refuted the thought, but she resisted the argument.

Something tickled her bare leg, and she opened her eyes. Landon was beside her, his knee propped up on the bench, his elbow poking outward. The wind tousled his hair.

“Who am I kidding?” he said. “I can’t imagine three months without—without seeing you.”

Sam had never seen him so solemn. He hadn’t shaved that morning, and a light coat of stubble covered his jaw. She wanted to draw her fingers across it and feel the coarseness against her hand. She turned away, his words echoing in her head.

She didn’t care if he would miss her. It was his choice to go away to college. He was doing this to them. She knew he had dreams, but Sam had her own too. It wasn’t fair that he got to go away while she had to stay here and work for another year to afford college.