Every Little Kiss

PRAISE FOR THE NOVELS OF KENDRA LEIGH CASTLE

For the Longest Time

“A delightful story filled with endearing characters and laugh-out-loud humor.”

—
USA Today
bestselling author Katie Lane

“Sweet and sexy character-driven romance!”

—Fresh Fiction

“A great romance story . . . yummy sparks and heated passion.”

—Stuck in Books

“
For the Longest Time
adeptly shows that even misfits and dreamers can go home again.”

—Heroes and Heartbreakers

“Characters you love to love and a few furry ones who will melt your heart. This has everything.”

—Open Book Society

“If you’re a fan of Jill Shalvis or Kristan Higgins, you’re going to want to pick this one up. . . . Definitely on my must-read list from here on out.”

—Fic Fare

“I devoured it . . . beautifully written small-town romance.”

—Under the Covers

“Castle’s Harvest Cove promises to be worth repeated visits.”

—
Publishers Weekly

The Harvest Cove Series

For the Longest Time

SIGNET ECLIPSE

Published by the Penguin Group

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First published by Signet Eclipse, an imprint of New American Library,

a division of Penguin Group (USA) LLC

Copyright © Kendra Leigh Castle, 2015

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ISBN 978-0-698-14172-8

PUBLISHER
’
S NOTE

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

For my sister, with
love

B
reaking up a wild party in his own neighborhood wasn’t Seth Andersen’s idea of a fun Saturday night, but he found himself trudging up the walk toward the door of 121 Juniper a little after midnight anyway. It wasn’t a big deal. When the call had come in, he’d nearly been home, technically off-duty but still in uniform, and Jess, the dispatcher, knew he’d take it. Harvest Cove was a small place. He could manage what would probably amount to nothing more than a “knock it off” conversation with the guy who lived three houses down. Hell, the sight of a uniformed officer at the door was usually enough to drive the point home, and he’d had an impromptu cookout with Aaron Maclean only a week ago. This shouldn’t be a problem.

He sure hoped not, because right now, all he wanted was his bed. He’d learned to sleep through the sounds of artillery fire out in the desert, but he’d rather not have to try to sleep through Pitbull’s praising of his woman’s booty, over and over and over to a beat that could wake the dead.

Judging from the noise coming from the little Cape Cod, Seth figured that the house, not too different from his own, had to contain a couple hundred people more
than it ought to fit. He was halfway to the door when it opened on its own. At first he thought Aaron had seen him and was coming out to save some time, but there was nothing masculine about the figure that stumbled through the door and nearly toppled into the bushes. Nothing masculine, Seth realized, but everything familiar.

It was just a little sad that he had the curves of a woman he’d never spoken to so thoroughly memorized.

“Emma?”

He blurted her name before he could think better of it, and the blank look she gave him as she shoved her hair out of her face only confirmed what he’d suspected: He’d lived in Harvest Cove for six months, and Emma Henry still had no clue who he was. Maybe it was the time he’d spent in the army—he’d gotten good at blending in with the scenery when he had to. But Seth thought it was more likely that Emma just didn’t notice anything not already on her to-do list. She sure seemed that type, and nothing he’d heard about her had ever changed the impression. Everything from her tailored suits to the way she clipped around in those sexy heels screamed all business, all the time.

Not tonight, though. Turned out she owned a pair of jeans after all—and from the smell, he thought she might be wearing as much beer as she’d imbibed.

“Something wrong, Officer?” Emma straightened, shoved her long, dark hair out of her face again, and put on what he expected she thought was an innocent expression. Not a bad effort, but her inability to stay still while maintaining her balance was kind of ruining the effect.

“Nothing too bad, Miss Henry,” Seth replied, remembering his manners this time as he ambled forward. He was just some random cop to her. Probably just as well.
“We’ve had a few noise complaints from the neighbors. I came by to let Mr. Maclean know that he needs to either calm things down or break it up.”

“Oh. Are we that loud?”

He tried not to smile, since she seemed sincere.

“Yes. Yes, you are.”

“Wow. I’m really sorry.”

Her eyes rounded. The light out here was dim, but Seth knew from his previous almost-encounters with her that they were a startling forget-me-not blue made even more striking by her fair skin and dark hair. Usually she had all that hair pulled back, but he liked it this way, with the thick waves down past her shoulders. Some of the ends were damp, though, and Emma was having a hard time keeping it out of her face. She shoved at it again, frowning, her full lower lip plumping further when she stuck it out to concentrate.

She was cute. And really, really drunk. It seemed so utterly out of character for her that he had to work at suppressing his amusement. As he got closer, he could see that her shirt was even damper than her hair, the dark fabric clinging to her breasts. He couldn’t help but notice—her curves were impossible not to notice, even at his most distracted. Still, her bedraggled, slightly bewildered appearance left him feeling more protective than turned on. She needed to be home, tucked in and sleeping this off, not wandering outside at this hour. Bad things happened everywhere, even in the Cove.

Seth sighed inwardly. His bed was looking farther away than he’d hoped.

“Do we know each other?” Emma asked, wrinkling her nose and looking utterly confused.

“No.”

“How’d you know my name, then?”

“The Cove’s not that big, Miss Henry,” he said. “You run the party-planning business down on the square. I’ve only been here for six months, but knowing who’s who is part of my job.”

That seemed to satisfy her, at least well enough to change the subject. “Oh. Well, Officer . . .”

“Andersen.”

She blinked and appeared to mull that over for a moment. “Okay,” she finally said, and Seth knew she had tried—and failed—to place what should have been a familiar last name. “You’re not going to arrest anybody, are you? It’ll ruin my sister’s party if you do.”

“Your sister’s party?”

One dark brow arched. “She’s getting married.” Even as drunk as she was, the “you idiot” on the end was strongly implied. He had to swallow a laugh. Not everyone could be wasted and beer-stained, and still pull off “haughty” this well.

“Ah,” Seth replied. Now her presence at the house party—not to mention her condition—made sense. “Bachelorette party, then.”

“Yeah.”

Seth’s eyes went to the door, considering it. “Please tell me there aren’t any strippers in there.”

She snorted. “If there were naked people in there, I would know. I mean, I think. I hope there aren’t any naked people in there.”

Her small smile hinted at the promise of an absolutely gorgeous full one. He’d never seen her smiling. But he’d certainly like to.

Jesus, Andersen, just get this over with and go home.

He cleared his throat. “Well, whatever the stripper situation is, I need to speak to Mr. Maclean, Miss Henry. Are you heading back in?”

She hesitated, then turned her head to look at the house. “I guess.”

His eyes narrowed. “You weren’t planning to drive home, were you?”

“No! Why would you think I’d do something that stupid? I don’t even have my keys!” The words were slightly slurred, but they were loaded with real offense. He wanted to believe her. He didn’t want her to be the kind of person who did the sorts of things that so often left behind devastating messes for people like him.

Seth didn’t know why it mattered to him. It just did.

“It’s not an unreasonable question, Miss Henry. You wouldn’t be the first person to make that mistake.”

Emma glared at him a moment, then closed the distance between them, weaving a little but maintaining her bearing until she was glaring up at him, close enough to reach out and touch.

“Listen, Officer Am . . . Alf . . . Amster . . . whatever,” she said, waving her hands dismissively before settling them on her hips. Seth tried not to let his eyes linger, but it was tough. He was a sucker for an hourglass figure, and hers was just about perfect.

“
I
am a
respectable
businesswoman
in this community,” she informed him, the picture of angry, wounded pride. “I don’t know who the hell you are, but just because you get to carry a gun and handcuffs and whatever doesn’t give you the right to—to impugn my integrity.”

He found himself caught between wonder and gut-busting laughter. It took everything he had not to give in to the latter.

“I’m not impugning anything, Miss Henry,” he answered while struggling to keep a straight face. He wondered what other fifty-cent words she liked to throw around when she was mad. The woman was probably a
veritable dictionary when pissed off and sober. He found the idea ridiculously sexy. “I’m just concerned for your safety. I don’t want you to get hurt.”

The change in Emma’s expression was instant. Her eyes widened, anger vanishing to become innocent surprise. Her lips parted, just a bit, as she looked up at him and became the picture of vulnerability.

“Really?” she asked.

Seth blinked. He’d dealt with plenty of drunks in his line of work, but he was having a hell of a time finding his footing with this one. She’d been surly and sweet in equal amounts, shifting between the two fast enough to give him whiplash. Right now, though, there was something winsome about the way she looked up at him, something that pushed a few buttons he hadn’t expected to have pushed tonight, or any time soon. Those buttons had gotten pretty rusty, but it seemed like they were still there.

He guessed he should be glad he could still feel an attraction like this, like a hot punch straight through his chest. Maybe he would have been, if the sensation had ever foretold anything but trouble.

Since she appeared to be waiting for an answer, Seth nodded his head. “Really,” he said.

She swayed for a moment, her gaze inscrutable. Then she smiled, that big smile he’d been waiting for that crinkled her nose. For a few long seconds, all Seth could do was stare. Whatever he might have imagined, this was better. As beautiful as she was, that smile was like someone had turned a light on inside her.

“You should smile more often,” he said softly, realizing too late that the words hadn’t stayed in his head where they belonged. At least they didn’t seem to faze Emma, who simply shrugged, nearly losing her footing
in the process. Seth moved on instinct, reaching out to catch her beneath the arms before she went down on the walk. Her hands gripped the front of his shirt as she regained her balance. When she looked up at him this time, her face was only inches from his. He caught the faint smell of her perfume, something light but musky, a whiff of exotic smoke. Its sensuality was a startling contrast to Emma’s normally buttoned-up image. A hint, maybe, of the woman beneath.

Do. Your. Job. Andersen.

“You have pretty eyes.” She sighed, fingertips running down the front of his shirt to his hips. His stomach muscles flexed in reaction, and his breath caught in his throat. Parts of him stirred that had no business stirring when he was working. And that was what this was—part of his job. This would be a good time to remember that.

“Thanks,” Seth replied, forcing out the word while removing his hands and stepping back. “I need to—”

“Will you take me home?”

It took him a few seconds to close his mouth. “What?” His voice sounded hoarse to his own ears. She couldn’t possibly have said that. If she had, she couldn’t possibly mean it. And if she did, there was no way he could say yes, because that would require a level of awfulness he was nowhere near considering.

Emma looked up at him with those big luminous eyes, and he wondered whether he’d somehow taken a wrong turn and landed in hell.

“I want to go home. I can’t drive. Can you take me?”

“Uh . . . why don’t you just . . . Hang on a sec,” he said. “Stay here.” This was not his problem. This was Aaron’s problem, because it was Aaron’s party. He walked away quickly, trying not to run and thinking of every unappealing thing he could to erase the wildly erotic images
trying to cascade through his brain. He blamed his fatigue. The last few nights hadn’t been good ones, sleepwise, and it seemed like that had caught up to him all at once. How else to explain his reaction to her? She was a beautiful woman, sure. But while he might not be Channing Tatum, he hadn’t exactly had a hard time finding a date when he’d wanted one.

The front door opened again just as he reached it, and Seth was relieved to see his neighbor emerge, purple-streaked hair and all. It was a wonder they got along as well as they did. The only art Seth had ever spent much time looking at was World War II pinup girls, and Aaron had been very up-front about the feminine form, outside of a basic aesthetic appreciation, not being his thing.

As long as Aaron kept his lawn mowed and wasn’t a complete jerk, Seth didn’t much care who the man brought home.

“Emma?” Aaron looked past him at first, beyond to where Emma had just been standing. “Are you okay? Zoe said that somebody told her you didn’t feel good and—oh. Hey, Seth.” He watched Aaron take in the uniform, then wince. “Oh. I guess it’s Officer Seth tonight. This is about the noise, isn’t it? Sorry.”

“Yeah.” Seth shifted his weight from one foot to the other and thought again of his bed. His body was telling him it would actually stay asleep for a solid block of time tonight. That was, if he could ever get to his bedroom. “We’ve had a few complaints. I said I’d stop by on my way home to let you know, since I didn’t think you’d have a problem taking care of it.”

Aaron shook his head with a sigh. “No, of course not. This got to be a little bigger than I was expecting. We started at the bar, and I think the bar followed us home.”
He swept an arm at the cars parked up and down the street. “Guess it’s what happens when you throw a big party in a small town. The whole world shows up. It was supposed to be ladies only, but we’ve gotten a few infiltrators.”

Seth snorted. “Uh, you might want to look in a mirror.”

“I do. Frequently,” Aaron replied with a flash of a grin. Then he shrugged. “I’m the host. I get a free pass.”

Lucky bastard.

“You want me to help clear everyone out?” Seth asked, relieved when Aaron immediately shook his head no.

“Nah, I can handle it. Sam and her friends are staying over. Everyone else can leave the same way they got here. I was starting to worry about what was going to get broken first anyway. House parties are a lot more fun when they’re not at
your
house, you know?”

“I can imagine.”

Aaron arched an eyebrow, a smile playing at the corners of his mouth. “Not a partyer, Officer?”

“Very funny. And no, not so much. Used to be, but I guess I kind of outgrew the appeal.”

“Hmm. You’re kind of young to sound like such an old fart.” Aaron tilted his head, regarded him with a fair amount of curiosity, but then returned his attention to the woman farther down the walk. “Emma, why don’t you come back in?” Aaron called. “I don’t think sleeping on the concrete is a great idea.”

Her unintelligible mutter had Seth turning back to look. Emma had apparently decided that standing up was too much work. She was now lying down in the middle of the walkway, curled into the fetal position. That told Seth all he needed to know about her current state.