“That must have been tough on a kid.”
“Yes.” An understatement. “When I was thirteen, he got a more stable job as the county road supervisor on the central coast of Oregon so we stayed put through my high school years.”
“What was your favorite place to live?”
She had to think about it. “Well, I did enjoy Lincoln City. We lived for four months on the Big Island in Hawaii. I loved waking up and smelling the ocean, being able to ride my bike down to the beach and play in the baby breakers. I even surfed a little. There is something so...comforting about the water, you know?”
“Something we have in common. It’s one of the things that drew me to Lake Haven. It’s not quite the same as the ocean but a mountain lake offers its own kind of calm.”
She thought of the lunch she had shared with the women in town and the bits of conversation she had picked up. “I think it only fair to let you know, you’ve put the whole town on edge.”
He looked startled. “I have?”
“I stopped at Mayor Shaw’s gift store earlier. Apparently a group of her friends gets together a few Friday afternoons a month for a buffet lunch. This happened to be one of them and they invited me to join them.”
“That’s nice. Haven Point seems like a very friendly town.”
She wished again that it could have become
her
friendly town. All those years of moving around as a child had given her a deep desire to settle in a place where she and Maddie could belong. This would have been idyllic.
She had to stop wishing for the impossible. First a job that now didn’t exist and then a man who might have kissed her once but certainly wouldn’t make that mistake again.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
S
HE
WAS
NERVOUS
.
As Eliza drove, Aidan couldn’t help noticing the way her fingers would tighten and release on the steering wheel or the fine tension in her shoulders, the curve of her jaw, the way she pressed her lips together.
Was it because of that kiss?
He certainly hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it. The entire time he was enmeshed in the last-minute negotiations for a software company he didn’t even care about, he had been remembering the softness of her skin, those delectable little sounds she made, the sweetness of her mouth.
She was even lovelier than he remembered. He wanted to kiss her all over again. Even the headache pressing in against his skull wasn’t enough to distract him from the aching need.
He dragged his attention back to more appropriate channels and tried to focus on what she was saying.
“Haven Point is a friendly town, from what I’ve seen,” she said. “You should probably know, however, that the people of this friendly town all seem to be waiting with bated breath for you to make a move.”
“Make a move?” For a crazy moment, he thought she was talking about kissing her again.
“Yes. You’re now the biggest landlord in town. Did you know that? From what I gathered at lunch, you hold the title to a huge chunk of the available commercial space. It could reasonably be said that you own this town.”
“That’s an exaggeration.” Yes, he knew Ben’s holdings included several commercial buildings in town, along with the family’s now-closed boat manufacturing plant.
Ben had been desperate to sell after years of trying to keep up with the property tax on his family’s holdings in the town he now hated, for reasons he had never shared with Aidan.
He had been eager to unload the property and after one exploratory visit, Aidan had jumped at the chance. Okay, he might have been influenced by a brain tumor pressing in on critical decision-making parts of his brain, but his attorneys still assured him it had been a sound investment.
“It’s not much of an exaggeration, from what I hear,” Eliza went on. “At least not according to the leading ladies in town—the Haven Helping Hands. Yes. Lame name. They know. They all seem to think you have the power to make or break this town.”
He rubbed at the side of his head where his scar itched like crazy. “That’s ridiculous. I don’t have plans to make any changes in the immediate future. I just want to get through the holidays with my family.”
“What about
after
the immediate future? I got the impression during the conversation over soup that everyone is worried you’re going to let their downtown dry up and become a ghost town, like some of the empty towns on the north side of the lake. Or worse, they worry you’ll bring in a ski resort—or five or six—until the whole lake area becomes just another Aspen or Vail—or Hope’s Crossing—and loses all its character.”
He frowned. “Hey. Hope’s Crossing drips with character and charm. You should visit some day. It’s a great place. Becoming a hot tourist destination doesn’t automatically suck all the personality and sense of community out of a town.”
She shifted her gaze from the road to him and then back again. “So you
are
planning to bring in some kind of big resort?”
“I didn’t say that. I honestly don’t know what I’m going to do yet. It hasn’t been at the top of my priority list.”
“Maybe not, but it is for the people of Haven Point. You might fly in for a weekend here and there but these women live here all the time, have their businesses here, raise their families. The local economy is obviously struggling. You’ve probably seen it yourself. Half the shops on Main Street are shuttered during what should be the busiest shopping season of the year.”
And people thought
he
was going to sweep in like some white knight and make all the difference? The guy with the hole in his brain?
He wanted a place he could come to relax, not a new set of problems and more people who wanted him to fix them all.
“Why is this so important to you?” he asked.
She looked surprised that he would ask. “It’s a nice town,” she said after a moment. “I’d like to see it stay that way. I had an earful in the forty minutes I spent at the mayor’s shop. Apparently back in the day—when people used to flock here by the thousands to take the miracle waters at the old Shelter Springs resort, before the waters all but dried up—this town was once completely dependent on tourist income. At one point the population was almost equal to Boise, or so Linda Fremont told me. She’s apparently the self-appointed town historian. In the 1920s, the springs slowed to a trickle and the town started to die with it. This area has been struggling ever since. Your friend closing his family’s boat factory was the last straw, apparently. People want to know what you plan and I can’t say I blame them,” Eliza said.
He had seen the shuttered buildings on Main Street but hadn’t given it much thought. Really, the only thing he wanted in town was Snow Angel Cove but he supposed he was going to have to figure out what to do with the other buildings and the closed factory.
“As soon as I work up some kind of a game plan,” he said slowly, “I’ll schedule a town meeting or something to take input and spread the word. Will that help?”
“Yes! Oh, what a fabulous idea, Aidan. A town meeting would help everyone feel invested and involved. If you alienate the whole town from the beginning, you’ll have a very hard time finding support later when you’re ready to make changes.”
“How do you know so much about community dynamics?”
“I don’t. I just know from working in management and trying to motivate a team how important it is for everyone to feel like they have some skin in the game, you know?”
“You’re right, which is why stock shares are an important part of the benefits package for all my employees.”
“Whatever you decide, you definitely want to do whatever you can to get McKenzie Shaw on your side. She is not only the new mayor of Haven Point but I get the impression she’s also a natural leader. It wasn’t hard to see that she’s the driving force behind the service group and though she’s young, she’s a firecracker. And watch out for a woman named Linda Fremont, the one I mentioned before. She is one of your tenants. She seems a little sour and not afraid to share her opinions. Her daughter Samantha seems pretty reasonable-minded, though.”
“I will keep that in mind. Thank you for the suggestions. Very valuable insight.”
Out of nowhere, Eliza blushed. “Sorry. It’s a habit. I try to read people so I can determine how best to meet their needs as my guests. Sometimes I go overboard.”
He was willing to bet she had picked up that habit while she was a young girl trying to make new friends in move after move to a new town.
“Don’t apologize. It’s a skill I envy. I’m much better at analyzing data and working with code than I am with personal relationships. They give me a headache, if you want the truth.”
“Or maybe that’s from the brain surgery you had three months ago.”
He laughed, surprised and delighted somehow that she could joke about it. Most people in his world who actually knew about the surgery treated it as some dark, mysterious, rather embarrassing off-limits subject, as if he had a huge hairy wart on the tip of his nose. “Good point.”
She cast him a sidelong look as she pulled up to the security gate and pressed the remote in the car so the gates swung open. “Did you try to see anybody about your headaches while you were in California?” she asked.
Her concern felt like a soft blanket tucked around his shoulders, warm and comforting. “Yeah. The neurosurgeon gave me another med to try.”
“Good. I hope you’re able to enjoy the holidays with your family without too much pain.”
“I should be fine.”
She pulled her SUV in front of the house, shifted out of gear then turned to face him, her eyes serious. She was so lovely, prettier than a Christmas ornament, with those bright green eyes, and the little smattering of freckles over the bridge of her nose, he wanted to just gaze at her all day, his headache be damned.
He hadn’t been able to stop thinking about that kiss. No other woman had ever jumbled him up inside like this. The whole flight back from California, he couldn’t seem to shove down the anticipation bubbling through him, the feeling that he was, at long last, coming home to her.
“You know you’re going to have a tough time keeping this from your family, right?”
“That’s your opinion,” he said, his voice more terse than he intended as he reminded himself he wasn’t coming home to her or to Maddie. Eliza was his employee and Maddie was his employee’s daughter. That was all.
She didn’t seem to be deterred by his cold tone. “Think about it. Unless your family members are stupid or just completely oblivious, they’re going to suspect something is wrong.”
“Why would they?”
She gave him an exasperated look. “You had brain surgery, for heaven’s sake! You have headaches that just about knock you to the ground. You’ve got a four-inch scar on your head that all the hair product in the world can’t completely hide, once somebody knows where to look. With a house full of people, someone is bound to notice
something.
”
He frowned. “I know what I’m doing when it comes to my family.”
“I don’t get the big secrecy, especially keeping something this big from your family—the people you’re supposed to turn to when times are hard.”
“It’s not your job to understand anything.” The headache sharpened his voice. “For the next week, your only job is to keep my family happy. That includes not divulging my confidential medical issues.”
She recoiled a little as if he had smacked her and pressed her mouth together. “I overstepped. I’m sorry. You’re right, your family dynamics are your own business.”
“Eliza—”
She shook her head. “I’m going to pull into the garage but this is probably the most convenient place for you to get out.”
She put a little more emphasis on the last two words than strictly warranted, not quite making them an order but close enough.
He gazed at her for a long moment. He wanted to tell her he was sorry for his abruptness but he wouldn’t apologize for the motive behind it. He
didn’t
want his family to know about his surgery. He had told her so. It would cause unnecessary drama and would make him the object of concern to his father, unwanted compassion to his sisters-in-law and deplorable pity to his brothers.
“Fine. Thank you for the ride.”
“Just doing my job,” she answered with a polite smile, in a perfectly pleasant voice he hated.
Aidan climbed out of the vehicle and headed into his house. Yeah. Give him an uncomplicated computer any day over people and their messy, tangled feelings.
* * *
T
HROUGH
THAT
EVENING
and the next day, Aidan could tell she was avoiding him. She had plenty of excuses. The house. Her responsibilities. Her daughter.
An awkward tension seemed to crackle through the house like static electricity and he didn’t know how to ease it. She was polite enough but not the warm, sweet woman whose company he had craved while he was in California.
He and Jim spent Saturday morning at a ranch twenty miles to the west with the horse trailer and the flatbed pickup, arranging for the loan of a large ten-person sleigh and a couple of sturdy draft horses so he could take his family around on Christmas Eve.
After unloading the horses and the sleigh, he headed inside to take off his hat and his coat in the mudroom. His stomach growled at the delicious scents coming from the kitchen—fresh bread mingling with some kind of hearty smelling dish. Vegetable beef soup, if he had to guess.
“Sue, my dear, I don’t pay you nearly enough,” he called out.
He heard her whiskey-rich voice laughing. “Da— er, darn right you don’t,” she answered.
Maddie must be in the kitchen with her, he thought when he heard Sue temper her typical salty language. He was smiling as he walked into the kitchen, until he found Eliza
and
Maddie at the table with bowls in front of them.
Maddie beamed at him. “Hi, Mr. Aidan.”
“Hey, kiddo,” he said with a smile.
Her mother’s smile lacked both warmth and sincerity. What would she use as an excuse to escape his presence this time?
“We’re almost finished,” she said with some predictability. “We’ll be out of your way in just a moment.”
At her stiff tone, he mentally uttered the curse word Sue had swallowed back, and a few juicier imprecations along with it. He didn’t like this stilted, cool Eliza. He wanted the one who freely offered advice, who was sweet and appealing, who kissed with her whole heart.
“Don’t hurry off,” he said. “I would enjoy the company.”
Her mouth tightened and he realized that as her employer, he had just basically ordered her to stay and entertain him. Here was a grand example of why becoming involved with people who worked for him was a lousy idea.
“We’re having beef and barley soup,” Maddie announced. “It’s very good, except I don’t like barley.”
Sue snickered, unoffended. “Next time I’ll keep it out for you, except it will be plain old beef soup, then.”
He went to the sink and washed his hands then pulled a bowl out and served himself from the big stockpot on the stove, then cut off a large slice of Sue’s fabulous honey wheat bread.
He deliberately took a seat next to Maddie and across from Eliza.
“What have you been up to today?” he asked the girl.
“Helping my mama,” she answered in a matter-of-fact tone. “We’re making this big house into a real home instead of a fancy shell.”
Now that sounded like she was parroting words she had heard from someone else. He glanced at Eliza and saw that delicate blush creeping over her cheekbones.
He managed to hide a smile at the last minute. He shouldn’t enjoy seeing her a little embarrassed at her daughter’s openness but after the way she had avoided him for nearly twenty-four hours, he would take amusement where he could find it.