Forever and a Day (35 page)

“Really?”

He pulled her in tighter and buried his face in her hair, inhaling her in. “Forever,” he said, and as he lowered his head to kiss her, a wild cheer went up from the crowd outside the window.

Epilogue

One year later

G
race woke from a Maui sun-soaked snooze when a shadow blocked her rays. She opened her eyes and took in the sight of Josh in nothing but loose board shorts, slung so low on his hips as to be indecent. His big, built body was tanned and wet from his ocean swim.
Very
wet, and he had a wicked gleam in his gaze. “Don’t,” she warned him. “Don’t you dare—”

With a badass grin, he scooped her out of the oversized lounge chair on the private beach of their honeymoon house and up against his drenched body.

“—get me wet,” she finished weakly.

“Oh, I’m going to get you wet, Mrs. Scott.
Very
wet.” He nuzzled her for a moment, then dropped down onto the lounge, with her now on top of him. He made himself comfortable, his hands roaming freely over her body as he did. “Mmm. You smell like a coconut. You know I love coconuts.”

She did. She knew this firsthand…It’d been a lovely few days, and they had a few more left. They’d gotten married six months ago, but this had been their first opportunity for a getaway. Anna had come home on college break to watch Toby and Tank for them.

They’d made the most of their alone time, and Grace lay there on top of Josh in sated, contented quiet. Working their way down her sexual fantasy list had proven exhausting business, and they had yet to start on Josh’s, although sitting on him as she was, she could tell he was ready to get going.

Josh entwined his fingers with hers and drew them up to his mouth, kissing her palm, regarding her with a serious look on his face. “Promise me something.”

“Anything.”

His free hand slid to her still-flat belly. At only three months pregnant, she wasn’t yet showing at all. “We skip the Star Wars DVDs with this one.”

The Chocoholics’ Cupcakes-Worth-the-Fat-Grams

Cupcakes

• 1 7-ounce milk chocolate bar
  
• ¼ cup butter
  
• 1 ⅔ cups boiling water
  
• 2 ⅓ cups unsifted flour
  
• 2 cups light brown sugar
  
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
  
• 1 teaspoon salt
  
• 2 eggs
  
• ½ cup sour cream
  
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
  

Combine chocolate, butter, and boiling water in medium bowl. Stir until smooth. In large bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking soda, and salt. Gradually add chocolate mixture to dry ingredients, beating well. Blend in eggs, sour cream, and vanilla. Beat till smooth, about 1 minute.

Pour into cupcake tins (approximately 24 cupcakes) and bake at 350 degrees for 35 to 40 minutes.

Frosting

• 2 ½ tablespoons cocoa
  
• 1 cup sugar
  
• 1 stick butter
  
• ¼ cup milk
  
• ½ teaspoon vanilla
  

Sift cocoa and sugar in a saucepan. Add butter and milk and bring to a rolling boil for 60 seconds. Add vanilla. Pour into a small mixing bowl and beat until cooler and spreadable.

Frost cupcakes and enjoy the scrumptiousness!

After Maddie Moore loses her boyfriend and her job, she moves to Lucky Harbor to fix up the inn her mother left as her inheritance. But the contractor she’s hired is making it hard for her to remember that she’s sworn off men…

Please turn this page for an excerpt from
Simply Irresistible
and see why readers first fell in love with Lucky Harbor.

Chapter 1

“I chose the path less traveled, but only because
I was lost. Carry a map.”

Phoebe Traeger

M
addie drove the narrow, curvy highway with her past
still
nipping at her heels after fourteen hundred miles. Not even her dependable Honda had been able to outrun her demons.

Or her own failings.

Good thing, then, that she was done with failing.
Please be done with failing,
she thought.

“Come on, listeners,” the disc jockey said jovially on the radio. “Call in with your Christmas hopes and dreams. We’ll be picking a random winner and making a wish come true.”

“You’re kidding me.” Maddie briefly took her eyes off the mountainous road and flicked a glance at the dash. “It’s
one
day after Thanksgiving. It’s not time for Christmas.”

“Any wish,” the DJ said. “Name it, and it could be yours.”

As if. But she let out a breath and tried for whimsy. Once upon a time, she’d been good at such things.
Maddie Moore, you were raised on movie sets—fake the damn whimsy.
“Fine. I’ll wish for…” What? That she could’ve had a do-over with her mother before Phoebe Traeger had gone to the ultimate Grateful Dead concert in the sky? That Maddie had dumped her ex far sooner than she had? That her boss—may he choke on his leftover turkey—had waited until
after
year-end bonuses to fire her?

“The lines are lit up,” the DJ announced. “Best of luck to all of you out there waiting.”

Hey, maybe
that’s
what she’d wish for—luck. She’d wish for better luck than she’d had: with family, with a job, with men—

Well, maybe not men. Men she was giving up entirely. Pausing from that thought, she squinted through the fog to read the first road sign she’d seen in a while.

WELCOME TO LUCKY HARBOR!

Home to 2,100 lucky people

And 10,100 shellfish

About time. Exercising muscles she hadn’t utilized in too long, she smiled, and in celebration of arriving at her designated destination, she dug into the bag of salt and vinegar potato chips at her side. Chips cured just about everything, from the I-lost-my-job blues, to the my-boyfriend-was-a-jerk regrets, to the tentatively hopeful celebration of a new beginning.

“A new beginning done right,” she said out loud, because everyone knew that saying it out loud made it true. “You hear that, karma?” She glanced upward through her slightly leaky sunroof into a dark sky, where storm clouds tumbled together like a dryer full of gray wool blankets. “This time, I’m going to be strong.” Like Katharine Hepburn. Like Ingrid Bergman. “So go torture someone else and leave me alone.”

A bolt of lightning blinded her, followed by a boom of thunder that nearly had her jerking out of her skin. “Okay, so I meant
pretty please
leave me alone.”

The highway in front of her wound its way alongside a cliff on her right, which probably hid more wildlife than this affirmed city girl wanted to think about. Far below the road on her left, the Pacific Ocean pitched and rolled, fog lingering in long, silvery fingers on the frothy water.

Gorgeous, all of it, but what registered more than anything was the silence. No horns blaring while jockeying for position in the clogged fast lane, no tension-filled offices where producers and directors shouted at each other. No ex-boyfriends who yelled to release steam. Or worse.

No anger at all, in fact.

Just the sound of the radio and her own breathing. Delicious,
glorious
silence.

As unbelievable as it seemed, she’d never driven through the mountains before. She was here now only because, shockingly, her mother’s will had listed property in Washington State. More shockingly, Maddie had been left one-third of that property, a place called Lucky Harbor Resort.

Raised by her set-designer dad in Los Angeles, Maddie hadn’t seen her mother more than a handful of times since he’d taken custody of her at age five, so the will had been a huge surprise. Her dad had been just as shocked as she, and so had her two half-sisters, Tara and Chloe. Since there hadn’t been a memorial service—Phoebe had specifically not wanted one—the three sisters had agreed to meet at the resort.

It would be the first time they’d seen each other in five years.

Defying probability, the road narrowed yet again. Maddie steered into the sharp left curve and then immediately whipped the wheel the other way for the unexpected right. A sign warned her to keep a lookout for river otters, osprey—what the heck were
osprey?
—and bald eagles. Autumn had come extremely late this year for the entire West Coast, and the fallen leaves were strewn across the roads like gold coins. It was beautiful, and taking it all in might have caused her to slide a little bit into the next hairpin, where she—oh, crap—

Barely missed a guy on a motorcycle.

“Oh, my God.” Heart in her throat, she craned her neck, watching as the bike ran off the road and skidded to a stop. With a horrified grimace, she started to drive past, then hesitated.

But hurrying past a cringe-worthy moment, hoping to avoid a scene, was the old Maddie. The new Maddie stopped the car, though she did allow herself a beat to draw a quick, shuddery breath. What was she supposed to say—
Sorry I almost killed you, here’s my license, insurance, and last twenty-seven dollars?
No, that was too pathetic.
Motorcycles are death machines, you idiot, you nearly got yourself killed!
Hmm, probably a tad too defensive. Which meant that a simple, heartfelt apology would have to do.

Bolstering her courage, she got out of the car clutching her Blackberry, ready to call 911 if it got ugly. Shivering in the unexpectedly damp ocean air, she moved toward him, her arms wrapped around herself as she faced the music.

Please don’t be a raging asshole…

He was still straddling the motorcycle, one long leg stretched out, balancing on a battered work boot, and if he was pissed, she couldn’t tell yet past his reflective sunglasses. He was leanly muscled and broad shouldered, and his jeans and leather jacket were made for a hard body just like his. It was a safe bet that
he
hadn’t just inhaled an entire bag of salt-and-vinegar chips. “Are you okay?” she asked, annoyed that she sounded breathless and nervous.

Pulling off his helmet, he revealed wavy, dark brown hair and a day’s worth of stubble on a strong jaw. “I’m good. You?” His voice was low and calm, his hair whipping around in the wind.

Irritated, most definitely. But not pissed.

Relieved, she dragged in some air. “I’m fine, but I’m not the one who nearly got run off the road by the crazy LA driver. I’m sorry, I was driving too fast.”

“You probably shouldn’t admit that.”

True. But she was thrown by his gravelly voice, by the fact that he was big and, for all she knew, bad, to boot, and that she was alone with him on a deserted, foggy highway.

It had all the makings of a horror flick.

“Are you lost?” he asked.

Was she? Probably she was a little lost mentally, and quite possibly emotionally, as well. Not that she’d admit either. “I’m heading to Lucky Harbor Resort.”