Sweet Talk Boxed Set (Ten NEW Contemporary Romances by Bestselling Authors to Benefit Diabetes Research plus BONUS Novel) (139 page)

Ed laughed. “One in every crowd,” he teased.

“We realize you moved here for some quiet and anonymity and you really went out of your way to help us. We promise you we will make you glad you chose Sand Dollar Cove for your home.”

He raised his longneck beer in the air. “Already am, gal!”

“Now, let’s party and start the countdown to opening day!” She cheered, and Brody caught her mid-leap in the air and swung her around.

“Hang on,” Ed said. “My buddy here wants to say something before I play.”

Elli looked at Ed and shrugged. Maybe he expected a more formal introduction. Did he mean her? She’d made all the announcements she’d planned to.

Brody took the microphone from Ed. “Thanks. I have something to add.”

“What are you doing?” Elli whispered.

“I also wanted to share that R waveSTYLE has reallocated some of our marketing fund to host an annual skimboarding competition here on the beach, and Elli has been helping me with the details. Marketing will go gangbusters tomorrow worldwide for the end of July event.”

Everyone cheered, and Elli hugged his neck and he pressed a kiss to hers.

He turned his attention back to the people at the gathering. “When I decided to set up an East Coast operation for R waveSTYLE, I had no idea just what a great location I’d found. Not only is it perfectly located along the Eastern Seaboard, and on one of the nicest beaches around, but the people here are exactly the kind of people I want to work for us. And exactly the kind of people I want to spend my time with.” He turned to Elli. “Especially you, Elli Eversol.”

He reached for her hand.

“I figure if we can rebuild a building in just a few days, meeting my future wife in just the course of a couple months is about the accurate speed calculation for how fast things can happen in here in Sand Dollar Cove.”

Someone wolf-whistled from the crowd.

“Elli, if you’d do me the honor, you’d make this surf bum the happiest wave rider around.” He took to one knee. “Will you be my bride? Because the first day I showed up at the Sol~Mate, I met my soul mate, and I don’t want to spend a single day without you by my side.”

Her legs went weak. Thank goodness he was holding her hand, because otherwise she might topple right over. She grabbed his arm with her other hand. “Yes! Yes, I’ll marry you.”

Brody handed the microphone back to Ed, then gathered her into his arms.

It didn’t even matter that hundreds of people looked on as he kissed her, because nothing but Brody mattered at this moment. Her heart was so full she could barely breathe. “I love you,” she said.

“2020.”

His sweet mention of the loving tradition her grandparents had shared made joyful tears tickle her lashes. Every moment her love seemed to deepen for him.

Ed put the microphone in the stand and played a few chords to one of Cal’s most popular songs. “I’ll host the wedding right here. How about it? Beachfront wedding?” Ed said.

The crowd cheered, but the noise seemed to fall away. She looked into Brody’s eyes. “Can we? Would you be okay with that?”

He moved closer, his breath fanning her face. “Whatever you want. Just don’t make me wait too long to start our forever.”

“It’s already begun.”

About Nancy Naigle

USA Today
bestselling author Nancy Naigle whips up small-town love stories with a dash of suspense and a whole lot of heart. She began her contemporary romance series, Adams Grove, while juggling a successful career in finance and life on a seventy-six-acre goat farm.

Now happily retired, she devotes her time to writing, antiquing, cooking, and the occasional spa day with friends. A native of Virginia Beach, she now calls North Carolina home.

Barbecue and Bad News is the sixth book in her popular Adams Grove series, with the next one already under way.

An International Thriller Writers Debut Author for 2011/2012, Nancy's active in several writer organizations, including:

Romance Writers of America

Mystery Writers of America

International Thriller Writers

among others.

Nancy also enjoys collaborating with other authors on projects like her humorous women's fiction, THE GRANNY SERIES, co-written with Kelsey Browning. Honey, these are
not
your momma's grannies. These gals are just like Dirty Harry...only over 50, female and from the South! Get all the details on that series
at www.TheGrannySeries.com
.

Stay in touch with Nancy at her website,

www.NancyNaigle.com

and on
Facebook
,
Twitter
,
Pinterest
, and
Goodreads

Chapter One

December 24, 2001

8:05 PM

It was snowing. An icy, dry snow, and in the porch light the drifts on the steps in front of Trina Crawford looked like piles of diamonds.

Oh, if only…

Trina pulled her gloved hands into her pink coat and blew into the sleeves. The blast of heat from her breath was a quickly fading comfort. So was the thought of diamonds.

Nothing is going to help me. Nothing.

“Enjoying the view?”

The voice made her jump. It wasn’t her mom's voice, which was the one she wanted to hear, but it was a really nice voice all the same.

“Dean?”

“In the freezing flesh.”

Dean McKenzie came out of the dark at the edge of the house, wearing his serious snow gear. He must have driven an ATV the back way over the creek that ran along the border between their families’ properties.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, though she didn’t really care
why
he was here. It was like taking a sip of water only to realize how totally thirsty you are.

Seeing Dean was like that. She was never lonely until he showed up.

“My mom said your mom left. I figured you might want some company.” That was pity on his face. He tried to hide it, because he was her friend and he knew she hated pity, but she could still see it.

“She’s coming back.” Trina had to say that. She had to believe it. Otherwise it was just her and her dad forever, and she couldn’t wrap her head around a future so crappy.

“Totally.” He nodded, definitively on her side as he had been for the sixteen years they'd been friends. “But maybe…you want some company?”

“That’d be awesome.” She shifted over on the blanket she’d placed between her numb butt and the wooden porch.

“I brought you some supplies.”

“Supplies.”

“Yeah, you know. Stakeout supplies.”

“You think me sitting here is a stakeout?”

“Sit-in?” He collapsed next to her. “Strike?” Their arms touched for a moment, and even through the layers of their coats she could feel his arm—or thought she could—and that was enough to make her twitch away.

Jenny at school said that she and Dean broke up because Dean was secretly in love with Trina. Which was ridiculous. They were neighbors. Friends. And not at all into each other. Not like that.

And besides, their dads would KILL them. Like kill them dead. If they ever got together.

In fact, it would make her father so angry she actually considered dating Dean, just to watch Dad register any kind of emotion in her direction.

“Well,” Dean said. “Whatever it is. You need some food.” He handed her a plastic bag full of fancy party food: shrimp (gross!), olives (yay!), little cubes of cheese. Toothpicks sticking out of some of the stuff had pierced the bag, and olive juice was everywhere. “And I hope you’ll notice, I remembered you’re a vegetarian and didn’t bring you the elk sliders. Even though they were awesome.”

“This is so nice, thank you,” she said, ignoring the shrimp.

“And here’s something to drink.”

He opened the thermos in his hand and steam poured out. Hot chocolate and something minty. Probably schnapps.

Even better.

“Thanks.” She took a sip, and the heat and the booze burned down her throat.

“Where’s your dad?” Dean asked, stretching his long legs out in front of him. He opened the neck of his snowmobile suit and she saw a glimpse of a black tie.

He’d come right from the party. With olives. It was such a nice thing. Like…maybe one of the nicest things anyone had ever done for her.

“Inside.”

“Really?” For a second he looked panicked. Seriously, that’s how ridiculous it was between their fathers.

“Don’t worry, he’s passed out in the den. After he and Mom fought, he didn’t stay awake long enough to watch her go.”

“She’s left a lot of times before.”

She didn’t have to say that this one felt different. It was Christmas Eve, after all. What kind of mom would drive away on Christmas Eve unless she meant it?

More booze seemed in order. Lots more booze. The heat and alcohol didn’t burn this time. She could feel it spreading through her body, a stream of light warming her fingers and knees and the tip of her nose. “She told me I was old enough now. That when I graduate in May, I can leave. Just like her. And never come back.”

“Nice.”

She laughed at his sarcasm. “Parents of the year, I tell you.” A coyote howled, and they both turned toward what was left of the McKenzie property, which ran on the other side of the creek.

“Your dad worried about that coyote?” he asked.

“I have no idea.” Her dad never told her anything. He used to talk to Dean about that stuff. Coyotes and high pastures and grazing yields. Dean had once been the son her father never had. “You know, I never told you how sorry I was that he fired you.”

“Sure you did. Like eight hundred times.”

“Well, I’m still sorry.”

“It was ages ago,” Dean said. Dean’s family had sold off most of their herd, and Dean had been working summers for Dad since the minute he’d been able to sit on a horse and drive an ATV. Which was roughly about five minutes after being born.

“It was two summers ago,” she reminded him. It had been during the bright white-hot months of the fight between their fathers. “And it sucked.”

“It did. I liked that job.”

“Sometimes I think you were born in the wrong century.” She was loose from the booze and no food.

He gave her side-eyes.

“I mean it in a good way,” she clarified. “Like you would have been so happy in the old west, where there were tons of jobs on the land and you could just ride your horse and sleep under the stars and eat beans.”

He laughed. “Well, I hate beans, but the rest of it sounds good. But there’s still plenty of work to do in this century.”

“What are you going to do this summer?”

“I have pre-acceptance at Laramie Tech. Land Management.”

“You didn’t tell me that!” she cried.

He could blame his pink cheeks on the wind or the cold, but she knew the truth. And the truth was that big, bad, tough guy Dean McKenzie—blushed. “Well, it’s not Stanford—”

“Stop,” she whispered. “Don’t do that. That’s exactly the program you wanted, and you worked hard to get there. It’s awesome. What did your dad say?”

“That it was a miracle.” Dean kicked snow off the toe of his boot. Trina's Mom once said that Dean and his dad, Eugene, fought like cats in a bag. And it was true, they couldn't be in the same room without turning on each other.

Dean didn't want what his father had. Not the money or the power. None of it. And Eugene could not understand that and so the fights were epic.

Sometimes Trina didn't know who had it worse, her with her father and their long icy silences or Dean and his dad who clashed and fought and exploded against each other all the time.

It was a crappy toss-up.

“Screw him.”

“I’ll drink to that.” Dean tipped the flask to his lips and took a long pull. “Luckily, Laramie is far away and I’ll never have to come back here if I don’t want to.”

“Hear, hear,” she said, and took a swig when he handed the flask back to her.

The wind blew past the porch, and she couldn’t control her full-body shiver.

“You’re freezing,” he said.

“I’m fine,” she lied. But Dean got up off the blanket and wrapped the part he’d been sitting on around her. And then he tugged her against his chest, her cheek against the scratchy fabric of his camouflage snowmobile suit.

Her eyes went wide. She held her breath, both trying and not trying to feel his body beneath the layers between them. But she felt stupid and awkward. Heavy and stiff, like she’d suddenly turned into a mannequin.

She tried to pull away, because she didn’t know how to do that—how to lean back against Dean like it meant nothing. Because she didn’t know what she wanted it to mean. Or if it meant something to him.

Basically, she just didn’t lean back against guys.

“Just…relax,” he muttered, pulling her close, holding her still.

She sighed and did as he asked. In stages, she just let him hold all her weight and all the worry on her back, and after a while, after all the awkwardness faded away, it just felt really good. To just let him hold her up. He was big. He was strong.