ThisTimeNextDoor (40 page)

“Not quite the same guy he was a few months ago, but pretty close,” April said.

Overwhelmed, happy, shocked, thrilled, Rose ran down the hall and threw her arms around her mother’s waist. “Mom!” Then she buried her face in her snowy hair, not caring about the tears pouring out of her. “Oh, Mom.”

Her mother hugged her right back, laughing, then pushed her gently aside. “Merry Christmas, sweetie.” She hooked her arm in Rose’s, turned to Mark. “Well, I didn’t need to be told who you are.”

“Mom, this is Mark. The guy I’m totally in love with. And he loves me right back.”

“Of course he does, baby,” her mother said. She held out her hand, twinkling at him. “That’s why I let him put me on a plane at six in the morning Christmas Day.”

He did this for her? Rose turned her head to look at him, reeling again. It was so much.
 

He came over and kissed her mother on the cheek, a lopsided grin on his face. “Rose didn’t tell me she had a little sister.”

Eyebrows flying up, her mother laughed, kissed him right back. “Oh, you are a keeper.”

That’s the plan
, Rose thought.

Slowly they all made their way upstairs, talking over one another, trying not to trip over the dogs. Zeus had taken a particular interest in her mom, and she’d picked him up for a cuddle.

It was all good. All wonderful. Even if her stepfather joined them, she wouldn’t mind, she’d learn to get along, work it out. Even use his real name.

She reached around her mom’s arm to scratch Zeus behind the ears. “Is Phil getting the suitcases?”

Pausing on the stairs, her mom sighed. “It’s just me, I’m afraid,” she said. “I couldn’t get him to brave the plane.”

Rose bit back a laugh, looked away. Mark helped her hide her relief by kissing her again, pinning her against the wall while their families left them alone.

It really was a happy ending.

About the Author

Gretchen Galway writes romantic comedies because love is too painful to survive without laughing. Raised in the American Midwest, she now lives in California with her husband and two kids.

You can find her online at
www.gretchengalway.com
, or via email at
[email protected]
.

And if you enjoyed this book, please consider lending it to a friend—all of Gretchen’s books are DRM-free—or leave a review online. Feedback from readers like you is priceless.

Thank you for reading!

©2012 Gretchen Galway

THIS TIME NEXT DOOR

(previously published under the title THE GEEK WHO LOVED ME)

www.gretchengalway.com

Cover design: Gretchen Galway

Cover photos: Shutterstock (tachyglossus)

All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, no part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without prior written permission of the Author.

All characters in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Also by Gretchen Galway

Meet Mark’s big brother in…

LOVE HANDLES
 

©2011 Gretchen Galway

The world of fitness apparel isn't ready for Beverly Lewis. She hates the gym, is nice to everybody, and shops at Ross Dress for Less. When she's not teaching preschool, she's wearing yoga pants . . . to nap in. So when she inherits her estranged grandfather's fitnesswear company in San Francisco, nobody expects her to keep it. Fite Fitness needs a heartless suit to save it from bankruptcy, not a thirty-year-old woman who cries when her students leave for kindergarten.

Someone like Liam Johnson. A former Olympic swimmer, Liam is Fite's executive vice president. Unlike Bev, he's devoted his life to Fite's success. Managing one little preschool teacher--and his attraction to her--shouldn't be an issue. Right?

But Bev's tired of being underpaid and underrated, and refuses to step aside as an obedient figurehead. To everyone's shock and horror, she moves up to San Francisco, sets up an office, and dives into the business. Nothing--not mockery, not exercise, not sabotage, not a disastrously hot night with her aggravating VP--is going to scare her away.

As Liam realizes she's tougher than she looks, he discovers that losing Fite might not be nearly as bad as losing her . . .
 

A story about the pursuit of love, happiness, and the perfect yoga pants,
Love Handles
will speak to anyone who's ever had to face what scares her most.

Excerpt of LOVE HANDLES

©2011 Gretchen Galway

CHAPTER 1

The funeral was more fun than this
, Bev thought, waiting in the lobby of her late grandfather’s fitnesswear company. The young receptionist was on the phone and had been deliberately ignoring her since she came in.
Maybe she can tell I got my suit at Ross Dress For Less.

Bev glanced around the dim lobby, shifting her weight from one foot to the other, surprised Fite Fitness looked more like the waiting room for a used car dealership than an upscale fashion manufacturer. It even smelled stale, like yesterday’s lunch.

“That piece of shit car,” the receptionist said. She wore a lopsided cordless headset over her skinny blond braids but was speaking into a cell phone she had slipped under the earpiece. “I hate San Francisco. I just replaced those brakes like last year, and the prick’s like, ‘Oh it’s your fault for braking too much.’ Like I should just crash into everybody. Stupid hills.”

She doesn’t look old enough to drive
, Bev thought, feeling ancient at thirty. She checked her watch again. Only a few hours until her flight home to LAX. “Excuse me,” she said, smiling broadly. “I’m Beverly Lewis.”

The receptionist held up one hand, index finger erect, and kept talking.

“I have an appointment with Richard,” Bev continued. “The CFO. It’s kind of—”

The girl spun her chair around so that Bev was staring at the tangle of braids on the back of her head.

“—important.” Her mother had warned her the fashion business was filled with self-absorbed, emotional people, but Bev was an expert—she worked with demanding four-year-olds every day. She just had to think strategy.

Next to the desk, racks of clothes were lined up like the under-staffed dressing room of a department store. Curious, Bev stepped to the other side, slid the hangers apart, and ran her hands over the smooth Lycra and polyester. Track suits. T-shirts, yoga pants, running shorts. Cropped tanks with built-in bras.

Poor man must have been senile, leaving his company to me.
She was a preschool teacher with no muscle tone—which her grandfather would have known, if he’d ever met her. Shaking her head, Bev pulled out her cell phone and scrolled down to the number she’d got from the lawyer.

The desk phone trilled. The receptionist let out a loud sigh, set down her cell, and realigned her headset. “Fite Fitness, this is Carrie.”

“Hi Carrie, this is Beverly Lewis, right next to you. I’m here to see Richard, the CFO.”

Carrie jerked her head around and stared at Bev holding her phone.

Bev smiled, trying not to laugh at the look on her face. “Ed Roche was my grandfather,” she said into the phone, since Carrie seemed to process better through it. “Could you please tell Richard I’m here?”

The woman’s eyes widened. She nodded and swung back to the phone to dial. She mumbled something, dialed, mumbled again, then hung up.

“Thanks,” Bev said, this time without the phone.

“He didn’t pick up, but I left a message. You should have told me who you were.”

“Sorry. Richard didn’t answer?”

“I’m sure he’ll come out and get you. It’s kind of hard to find his office.” Carrie pinched her lips together again, this time with an apologetic look. “I’d get you something to drink, but we don’t have anything like that anymore.”

“That’s okay, I’ve got my water bottle.” Bev pulled it out of her shoulder bag, waved at Carrie, and walked over to a lint-colored chair that may have been white when it was manufactured in the 1980’s. She thought about the word Carrie had used—
anymore
—and wondered if business was as bad as it looked.

Not her problem. Her aunt Ellen could figure out what to do with it; Bev’s life was hundreds of miles away.

She sat down next to a dusty ficus, noticing the brown leaves littering the floor beneath it. She lifted her hand and caressed a crispy leaf with her thumb. “Poor thing. When’s the last time you had a drink?”

She got up onto her knees and leaned over the back of the chair, pouring her Calistoga into the pot. Clouds of dust motes rose up around her head, glimmering in the shafts of light coming in from the street. She sneezed.

“Did you lose something?”

The man’s low voice made her flip around in surprise, hand over her mouth, fighting back another sneeze. Right behind her stood a muscular blond man in a tank top and shorts. She tilted her head up to gaze into his face, suddenly wishing she’d spent a little more on her outfit for the day. With a face that would impress even her Hollywood executive relatives, the man was well over six feet tall, broad at the shoulder, narrow in the middle, and glistening all over—her classic nightmare.

She realized she’d seen him at the funeral, though not dressed like this.

“Thank you.” She maneuvered herself off her knees and onto her feet, trying to look graceful. He must have just had a lovely view of her big butt. Her face burning, she extended a hand. “I’m Beverly Lewis. Are you Richard?”

His cheerfully sun-kissed hair didn’t suit the gloom of the rest of him. His workout clothes were slick and black, his mouth was a hard line, and his penetrating dark eyes made her feel as though he could see through her retinas into the soft, jiggly underbelly of her soul. Not to mention the rest of her.

Why is he staring at me like that?
 

“I'm Liam Johnson. Executive Vice President,” he said.

He took her hand in his, enveloping it completely. Unlike many men shaking a woman's hand, he exerted genuine pressure—as though he expected she was strong enough to take it, or didn't care if she wasn’t. She squeezed back as hard as she could, secretly disappointed he didn’t flinch, then pulled free.

He must have skipped the gathering at Ellen’s house, just as Bev and her mother had. To go running, apparently, from the looks of him—unlike Bev, who’d been eating a cheeseburger.

“So, you’re the granddaughter,” he said. “Our new owner. What a pleasure to finally meet you.”

The sarcasm in his voice made her stand up to her full five-foot-ten. She hadn't expected a warm welcome, but the depth of hostility was a surprise. He was probably one her aunt’s allies. “I didn’t know about his will until the day before yesterday.”

“But you knew you had a grandfather. Funny I never saw you before now.”

Her lips were tight over her teeth, holding up the smile she didn’t feel. “Perhaps you could help me find Richard so I can get on my way. I have a flight in a few hours.”

That surprised him. He frowned. “Today? Where are you going?”

“Orange County. I need to get home.”

For a long moment he just stared. Then a corner of his mouth twisted. “Of course. Death can be such an inconvenience.”

A chill settled over her. She studied him closer, trying to remember more of what she'd heard from her aunt that morning about the staff at the company. He must be the guy who grew up next door to her grandfather in Oakland. The protégé. Her grandfather’s death must have been a shock to him. “You're the swimmer, aren't you? He hired you right after the Olympics.”

“I'm surprised you would know anything about what he did.”

Ah. That was it. “It's true we weren't close,” she said. “But you were, weren't you?”

His jaw hardened. He shrugged.

“I'd love to hear anything about him you might like to share,” she said. “Our branch of the family has been kind of estranged for a while.”

“Oh?” A lot of unforgiving ice packed into one word.

“Since before I was born,” she added.
So lay off, dude.

“Your loss.”

Bev looked past him to one of the doors along the far wall, nodding in agreement. She’d done her best to chat with her infamous aunt Ellen over the past couple of days, but her mother still wasn’t talking to her—her only sibling—after thirty years. Not even at the funeral. It wasn’t right.

“Perhaps we could continue this inside.” She looked down at his exercise clothes with a raised eyebrow. “Unless you’re too busy.”

Smoothing the tank top over his chest, the thin fabric clinging to sweat and muscle like synthetic skin, he began to walk towards a doorway. “The administrative offices are back here.”

“Great. Thank you.” She waved at the receptionist, but the young woman sat petrified and stared at Liam without blinking. No doubt the sporty ice cube was a difficult boss.

He led her down a narrow, carpeted passageway with offices on one side, most of them empty. The shabby carpeting was brown with tan stripes worn down the middle from the tread of human feet. Pausing in a doorway, he looked over his shoulder at her. “I mistook you for Ellen at first. I thought she might have dropped her phone behind the chair.”

Bev walked faster to catch up. “Some people say I look like her, but I think it's just the black hair.” Aunt Ellen had the same pale skin too, but their features were nothing alike. Ellen had a cold beauty Bev was happy to live without. It put people on edge, demanded attention, caused trouble.

He ushered her into a dark room, slapping the wall to turn on the lights. She was trapped inside with him. His gaze fell down her body. “You’re right. I don't know what I was thinking.”

She was annoyed with herself for feeling insulted. She lifted her chin and looked past him into the windowless office, noting floor-to-ceiling metal grids bolted to the walls holding up clothes and white foam presentation boards, sketches, magazines. “This isn’t Richard’s office, is it?”

“It’s mine.” He crossed his arms over his chest, the sheen of perspiration still visible on his skin.