When It's Love (7 page)

“I need to chat with the crew for a bit, but thank you for coming out with me on the kayak today. It really helped.” He put his hand over hers. “And I really appreciate you taking a risk on me.”

Even though she found she didn't like to imagine anyone else having fun with him out on the ocean, she said, “Hopefully, Morgan will be back on her feet by the time your next segment comes around.” It wasn't easy to pull her hand away from his, but she made herself do it. “Good-bye, Nicholas.”

A few minutes later, when she got back to her car, the only reason Rachel didn’t leave tire tracks behind as she set off for home was because driving off at a high speed wouldn’t have been safe. Although right then, the truth was that nothing felt particularly safe anymore.

Particularly the way she was feeling about the surfer with the sweet and sexy smile...

CHAPTER EIGHT

“We'll just add one last touch with the bow in the front of your dress,” Rachel said that evening as she tied the satin ribbon into place on Charlotte's pink party dress. “Gorgeous!”

“Why do we need to look so pretty, Mommy?”

“Tonight’s a very special night. All your aunts are going to be there, and Michael, Brian and Joel, and so are Grandpa Tres and Great-Grandma Ava.”

Every year, the whole family met up for a big fall dinner, usually not long after Rachel’s father had returned from leading his educational tours through Europe and was back teaching at the high school. It was the one time you could guarantee that all of the Walkers would be in the same room at the same time, with Morgan coming in from New York when she had lived there and Hanna taking the ferry in from Seattle.

Tonight, Rachel had decided they would walk to Grams' house as she wanted to have a glass or two of wine with her family and she wasn’t going to risk driving afterward.

“Is Aunt Hanna's hair still pink?”

“I'm sure it's some bright color,” Rachel said with a laugh. “In any case, we'll find out for sure soon.”

“Can I have pink hair?”

Rachel smiled at her daughter's question, one she'd known was coming. “I think your hair looks very pretty as it is.”

“Will Nicholas be there?”

He wasn’t family, but Grams always loved to include her houseguests in whatever events were happening while they were on the island. Still, Rachel said, “I don't know,” because she didn't want to get Charlotte's hopes up, especially when her daughter was clearly hoping that he would be at the party. But he'd been too busy partying to have dinner with her grandmother and sisters the previous night, hadn't he?

They stopped for a few minutes to watch a butterfly, and by the time they arrived at Grams', Paige was at the door waiting for them. For once, she wasn’t wearing dance gear, although she was still dressed in the elegantly understated way she favored.

“Rachel, Charlotte, there you are. The others just arrived, as well.”

Charlotte rushed forward to hug her aunt. Before she’d started school, Charlotte had spent quite a lot of her free time down at Grams’ dance school, where Paige did a lot of the teaching. The two of them were very close.

Not wanting to give herself away by immediately asking if Nicholas was also there, Rachel said instead, “How is Dad doing with Joel?” Their father had been away in Europe when Joel and Hanna had fallen in love. He’d said he was happy about their relationship, but a feud between their families had gone on for a long time—generations even—and it was obvious to all of them that their father was still trying to get used to having a Peterson as a new member of the Walker family.

“They’re getting on just fine, thankfully,” Paige said. “And Emily’s in the kitchen, like always. I would have tried to help, but when Michael did, she immediately shooed him out of the room. And Morgan is obviously drinking cough syrup like water just to be here.”

“Poor thing,” Rachel said as she took Charlotte through to the dining room, where everyone was sitting around the huge wooden table. This room was the heart of the home Rachel had grown up in, and it said a lot about the Walker household that, even with everyone gathered together, it didn’t feel overcrowded.

It felt just right.

Rachel made her way around the table, hugging each of her sisters and then her father and grandmother. Hanna had switched the streak in her hair from pink to blue, and Charlotte reached up to touch it when Hanna knelt down to say hello.

“No, you can’t have your hair blue either,” Rachel said to forestall the obvious question.

Beside them, Morgan smiled. “Hanna makes more changes to her hair than I do.”

“That’s because I’m behind the camera, not in front of it, so I can afford to be a continuity nightmare.”

When Charlotte began to reach up to hug Morgan, her sister said, “I'm sorry, sweetie, it’s better if you don’t. I’m afraid I'm still full of germs.”

Taking her seat, Rachel was struggling with a mixture of both relief and disappointment that Nicholas wasn't there, when suddenly he breezed in—sending her heart rate immediately flying. Charlotte made a sound of joy and immediately launched herself into his arms.

“Are you feeling better?” he asked her little girl.

“Yes,” she replied as she hugged him tight, “and I love my new stuffed rabbit.”

With a ruffle of her hair, he put her back down just as Grams said, “I was beginning to wonder where you’d gotten to. We can’t have you missing dinner with us again.” Rachel was surprised by the way her grandmother was calling Nicholas out on partying rather than spending time with them the night before. Ava wasn't usually so confrontational. But then she added, “Did everything go all right with the production company?”

“It all looks like it's going to be fine,” Nicholas replied. “I’ve always loved family dinners, even when it isn’t my family, and I really am sorry that dealing with the issues that came up with filming meant I had to miss dinner yesterday and that I'm racing in today, as well.”

Rachel felt a pang of guilt that she had jumped to conclusions yet again, simply because his job was professional thrill-seeking. He hadn't been partying, he'd been working.

“I thought we had filled out all of the necessary paperwork for the permits, but they keep finding new documents for me to look over,” he continued. “Fortunately, nothing needed to be notarized today. Although it was worth taking care of those permits yesterday, because otherwise Rachel and I wouldn't have been able to go out kayaking this morning.”

“You talked Rachel into going kayaking with you?” The disbelief was clearly audible in Hanna’s voice.

“Sure did,” Nicholas said with a smile that felt like it was meant only for Rachel. “We found the perfect little cove on the beach just below Morgan and Brian's cottage, and Rachel agreed to go out in the double kayak with me while we filmed the first test segment.”

She dearly appreciated that he didn’t tell anyone just how much effort it had taken to get her into the kayak, or how she'd abruptly ended the outing. Instead, he made it sound as if it had simply been a fun day out for the two of them.

The ambience at the fall dinner was very different from the way it had been in previous years. The meal itself was as wonderful as ever—Emily always did such a great job on the food—but there were many more people, for one thing, what with Brian, Joel, and Nicholas.

“Have you ever surfed in Europe?” Rachel’s father asked Nicholas. “I’ve just come back from that part of the world, and it seems hard to believe there’s much surfing there.”

“More than you might think,” Nicholas assured him and started to describe some of the better surfing spots along the Mediterranean and farther north along the coast of England. “And even when there isn’t much surfing, there's always something really interesting to do.”

As Tres encouraged Nicholas to tell them about a climb he'd done in New Zealand, Rachel's thoughts drifted back to the time they’d shared in the kayak, just the two of them moving perfectly together over the water. For that brief time, her worries had drifted away on the tide...and it had been truly wonderful.

When Emily got up to bring in dessert, Rachel was surprised that her sister asked her to help in the kitchen. Once they were away from the dining room, Emily asked, “Are you okay?”

“I'm fine.” But even to her own ears, she didn't sound particularly
fine.

“Are you really? You seem a little preoccupied tonight.”

Before Rachel could stop herself, she blurted, “It’s Nicholas.”

Emily looked more closely at her. “What about him?”

Rachel barely knew where to start. “The gorgeous way he looks. The way he's so much sweeter than I expected him to be. The fact that he got me to go kayaking with him, and then, when we got out on the water…”

“It felt good?” Emily guessed.

“So good. But it shouldn’t have.”

“I don't understand. Why shouldn't being out on the ocean with a handsome man feel good?”

“Because it's not safe!
He
isn’t safe. Nothing about him is safe, from what he does for a living to how he looks at me. And yet, I still can't stop thinking about him! It's so bad that I couldn’t concentrate at work today after we went kayaking, even though I shouldn’t be thinking about a guy like him in that way.”

“Ah, I think I understand now,” Emily said softly. “
Guy
is exactly the problem, isn’t he?”

Rachel swallowed. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Yes, you do. You’re worried that Nicholas is just like Guy. You look at him, and you keep wondering if you're falling for the same man who abandoned you and Charlotte just like”—she snapped her fingers—“
that.
”

Knowing there was no point in continuing to deny it, Rachel nodded. “It’s hard not to compare the two of them. I mean, when I first saw Nicholas, he was leaning against his surfboard on the docks and people were fawning all over him, telling him how great he is.”

Emily put an arm around her. “But don't you see? You, more than anyone, know how to spot a fake now. And if you can't stop thinking about Nicholas, then I can't help but think there's a reason for it. That beneath his good-looking, adventurous surface, there must be something strong pulling you two together. After all,” her sister added, “you did just say how sweet he is.”

“Speaking of sweet,” Rachel said by way of changing the subject, “we should probably take dessert out now.” But all the while, she couldn't help wondering if her sister was right—and if she should risk giving Nicholas a chance.

CHAPTER NINE

After dinner, while Rachel helped Emily with the dishes, her sister was kind enough not to ask any more pointed questions. Probably because she could clearly see that Rachel was still thinking things through. Was Emily right about Rachel judging Nicholas by an unfair comparison to
Guy
?
And if she was, how much of herself—and her carefully guarded heart—would she have to risk to find out whether he was truly different from her ex?

By the time she'd put away the final dish and headed back into the family dining room, Charlotte was busy playing cards with Nicholas.

“Go fish!” Charlotte said.

Charlotte had always been a happy little girl and was rarely happier than when she was playing cards. A couple of months back, she’d engaged Grams in a game of rummy that had gone on for hours until Grams had finally declared she was too tired to keep up. But Nicholas didn’t seem to mind. In fact, he seemed to be enjoying the game and wasn't in any sort of rush to end it. But since Charlotte had school in the morning and it was already close to her bedtime, Rachel knew that they ought to get home.

“It’s time to finish up the game so that we can get you home to bed.”

“But, Mommy, I’m not tired.” She might have been more convincing if she hadn't yawned just then. “Can’t we stay at Grams’ house? Nicholas is.”

“That's because he’s just visiting Walker Island. His home is a long way away on another island called Hawaii,” Rachel explained. “Did you thank him for the bunny he gave you earlier?”

“I did,” she replied, but turned back to Nicholas and said, “I totally love it.”

“I’m totally glad,” Nicholas replied with a warm smile.

“Now say goodnight to everyone. We’ve still got to walk home.”

Charlotte didn’t look happy about the game ending, and she
really
didn't look happy about walking home on top of that. Maybe walking over here had been a mistake. After all, for a tired six-year-old, it was quite a long walk back. Rachel figured she would probably end up carrying her at least part of the way home.

But right then, Nicholas stood up and held out a hand to Charlotte. “How about if I give you a piggyback ride home?”

Charlotte was already clambering up onto Nicholas’ back as Rachel said, “That's really nice of you to offer to carry her home, but then you'll have to walk back afterward, and—”

“It’s fine,” Nicholas assured her. “I don’t mind doing the walk in both directions.”

“It’s fine, Mommy,” Charlotte said, echoing him.

But was it actually fine?

The last thing Rachel wanted to do was encourage her daughter to become attached to someone who was going to be gone in a week. But at the same time, she didn't want her to be afraid of meeting new people. Plus, hadn't he just shared a meal with them where he'd fit in amazingly well with her family? And, if she were being totally honest with herself, didn't the idea of a moonlit walk with Nicholas make her own heart beat just a little bit faster?

“Okay, thanks,” Rachel said, then went to hug each of her family members goodnight. She couldn't help but laugh when Nicholas carried Charlotte around so that she could do the same. Once all the good-byes had been said, he made a run for the door with Charlotte clinging to him.

“Come on, let’s see how fast we can go.”

Rachel set off after them, half-worried that he was serious. What if he fell? What if Charlotte lost her grip? But once she got outside, it was clear that he had only been teasing and was ready for a slightly more sedate walk back.

As they set out, Rachel could see that after her initial burst of energy, Charlotte was actually quite sleepy. Which meant that if Nicholas hadn’t been there, she would have either ended up carrying her daughter all the way back home, or trying to coax her into walking despite how tired she was. No question about it, having Nicholas accompany them home was definitely the better choice.