Harvest Moon - By Robyn Carr Page 0,27

heels of exhaustion, she slept a good, peaceful eight hours or more. Her head was clear; she didn’t face daily conflict.

She’d only been at Jillian’s for a week when Jill said, “When the movers empty your flat of household goods, have everything brought here. Take the whole third floor—it’ll give you space for your sofa, favorite chair, TV, desk—it’s more spacious than your flat was. You’ll have as much privacy as you want and if you want to be around people, you know where we are.”

“I wasn’t planning a long stay—”

“Listen, you could live in this house for a year without even bumping into anyone, if that’s what you want. But let me tell you what I want,” Jill said. “I want you to give yourself enough of a break to be sure your health is good, your emotions level and positive and your poor heart mended. The first thing to do—let Dr. Michaels give you a quick checkup to be sure your new blood pressure medicine is doing its job. My guess is that once you’ve had some time away from that nuthouse of a restaurant, you won’t even need it anymore.”

Kelly had spent most of her adult life avoiding doctors, and she hadn’t had a single symptom or incident since moving into Jill’s house. But it made sense to see the local doctor.

As for her positive emotional state and poor broken heart? She was working on it. Things were coming into perspective—all her fantasies about life with Luca were a mistake and she should have known better.

Getting herself kissed by a sexy guy didn’t hurt. Whatever it was with Lief—not quite a romance but something more than simple friendship—it made her feel better about herself. When he was near, she just couldn’t stop looking at him—that thick, burnished blond hair, expressive brows, warm brown eyes all combined to make him so handsome. But that body and what he did to a pair of jeans just knocked her out.

Lief dropped by daily. Determined not to be a drain on the household, he took it upon himself to chop wood, getting Jillian started on a big pile that would get her through winter. He’d show up in the morning and split logs for a while before sitting at the work island while Kelly was cooking. Problem was, it was pretty hard for her to focus on her project of the day while he was hefting that ax out by the storage shed. The beautiful strain on his shoulders, back and arms could send her right into an erotic trance.

And he caught her staring out the kitchen window every time. He would flash her that wide, white grin before getting back to work.

He never mentioned it, though. Once his log-splitting was done for the day, he was content to sit in the kitchen and talk.

“Tell me how one goes about writing a movie,” Kelly said.

“Just about the same way one creates a recipe,” he said. “You experiment with taste, I experiment with words and feelings and settings. I have an image in my head that I try to get on the page. The script is like an architectural drawing with details and directions to build a movie.”

“How many have you actually sold?” she asked.

He shrugged. “Half a dozen. The selling isn’t the important part—it’s the filming and releasing. Lots of original scripts are optioned, which is kind of like ‘reserved’ for a period of time. Then when there’s principal photography, when they begin to actually shoot the movie, they’re officially sold. But they still have a long way to go before a viewing public might see them.”

“But when do you write them? Late at night?”

“I haven’t been doing that much writing lately—I’ve been setting up a home, spying on Courtney, fishing, chopping wood, thinking and trying to get things under control. Like things were once upon a time.”

“I take that to mean, when Courtney’s mother was alive.”

He nodded. “Lana worked in wardrobe for a production company. She was a single, working mom when I met her and she was getting along very well. We were married four years when she died, suddenly. Aneurism. She was at work. We were in shock, me and Court, but I love writing and was trying to work my way through the grief when I realized Courtney’s life was going to hell. She was being shuffled between her dad and his second family and me, not sure where she belonged anymore. Her appearance and behavior changed—I