the floral bouquets or bath baskets or luxury linens she could have sent.
“We’ll catch up. I promise. As soon as I get my mom settled, we’ll find a babysitter for your boys and we’ll head to The Sea Shanty, where we can drink margaritas all night and tell each other everything.”
“That sounds perfect,” Mel said with a rather watery smile. “I’ve missed you.”
“Same, times a million,” she said, giving Melody another hug.
“You’d better get out of here and head to the hospital so you can catch your mom before surgery.”
“Yeah.” She hugged her dog one more time then set him back in the safe zone of his carrier and headed for the door.
“I’ll call you as soon as I know anything,” she promised.
“I’ll be waiting.”
Melody stood at the top step of her cottage, waving as Olivia headed down the sidewalk.
She had just reached her vehicle and opened the door when a shiny blue pickup truck pulled up into the driveway next to her.
Not her business who else might be visiting Melody, she told herself as a man climbed out of the driver’s seat.
For just a moment, their gazes met, his curious and maybe a little suspicious, and Melody felt as if someone had dumped a bucket of salt water over her head.
It was Cooper Vance, Melody’s older brother.
Lean, tough, dangerous. Gorgeous.
A hundred memories suddenly chased each other across her mind, tumbling and rolling, leaving her off balance and feeling a little dizzy.
She was only tired and overcaffeinated, she told herself. That was the reason she felt that seismic jolt of awareness.
When she was barely a teenager she used to have such a crush on him. In one of those weird twists that often happened among neighbors close in age, his sister had been her best friend, while her sister, Natalie, had been his.
She used to think he was hotter than all the guys in her favorite boy band mixed together.
He gazed at her without any trace of recognition. Big surprise there. She had only been fourteen the last time she saw him, gawky and awkward, with an overbite, braces on her teeth, frizzy, overprocessed hair and no figure to speak of.
He had moved away from Cape Sanctuary, joining the military as an elite special forces pararescue trooper. When Natalie died of an overdose, he had been stationed overseas and hadn’t been able to make it back for her funeral.
Somehow their paths had not intersected in all the intervening years. If she were smart, she would figure out a way to keep them from ever intersecting.
The man was trouble.
She had known he was back in town. Melody had mentioned it a few months ago in an email, something Olivia had registered vaguely as one of those interesting details that wouldn’t have much impact in her life. Why would it? She was busy with her life in Seattle and rarely came back to Cape Sanctuary.
And then her mother had mentioned Cooper a few weeks ago, telling Olivia she had run into him at the grocery store. The conversation had been typical Juliet.
“He was so kind,” her mother had said, always looking for the good in people. “He insisted on loading all of my groceries into my trunk like I was some old lady. I always liked that boy. Your father did, too. It didn’t matter what his background was, how difficult his home life might have been, that his dad was in prison and his mom was a drunk. He always worked hard and looked out for his family.”
Yes, Cooper was perfect in Juliet’s eyes. Olivia had a sexy dream about him that night, she remembered now, and could feel her face heat at the memory.
She frowned and would have climbed into her car and driven away except this was Cape Sanctuary and that sort of rudeness just wasn’t acceptable.
He offered a polite smile. “Hi. I’m Cooper Vance, Melody’s brother.”
“I know.”
He looked apologetic. “Sorry. I haven’t been back in town very long and I’m still trying to remember faces and names.”
He gave her a closer look. “Olivia? Is that you? Good Lord. How long has it been?”
So long. And not long enough.
“A few years. Mel told me you had moved back to town.”
He shrugged. “The fire chief job opened up here and I was looking for a change. The timing seemed right. I can’t believe I didn’t recognize you. I obviously wasn’t looking closely enough. You look like your mom and...you have Nat’s eyes.”