Sunset on Moonlight Beach - Sheila Roberts Page 0,62

moving forward with Brody.

She started to back up, but he had eyes like an owl and he’d seen her. “Join me,” he called.

It would be rude not to. He was a big part of her life at the Driftwood. They were friends.

“Your mom all settled in?” he asked as she took a seat next to him on a log.

He pulled a can of root beer out of the mini-cooler at his feet and offered it to her. He knew she wasn’t a beer drinker. Had he hoped she’d see his fire and join him and planned accordingly?

She took it and popped the top, took a drink. She suddenly felt a little hot, sitting there by the fire.

“Yep. I think she’ll be happy down here.”

“Pretty hard not to be. Nice house.”

“She could have stayed with us, though,” Jenna said. “We’d have made room for her.”

“Parents like having their own digs. Both my brother and my sister have tried to talk our mom into living with them. She says the only way they’ll get her out of her place is feetfirst.”

“What’s your mom like?”

“Good-hearted, strong. My dad wasn’t in the picture for long. She pretty much raised us single-handed. She’s a lot like your mom, only a little rougher around the edges.”

“Will she ever come up here and visit?”

“She says she’ll make the trek if I get married.” He cleared his throat, took a drink from the beer can he was holding.

“Which will be in a parallel universe,” Jenna said.

A little resentfully? No. She had no reason to be resentful. Her life was all sorted out. She moved them on to new conversational territory. “Thanks again for your help today.”

“You didn’t really need me. You had plenty of help.”

“I’ll always need you,” she said. As a friend, of course.

“I don’t think so. You’ve got the house peddler now. Looks like things are getting serious between you two.”

“I need to get serious with someone,” she said.

“Yeah, you do,” he agreed, but didn’t volunteer for the position. “I want to see you happy.”

“With another man.”

“The guy’s got money, a fancy house, fancy car.”

“As if that stuff’s important to me? How shallow do you think I am?” she demanded.

“You’re not, but there’s nothing wrong with having a good life. He’ll be good to you.”

“I need somebody to be good to me.” It was about time. Past time.

“You deserve that,” he said.

All this nobility. Blech. “You don’t have to be so agreeable, you know.”

“How do you want me to be?” He sounded irritated.

Jealous. Angry. Willing to fight for her. “Why did you invite me to join you, anyway?”

“Heard you coming. I was being polite.”

“Polite, huh? You know what? You’re a tease.”

He crumpled his beer can and tossed it in the mini-cooler. He shoved it shut, then stood and doused the fire with a nearby bucket of water.

“No, I just have a hard time letting go,” he muttered.

“No one told you to let go,” she snapped.

He kicked sand over the sizzling mess. “No one had to.” He picked up his cooler and bucket. “Good night, Jenna.”

It was suddenly very cold with the fire doused. She stood, shivering, and watched him walk away. Seth was damaged and there was no mending him because he wouldn’t let anyone close enough to do that. She truly had made the right choice.

She went to bed and slept dreamlessly all night. That bothered her almost more than the crazy dreams she’d been having, though she wasn’t sure why.

There was little enough time to think about it. Between family breakfast and church, Sunday was a busy morning. Right after lunch, Brody took Celeste and Henry house hunting. Henry had gotten money from his publisher and was finally open to looking. They’d decided to keep the houseboat as a rental and had set a budget for what they felt they could spend on a house and Celeste was now a woman on a mission. Sabrina and Aunt Edie stayed behind to play with the baby while Jenna went on the hunt with her sister and brother-in-law.

The house Celeste had lusted over hadn’t lasted, but she’d found more on the internet and had finally convinced her long-suffering husband to come look with her. Henry balked at the price on the first house, and vetoed even going inside no matter how hard she begged.

“If we go in it we’ll want it,” he said.

“They always look at houses that are over budget on House Hunters,” she argued.

“We’re not on House Hunters,” he argued back. “Don’t do it