Time After Time (Sweetbriar Cove #14) - Melody Grace Page 0,3

of the woods. She couldn’t imagine who would decide to call a sterile, modern place like that home. Some out-of-towner, probably, with more money than sense. The heating bills alone, with all those windows… But then again, people like that rarely stayed the winter. This was just a summer vacation spot to them, and come September, they were packed up and heading back to their normal lives again, leaving the locals like her to enjoy the peace and quiet of the Cape all to themselves.

It was their loss… and Stella’s gain. She smiled as emerged through the trees at the pond’s edge, ready to strip off her jeans and T-shirt and go wading in. But a flash of movement in the shallows caught her eye just in time.

There was already someone out there.

And as he rose up out of the water, Stella realized two very important things. Despite all his promises, Aidan Kinsella was back in Sweetbriar Cove.

And he wasn’t wearing a stitch of clothing.

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Stella stopped dead in surprise. What was he doing here? Aidan was supposed to be hundreds of miles away, living his big-shot city life, not splashing around the shallows of Black Bottom Pond in his altogether.

However good that altogether looked.

Stella stood there, still frozen on the shore. She knew the polite thing for her to do would be to hightail it home as if she’d never been there. Or, to turn her back, and call a greeting, and give Aidan the chance to wade to shore and cover his, umm, modesty. But for some reason, she couldn’t look away.

OK, she knew the reason, and it was six-foot-two of taut, tanned muscle, standing there in the water like some kind of Greek god. Aidan was still turned away from her, looking out across the pond, giving her a prime view of his muscular back and honed—

Other parts.

Stella blushed. In an instant, memories of that impulsive kiss came flooding back to her in all their steamy, heart-pounding glory. She barely even knew Aidan, she’d just seen him around Sweetbriar Cove those summers when she was growing up, the oldest Kinsella boy. He’d always looked so focused, even as a teen, and although her friends tried to flirt with him, he’d seemed high above their high school games. Until one night at a beach party, he’d joined a game of Spin the Bottle… and Stella’s turn had landed on him. She could still remember it now: that jump-start flicker of exhilaration, catching his eye across the flames. She’d started to make her way over, her heart beating faster—

But before she could claim her prize, a fight broke out down the beach, and the cops came to break things up.

She never did get that kiss.

In the back of her mind, she hoped she’d see him the next summer, and teasingly flirt over their missed connection. But Aidan hadn’t come back that next year, she heard he’d landed some fancy finance internship in New York, instead. Stella had met a cute college guy at the fireworks, and started dating him, and soon, she had bigger things on her mind than an almost kiss. Aidan hadn’t crossed her mind in almost fifteen years…

…Until she’d run into him a couple of months ago. He’d been stuck on a back-country road near the farm, blocked in by her stubborn alpacas, and he was just as handsome – and buttoned-up – as ever. He’d been running late, and hadn’t even recognized her at first, but Stella didn’t blame him. She was a long way from the pampered debutante she’d been back then. But he still owed her a kiss, and Stella couldn’t resist feeling sixteen again, just for a moment.

Only it turned out that her moment of madness was back on her doorstep again.

Stella finally snapped out of her daze. The last thing she wanted an awkward reunion after the stunt she’d pulled. What was she supposed to say? “Sorry for mauling you like some kiss-starved spinster?”

No, she needed to get out of there before he was any the wiser. She began slowly backing away, into the trees, and she was almost out of sight when her foot came down on a dry branch.

Crack.

Aidan spun around. “Is someone there?”

Stella cringed. Why hadn’t she changed out of her clumpy work boots?

“Um, hi Aidan!” she called, her cheeks burning with embarrassment. She gave a wave, and then quickly slapped her hand over her eyes. “I didn’t see anything!” she lied. “Well, not nothing. I mean, you have