Sometimes even lifeguards need saving...

Lifeguard Sam Logan is always cool under pressure. But his laid-back nature is put to the test when his daughter begrudgingly comes to live with him for the summer. Luckily, his new neighbor, Silicon Valley tech guru Sarah Buckley, agrees to mentor her. In return, Sam teaches Sarah some much-needed meditation.

Brash and self-centered, Sarah is not the best influence for eleven-year-old Lucy. Yet Sam can’t deny he’s attracted to Sarah’s drive—and the vulnerability she starts to show him. It’s no secret that at the end of her sabbatical, Sarah is heading back to California. So why does this feel like more than just a summer fling?

CATHRYN PARRY is the author of ten Harlequin Superromances. Her books have received such honors as the Booksellers’ Best Award, HOLT Medallion Awards of Merit and several Readers’ Choice Award nominations. She lives in Massachusetts with her husband and their entertaining cat, Otis. Please see Cathryn’s website, cathrynparry.com, for information about upcoming releases and to sign up for her reader newsletter.

Books by Cathryn Parry

HARLEQUIN SUPERROMANCE

The Undercover Affair The Good Mom The Secret Between Them Secret Garden Scotland for Christmas The Sweetest Hours Out of His League The Long Way Home Something to Prove

Other titles by this author available in ebook format.

Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk

Summer by the Sea

Cathryn Parry

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ISBN: 978-1-474-08109-2

SUMMER BY THE SEA

© 2018 Cathryn Parry

Published in Great Britain 2018

by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF

All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.

By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.

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www.millsandboon.co.uk

For Megan Long. Every book that you edit you make better. Thank you for being a blessing in my life!

“Do you mind if I ask you a favor?” Sarah said impulsively. “May I bring over a steak for you to grill for me?”

Sam shook his head, appearing as if he was trying hard not to laugh. “How do you know I’m up to your fine standards?” he teased.

She eyed the steaks he was putting onto a plate. “Because I know quality when I see it.”

He barked out a laugh.

“And I was so determined not to like you.” He shook his head as he set the plate down and sank into an Adirondack chair beside her. He laughed again.

“Excellent,” she said cheerfully. “Let me go get the steak I bought.” She rose. “I can bring over a salad for you and Lucy to share with me.”

“Already taken care of. Plus, grilled corn on the cob will be coming later. But tell me.” He leveled his gaze at her, suddenly serious. “Why should I even do this? All you seem to do is insult people, and frankly, I’m not up for that when it comes to my family.”

“But...I apologized to you,” Sarah said.

“Oh, boy!” He gave her a mock cheer.

“Look, I never apologize, Sam! Apologies admit weakness. So this is a first in the history of the world for me—be flattered.”

“You’re quite self-centered.” Sam paused and grinned at her wickedly. “And I never insult people—be flattered.”

Were they flirting?

Dear Reader,

Welcome to Summer by the Sea, a new Wallis Point, New Hampshire, story set in the fictional seaside town first described in The Long Way Home and continued with The Secret Between Them and The Undercover Affair.

Sarah Buckley is a driven type A tech entrepreneur who is at first enraged to be banished to a rustic beach cottage for a quiet summer sabbatical.

All Sarah wants is to return home to her busy Silicon Valley company, where she can continue her quest to conquer the tech world. First, though, she needs to prove that she’s learned to relax and “become more Zen” in her relations with others.

So, is her beach neighbor Sam Logan, a laid-back lifeguard without any apparent life goals—and his genius eleven-year-old daughter, whose future he and Sarah conflict over—the person to teach her?

A summer by the sea can work wonders and heal any wounded hearts. I hope you enjoy Sarah and Sam’s spark-filled romance!

All the best,

Cathryn Parry

Acknowledgment

A special thank-you to Cape Cod lifeguard Sarah P. for answering my questions and teaching me about torps, rip currents and—in an unplanned encounter—how to treat a jellyfish sting.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

About the Author

Booklist

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Introduction

Dear Reader

Acknowledgment

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

EPILOGUE

Extract

CHAPTER ONE

SAM LOGAN’S SUMMER plans were turned upside-down in a single phone call.

Twenty-four hours later, his eleven-year-old daughter, Lucy, stood in his tiny bachelor kitchen, surrounded by her suitcase, her iPad, and a ragged and well-loved stuffed bear that he hadn’t even known she still slept with.

Sam stared at it—and her—in shock. Seeing that teddy bear made him realize he really had no idea what was going on with his daughter. He felt completely inadequate to the task of being Lucy’s full-time dad.

Ironic, considering Sam worked with kids her age every day. He taught environmental science to middle school students. Sam was known as a laid-back teacher. A guy who could handle whatever came his way without getting his feathers ruffled or ruffling feathers. It was his great strength, his inner Zen.

But the panic rose from deep in his chest and clutched at his throat, affecting his ability to breathe. This must be what swimmers felt like when they were caught up in a giant, sucking rip current.

Sam had never been caught in a rip current himself. As a professional lifeguard at Wallis Point beach in summer, he knew the signs and avoided the trap. A few times per season, he rescued people caught in the grip. He even taught the younger guards—college-aged men and women—to notice the signs so they could warn others, too.

Avoidance of danger had always been key in Sam’s world.

Sam wiped sweaty palms on the back of his shorts. Lucy was here, sitting at his kitchen table, pushing her light brown hair from her eyes and staring at her luggage, probably as uncomfortable as he was. Her mother had decided to head to Alaska for the summer to work as a singer on a cruise ship, so Sam was now responsible for her. For ten long weeks. Alone. During lifeguard season.

Shaky, he wondered what he should do with her—feed her lunch, maybe? Usually she came to his house for two Saturday afternoons per month—had ever since she was a toddler—and before they left for whatever fun activity he’d planned that day, Lucy always sat and ate a peanut butter sandwich and drank an orange soda. That was their tradition.

So he opened his refrigerator door. No orange sodas. Instead, one whole shelf was filled with a batch of craft brew he’d made earlier in the week. He bent and felt past the beer bottles, finding two cold cans in the back of the fridge. “Luce,” he said, straightening, “I’m out of orange soda. Would you like a ginger ale?”

His daughter regarded him stoically. “Yes, please. I’ll make my own sandwich.”

“Okay. Good.” Feeling a little more hopeful, Sam popped the two cans open then passed her one. Without any drama, she stood, got a plate, bread, peanut butter and knife and began making lunch for herself.

He should calm down. He and Lucy would be fine—they could figure out this new arrangement as they went. He saw her often enough to know the basics of caring for her according to the rules Colleen had insisted upon since Lucy was a baby.

Sam had been blindsided when she’d been born. Though he and Colleen hadn’t been together anymore and Sam had been a young father—just twenty-one at the time—he had coped. He would have preferred to see Lucy more often, but the lawyers had told him what was best for the three of them, and Sam had rolled with it. He would roll with it now.

He seated himself across from Lucy and took a long drink of the almost medicinal-tasting ginger ale. Even if he had no idea what he was going to do with her for the next ten weeks—and he couldn’t take Lucy to a movie or a museum or a theme park or even his brother’s house near Boston every day, like he usually did when he had her—he wasn’t going to freak out. Neither was he going to put the burden on Lucy. The situation wasn’t her fault. Sam didn’t want to be like his own parents and force inappropriate decisions on her the way they had with him and his brother when they were kids negotiating a difficult divorce.

Be Zen. Be detached. Stay cool.

That’s what Sam had learned young. Dealing with other people’s kids in the public school system reinforced the lesson for him daily. It was best to keep calm under pressure. Have non-emotional and non-threatening conversations. Use humor whenever possible.

Sam gave Lucy his easiest smile. “It’s all good, Luce. There are worse places we could be stuck together for the summer, right?”

She gazed up at him with her serious brown eyes. “Maybe,” she replied calmly. Then she went back to cutting her sandwich precisely in half with a serrated bread knife.

The most grown-up kid I’ve ever known, Sam’s brother had once said. Sam had been proud of it at the time. But now he glanced at Lucy’s teddy bear leaning forlornly against her adult-looking black luggage, and he wondered if there was more to her stoic behavior than was apparent on the surface.

Too bad he couldn’t just let her be a free-range kid like he and his brother had been during their carefree, predivorce summers on the beach. But nowadays, the powers that be frowned on unsupervised kids, especially in a high-traffic tourist town. Even at eleven years old, Lucy needed somebody to watch her and be responsible for her. He worked as a lifeguard full time. What was he supposed to do?

Sam gazed over Lucy’s head and out the window toward the seashore where he’d spent most of his life working and playing during the short-but-sweet New England summers. He loved his summers here. He would never live anywhere else. He liked waking up to the smell of salt water outside his bedroom window and the sounds of rolling waves and cawing seabirds. Beyond a long expanse of sand was the deep blue Atlantic Ocean, and all he had to do was stare at that horizon whenever he needed to find peace.

“Do you remember when you were little, and you used to sit up on the lifeguard chair with me?” Chair ten, right outside his window. It wasn’t set out for the season yet, but it would be soon. “You used to love spending time on the beach.”

Lucy stopped chewing and stared at him. “I can’t sit on the beach with you while you’re working, Sam.”

Sam. That about killed him. He smiled anyway. “Yeah, I know. And I know this isn’t what you had planned for your summer vacation, either, but don’t worry, we’ll figure it out and make it work for us.”

He took another long drink from his ginger ale can. “Are there any day camps you might be interested in for the summer?” He figured he should ask—maybe she had something in mind that he didn’t know about. As a local teacher, maybe he could use his connections to get her a last-minute slot. “Wallis Point has a swimming program and a sailing academy. Then there’s always tennis lessons—”

“No, thank you, Sam.”

He winced and glanced back at the beach. His friend Duke drove by on one of the two open-roof all-terrain vehicles that the Wallis Point lifeguards employed. During the school year, Duke was vice principal of the high school in town. In summer, Sam often drove with Duke on patrol. Today, though, was the day after classes had let out for the summer, and if not for Lucy, Sam would have been flying out of Logan Airport for his yearly backpacking vacation before he started his lifeguard job. This year, trekking through Scotland for a week.

“I like the library,” Lucy suddenly said.

Sam turned around. “The library, in summer?”

“Yes, please.”

She really was a serious student. If he was honest with himself, he was worried about that. Lucy was eleven years old, and she didn’t have fun easily. It occurred to him that she was a throwback to his own mother. That was the only conclusion Sam could come up with.

Lucy finished the last bite of her sandwich, so Sam reached for his sunglasses. He gave her another bright smile. “Okay, Luce. How about we take a walk on the beach and discuss this some more?”

“No, thank you. I’m going to see Cassandra,” she said simply, and stood. Lucy never asked permission. She just did whatever the inner force inside her told her to do.

“Okay, sure,” he said reasonably. Cassandra was Sam’s next-door neighbor. Seventy-something and eccentric, she was a bona fide working artist—an internationally famous children’s book illustrator. Lately, Lucy had taken to ending their Saturday visits with a stint at Cassandra’s cottage. Sam hadn’t interrupted them. The relationship was good for Lucy, he thought. Lucy seemed to love visiting Cassandra, and that was what mattered to him. Besides, a couple of hours every two weeks hadn’t seemed as if it would be a burdensome interruption for his neighbor.

He leaned back, watching Lucy clear away her lunch dishes and load them neatly into his dishwasher. Lucy just did things like that. She was independent and capable, but there was no getting around it. Somebody needed to be here for her full time, and that somebody needed to be him.

And wasn’t this his opportunity to get closer to her, scary as that seemed?

He slipped on his sunglasses and stood. He might ruffle feathers for what he was about to say, but... “I’ll walk over with you. I need to see Cassandra, too.”

Lucy looked him straight in the eyes and nodded. “Okay.”

“Just so you know, if it’s all right with Cassandra that you hang out with her a little more often than usual this summer, then it’s cool with me.”

“Good.” Lucy seemed more animated and hopeful than she’d been when she first arrived. “Last time I saw her, Cassandra said she would be home today.”

“Great.” Sam opened the glass slider that led to the porch. “Before we go over there, though, could I ask you something?”

Lucy slipped her hands into her jacket pockets as if bracing herself.

“We need to figure out something for, ah...” He didn’t want to say “childcare,” but that was the only word he could think of, so he swallowed his reticence. “Someone to take care of you. I, ah...” He took a breath. He’d never wanted to face this. And it pained him to say so, but he’d made a monumental decision. He was going to sacrifice something for her, his only child, that he’d never thought he could ever sacrifice for anybody. He needed to resign his lifeguard job. There really wasn’t any other way out of it.

“Sam, I want Cassandra to watch me this summer.”

He blinked in surprise. “Do you really think it’s fair to ask Cassandra to do that?”

“We already discussed it, she and I.” Lucy set her chin.

How was that possible? “Cassandra doesn’t have a phone,” he pointed out.

Lucy used the toe of her sneaker to outline the edge of his breakfast bar in the kitchen. “We talked about it the last time I was here.”

He willed himself to breathe easily, in and out. He would not care. Would not get upset.

“You were here almost a week ago.” Four days before Colleen had called him. “We didn’t know then that your mother was going to go off to Alaska for the summer.” He’d tried to keep the sarcasm out of his voice, he really had.

“Mom knew she was going,” Lucy said in a small voice.

“She told you?” he asked softly.

“No.” Lucy shook her head vehemently. “I heard her on the phone with the cruise ship people.”

“By accident?”

Lucy moved her wispy bangs to one side. “I listened on the extension because I thought it was a call from my teacher.”

Okay, should he be concerned? With his students, he only rarely called their homes. Usually because there was a problem with the child. “Why do you think your teacher would be calling your mom?”

“That’s not important,” Lucy said.

Yeah, it was. And he was going to lose his patience if he wasn’t careful. “Okay. We’ll go see Cassandra,” he said simply.

He grabbed his windbreaker from a hook and put on a ball cap. They stepped through the sliding door onto his deck overlooking the beach. In mid-June, it was windy and cool. Cassandra’s cottage was only about twenty yards away, but despite the nearness, they didn’t talk often. They usually just waved when they saw each other. Most days, he caught glimpses of her working on her paintings. A bit of a bohemian, the lady often dressed in Indonesian batik and straw hats. She smoked imported cigarettes that smelled like clove and cinnamon spices, and she seemed more detached and easygoing than even he was. Every now and then she stopped by Sam’s house parties in summer, and nothing seemed to faze her. Yet she didn’t seem irresponsible. She taught art classes to teens regularly at the local library, and she was a popular teacher.

Lucy adored her.

She always had. The first time Lucy had toddled over to greet Cassandra, she’d been three, and Cassandra had given her an ice pop and let her play with her paint brushes. His serious, stoic daughter had been hooked on the woman ever since.

They walked through the beach sand together, he and Lucy. When she was little, he’d held her hand, but now that she was older, they didn’t do that.

When they got to Cassandra’s door, Lucy gave a small, hesitant knock on the glass.

Cassandra answered immediately. She radiated “earth mother” authority, her billowing, colorful pants as bright as her smile. Reading glasses sat atop her head of white-gray hair, and in her right hand was a cane—solid metal of some type and vividly purple.

“Come in, come in.” She opened the door wider, smiling broadly at his daughter. “Welcome, Lucy.” Then Cassandra looked directly into Sam’s eyes. “You’ve brought your father with you this time. That’s good.”

Sam nodded to his neighbor. “Good to see you, Cassandra. I don’t mention it often enough, but thanks for everything you’ve done to help Lucy over the years.”

“I enjoy her company very much.”

He glanced over to find that Lucy had taken up a perch in a vintage, lime-colored beanbag chair. A small black-and-white tuxedo cat wandered over to investigate her on silent cat feet. Lucy scooped him up into her lap and pressed him to her cheek.

Yet again, Sam was taken aback. Lucy had never been cuddly with him. Other than the worn teddy bear he’d been surprised to see in her luggage, he hadn’t realized she had this side to her.

Cassandra shuffled over to her kitchen and bustled with a plastic grocery bag on the counter. The front half of the cottage was one big room—a combination art studio/library/kitchenette and seating area. A stereo on one of the shelves played a jazz song from the thirties or forties, sung by a woman with an emotional, raspy voice. Sam felt unsettled by the unfamiliar environment and the strange new revelations his daughter had given him.

Cassandra brought over a snack for Lucy.

“Blueberry cake!” Lucy said, excited.

Sam remained standing, not sure what to say.

“Cassandra gave me The Witch of Blackbird Pond to read,” Lucy told him, her tone serious again. As she contemplated him, that studious look came over her and she turned silent once more.

He instinctively touched the doorjamb. “What’s The Witch of Blackbird Pond?” he asked Cassandra.

Cassandra smiled at Lucy. “Shall you explain the story to your dad, or should I?”

“It’s an old story,” Lucy said, settling the plate on a table beside her. “It’s a novel about a teen who has to travel to a new place in the 1600s, and it isn’t anything like what she’s used to, and she gets upset because she doesn’t fit in. So she runs away and meets a kindly Quaker lady who lives by herself on a pond, and she takes her in and feeds her blueberry cake and lets her play with a kitten every time she comes to visit.”

He just stared at Lucy. “So you’re saying you’re upset when you come to see me, and that every time you visit Cassandra’s you eat blueberry cake and play with a kitten?”

She rolled her eyes. “No. It’s not literal, Sam.”

But there had to be some truth to it. And Cassandra appeared to be watching him closely. He wasn’t sure he liked the scrutiny.

It bothered him that his neighbor seemed to know more about his daughter than he did.

But he shook the feeling off. Decided to get right to it. Giving Cassandra his charming smile, the one that usually got him places with women, he said, “Lucy’s mom is going to be away for the summer. It looks like she’s going to be staying with me for a couple months.”

“Yes, I heard that from Lucy last week,” Cassandra said noncommittally. “You must be very excited.”

The back of his neck tightened. He’d momentarily forgotten that his neighbor had known about the change of plans before he had.

But he kept smiling. Folding his arms, he said quietly to Cassandra, “I am excited that she’s here. In fact, I’m resigning as a lifeguard supervisor in order to spend as much time as possible with Lucy.”

As he said it, he knew it was the right thing. Years ago, he’d never expected he would one day have the privilege of living with his only child. Maybe this summer was a gift to him.

But evidently, Lucy didn’t think so. Her face drooped as if he’d dropped a depressing bit of news on her. He felt his own sadness in the hollow of his breastbone.

Outside, the new lifeguard recruits were being drilled. Wind sprints.

Cassandra took her cane and thumped her way across the room. Picked up a paintbrush from a jar on the table. Based on the chemicals and rags spread on a piece of newspaper, she appeared to have been cleaning her painting implements when he and Lucy interrupted her.

Lucy was gazing down at the cat in her lap, stroking his black fur, saying nothing.

It hit Sam, all at once, that while he’d thought he and Lucy were doing okay together all this time, they really weren’t. Lucy was as remote and detached from him as anybody he’d ever known.

He’d lived this way for years. On the surface, he welcomed his daughter to his home two Saturdays a month. They did something interesting and fun together—a movie, a trip to a marine wildlife reserve or a museum, a visit to his brother’s house where she played with her two cousins’ electronic toys to her heart’s content.

But always she ended the visit at Cassandra’s cottage. He’d considered Cassandra a warm grandmother figure to Lucy, filling a role that was missing in Lucy’s life, but it was becoming clear to him that Cassandra had been more to her than he’d realized.

Cassandra connected with Lucy. He didn’t.

He was a piece that didn’t fit in Lucy’s story.

And he didn’t want that to be true any longer.

He glanced back at Cassandra and caught her studying him. She relinquished the brushes and slowly made her way back toward him. Thump, thump, thump.

“Isn’t this usually the week that you take a backpacking vacation?” Cassandra asked him softly. “School got out yesterday.”

“It did.” He tried to keep the bitterness from his voice. “And I cancelled the trip yesterday.”

“Because Lucy needs you.” Cassandra said it as a statement and not a question, and he gave her a short nod. He wasn’t even attempting the charming smile anymore.

“Where were you going this year?” Cassandra’s voice was very low, meant as a conversation between two adults, with Lucy left out of it.

He frowned. “To Scotland. Hiking.”

“Ah, with the Scottish lassies.” She exhaled.

The older woman couldn’t know. Nobody did. It was his own personal secret. The day after school let out, every year, Sam chose a different place in the world to escape to, alone. Someplace interesting to him. And there, wherever “there” was, he nearly always met a woman, though they never exchanged last names. For a week they would get closer, and it was intimate, yet anonymous. That vacation lasted him for a year. For the other three hundred and forty-odd days, he lived his life separate, detached, not really opening himself to anybody. Not even, he realized now, his own daughter.

“This is a small town,” he said to Cassandra, falling back on his old excuse. “A bad idea for a single male teacher to...” To date, and therefore to provide gossip for the mill, he was going to say. But he didn’t want to get into it in front of Lucy.

“Hmm.” Cassandra left it at that. “Your job is very important to you,” she finally said.

He shrugged. Honestly, teaching was interesting and it was a paycheck. That was about it.

Cassandra glanced sharply at him as if reading his mind. “I meant being a lifeguard.”

He blinked. It was true, he looked forward to his lifeguard job all year. He liked the keeping-people-safe aspect of it. He liked sitting in his chair, looking out over the ocean and feeling calm and at peace with the world.

“Well, yes, it’s a good job. But my daughter is more important to me. I’ll take care of her, Cassandra, you don’t have to worry about her being here all the time while you have work to do.”

“Please, Dad!” Lucy interrupted. “I don’t want you to quit your lifeguard job to take care of me!”

She’d called him Dad, not Sam.

He felt himself grinning like a fool.

“Cassandra says you’re really good at what you do.” Lucy continued. “She says you’re the only lifeguard trainer she’s ever seen who teaches the lifeguards how to meditate to stay calm. And you show them the best way to return lost children to their parents. And...to defuse tense situations.”

That was the most Lucy had said to him in a long time, and Cassandra smiled sheepishly at him. “Your lifeguard station is right in the line of sight of my workspace. I’ve been listening to you lead morning training sessions for years.”

Cassandra had obviously been talking him up to his daughter, and he appreciated that. “Thank you, Cassandra,” he said quietly.

She folded her hands and slid a sideways look at him. “I wonder if you could do a favor for me this summer.”

“Oh?” He felt his smile tightening.

“It’s nothing to worry about,” Cassandra hastened to explain. “I have a young houseguest coming here from the West Coast, on sabbatical from her demanding job. She’s looking for someone to tutor her in meditation. I wonder if you could teach her some techniques?”

He almost burst out laughing. He would just bet this “young houseguest” was single, a sweet young thing, and Cassandra was attempting to fix him up. He was thirty-two and unattached, and his fellow teachers tended to do that to him, too. Cassandra he couldn’t get mad at because she was Lucy’s friend. Plus, he could see the irony in her request.

Cassandra noted his amused expression and tsk-tsked him. “You know how important meditation is, Sam. Sarah asked me to find her a class, and I thought of you. I never saw anyone teach neophytes at work like that until you came along. The other lifeguard supervisors scream at the recruits and blow their whistles. Run, swim, practice mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.”

“Mouth-to-mouth resuscitation is quite important,” he teased.

“Staying calm and responding appropriately to stressful situations is more important.” She nodded at him.

He agreed with her, but that wasn’t the point. “How old is your houseguest?” he asked.

Cassandra didn’t bat an eye. “Sarah is in her thirties, like you, and she’s quite pretty. She returns to California after Labor Day.”

So here was this summer’s anonymous yet intimate fling—was that what she was implying?

“No, Cassandra. Sorry.” Honestly, the morning’s uncomfortable realizations about him and Lucy not having an emotional connection were making him not want to have his yearly fling. It seemed pathetic now. Maybe he’d only thought he’d been connecting with these women, just as he’d thought he’d been connecting with Lucy during their twice-monthly Saturday outings. Lucy had made him see that it hadn’t been true, at all.

“Please, Dad, help her!” Lucy’s voice was a shriek. He nearly jumped, it surprised him so much.

“Luce, I’m going to be busy with you. You and I can hang out and do stuff together. We can go to the library and read books together all day, if that’s what you want.” He would miss his job, and money would be tight, but at least the time spent together would bring them closer.

“But, Dad, you don’t understand...” Lucy got up and shrugged out of her backpack. She riffled through a stack of books and papers and pulled out a magazine.

Business Roundup. He stared at her, confused. This was an adult publication, and not something he or her mother read, that was for sure. He couldn’t quite picture bohemian Cassandra reading it, either.

Lucy flipped the pages open to an article she’d marked with a yellow sticky note and showed the pages to him. One featured a huge, glossy picture of a severe, unsmiling woman.

He blinked and looked up at his daughter.

“This is Sarah Buckley,” Lucy said. “Haven’t you heard of her?”

Should he have? He shrugged and held up his hands.

“She’s one of the most important women in Silicon Valley,” his eleven-year-old informed him.

He studied the picture again. Sarah Buckley wore a black suit jacket with a white shirt and had dark chin-length hair. Her fighting gaze made her look like she battled and scrapped for what was hers and never gave up trying.

“I didn’t know you were interested in business,” he said to Lucy.

“She’s a woman of substance. That’s what it says. Read the article.”

He took the magazine from her and flipped through the piece. It was five pages long. When he heard his daughter loved the library, frankly, he’d thought she meant the young adult section. Cassandra had all kinds of artsy friends who wrote literature for kids and teens, but seriously...business magazines?

“Sarah Buckley talks about setting life goals and making daily progress and moving above the limitations of your background.” Lucy set her chin as she spoke, and in that moment, there was no question, she absolutely reminded Sam of the driven woman profiled in the piece.

He moved away from the magazine with the photograph of the intense Silicon Valley executive that Lucy so admired. He strode over to a couch across the room and sank deeply into the cushions. The whole day so far had been staggering to him. What other parts of herself had Lucy kept hidden from him? He had such a gap to bridge with her that it felt overwhelming.

Lucy settled back in the chair, rereading the article about the woman she obviously idolized. Cassandra wore a thoughtful expression that Sam couldn’t place.

“She’s my niece,” Cassandra said quietly. “My deceased sister’s only daughter. She’s in trouble with her job and she’s coming here to destress for the summer.”

“Sarah Buckley is your niece?” He stood up and glanced over Lucy’s shoulder at the photograph again. He saw no family resemblance to Cassandra.

A movement out the window caught his attention. On the beach, a crew on a town dump truck was delivering freshly painted lifeguard stands to each of the assigned stations.

A pang went through him. As much as he wanted to improve his relationship with Lucy this summer, the reminders of what he was giving up for that made Sam think again of all the good things he loved about his job that he would miss once he tendered his resignation. He would miss the early morning swims with the lifeguard teams, being calmed by and at peace in the vast, powerful ocean, his refuge since he’d been able to walk. Being one with the ocean was a feeling he couldn’t easily describe, a home to him. It was his peace and his anchor. He’d hoped Lucy would feel this way too, but she didn’t.

Not everybody loved the ocean, he reminded himself. Lots of people couldn’t swim or didn’t know how to manage the powerful rip currents that could drown even strong swimmers in seconds if they didn’t know how to read and navigate the tide’s unique signals. Sam loved the rescue teams, the camaraderie of the other lifeguards, his older bosses and the younger men and women, still in college, that he trained and mentored. He loved helping lost kids find their families and he loved diffusing tensions between beachgoers who’d sat too long in hot summer traffic.

He was good at it. He would do it year-round if the wages were good enough and he lived in a region of the country that supported it. Because of Lucy, he had stayed in Wallis Point, a town close to her home. It had now become his permanent home, too.

“Dad, you shouldn’t quit your lifeguard job,” Lucy pleaded again. “Please let me stay with Cassandra.”

She must have been watching him stare wistfully at the beach. The magazine was slack in her lap, and her serious brown eyes seemed sorry for him.

“She’ll be in good hands here,” Cassandra added softly.

“What about your work?” he asked Cassandra.

She resumed washing her brushes. “Don’t worry about me. I always take care of myself.” She glanced up at Sam with an expression he couldn’t quite read. “I’ve never told anyone this, but I do have regrets from Sarah’s childhood.”

Both he and Lucy had given her their full attention. They waited for her next words with rapt curiosity.

“Her parents both died when Sarah was twelve.” Cassandra paused to scrub at an especially tough stain on one of her brushes.

“I know this story.” Lucy jumped in eagerly. “Sarah talks about it in the article. She said that facing tragedy and then a difficult home life in her younger years helped hone her focus and showed her the importance of hard work in creating her own destiny.” She read from the magazine. “‘Because only in creating one’s own destiny can one ever be free.’” She put the magazine down. “She won a full scholarship to study engineering at university, where she started developing her own patents and inventions. She started her own company, and now I think she’s really rich. Nobody can push her around anymore.”

Sam stared at his daughter, confused on all kinds of levels. Money was what was important to Lucy? He hadn’t had an inkling that she placed so high a value on wealth. He certainly hadn’t passed that onto her. Business and power had never been important drivers to him. He was more of a helper, and he liked to live simply. Humbly. Sarah Buckley’s world just wasn’t his kind of place.

Cassandra shuffled over, bringing the platter of blueberry cake with her. She plunked it down before him. “Some refreshment, Sam?” she asked drily.

“That is just like what Hannah the witch gave to Nathaniel, too!” Lucy exclaimed. “Dad, you can be Nat!”

Cassandra raised an eyebrow at him.

“Let me guess,” he said, realizing he would have to get used to living with Lucy on her terms and not just spending two afternoons per month on a fun, distracting outing he’d dreamed up. “I’m living in The Witch of Blackbird Pond?”

“Nathaniel was Kit’s love interest. They both needed blueberry cake and kittens to find their happily ever after,” Cassandra explained.

“They get married in the end,” Lucy piped up. “Neither of them see it coming. But it’s true love and a happy ending.”

“Mm-hmm. Right.”

“Cynical about love, are you?” Cassandra asked him with a smile.

He laughed. “I’m not cynical about anything.” Actually, he was amazed that Lucy was talking so much, and about things she never talked about with him. With Sam she was always so serious and polite. This afternoon’s conversation was a revelation, even if much of it was disturbing to him. A reminder of how much he’d let himself off the hook as a parent.

He shook his head. It was bewildering, sometimes, that he was even a father to a daughter.

With a sigh, Cassandra sat beside him on the couch, patting his knee with her hand as she did so.

“Lucy will be safe and happy here, Sam. Let me watch her during the days for you—this is what she wants. And my cottage is close by—you can glance back at it any time of day from the beach, and here she’ll be. Except when we’re at the library, of course. And, yes, I do have an ulterior motive in wanting to keep Lucy around for the summer. It plays to my own guilt.”

“I don’t understand.”

“As I was saying before, I wasn’t there for Sarah when she needed me,” she said in a low voice. “After her parents were killed in an automobile accident.”

“So, where were you?”

Cassandra glanced at Lucy, who now had two cats on her lap. The second was a huge guy who looked part Maine Coon, with big bushy ears and a thick black coat. He blinked his green eyes slowly and purred while Lucy petted him.

“That’s Simmonds,” Cassandra said. “The smaller male in the tuxedo fur is Becker.” She turned back to Sam. “Let’s you and I step outside for a minute. Lucy will be fine with my two boys to keep her company.”

He nodded and rose with Cassandra. Lucy barely noticed, so busy was she talking to Becker, who actually seemed to be “talking” back.

“Becker rules the roost,” Cassandra said, as she crossed her small porch and sat in a blue metal seat. Sam sat across from her on an Adirondack chair. “He’ll be out here squawking in an instant if anything happens with Lucy. Have I ever told you the story about Becker waking me up when the kitchen was filled with smoke? A wire shorted and I didn’t hear the smoke alarm, I’m such a heavy sleeper.”

Sam smiled politely. He wasn’t a cat person himself.

“Ah, well.” Cassandra settled back and closed her eyes. The breeze stirred her gray hair and she sighed. “About Sarah. She was left alone after her parents died, and I wasn’t aware that she didn’t have anybody else except me to rely on until months later. I was in Naples, you see.” Her mouth twisted. “And back then...” She lifted her hands and shrugged. “The authorities in the States didn’t know where I was. They tried after the funeral, but couldn’t locate me in time.”

“What happened to Sarah?”

“She was put into a foster home. Maybe two.”

Oh. Hell.

That made Lucy’s situation look like a walk in a park. “Are you okay with your relationship now?” he asked.

Cassandra leaned forward on her cane and stretched out her legs in front of her. The legs of her batiked pants billowed like flags in the breeze.

“It’s certainly affected her and how she feels toward me, I can’t deny that. I’m not sure she ever forgave me for my initial choice to skip the funeral. The truth was, I couldn’t bear to face it. And by the time I realized what had happened to her and flew back to the States to fetch her, she’d managed to win herself a scholarship to an exclusive boarding school in California and was building her own life for herself. I didn’t stop trying to make it up to her, but...” Cassandra paused. “I had my own problems at the time,” she admitted. “There...was a reason I was in Naples to begin with.”

“And what was that?”

She waved her hand. “It’s not important now. The important thing is that Sarah reached out to me and she’s coming here to relax on her sabbatical.” She gazed out to sea. “I’m hoping the slower pace can help her.”

A summer by the sea could do a lot to help heal people. He’d seen it himself.

“When is the last time you saw your niece?”

“In person?” Cassandra turned her face to the sun. “It must be since she graduated from college.”

“That long?”

“She’s usually quite busy with her job, Sam.” Cassandra crossed her legs. “My thought is that Sarah and Lucy can each be good influences for one another. I confess—I was the one who told Lucy about Sarah. A young girl needs female role models. And for Sarah, getting out of her own head and teaching Lucy what she’s learned would distract her from the stress of work she’s dealing with.”

“I thought your goal this summer was to improve your relationship with Sarah.”

“It is. If she and Lucy click, it could help us all quite a bit. I want to create a good environment for both of them.”

He still felt skeptical. Was this really the best thing for Lucy?

“I had my choices to make, Sam,” Cassandra said softly. “I did the best I knew how.” She placed her hand on her cane and leaned closer to him. “So, will you help me? Will you bring my niece into a class or two with your lifeguards? Encourage her to take Lucy to the library now and then? They could talk about their common interests. Topics that you and I don’t have the passion for or knowledge of but that they seem to share.”

When Cassandra put it like that, it didn’t seem so harmful. A relaxed childcare and niece-helping arrangement that just might make sense for everyone.

Most important, it was what Lucy wanted.

“Well, okay. Sure. As for the meditation lessons, we’ll play it by ear once your niece gets here—that’s the best that I can do.”

Cassandra nodded, obviously relieved. “Sarah is coming at the end of next week. Sam, I can start watching Lucy for you immediately if you’d like. I would enjoy taking her to the library as she pleases. I don’t have any contracted commitments for the next month at least, so this would fill my time and give me great pleasure.”

Having Cassandra provide childcare for Lucy while he worked would help Sam with his finances. And he did love his job.

Plus, he would still see Lucy in the mornings and evenings, at lunch time and around his shifts...

“Fine. I’m off work already this week, and I don’t start lifeguarding until Monday morning. I’ll walk Lucy over to your cottage then. You can bring your niece over to my lifeguard station when she arrives, and I’ll talk to her about the classes.”

Cassandra gave him a relieved smile. “That sounds lovely.”

The wind was kicking up again; they should go back inside soon. “So...we’re set with our plan for summer? Lucy rejoins her mother on Labor Day weekend. Or is there a problem with your schedule for the month of August?”

Cassandra hesitated. “No, not a problem, but...”

He waited.

“My gentleman friend in Naples...we’ve kept in touch all these years, and there is a possibility he might visit for a week in August. We haven’t decided on that yet. It depends how well things are going with Sarah and me.”

“Is this gentleman friend the same reason you were in Naples when Sarah’s parents died?”

“It was.” A sad expression crossed Cassandra’s face. “But before he commits to visiting, I’m waiting to see how Sarah feels about it.” Cassandra looked quickly at Sam as if to reassure him. “If he does come, I’ll have him stay at the Grand Beachfront Hotel while he’s here. My cottage is so small.”

Sam couldn’t help asking, “Was it a love affair that kept you from Sarah?”

“It was.” Cassandra turned her face to the wind, and he’d never seen a woman so grief stricken. “I told you I had regrets, Sam.” She swallowed.

“Yes,” he said, thinking of his regrets with Lucy. He and Cassandra both had relationships to mend.

They sat companionably, side by side. With her faraway look, Cassandra seemed to be revisiting memories. He turned his own face to the sun. It warmed him even though the wind was brisk, and the rolling ridge in the beach blocked the worst of the gusts. It struck him that maybe this summer could work out well, after all, and be beneficial to all of them.

“We’ll keep Claudio’s visit between us,” Cassandra suddenly said. “For now. Until Sarah arrives.”

“Sure,” he agreed. He didn’t see how Cassandra’s secret could possibly affect him and Lucy.

“Well,” Cassandra sat up and patted his knee, then reached for her cane. “Come. Let’s go see what your very bright and imaginative daughter is up to now.”

Yes. He was curious about that himself.

He stood, opened Cassandra’s cottage door for her and held it while she made her way back inside.

“Be patient with my niece when you meet her,” were Cassandra’s final words on the subject that morning. “She’s had a hard life.”

Sam just nodded.

A week later, he regretted everything he’d agreed to with Cassandra for his and Lucy’s summer.

CHAPTER TWO

One week later

SARAH BUCKLEY KICKED the door of her rental car shut. The friggin’ thing. Hours stuck in traffic driving up from the airport on the wrong coast had done nothing to improve her already pissed-off attitude.

She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had to drive herself. Her time was simply too valuable. Instead, other people drove her. She sat in the backseat and made calls and tapped out directives aimed at the future sale of her company. Now, it seemed like she was back to square one with that. She was furious—she’d worked too freaking hard for this crap to have happened to her, especially the way it had.

She reached through the open window and yanked her briefcase off the passenger seat. But the top wasn’t zipped securely, and the books she’d packed came tumbling onto the sand in her Aunt Cassandra’s weed-lined excuse for a driveway.

Textbook after textbook. Sarah was a tech engineer by training—she’d been reading ebooks well before they became mainstream—but these books weren’t for quick perusal or for an underling to bullet-point for her—no, these she’d assigned herself to study. Since her college and MBA days, she’d always retained information better when she’d marked it up by hand.

In disgust, she bent over to collect the textbooks. Meditation. The Art of Zen Business. How to Speak with Millenials.

Idiocy. Unfortunately, her new financial partner and major investor was into this crap. She resented that she’d been forced to bring him in as her partner, but she’d had to—she needed his capital and his good counsel. The sale of her company couldn’t happen unless he was pleased with her. To impress him, she’d even hired a crew to install a Zen garden in her San Jose home—they were probably finishing it up today. The aggravation was enough to make her weep. She’d hated to deface her beautiful home, renovated slowly, carefully over the years—she’d started with the small house when she sold her first company, and then had made additions. Now, she had a beautiful custom-designed house with an attached pool, her own gym—and a ridiculous Zen garden, because Richard Lee was into Zen.

With a snort of disgust, she tossed the books into her Chanel bag, which was now covered with sand in the rustic New Hampshire driveway. With her heels equally sandy, she leaned against the car and surveyed the wreck that was Aunt Cassandra’s cottage.

Tiny. And Sarah knew it because she’d been here once before. The cottage had two small bedrooms and a bathroom that was too cramped for a soaking tub. The paint was peeling and the screen door hung half off its hinges. Rambling red roses bloomed prolifically on the rail fence, just as they had in the summer before the worst day of her life, and it was that small, innocent detail that punched her right in the gut.

Her eyes watered. No swear words occurred to her.

Sarah felt twelve years old and all alone in the world again. She’d spent one magical summer in this place, the last summer her parents were alive. They’d driven her up from Connecticut to spend two weeks with her eccentric aunt, a famous children’s book illustrator.

She and Cassandra had ridden fun, old-fashioned bicycles with wicker baskets on the handlebars. Down the boardwalk they’d careened, part of a daily expedition to the library to check out whatever books caught their fancy. Cassandra had bought her ice cream cones and gently drawn out Sarah’s hopes and dreams for her future.

“You’ll be a woman of substance one day,” Cassandra had promised her.

That encouragement was the reason Sarah could never completely hate Cassandra for not being there when she’d most needed her.

Sarah found herself sniffling, rubbing her eyes with the heel of her hand as if she were twelve all over again.

Two months after she’d returned from that August visit with Aunt Cassandra, on a sunny autumn afternoon, the principal at her junior high school had stood solemnly at the door of Sarah’s English classroom. After she’d followed him into the hallway, he’d spoken the worst words she could have imagined.

Her parents were dead.

All of her grandparents had already died.

Her father’s only brother had been off in the army in Germany.

And Cassandra, her mother’s sole sister, had been somewhere on the shore of the Mediterranean Sea, inside an artists’ colony with her married boyfriend. They most definitely hadn’t wanted to be found by the outside world.

Sarah wiped her eyes. At twelve, she’d learned tough lessons about self-preservation, self-reliance, success and grit. The hard, cruel world didn’t help the vulnerable. People could be abusive, both emotionally and physically, and strangers didn’t take care of the weak.

But soon she would be invulnerable. Just a few more months of putting up with her new partner, Richard Lee, and his games and indignities, and then she could take her company public. That’s when the really, really big money would start coming in. Then she could say “screw you” to the Richard Lees of the world, and anyone else for that matter, for the rest of her life.

Slinging the briefcase over her shoulder, she hauled herself to her feet and glanced around. Hadn’t Aunt Cassandra heard her yet? Her arrival hadn’t exactly been subtle, with the slamming door and textbooks dropped on the driveway. Then again, maybe her aunt’s hearing wasn’t great. Sarah guessed she would be in her midseventies by now. Sarah had been the only child of parents who had waited until they were in their forties to marry.

Well, Sarah was turning forty herself this summer. And that milestone birthday wasn’t improving her mood, either.

Scowling, she tried the handle of the cottage door, but it was locked. Strange. Aunt Cassandra hadn’t believed in locked doors when Sarah was twelve, but that was back in a magical, faraway past when the world seemed so much more innocent than it was today.

Sarah went around to the beach-facing side of the cottage, put a hand up to shade her eyes from the sun and peered inside the living-room window.

The furniture was different than she remembered. The paintings on display were also new. But she could see into the open doorways—the two bedrooms and the tiny, rustic bathroom—and it was apparent that no one was home.

Cassandra must have stepped out.

She couldn’t have gone far. Her aunt didn’t drive, and her mobility was limited.

Sarah dropped her bag and went out to the beach to search for her. On a sunny June weekday afternoon the shore was dotted with people. Couples, families, groups of moms and kids. A lifeguard with a perfect body stood beside his chair. Arms crossed, listening to one of the moms as she spoke to him in an animated fashion.

But no Cassandra.

Frowning, Sarah checked the time on her phone. She was right on schedule. Cassandra knew she was coming. Sarah had written the letter to her aunt herself—no email for her free-spirited, unorthodox aunt—and Cassandra, in her flourishing, dramatic script, had confirmed Sarah’s visit.

What the hell?

One would think that if her aunt really cared, then she would be more careful. Or could she be doing it again? Could she be cavalierly reburning the bridge that Sarah had let stay burned for all these years before deciding to tentatively rebuild it just last month?

Sarah didn’t know because Cassandra wasn’t here to ask in person. And it wasn’t as if Sarah could simply direct her administrative assistant to zip off a quick text message to her aunt.

Cassandra had no cell phone, no email address—not even a tablet with banking apps. She still wrote paper checks. She relied on the post office to mail pleasant notes written on real stationery. Her lawyer in town handled any communications of urgent importance.

Sarah didn’t have an administrative assistant here to deal with a lawyer, anyway. That meant she had to hunt down her technophobic aunt herself, on her aunt’s terms.

Gritting her teeth, she took out her phone and pulled up the lawyer’s contact number.

“Kimball Law Firm,” a young female voice answered.

Sarah gripped her phone and spoke firmly, like she always did, as a woman of substance. “This is Sarah Buckley. Put Natalie on the line.” She swallowed and thought of Richard Lee’s admonition to her. “Please,” she added.

“Ms. Kimball is in a meeting right now, but I’ll take a message.”

“Who is this?” Sarah demanded. “What is your name?”

There was a slight pause at the other end. As there should be.

“This is Sophia, Ms. Kimball’s assistant,” the woman said pleasantly. “Would you like to leave a message for Ms. Kimball?”

“Yes, tell her to get her ass down to Cassandra Shipp’s cottage to let me in. Otherwise, my aunt will be looking for a new lawyer to manage her affairs.” Anger coursing through her, Sarah clicked the phone off and tossed it onto the sand.

It sat there, winking in the sun.

What the hell was she doing?

Sarah knelt and picked it up, brushing off the beach sand. This phone was her lifeline. With it, she could call Richard Lee and beg him to reconsider her temporary banishment from the company she had started.

She wasn’t cut out for a “retreat.” She didn’t want to “put her head on straight,” or “think about her actions” as he’d instructed. She was meant to work. To get things done and accomplish business miracles.

She put her head in her hands and began to weep again. Honestly, she’d reached rock bottom. She hadn’t even wept when her entire staff had resigned en masse.

Just because she’d called them “ungrateful little shits” during their morning motivational talk. Who the hell needed morning motivational talks—aside from Richard Lee, apparently? What were they all—in kindergarten? These were business professionals working in Silicon Valley’s most up-and-coming tech firm, for the California Business Bureau’s Woman of the Year.

Yet again, she wiped her eyes.

Her phone still remained silent. No one called her back. No one jumped at her command.

This was not her usual life.

Sarah sat cross-legged, imitating the picture on the cover of the meditation textbook she’d marked up for all six hours of her flight. Airy-fairy, none of it made a bit of sense to her, but since she was at rock bottom, she was going to do anything she possibly could to claw her way out of this pit of despondency.

Breathe in, breathe out, she told herself. Breathe in, breathe out.

So friggin’ idiotic. What was the point in counting breaths like a child just learning her numbers?

Still, maybe she shouldn’t have called that lawyer’s assistant—she couldn’t even remember her name—an ass. Or had she called the lawyer an ass? Sarah couldn’t remember. It didn’t even matter, to tell the truth, except that if she didn’t please Richard, didn’t at least try to “calm down,” then she would never influence him to bring her company public in the timely manner she wanted.

She needed Richard’s goodwill. Richard Lee was respected. A big-time mover and shaker in the Valley, with a track record of bringing companies public and making the founders as well as himself wealthy beyond all belief.

She took a breath and grabbed the phone. Richard would want her to apologize to the lawyer’s assistant. But it had been a long time since she’d apologized to anybody.

Her phone suddenly rang, shocking her.

“Hello?” she answered the call tentatively.

“Ms. Buckley?” This was the same young female voice as before. “This is Sophia, Ms. Kimball’s assistant again.”

“Hello, Sophia. I’m...sorry for using harsh language with you. I apologize.”

There, she thought. Richard would be proud.

“Um, that’s okay. I called Ms. Kimball, and she said she’ll be over to Cassandra’s cottage in about an hour. She’s at a real-estate closing with a client, and as soon as it wraps up, she’ll be there.”

An hour? “What am I supposed to do until then?” Sarah demanded.

“Well...there’s a beach right there, isn’t there?”

“I don’t care about the beach,” Sarah snapped. “I need a shower. And Wi-Fi.”

There was silence on the other end.

Damn it. It occurred to Sarah that if Aunt Cassandra didn’t have email, then she certainly didn’t have Wi-Fi, either.

Sarah held back her scream. The summer was going to be worse than she’d thought. “Fine,” she gritted out. “I’ll expect her in an hour.” She felt hot and sweaty and disgusting from the long plane ride followed by a long drive in a rental that smelled of cleaning fluid and didn’t work too well in the air-conditioning department. “Until then, I’ll change into my bathing suit at the gas station down the street and then take a long jump in the ocean. That’ll freshen me up from my journey.”

She was sounding too much like a martyr, so she cleared her throat. “I’m looking forward to meeting my aunt’s attorney,” she added. After all, as Cassandra’s only surviving family member, Sarah would likely be an executor of her aunt’s will someday, so she saw the practicality in having a decent relationship with the woman.

You see, Richard, she thought, I can be nice when I need to.

“Ms. Shipp brought the Business Roundup article you were in to show us,” Sophia continued, oblivious to Sarah’s irritation. “We’re so excited you’ll be visiting us in Wallis Point this summer. You’re a local celebrity.”

Wait, what? Cassandra had seen that article? Sarah didn’t know which was more surprising, that Cassandra had noticed it or that she’d been proud enough to show it to people.

“Well, it may not be for the whole summer,” Sarah said. Indeed, she was hoping Richard could be persuaded to let her come back earlier. Say in a week or two, when she could meditate and radiate Zen with the best of them. Sarah had always been a good student when she’d put her mind to something.

“Hmm,” Sophia was saying. “Maybe you could give a talk at the library? I’m a volunteer, and we—”

“No,” Sarah interrupted. Nip that idea right in the bud. Sarah didn’t intend to get too comfortable in this beachy backwater. Her time here was an exile—her punishment for forgetting that she’d ceded too much power to Richard, her investor. She needed to focus on sucking up to him again so she could grab her power back.

Besides, she was still wary of her aunt, truth be told. For good reason.

“Sorry,” Sophia murmured. “I know you’re very busy. We won’t disturb your vacation.” She cleared her throat. “Excuse me, but I have a call coming in. Rest assured that I’ll follow up with Ms. Kimball and keep tabs on how her time is running. She’s promised she’ll be right out with Cassandra’s key as soon as she can. In the meantime, please do enjoy the beach. It’s a gorgeous day, and I would kill to be outside with you.”

And Sarah would kill to be back in her office in California, but that wasn’t likely to happen within the next week or two, at least. Her plan was to master meditation in a lesson or two with Cassandra, and then have her charming and illustrious aunt call up Richard Lee himself. By next Sunday—or the following one, at the latest—Sarah should be back in San Jose. Ready to be calmer with her staff. More communicative. Less angry.

“Very well,” she said to Sophia, testing her new communicativeness. “I’ll be out on the beach. Please have Ms. Kimball come and find me when she gets here. Thank you. Have a nice day.”

* * *

I DON’T BELONG HERE, Sarah thought one hour later, gazing at all the serene, pleasant, happy people spread out on beach towels, lounging in sand chairs and meandering along the shoreline with the flowing tide.

Everybody within sight was either coupled up, with children or hanging with a group of friends. Sarah was the lone singleton. And her aloneness, combined with the uncomfortable memories of one perfect August summer, made her want to weep.

Again.

Until Richard had banished her, she couldn’t remember the last time she’d cried.

Swallowing, Sarah wrapped her arms around her knees. The beach was just as she remembered it, but smaller, maybe because she was no longer small. The air was cool with a salty sea breeze, different from the breeze in California. The sand was brown and soft like sugar. There used to be sand dunes between her aunt’s cottage and the sea, but sometime in the intervening years they’d eroded away, so now her aunt had a clear, direct view of the beach.

The tide was pushing her back—it was coming in fast. Sarah got up and moved her towel above the high-water mark. The waves were large today, larger than she remembered. A long time ago, her aunt had taught her to body surf. She’d taught her to stride into the water vigorously and without fear of the cold. To dive into a wave was preferred. Then, to wait for just the right one, at just the right time, and put her hands over her head and ride the wave face down in to shore.

Once she’d gotten the hang of it, it had been exhilarating. She’d felt such power in being part of nature’s force. Sarah felt herself smiling.

She glanced down at the one-piece bathing suit she’d changed into at the gas station down the street. The suit was red. Concealing. She would have no wardrobe malfunctions when she rode those waves again. No one was in the water right now, but Sarah was braver than most people—she’d had to be. She’d quickly learned not to shrink from a little frigid water, from hardship, from a challenge. It wasn’t in her nature anymore. She stretched, shifting her face away from the strong sun. Just then, a lifeguard in orange shorts and no shirt—just a whistle around his neck and a baseball cap on his head—pulled up on a single-rider all-terrain vehicle, about twenty feet in front of her. He lazily got off, sauntering to the tall lifeguard chair. He put his hands on his hips and peered up at the younger lifeguard occupying the seat.

Sarah took off her sunglasses to get a better look. The lifeguard who’d driven up was definitely older than the near boy on the chair. Perhaps he was a supervisor. Still, he was younger than she was, and once again, she remembered with gloom that she would be celebrating her fortieth birthday soon. Hopefully back at home rather than here with Cassandra.

But for now, Sarah didn’t mind looking at the man. He had a nice chest, tanned and buff, and she liked the look of his face, too. Intelligent and guarded.

The older lifeguard said something to the younger man that Sarah couldn’t hear. She sighed and forced herself to stop looking at them. A small plane flew overhead with a banner: Eat at Billy Joe’s. Fried Clams and Pasta. Family-Sized Dinners.

No, thank you, Sarah thought with a shudder. She worked hard to keep herself healthy. It was definitely harder these days than it had been at thirty, never mind twenty. And why was she looking at younger-than-her lifeguards without their shirts on, anyway?

That wasn’t what this week was for.

Shaking her head, she got up and wiped sand off her bottom. The breeze had stilled, and she was getting hot sitting on the sand. And it wasn’t good that she’d neglected her sunscreen. When she got back, she would cover up with the cheap towel she’d bought at the store beside the gas station.

The sand squishing between her toes, Sarah beelined toward the water. She was tired of being angry, upset, inconvenienced, out of sorts and shoved from her environment. For once, she wanted to feel fun again, young again.

Maybe it was being on this beach that had affected her. This was the last place she remembered enjoying herself before it had all turned to muck. The most fun thing she remembered from back then was running into the waves and bodysurfing with other kids she’d met at the beach.

Sarah decided to go for a swim. She wouldn’t mind that her limbs moved more stiffly, more heavily, than they had when she was a girl. The wind was still in her face and she would brace her body for the shock of the cold New England ocean when she felt it.

* * *

SAM WATCHED THE woman as she sprinted for the surf. He didn’t make a habit of checking out women while he was on the job, but there was something about this one that drew his eye.

He paused on the driver’s seat of the ATV. Duke had asked him to check in with the newer guards. For about half of them, it was their first summer, and Sam, at thirty-two, was an old hand. He was practiced at constantly scanning the water and the beach. He knew when swimmers ventured too far out; he would summon them in with a whistle and a wave.

Very few people were swimming today. In June, the water was frigid and the air wasn’t hot enough to drive people into the water seeking relief. Farther up the coast, the surfers would be wearing wetsuits. Here, at the fringes of the family beach, still not quite on the main boardwalk section, there was little incentive to wade in beyond one’s ankles.

It was a sleepy, easy day. Great for a lifeguard new to the job. Not too many kids—it was still early for family vacations, and school was still in session in some local towns. Midweek was prime time for retired couples, groups of moms with preschoolers and the odd pair of early vacationers relaxing here and there with their books.

When the woman appeared again in his peripheral vision, he couldn’t help turning to watch her pass. Of everyone on the beach, she stood out. It was the way she moved. One thing that had always fascinated Sam was watching the different people in the grand parade of humanity that passed up and down the shoreline in summer.

Some people strolled. Some marched. Some lolled. Some shuffled. Others strutted—the young, usually. Teens slunk along in too-cool-for-school groups. Little kids skipped or danced. Young couples walked hand in hand. His own daughter strode with purpose.

This woman—she commanded. It was the only word he could think of, the only action that described her.

He liked that she was confident and powerful. She strode toward that water like she wasn’t afraid of it. Like she was going to possess it and make it her own.

He paused, aware that he was smiling. The first lighthearted, happy moment he’d felt all day. His cares lifting, he leaned back and waited to see what she would do when her toes hit the frigid water. Her pale skin suggested she didn’t get much sun. The grim set of her jaw told him she was determined to bathe in the sea.

The foamy tide surged toward her. He watched, waiting. With her ankles submerged in the chilly surf, she paused. Where others shivered and hugged themselves, she was stoic. A look crossed her face, a small, sad smile. He wondered why.

She was someone he would like to talk to. Not here. Not now. But if he were across the world, in Scotland, say, hiking on the West Highland Way (as he had planned, but he wasn’t going to think of that), he definitely would have found an excuse to catch up with her. To match those powerful, determined steps. To walk beside her and make light conversation.

And later that night, to take her into his bed.

With a sudden set to her jaw, she shocked him by surging forward. With great, long-legged, awkward steps she raced through the cold water as fast as she could. When she was waist deep, she thrust her arms over her head and made a graceful, curving arc. She dove directly into the wall of a large, nearly breaking wave.

It was magnificent.

But she didn’t come up right away. Frowning, he stood up straight, on alert.

And then he noticed what he should have noticed, if he’d been concentrating on the water and not on the woman.

The water was dark and swirling—a single lane that led from the beach out to sea. On either side of the lane were tiny ripples of white waves.

The woman had entered straight into that dark tunnel.

“Damn,” he said aloud. He jogged to the guard’s chair, knocking on it. “Charlie? Radio to chair nine, tell Jeannie McLaren to get over here and join us ASAP. Tell her to bring her rescue equipment.”

The young man gaped at him. “Why?”

“Rip current,” Sam said grimly, gazing toward the woman. Her head had appeared. Already she was being pulled farther from shore, but she might not have noticed that yet.

“Rip current?” Charlie repeated, shading his eyes and staring at the surf ahead.

“Yeah, we talked about it yesterday. Do you remember what we need to do to save her?”

“Yeah.” The kid set his jaw. “Yeah, I’m on it.”

“Call chair number nine,” Sam instructed again. And then he grabbed a rescue torp and sprinted toward the woman who’d thought she could master the sea.

* * *

AT FIRST SARAH decided to swim out past the waves to where it was calmer. Swimming seemed easier than she remembered.

How long had it been since she’d swum in the ocean? Funny, but she’d lived in California for over twenty years now, and she’d never once taken a dip in the Pacific.

Catching a glimpse of how far out she’d come, past where the waves were breaking, she paused. Immediately, without her blood pumping as hard, she started to shiver. This water really was freezing, and she couldn’t ignore that any longer. She tentatively stretched her legs, but her toes didn’t touch bottom. Or maybe she just couldn’t feel it.

In any event, as she realized how far out she was, it was pretty obvious that she must be way over her head.

And the longer she watched the shore, the farther out she appeared to get. The beach was receding by the second, and that wasn’t her imagination.

Taking a breath, Sarah started to swim directly to shore. The salt water stung her eyes and her lungs burned with the effort. But when she looked again, she seemed farther out, if that was even possible.

It simply made no sense. She felt like she was in a science fiction movie, lost in a twilight zone. Or on some strange planet where the laws of nature didn’t apply.

I’m just out of shape. I need to do something about that. Now I have all sorts of time to remedy it.

Hysterical laughter erupted from her throat. But it did no good; she was being swept farther and farther out as the seconds ticked past.

I might die here, she thought.

Panic bubbled in her chest.

Flailing, she tried harder to swim and make progress. Stroke, stroke, stroke, she told herself. Kick, kick, kick. Her lungs ached with the effort. She couldn’t control her breathing any longer—oh, to be able to count breaths and meditate! Another small, hysterical laugh broke from her mouth, and with that, a snort of seawater went down her throat.

She choked, sputtering. But she couldn’t hear herself panicking, because the roar of the ocean filled her ears.

Don’t give up, Sarah! Work harder! Fight harder!

She stroked and kicked with all her might.

Until she couldn’t anymore.

CHAPTER THREE

SAM’S TEAM OBSERVED from the shore while he swam out as fast as he could to reach the woman caught in the rip current.

He gripped a flotation device—one of the bright red rescue cans that they called torpedo buoys, or torps, because of the shape—and kicked out past the breaking waves on a course parallel to the swimmer he intended to assist.

Sam’s adrenaline kicked in. He didn’t think he loved anything better than the intensity of making a save.

When he was as far out as she was, Sam turned sharply and swam toward the female swimmer across the narrow rip current, kicking hard, holding the torp in front of him with outstretched arms. Though the woman’s dark hair was matted to her head and her blue eyes were huge, he assessed that she wasn’t in such distress that she couldn’t understand him.

“Grab the handles and I’ll pull you to safety,” he called to her. When he was close enough, he helped the woman latch onto the flotation device and then guided her out of the lane of the rip current.

Sam had to give her credit; she was breathing heavily but she was alert and hadn’t panicked—her skin wasn’t clammy and her pupils looked okay. She was a fighter, that was for sure.

“Hang on,” he said to the woman. “Just a few more yards. I’ll stay with you until you can touch bottom. Then we can walk in to shore together.”

“I’m fine,” she insisted through clenched, chattering teeth. “I can handle it on my own.”

He said nothing in response. They would talk again when they were safely on shore and he’d called in a medical team to assess her.

His feet hit the sandy bottom, and he shifted one hand to the waist of her red bathing suit. Soon they were sloshing through the shallow waves together. He kept his hand on her waist, guiding her in.

“Let go of me,” she hissed.

“Your legs might be shaky. You’ve been through a rip current.”

“I had it under control,” she muttered. “I don’t need you.”

“Maybe so,” he answered. “We’re just being careful. Rip currents can be quite powerful and tough to escape from.” He went into science teacher mode. “In this case, they’re formed by a depression, or low point, on the ocean floor, which in turn causes a strong surface flow of water running from the beach back to the ocean.”

“I know all that,” she snapped. “I’ve had plenty of science classes in my day.”

He nodded and remained silent, just walking in with her. Once on shore, she bent over and gave herself a little shake. He could tell she was a bit stunned from her ordeal, but it was obvious she’d be okay.

He motioned to Jeannie McLaren to take out her radio. The new lifeguard looked at him owlishly. She seemed frozen.

“We’ll review the procedures again in training tomorrow,” he said quietly to McLaren. “But right now, it’s customary to call the medical team. They’ll check the lady over. Then I’ll make a report to the lifeguard captain. Typically, just one person is needed to handle a save like this, but since it’s the beginning of the season, I wanted you all to learn and get experience firsthand. As such, all of you will get credit.”

Charlie perked up. “Credit?”

“For the save,” Sam explained.

The lady he’d rescued shook her head at them. “No one saved me. I’m fine. And if you call any EMTs...”

She paused and gazed toward the direction of the cottages. They all did. A woman in a business outfit—skirt and sleeveless blouse—was picking her way across the sand toward them. She carried her shoes in one hand. Across her shoulder bounced a briefcase.

“...then I will sue you,” the lady they’d rescued continued, turning back to smile at them triumphantly. “And if I’m not mistaken, here is my lawyer.”

Sam squinted. The lawyer with the briefcase looked an awful lot like the only lawyer he knew in town, Natalie Kimball. Or had her name changed since she’d married? He couldn’t remember. In any event, she wasn’t his lawyer because she didn’t handle child custody cases.

While he was ruminating over name changes and custody cases, his “distressed swimmer” staggered off toward Natalie. Sam’s two lifeguards looked at him expectantly, as if to say, “Now what?” To add to the fun, most of the people who’d been soaking up the sun nearby wandered over, too. Everybody liked a show.

“What did you mean by ‘credit for a save’?” Charlie asked him. “Does that get us a cash bonus or something?”

“No, Charlie.” Sam sighed. “It just gives you bragging rights at the end-of-summer banquet.”

Charlie looked disappointed, but honestly, all lifeguard groups that Sam had ever known set up friendly competitions during the season. However, Sam didn’t need to be explaining all that with an audience of civilians gathering before them.

He slid a gaze back over at the lady. He couldn’t hear what she was saying to her lawyer, but could very well guess.

“Okay, good news—our distressed swimmer is obviously feeling better,” Sam said to his green staff, wrapping this lesson up so they could disperse the crowd as soon as possible. “The takeaway for the day is that we can’t force a person to go for treatment if they don’t want to. This is all perfectly normal.”

Charlie and Jeannie nodded in unison, along with some of the people in the crowd.

Usually, the medical team with the resulting paperwork would have been here by now—even if just to handle the victim’s refusal of treatment—but the season was still young and Sam supposed the recent hires were getting used to Wallis Point lifeguard protocol. In any event, he’d seen new teams being a bit clueless before. Nothing he couldn’t handle.

The radio on his all-terrain vehicle squawked. Sam’s boss. Sam headed over to answer the call. Probably, Duke had heard about the save. McLaren had radioed it in, and now there would be a report due.

Damn it. Sam still needed to get the victim’s information for the save statistics.

He glanced back up at the angry lady staggering away from them. He would have to follow her.

Again, nothing he couldn’t handle. In his years as a lifeguard, he’d seen many different types of victim reactions before.

Keep things smooth and easy—that was Sam’s motto.

* * *

SARAH CONTINUED HER march toward Cassandra’s cottage, her aunt’s lawyer beside her. She tugged tighter on the beach towel she’d wrapped around her wet bathing suit. The towel smelled strange, and the flimsy material of uncertain provenance felt gross against her skin.

“...and it’s such a pleasure to meet you,” Natalie was saying breathlessly as Sarah strode through the sand. “I don’t know if you realize it or not, but Cassandra showed your magazine article to everyone in the office. I love reading about strong female role models. We all think it’s wonderful. My daughter, Hannah, is six, and I hope women like you will be an inspiration to her.”

“Yeah, well—” Sarah stopped herself from a biting retort and glanced sideways at the lawyer. They were approaching Cassandra’s cottage now, near the tired-looking wooden deck without any railings, and the lawyer didn’t appear to be sucking up to Sarah or even blowing smoke. Natalie seemed strangely, provincially sincere. Sarah needed to adjust her expectations. She squeezed the towel tighter around herself. “Where is my aunt, anyway? She was supposed to be here to let me in. She knew what time I was set to arrive.”

“Yes. She asked me to handle that for her. I’m sorry I got held up so long.” Natalie pulled her briefcase from her shoulder. Daintily, she balanced it on the arm of an Adirondack chair as she opened a side pocket. “Here, I have a note from Cassandra explaining the situation to you. And your copy of the house key.”

“What situation?” Sarah spit out as she grabbed the letter with one hand and the key with the other. “Why is she always so damned dramatic? You should tell her to get a phone like regular people. Who uses a lawyer or a post office box to communicate with her flesh and blood? Her only flesh and blood, I might add.” Sarah’s voice had risen. She hadn’t meant to express her anger, obviously much deeper than she’d realized. But it was always there, inside her, and today had been a crappy day from start to finish. That Cassandra had pulled another of her stunts was so typical. Sarah was even angrier with herself for not foreseeing it.

Before Natalie could answer, the roar of an ATV drew suspiciously close. Sarah groaned and whipped her head around.

It was the lifeguard again. The older-but-still-younger-than-her man with the too-good looks, the bare chest and the surprisingly calm, competent manner.

He came to a stop and just gazed at her for a moment, his mouth hitched in a half smile, as if he found something about the situation funny.

“What?” she snapped at him.

“Hello, Sam,” Natalie greeted him.

“Hi, Natalie. Good to see you again.” But Sam had focused all his intensity on her. Sarah.

She’d been about to say something scathing to knock him off balance, but as his kind, appreciative eyes swept first up her body, then down, she felt the angry words wither in her throat. She’d forgotten what she was going to say in order to keep the upper hand. He didn’t seemed fazed by her anger in the least.

And then his eyes met hers directly—as deep blue as the ocean that had first seduced her, then nearly swept her away and swallowed her up whole.

She felt an uncharacteristic flutter in her chest. Her head was even dizzy. Yes, it must be the fumes from the cheap towel.

“Whoa,” Sam said in his rich, deep voice, then leaped forward to steady her elbow.

She hadn’t realized she was wavering on her feet. But the less this man touched her, the better. “To what do we owe the pleasure of your presence?” she asked, shaking his hand off her. “Do all your rescue targets receive such hands-on service?”

Now he was full-out smiling. She hated that he reacted to her this way, but it was as if he refused to be ruffled by her bad mood.

Worse, it was as if he saw straight through her offensive shield—over-the-top rudeness and all—and wasn’t intimidated in the least. He studied her as if none of what she said was real.

Nobody treated her this way. Except maybe Richard Lee, but she didn’t like Richard, and he didn’t like her. With Richard it was all business. With her high-tech, artificial-intelligence patents, she stood to make him a fortune, and at the end of the day, that was all he cared about.

Sam-the-lifeguard (yes, she would think of him like that—it was good defense for her), was back to peering into her eyes. Frankly, he looked worried for her health. Well, she was, too, but that wasn’t his business.

“I’m fine,” she insisted again, sounding unlike herself and too similar to a breathless sixteen-year-old girl, which was just irritating. She wrapped her cheap towel even more tightly around her body. If she could just put her armor back on—suit, expensive shoes, briefcase (even if it was full of meditation books)—then she would feel like herself again.

“Sorry to have to bother you,” he said to her, “but we’ve got unfinished business.” He shifted his gaze to Natalie. “I have to fill out an administrative report,” he said apologetically. “This won’t take a minute. Don’t sue me, okay?”

Sarah couldn’t very well be insulted that he was speaking to Natalie, not her, because she had told him that Natalie was her lawyer. “Leave my name out of your administrative report,” Sarah told Sam.

“Yes, please do,” Natalie agreed. “Sarah is a celebrity, and it wouldn’t do to bring that kind of attention down on her or Wallis Point.”

“I know who she is,” Sam said. “I didn’t recognize her, at first, but now that we’re at Cassandra’s cottage, I fully understand.” Both he and Natalie looked at her.

Whoa. Whoa, whoa, whoa.

“You know who I am?”

“Yes. But I didn’t know who you were when I rescued you.”

“You didn’t rescue me,” she clarified. “I rescued myself.”

“Right,” he agreed easily.

Why can’t my employees be so agreeable? she thought. Maybe he wasn’t that bad.

No. There had to be a catch.

“What do you want?” she snapped.

He gave her a sexy, lazy smile. He backed up a step so he was leaning his hip indolently against the beach buggy, the motor still idling.

She shook her head. She was practically forty. Over the hill, compared to him.

Sam tilted his head at her. “How old are you?” he asked.

She started. “Why?” Was this guy a mind-reader?

“For the report,” he said, still calm.

“Don’t put me in any of your reports!”

He shrugged. “It’ll be anonymous. No name given. Nobody will ever know that it was you.”

“Why don’t you just pretend it didn’t happen at all? Forget about it.”

“Can’t,” he said softly. “The chief of lifeguards knows about the incident. You’re lucky—it’s only because it’s early in the season that the medical team wasn’t called and ready for you by the time we brought you in—sorry, by the time you brought yourself in.” He gave her a teasing grin, showing a smile with really nice teeth. “Then you would be in the system—name and all. Police, fire and EMTs—they brook no nonsense.”

She crossed her arms. “You’re implying I create nonsense.”

“We’ve dealt with VIPs here before, Ms. Buckley. They never complained.”

She could feel her face growing red.

“You’ll be written up as female, aged whatever,” he continued. “That’s how our public reports always read. No other identifying information.”

“I don’t care what you put down,” she snapped. “Make something up.”

“Nope.” He shook his head. “Not falling into that trap. You tell me.”

“No.”

He pursed his lips. “How about twenty-one? You good with that?”

“Don’t be an ass.”

He grinned, showing a dimple this time. “You talk just like my middle schoolers. The ones with bad manners, anyway.”

“Excuse me?”

“He teaches middle school earth science,” Natalie chimed in. “In the local school system.”

“Ah. Very funny,” Sarah replied to Sam-the-lifeguard who was also a science teacher.

Obviously, he’d wanted her to know that. Wanted her to know he was serious of mind as well as body.

She licked her lips, trying desperately not to look at that body. Toned, sun-kissed skin. Welcoming chest. Really, really hot abs...

Stop. Just tell him you’re thirty-five. Not too much of a lie. Or go lower, thirty-two. It was a nice, round age for a woman. Not as preposterous as saying thirty, which was about the age that he looked.

He gave her a kind smile. “My daughter will be happy to know I’ve met you already. She idolizes you ever since Cassandra showed her the article in Business Roundup.”

Sarah coughed in surprise. She could feel her eyes bugging out, a blatant show. When she was younger, she’d practiced her “business” face in the mirror. An old mentor had suggested it as a necessity. He’d also suggested that she looked too vulnerable, which she’d been trying to correct, or at least to cover up, ever since.

This was a major fail.

“You think I’m too young to have a daughter, don’t you?” Sam winked. “Well, I had her when I was twelve.”

She couldn’t hold back a bark of laughter.

And yet, he wore no wedding ring. Not even a white tan line to indicate that he’d taken it off.

Not all men wore wedding rings.

“I’m not married,” he said, reading her mind again.

Natalie stood by silently. Sarah could swear she was hiding a smile.

It hit her all of a sudden. They were handling her. The way she usually sought to handle others.

The name of the game is power, her old mentor had taught her. Others will try to top you—don’t let them. It’s a sign of weakness and the worst you can do is to show weakness.

“Thirty-nine.” Sarah directed the information to Sam-the-lifeguard. “Put that number in your report.” It was the truth. She had almost two weeks until her fortieth birthday.

Deliberately looking through him rather than at him, she then turned to Natalie. Enough of this, she thought. “Where is Cassandra?” She crumpled the envelope the lawyer had handed her and dropped it on the deck. She didn’t want to read another one of her aunt’s placating notes. She wanted the truth, and she was through with the flaky games. “Tell me what’s going on. Stop enabling her.”

* * *

SAM COULDN’T HELP IT. He was fascinated, both intellectually and physically, by this emotionally fearless, over-the-top woman. Sarah Buckley wasn’t like anyone else he knew. She seemed to have this armor about her, clutching at her beach towel as if it was a shield, and her words to him were like verbal jousts. He’d been having fun talking to her, actually.

And his daughter was enamored of her, too. That made it difficult for him. He had to keep his hands off. And yet, he couldn’t walk away, either.

Good thing he had Cassandra as a buffer.

He turned to Natalie, feeling pretty confident as to where Cassandra was. She was with Lucy at the town library. Sarah was just going to have to chill out and wait for the two to return home. Yes, Cassandra could have left the house keys with him, but he wasn’t fixed to a lifeguard stand this year. He was more of a floating supervisor and therefore more difficult to find than he’d been in the past.

Natalie blinked nervously, shifting her weight from side to side. Sam could see how Sarah would do that to her. Natalie had been in some of his high school classes. She’d been a shy, bookish girl back then. She wasn’t like that anymore—she was a lawyer who argued cases in court and won all the time—but Sarah was an overpowering person, to put it mildly.

“Actually,” Natalie said to Sarah, “Cassandra left you the letter because she wanted to explain in her own words where she was. You really should read it.” Natalie knelt and picked it up.

A line formed in Sarah’s forehead. “She’s not here, is she?” Sarah asked flatly.

“Well, I’m sorry, no,” Natalie replied.

Sarah’s face turned red and blotchy. “I’ll kill her,” she said through clenched lips.

“It’s okay.” Sam reached out and touched her arm. “She’s with my kid. At the town library. She’s been bringing her there for the past four days, since Monday.”

Sarah stared at him. “You entrusted your child to her?”

He sent Natalie a help me out, here, look.

But Natalie appeared even more alarmed than Sarah had. She put her hand over her mouth. Blood drained from her face.

“What is it?” he asked Natalie. “Why are you upset?”

“Because my receptionist was given to understand that Cassandra had an emergency and was on her way to the airport to fly out of the country—which she never does—so I assumed it was a particularly bad emergency.” Natalie hastily smoothed the balled-up envelope that Sarah had crumpled and dropped.

But Sam felt so sick, so panicked, that he grabbed it from Natalie’s hand and ripped open the envelope himself. As quickly as he could, he pulled out and smoothed the two pieces of thick blue stationery.

Thursday morning, Cassandra had written on the heading in bold but shaky handwriting. The next line read, Dear Sarah, and that wasn’t for him so he stopped reading and lifted his head.

“So, she’s only been gone for a few hours?” he asked Natalie.

“It appears that way. She came to my office just before noon. She said she wanted to speak to me, but since I wasn’t there, she left the letter and key with my receptionist and said she was on her way to the airport. There was a car waiting outside for her. She left a number at her destination for me to call tonight. That’s all that I know.”

“Where did she leave Lucy? My daughter?”

Natalie looked at him helplessly. “I don’t know. What does her note say?”

But as Natalie spoke, Sarah grabbed the letter from him. He struggled to align himself so he could read beside her, but all they ended up doing was bumping heads.

Sarah glanced at each page for about two seconds. “There’s not a word here about a Lucy.” Sarah glared at him. “Just about her damn cats. And you. Evidently, I’m supposed to go and see you.”

“I need to find my daughter!” Adrenaline coursing through his veins, he turned and jumped off the short deck and onto the sand, sprinting toward his house, hoping Lucy was there.

“Wait, Sam! I think I know where your daughter is!” Sarah called, waving the pages as she spoke. “There is a mention of a Lucy!”

He turned, still running backward. “Where?” he shouted back.

“The library. Cassandra says she left Lucy at the library!”

His heart thumped wildly, but he gave Sarah a short wave of thanks as he changed course toward the street where he’d parked his truck.

He could be at the library in five minutes. Ten if he hit the two traffic lights on the way. If Lucy wasn’t there anymore...

No. He couldn’t think about that.

Inside his truck, he grabbed his keys from under the front seat then backed out of his parking space as fast as he could.

Please, let Lucy be okay.

He shifted into Drive and stepped on the accelerator. He was halfway down the boulevard when he realized he was driving in bare feet and wearing only his orange lifeguard shorts and the whistle around his neck. Crap.

* * *

AFTER SAM LEFT, everything seemed emptier. Sarah stood with Cassandra’s letter clutched in one fist, the house key in the other, both arms hanging limply at her sides.

She’d skimmed the whole letter, once. There were excuses, explanations—and as far as Sarah was concerned—rationalizations for why she’d left Sarah again.

Her Italian man in Naples. Sarah knew all about that. She’d heard it before, months after Cassandra had chosen to skip her parents’ funeral. And again when Cassandra had finally dropped into her life once more—as if her excuses were supposed to make up for another desertion.

How foolish had she been to think anything had changed with her aunt?

“I’m sorry,” Natalie murmured. “If I’d been at the office, and I’d known what confusion Cassandra was leaving behind, then I would have attempted to sort it through. When I came out here to see you this afternoon, I assumed she’d fully thought out what she was doing.”

“Oh, she’s thought it out, all right,” Sarah said bitterly. “Trust me.”

“But it’s irresponsible to leave a child unattended!”

“She once left me unattended for ten months, Ms. Kimball.” Shaking her head, Sarah went back to the driveway where her rental car was and gathered up her luggage. She rolled her suitcases back to the deck and joined Natalie, who was still standing there with that look of concern on her face.

“There’s nothing more you can do,” Sarah said simply. “She’s gone, and that’s that.”

Natalie’s forehead creased. “I’m going to call her tonight.”

“Fine. But don’t get me involved. I don’t want to hear about it.” Sarah took the house key and stuck it in the lock. The door opened easily.

“No, honestly,” Natalie said behind her. “I want to. My father, before he retired, was Cassandra’s longtime attorney. In his files, he has all sorts of her correspondence that I need to read because that is not the way I want to work with her in future.”

“Good luck with that.” Sarah bumped her luggage and briefcase over the threshold and into Cassandra’s inner sanctum. It smelled like paint and turpentine. “Social services tried to reach her when I was twelve. Repeatedly. When the woman decides to disappear, she really disappears.” Sarah glanced around at the room. It really hadn’t changed that much in twenty-eight years.

Natalie had followed her inside and was turning over papers on Cassandra’s kitchen table. “I’m sorry, but I’m not going to let this go that easily.”

Sarah just shrugged. She’d spent most of her life fighting in just the same manner. Fighting for answers. Fighting for power. Fighting to keep what was hers.

She should have left well enough alone when it came to Cassandra. She could have gone anywhere for this forced summer sabbatical of Richard Lee’s. Hawaii, for one. Tahiti or the South of France.

Sarah didn’t even honestly know why she’d chosen to come see Cassandra after all these years.

The meditation stuff...anyplace had people who could teach her that skill.

The rest of her reason for being here was...the subconscious cry of the little girl still inside her who was upset that she’d been abandoned by her aunt and wanted some honest answers why.

Completely ridiculous. Honest answers didn’t always come. Time and again, Sarah had learned that the only thing worth fighting for was her own personal power. If she had enough of it, she would always be in charge. And no one could hurt her again.

Cassandra had proven her wrong in that belief, too. Sarah saw now that she could be queen of the universe, and Cassandra would do whatever the hell she wanted to do, regardless of what was going on with the people around her. Even the little people—including her only vulnerable niece.

Natalie stopped rifling through the papers on the kitchen table. “Look at this.” She held up a letter. “It’s to you, from Sam’s daughter.”

Sarah snatched it from her. And immediately put her hand to her mouth.

In childish handwriting, a girl named Lucy Logan had written,

Dear Sarah,

I’m so glad you’re coming to visit us! I admire you and hope to meet with you soon.

Your friend, Lucy Logan

The girl had decorated the edges with tiny, skillful drawings of seashells and aquatic life.

Sarah just sighed and closed her eyes. “How old is Lucy Logan?” she asked Natalie.

“Eleven, I think.”

“And where is her mom?”

“She lives a few towns over. The rest is up to Sam Logan to tell you. Or not.” Natalie’s lips twisted.

Sarah sat and put her head in her hands. “I really hope that little girl is okay.” She looked up at Natalie. “Can you give me Sam Logan’s contact information, please? I need to follow up with him.”

The lawyer hesitated.

“I need to know that Lucy is okay,” Sarah insisted.

“Come here.” Natalie beckoned her to the side window. When Sarah had joined her, Natalie pointed to the two-story home with the back porch beside them. “See that house?”

Sarah saw two Adirondack chairs and a grill. A wetsuit hung over the railing, along with a beach towel. “Are you saying that’s where Sam lives? Right next door to me?”

Natalie nodded.

If Sarah stayed, there would be no avoiding him.

She didn’t know what to think. She was too tired and emotionally drained to even know what her true feelings were anymore. She just knew that her old reaction—to fight harder—seemed futile all of a sudden.

After Natalie left, Sarah brought in her bags and briefcase full of books and set about finding a place to sleep.

Her old room was set up for her. Plus, there were the cats her aunt had mentioned. Two of them, one large and black, the other small with a white belly and paws. They climbed out from under the bed when she sat on it.

She gave a little scream and jumped up. “Dammit, I don’t like pets! Go away!”

They both skittered back under the bed. Returning to the kitchen, Sarah saw that two containers with dry cat pellets were set up beside the table, along with two silver bowls full of water. There was also another, more detailed note explaining their care.

Cassandra obviously believed Sarah would feed and water her cats for however long she would be missing. She’d left instructions, but she hadn’t left a timeline.

Anger curled in her belly. But who was present for her to be mad at? She was all alone, yet again. Sarah climbed under the covers and pulled the crisp, clean sheet over her head. Before long, she was sobbing her heart out. Pathetic. A Silicon Valley tech executive, reduced to crying on her childhood bed because an aunt she didn’t have much of a relationship with anyway had left her on her own. Again.

And then she was vaguely aware of a shift on the mattress beside her.

She peeked out over the covers.

Two purring, furry bodies were snuggled up, one on either side of her.

Sarah had never lived with pets. But she buried her cheek beside the big one’s head. He purred her to sleep, and for a second before she drifted off, she could swear she didn’t feel so alone and angry anymore.

CHAPTER FOUR

SAM DOUBLE-PARKED his truck on Wallis Point’s Main Street. Then he got out and ran across two lanes of traffic toward the town library, up two short stone steps and through the heavy oaken doors, breathing heavily. He was barefoot and shirtless, but he wasn’t going to stop now. The air inside the library was cooler, but his skin was hot. He was filled with panic.

He just needed to find his daughter, and then he could breathe easier. Something must be terribly wrong with Lucy. Wouldn’t she have phoned him if she were here and safe?

He stopped just inside the lobby, perplexed. He didn’t often come inside this building—his middle school had its own library that he visited with his students—so he looked around for guidance.

A sign for the children’s section pointed down a set of stairs. No, Lucy wouldn’t be in the children’s section. Try the magazine reading room. Sam headed in that direction, but the only people there were two old men sitting on overstuffed chairs who didn’t even glance up from their newspapers.

Now what? Sam turned, heart in his throat, wondering who to ask for help, when a serious-faced librarian behind a desk called him over.

“Hello, sir.” With wide eyes, she looked him up and down and gave him a censuring frown.

He exhaled and held up his hands. “Sorry, but this is an emergency. I’m looking for my daughter, Lucy. She’s eleven. Medium-length brown hair. Yea high.” He used his hand to approximate her height. “Please, I can’t get hold of the woman who was taking care of her. Cassandra Shipp, you must know her? She’s a children’s book illustrator who lives on Wallis Point beach.”

“Yes, of course I know Cassandra.” The librarian smiled and stepped out from behind the desk. Luckily for him, she seemed to understand his state of mind. No mention of his bare feet, bare chest or orange lifeguard trunks. “I think I can help you, sir. I know where your daughter is.”

“It’s Sam,” he said in relief. “And thank you. I’m going out of my mind, here.”

“It’s not a problem.” She smiled sympathetically and beckoned him to follow her.

They zig-zagged through stacks of books that gave off a slight musty smell and finally ended up in a small open area with a row of computers.

Lucy was sitting alone nearby at a large wooden table. She was squinting in concentration as she tapped on her iPad.

“Lucy!” He ran over and hugged her to his chest. “I was worried something had happened to you!”

Lucy stiffened and frowned up at him.

The librarian hovered nearby, watching them. At Lucy’s less than enthusiastic reception, she suddenly seemed worried. “Is everything okay, dear?” she asked Lucy. “Do you need me to get you some help?”

Sam tried not to be insulted. He knew the librarian was just doing her job. He was trained to be sensitive toward dangerous situations with kids, too, so he understood her response. What he didn’t understand was Lucy’s reaction. It made him feel sick. But if he’d had a closer relationship with Lucy, frankly, then none of this would be happening.

His serious daughter shook her head at the librarian. “This is Sam Logan. He’s my father.”

Not a huge recommendation on his behalf.

“Yes,” the librarian said, “I understand. But are you all right to go with him?”

The breath seemed to leave Sam. He felt chilled, and when he saw the look in Lucy’s eyes, the chill deepened. Was she that indifferent to him? Did he not matter to her at all?

“I’m fine,” Lucy murmured, so self-possessed for a girl her age that he still couldn’t believe it. She went about shutting down her iPad.

“Are you sure?” the librarian pressed.

“Yes.” But Lucy didn’t look at her.

The librarian didn’t seem convinced. She pursed her lips. Her gaze dropped again to Sam’s swim trunks. “You’re a local lifeguard?” she asked. “At Wallis Point beach?”

“I am,” he answered dully. “I also teach earth science at Wallis Point Middle School. Sam Logan. I’m a registered mandated reporter.”

This meant he was trained to recognize signs of child abuse and to report them to the appropriate authorities. He took out the driver’s license he always kept in the pocket of his swim trunks in case he needed to show his identification on the beach and handed it to the librarian. “You can call my school principal and check on me. I’m sure you know who Tara is.”

The librarian squinted at his ID. “Yes, I know Tara quite well. Excuse me.”

She walked away, and Sam was quite sure she really was going to call his boss and check up on him.

He couldn’t remember if Tara knew about Lucy or not. Lucy didn’t live in Wallis Point, so she wasn’t a student in his school system. He didn’t talk about his personal life to his coworkers much. Maybe he shouldn’t have been so private about Lucy.

He definitely should have made her matter to him more. And until now, he hadn’t realized how important she really was to him. Until this, the first time he thought that he’d almost lost her.

While Lucy finished packing up her notes and papers, he sat with his elbow on the library table, nose pinched between his fingers. He just felt so beaten down.

Lucy stared at him, and her lip quivered. Maybe he was scaring her with his reaction, too. “Didn’t you get our letter, Sam?” she asked softly.

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