What a Girl Wants

He loved his involvement with the local fire hall and its contributions to the town. His father was the head of the police department in Brookhollow, and his older brother, Jim, and he had inherited their dad’s sense of pride and responsibility for the community. As kids they’d spent a lot of time at the police station and the fire hall, learning about the trucks and the duties of the fire chief and crew. As soon as they were old enough, they’d signed on to become firefighters.

The line moved, creating an empty space on the conveyor belt, just as his grip slipped from the side of his load. That was close. As he set the beer down and rubbed his aching forearms, his eye was caught fleetingly by a blonde disappearing at the far end of the store’s middle aisle. Emily? His mind raced, but his feet remained frozen to the floor as he leaned around the end of the register to try to catch another glimpse. Don’t be ridiculous, he told himself. She’d just called a few hours ago from Miami. Just pay for the beer....

“Just a second,” he told the clerk as he moved past the other customers waiting in line behind him. “Go ahead and take the next person.” Quickly he made his way toward the center aisle. “Emily?”

The woman turned immediately and smiled when she saw him. “Ethan, hi. How are you?” Emily’s younger sister Kimberly rushed forward to hug him.

He swallowed the lump in his throat and wiped his sweaty palms on his jeans before wrapping one arm around her in a brief hug. The sisters wore the same perfume.

“Hi, Kim. Sorry, I thought you were...”

“Emily. I know. I’ve been getting that a lot since I highlighted my hair.” She tossed the wavy golden locks over her shoulder. “Sorry,” she said with a sympathetic smile.

Ethan flinched, hating that look. It had been the only way anyone had looked at him for months after Emily had left, and he’d felt uneasy to be on the receiving end of sympathetic smiles and gossipy whispers.

“No, don’t apologize. I should have known anyway—Emily always wore her hair straight....” He coughed. Not doing a great job recovering here, man. Get a grip. “Anyway, how is she?” He closed his eyes and shook his head. He was hopeless. “I mean you. How are you?”

Kimberly gave him a knowing look. “She’s good...I think,” she said with a shrug as she reached for two bottles of merlot from the shelf. “I mean, she hardly calls, but she texts me every few days.... She was just offered a promotion to the senior management team—corporate trainer, I think.” She paused, her expression sheepish. “I’m sorry if all of this is hard to hear.”

“No,” Ethan lied. Of course he was happy that she was doing well, wasn’t he? “I’m glad she’s doing okay. How’s everyone else?”

“My parents just got back from a Caribbean cruise and I’ve been accepted to the media-design program at NYU for the fall semester.”

“Wow, Kim, that’s great.” He really meant it.

“Thank you. You know, that invite to dinner always stands. With or without Emily, you’ll always be part of the family.”

Ethan shuffled his feet, avoiding the sympathy in her ocean-blue eyes—Emily’s eyes. Just one of the features the sisters shared.

“Tell your folks I said hello....” He wasn’t ready to commit to anything with the family just yet. And though he suspected Kim might be genuine in the offer, he wasn’t sure Mayor and Mrs. Parsons would be as comfortable seeing him. Part of him believed they held him responsible for the relationship breakdown. Who knows, maybe they were right. His unwavering commitment to life in Brookhollow hadn’t made Emily happy. “And maybe think about changing that hair color, huh?” he teased.

“I promise to think about it,” she said, struggling to grab another bottle of wine from the rack.

“Here, let me help,” he offered, picking up the extra bottle. “Having a celebration tonight?”

“Victoria’s bachelorette party at the B and B. Actually, it’s a bridal shower, but they’re calling it a bachelorette party to make it sound more fun.” Kimberly followed him to the counter.

“Well, then, allow me.” He waved Jim’s credit card in the air. “Consider it a gift from the best man,” he said as he took the wine from her and added it to his own items on the counter.

CHAPTER TWO

JIM PROPPED OPEN the west entrance door of the fire hall with a brick as they carried the cases of beer into the fire hall later that evening. He plucked the receipt from the top case and shot his brother a questioning look. “What’s this wine on the bill?”

“I ran into Kim Parsons at the liquor depot. She was picking up wine for Victoria’s bachelorette party. I took care of it.... Rather, you took care of it.”

Ethan shut the back door of the Jeep. His brother, Jim, had been friends with Luke Dawson since grade school and he knew, despite his grumbling, Jim had been honored when Luke asked him to be his best man.

“Last time I send you to get the booze,” Jim huffed as Luke’s truck pulled into the driveway of the fire hall. The old clunker rattled and gurgled as Luke cut the engine and a dark puff of exhaust escaped the tailpipe.

Ethan watched in amusement. “What happened to his new truck?” Owner of a successful architecture firm that had contracts in New Jersey, New York and Boston, Luke had bought a new Ford F-250 just before Christmas, but whenever Ethan saw him, he was driving that old beater.

“Victoria is using it. As long as Bailey keeps reviving that thing, he’ll keep driving it,” he said, nodding toward the truck where Luke was trapped inside, struggling with the door handle.

“Must be love,” Ethan said. “So explain to me why Luke and Victoria are holding their prewedding parties so early. The wedding isn’t for another month.” His brother’s longtime best friend had gotten engaged for the second time to his childhood sweetheart on New Year’s Eve and the wedding was scheduled for the Labor Day weekend.

“Luke’s out of town a lot working on that restaurant in Boston for the next few weeks. His crews are under a tight deadline for a grand opening the first weekend in September. This was really the only time we could do it, and holding it at the fire hall made sense because I somehow got stuck on night rotation this weekend.” He turned as Luke entered, a case of beer under his left arm. “Hey, man. You weren’t supposed to bring your own drinks,” Jim said, taking the beer from him and putting the bottles in the cooler filled with ice near the poker table.

“My mother says you shouldn’t go anywhere empty-handed. Hey, great setup.” Luke scanned the transformed fire hall. A poker table stood ready to go, stacks of multi-colored chips at each place. A dartboard hung on the wall and the scoreboard had each of their names already written in white chalk. The old tan leather sofa and matching recliner had been moved to the side of the room and a small flat screen was set up on the coffee table. The first inning of the baseball game lit up the screen.

“Make yourself comfortable. I’m going to run out to get the pizza and wings before my shift starts,” Jim said, grabbing his truck keys from the hook on the wall near the door.

Ethan glanced at the clock on the wall. “Your shift started five minutes ago.”

“Yeah, but I’m usually fifteen minutes late, so technically I’ve got ten minutes,” Jim said as he disappeared out the side door.

“Can’t argue with logic like that,” Luke said.

“Brother or not, I’m going to have to start writing him up.” Ethan shook his head. “Anyway, ready to get wild and crazy?” he asked, slapping Luke on the back.

Luke laughed, suppressing a yawn. “As long as we’re done by ten. I’m exhausted.”

“Working a lot these days?” Ethan stocked the small bar fridge with extra beer, removing bottles of water and Gatorade to make more space.

“Around the clock. This restaurant chain I’m working on has me commuting to Boston three or four times a week. And then I’m helping Vic plan the wedding....” Luke pulled out a chair at the poker table and sat. He reached for a chip and flicked it between his fingers.

“I thought women loved to do all the wedding planning themselves?” Ethan opened a beer and handed it to Luke. “A game of darts before everyone else gets here?”

“Sure.” Luke headed over to the board and took out the darts. “Oh, don’t get me wrong. When I say helping, I mean acting as a buffer between our moms.” He handed Ethan three red darts, keeping the blue ones.

Ethan gestured for him to throw first.

Aiming carefully at the bull’s-eye, Luke released the dart with one easy, smooth motion. It landed in the black zone just millimeters from the center.

“Nice,” Ethan said, positioning himself for his turn. “But I thought your mom and Mrs. Mason were getting along again.” When Victoria had called off their wedding years before, it had created a feud between the mothers, one that had lasted over twelve years, but the couples reuniting last Christmas had brought the two women close again. Ethan threw his dart, landing it square in the bull’s-eye.

Luke let out a low whistle. “Impressive.”

“We have a lot of downtime,” Ethan explained.

“Our mothers are getting along, until there’s a decision to be made about flowers or cake....” Luke shook his head. “I swear they call Victoria at least four times a day. Then, of course, she calls me.”

“Women. I don’t know how you survive.”

“Hey, I’m just grateful she agreed to marry me—again. I’ll do whatever it takes to get her down the aisle this time,” he joked. “She left me once—twice actually....” he corrected, releasing his last dart. “I won’t be letting her go this time.” The dart missed by a mile and he turned to Ethan. “Sorry, man, I didn’t mean...”

“Don’t worry about it, really,” Ethan said, tossing his final dart and reaching for his beer.

“You know, Victoria still feels partly responsible for the whole Emily thing. She says so all the time.”