Small-Town Girl

“A week’s not going to ruin me.”

“Then go back to that cabin of yours and think.”

At this time on a summer evening, the main part of downtown Goose Harbor was flooded with people, so much so that cars stopped driving down the roads because there were too many pedestrians to maneuver around. Besides, Brice had left his car by the docks. He’d exit out the back door of Evan’s business and cut across the beach. He needed to spend some time seeking out God’s guidance anyway. The less-congested evening beach would be the perfect place to go pray.

* * *

The short-lease condo that Kendall had found to rent when she first moved to town was located on the opposite end of Ring Beach from the main portion of town. Walking to her business meeting with Sesser and Claire had sounded like a great idea earlier, but now her feet ached. Heels weren’t built for cross-terrain travel.

A girl from the foothills of Kentucky would need to ease into beach living slowly. Even if it was only a freshwater beach on Lake Michigan, having never been to the ocean, she found it the biggest, most impressive beach she’d ever seen.

Which was one of the reasons why she’d chosen Goose Harbor as the perfect place to start her business. Sure, a place like Orlando or Los Angeles would have been ideal, but then again, they would have been far too pricey. Her savings wouldn’t have lasted long in one of those cities. Rent the first month or two would have drained her completely. Moreover, her little business would have been easy to overlook in a large city. She could have never marketed enough to get noticed somewhere big.

After seeing the article in Midwestern Travel magazine about the quaint tourist town of Goose Harbor that swelled to four times its population for six months of the year, she knew she’d found her location. Her dream could finally become a reality. Discovering that Ring Beach was one of two freshwater beaches in the whole country that made it onto a list of best beaches in the world—well, that information sealed the deal.

A place like Goose Harbor would draw lots of couples and people looking for romance. That was where Love on a Dime would step in and plan dates for them. Provide whole catalogs of choices for clueless men looking to impress their girlfriends or, better yet, plan their proposals. And when no one was in the market for a date, she’d offer event-planning services or book excursions for girls’ weekends. The process had become second nature after she’d worked as an event planner at the golf course near her hometown for the past eight years.

She often wondered how many of the weddings she’d overseen ended in divorce. Fifty percent—that was the going rate nowadays, right? The number never ceased to shock her as well as solidify her desire not to marry. She’d been right to leave her serial dating habits back in Kentucky. Men complicated things. No, actually sometimes men were quite useful. Like when heavy boxes were involved.

Love was the enemy more than anything. Love made a person foolish and far too trusting. Love was responsible for countless people getting taken advantage of. But not her. Thankfully she had always ended her relationships before they became too serious. Goose Harbor would be a baggage-free paradise for her.

“Wait up.” A voice behind her made her stop.

She turned around to find Brice Daniels a few feet away.

“Oh, hey. It’s Brice, right?”

“Yes.” A quick wince crossed his face before he masked it. Brice looked tired, or like he had something on his mind.

“Are you okay?”

“Just wondering why you’re so determined to cross this beach with those shoes on when the sand’s cooled down some by now.” He smiled, but the look didn’t reach those piercing, pale green eyes of his.

“But the sun’s only just setting.” She turned toward the lake, pointing at the sun, but then stopped and grabbed Brice’s solid arm. There was no adequate way to describe the beauty of the sun going down over the lake, so instead Kendall gasped. “Sit and watch this with me.” She tugged on his sleeve.

Brice didn’t argue. He dropped onto the sand and looped his arms over his knees. “It never gets old, does it?”

Kendall sat right beside him and watched the orange and magenta light dance with the coming night across the lake’s surface. “I’ve never seen a sunset quite like this. It’s...it’s...too much for words.”

“You should see it out on the lake.”

“I can.” She thrust her hand out to indicate the water.

“From a boat.”

“When I find someone with a boat, I will.”

“I own a whole fleet of them.”

Shifting her gaze from the sunset to Brice, she caught him staring at her. “Would you take me sometime?”

“Sure.” He shrugged.

“Soon.”

“Okay.”

“Tomorrow?”

Brice chuckled. “All right.”

Wait. Had she just forced him to take her on a date? Wow. Her forward personality always seemed to get her into trouble. But she hoped it didn’t come across that way. No. She hadn’t...right? She couldn’t, because Kendall was not dating anymore. Goose Harbor was going to be a boyfriend-free zone.

Kendall trailed her fingers through the sand. “If you don’t want to, that’s fine. I kind of forced that on you.”

He looked over at her and they made eye contact. “I want to.” His voice was soft, almost a whisper. Brice’s pale green eyes were so intense her breath caught for a heartbeat. He kept speaking. “I have some smaller boats that I need to test out. I’m trying to decide what to do with them. One is nicer, and I’ve only taken it out once since I bought it. She could use a spin out on the lake.”

“She?”

“All boats are women. I thought that was common knowledge.”

“I guess I don’t spend time with enough pirates to know these things about boats.”

“You slay me.” He laid his hand on his heart. “Do you see an eye patch or a peg leg here?”

“You’re right. Pirates certainly don’t use words like slay.”

“Blame the books for how I talk.”

“You’re a reader?” She wondered what types of books he read. Nonfiction books about fixing cars? Autobiographies about people who definitely weren’t pirates? Or did strong Brice Daniels curl up with a fictional mystery during his downtime? Her interest piqued, suddenly she wanted to know all about him.

“Of course.” Brice’s voice broke through her thoughts. “What else is there to do when you’re out on the lake?”

“Um, watch these amazing sunsets!” She slapped his arm but then left her hand there. “Brice, I was just hit with the most amazing idea. Care to hear me out?”

“Sure.” Another one-word answer.

“You don’t speak a ton, do you?”

“That’s what you wanted to talk about?”

“No, but I just thought that.”

“Do you say everything you think right when you think it?”

Kendall pursed her lips and rubbed her chin, pretending to think really hard for effect. It worked. Brice shook his head, a half grin on his face and his eyes twinkling with a shared joke.

“Okay.” Kendall rolled her eyes. “Most of the time I say exactly what I’m thinking. Right when I think it.”