Suddenly Last Summer

“He’s a what?”

“Un beau mec. A hot guy. Sean is very sexy. We are two adults who chose to spend a night together. We are both single. Why would it feel awkward?” It had been her idea of the perfect night. No ties. No complications. A decision she’d made with her head, not her heart. Never again would she allow her heart to be engaged.

No risks. No mistakes.

“So seeing him isn’t going to bother you?”

“Not at all. And it isn’t the first time. I saw him at Christmas.”

“And neither of you exchanged a single look or word.”

“Christmas is the busiest time of year for me. Do you know how many people I fed in the restaurant? I had more important things to worry about than Sean. And it is the same now. We probably won’t even have time to say hello. All he thinks about is work and I am the same. It is only a week until the Boathouse Café opens and at the moment it doesn’t have a deck.”

“Look, I know how much this project means to you—to all of us—but it is no one’s fault that Zach crashed his dirt bike.”

Élise scowled. “He is their cousin. Family. He should have shown more responsibility.”

“Distant cousin.”

“So what? He should have finished my deck before he crashed!”

“I’m sure that’s what he told the boulder that jumped into his path.” Kayla gave a fatalistic shrug. “He has O’Neil DNA. Of course he is going to indulge in dangerous sports and have accidents. Tyler says he’s lethal on a snowboard.”

“He should not have been indulging in anything lethal until my deck was finished!”

“So does that mean Zach has been struck off the list of people you love?”

“You make fun of me but it is important to tell people you love them.” It wasn’t just important to her, it was vital. Sadness seeped into her veins and she breathed deeply, trying to block the spread. Over the years she’d learned to control it. To keep it locked away so it didn’t interfere with her life. “I should never have let Walter step in. It is because of me he is lying there all full of tubes and needles and—”

“Stop!” Kayla pulled a face. “Enough.”

“It’s just that I keep imagining—”

“Well, don’t! Talk about something else?”

“We can talk about how I have ruined everything. The Boathouse Café is important for Snow Crystal. We have included the projected revenue in our forecasts. We have a party planned! And now it cannot happen.”

Frustrated with herself, Élise stood up and gazed across the lake, searching for calm. The evening sun sent flashes of gold and silver over the still surface of the lake. It was rare that she saw the place at this time of day. Usually she was in the restaurant preparing for the evening. The only time she sat on her own deck was in the dark when she returned in the early hours, or immediately on rising when she made herself a cup of freshly brewed coffee and sipped it in the dawn silence.

Morning was her favorite time of day in the summer, when the forest was still bathed by early morning mist and the sleepy sun had yet to burn off the fine cobweb of white shrouding the trees. It made her think of the curtain in the theatre, hiding the thrill of the main event from an excited audience.

Heron Lodge was small, just one bedroom and an open plan living area, but the size didn’t worry her. She’d grown up in Paris, in a tiny apartment on the Left Bank with a view over the rooftops and barely room to pirouette. At Snow Crystal she lived right on the lakeshore, her lodge sheltered by trees. At night in the summer she slept with the windows open. Even when it was too dark to see the view, there was beauty in the sounds. Water slapping gently against her deck, the whisper of a bird’s wing as it flew overhead, the low hoot of an owl. On nights when she was unable to sleep she lay for hours breathing in the sweet scents of summer and listening to the call of the hermit thrush and the chattering of the black-capped chickadees.

If she’d slept with her window open in Paris she would have been constantly disturbed by a discordant symphony of car horns punctuated by Gallic swearing as drivers stopped in the street to yell abuse at each other. Paris was loud and busy. A city with the volume fixed on maximum while everyone rushed around trying to be somewhere yesterday.

Snow Crystal was muted and peaceful. Never, in the turmoil of her past, had she imagined one day living in a place like this.

She knew how close the O’Neil family had come to losing it. She knew things were still far from secure and that losing it was still a very real possibility. She was determined to do everything she could to make sure that didn’t happen.

“Can you find me another carpenter? Are you sure you’ve tried everyone?”

“There is no one. Sorry.” Looking tired, Kayla shook her head. “I already made some calls.”

“In that case we are all doomed.”

“No one is doomed, Élise!”

“We will have to delay the opening and cancel the party. You have invited so many important people. People who could spread the word and help grow the business. Je suis désolée. The Boathouse is my responsibility. Jackson asked me for an opening date and I gave him one. I anticipated a busy summer. Now if Snow Crystal has to close we will all lose our jobs and our home and it will be my fault.”

“Don’t worry, with your talent for drama you could easily get a job on Broadway.” Kayla paced the deck, obviously thinking. “We could hold the party in the restaurant?”

“No. It was supposed to be a magical, outdoor evening that will showcase the charm of our new café. I have it all arranged—food, lights, dancing on the deck—the deck that isn’t finished!” Frustrated and miserable, Élise walked into her little kitchen and picked up the bag of food she’d packed for the family. “Let’s go. They’ve been at the hospital for hours. They will be hungry.”

As they walked along the lake path to the car, Élise thought again what a good thing it was that Jackson had employed Kayla. She’d arrived at Snow Crystal only six months earlier, the week before Christmas, to put together a public relations campaign that would boost the resort’s flagging fortunes. The intention had been that she would stay a week and then return to her high-powered job in New York, but that had been before she’d fallen in love with Jackson O’Neil.

Élise felt a rush of emotion.

Calm, strong Jackson. He was the reason she was here, living this wonderful life. He’d saved her. Rescued her from the ruins of her own life. He’d given her a way out from a problem of her own making, and she’d taken it. He was the only one who knew the truth about her. She owed him everything.

The Boathouse Café was a way of repaying him.

Élise had always known that Snow Crystal needed something more than the formal restaurant and the small, cramped coffee shop that had been part of the resort since it was built.

On her first stroll down to the lakeshore she’d seen the derelict boathouse and envisaged a café right on the water’s edge. Now her dream was almost reality. She’d worked with a local architect and together they’d created something that matched her vision and satisfied the planners.

The new café had glass on three sides so that no part of the view was lost to those dining indoors. During the winter the doors would be kept closed, but in the summer months when the weather allowed, the glass walls could be pulled back to allow guests to take maximum advantage of the breathtaking position.

In the summer most of the tables would be set on the wide deck, a sun-trap that stretched across the water. The building should have been finished in June, but bad weather had delayed essential work and then Zach had crashed the bike.

Kayla slid behind the wheel and drove carefully out of the resort. “How long do you think Sean will stay?”

“Not long.”

And that suited her perfectly.

They probably wouldn’t even have any time alone together and she wasn’t going to worry about something that didn’t represent a threat.

Sean was entertaining company, charming and yes, insanely sexy, but her emotions weren’t engaged. And they never would be. Never again.

Memories slid into her, dark and oppressive and she gave a little shiver and stared hard at the forest, reminding herself that she was in Vermont, not Paris. This was her home now.

And it wasn’t as if she was living without love.

She had the O’Neils. They were her family.

That thought stayed in her head as they arrived at the hospital and it was still in her head as Kayla walked into Jackson’s arms.

She saw Kayla reach out her hand and curl her fingers into Jackson’s. Saw her friend rise up on the balls of her feet and brush her lips over his in a kiss that somehow managed to be both discreet and intimate. In that moment she’d ceased to exist for either of them. Their emotions were definitely engaged.