Kitabı oku: «The Inn at Eagle Point»

“Sherryl Woods always delights her readers— including me!” —No.1 New York Times bestselling author Debbie Macomber

“Compulsively readable … Woods’s novel easily rises

above hot-button topics to tell a universal tale

of friendship’s redemptive power.”

—Publishers Weekly on Mending Fences

“Sherryl Woods always delivers a fast, breezy … romance.”

—Jayne Ann Krentz

“Sherryl Woods gives her characters depth, intensity,

and the right amount of humour.”

—RT Book Reviews

“Sherryl Woods is a uniquely gifted writer whose deep

understanding of human nature is woven

into every page.”

—Carla Neggers

The Inn at Eagle Point

Sherryl Woods

www.mirabooks.co.uk

Dear Reader,

Launching a new series is one of my very favourite things. I get to enter a whole new setting, meet fascinating, complex new characters and, hopefully, create situations and conflicts that will resonate with all of you. When I was deciding the details of this latest series, I kept coming back to the Chesapeake Bay, an area near and dear to my heart. Though I don’t actually live on the bay, my summer home is on the Potomac River just above where it enters the bay. There are few places on earth more beautiful and serene.

Setting, however, isn’t the only thing that matters. Even more important are the characters who will fill these pages, and for this I wanted a huge, complicated, dysfunctional family. Thus, the O’Briens. You’ll meet four generations of them over time, many of them with major issues with each other. There will be stories of betrayal, reconciliation and, of course, love. There will be meddling and matchmaking and tough choices. And along the way, there will be lots of laughs and a few tears.

The Inn at Eagle Point is Abby’s story, but it is also a story about sisters and how they stand up for each other without question. It’s a story of a powerful love, first lost, then found again. And of two proud men who struggle to believe in second chances.

So welcome to Chesapeake Shores. I hope you’ll come to love the O’Briens and their world.

All best,

Sherryl Woods

For Morgan and Taylor … Welcome to the world,

little girls! You’re definitely going to keep your

moms and dads and big brothers on their toes!

Prologue

The arguing had gone on most of the night. In her room just three doors down the hall from her parents’ master suite, Abby had been able to hear the sound of raised voices, but not the words. It wasn’t the first time they’d fought recently, yet this time something felt different. The noisy exchange itself and fretting about it kept her awake most of the night.

Until she walked downstairs just after dawn and saw suitcases in the front hallway, Abby hoped she’d only imagined the difference, that the knot of dread that had formed in her stomach was no more than her overactive imagination making something out of nothing. Now she knew better. Someone was leaving this time—quite possibly forever, judging from the pile of luggage by the door.

She tried to quiet her panic, reminding herself that her dad, Mick O’Brien, left all the time. An internationally acclaimed architect, he was always going someplace for a new job, a new adventure. Again, though, this felt different. He’d only been home a couple of days from his last trip. He rarely turned right around and left again.

“Abby!” Her mother sounded startled and just a little edgy. “What are you doing up so early?”

Abby wasn’t surprised that her mother was caught off guard. Most teenagers, including Abby and her brothers, hated getting up early on the weekends. Most Saturdays it was close to noon when she finally made her way downstairs.

Abby met her mother’s gaze, saw the dismay in her eyes and knew instinctively that Megan had hoped to be gone before anyone got up, before anyone could confront her with uncomfortable questions.

“You’re leaving, aren’t you?” Abby said flatly, trying not to cry. She was seventeen, and if she was right about what was going on, she was the one who was going to have to be strong for her younger brothers and sisters.

Megan’s eyes filled with tears. She opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out. Finally, she nodded.

“Why, Mom?” Abby began, a torrent of questions following. “Where are you going? What about us? Me, Bree, Jess, Connor and Kevin? Are you walking out on us, too?”

“Oh, sweetie, I could never do that,” Megan said, reaching for her. “You’re my babies. As soon as I’m settled, I’ll be back for you. I promise.”

Though her declaration was strong, Abby saw through it to the fear underlying her words. Wherever Megan was going, she was scared and filled with uncertainty. How could she not be? She and Mick O’Brien had been married for nearly twenty years. They’d had five children together, and a life they’d built right here in Chesapeake Shores, the town that Mick himself had designed and constructed with his brothers. And now Megan was going off all alone, starting over—How could she not be terrified?

“Mom, is this really what you want?” Abby asked, trying to make sense of such a drastic decision. She knew plenty of kids whose parents were divorced, but their moms hadn’t just packed up and left. If anyone had gone, it had been the dads. This seemed a thousand times worse.

“Of course it’s not what I want,” Megan said fiercely. “But things can’t go on as they have been.” She started to say more, than waved it off. “That’s between your father and me. I just know I have to make a change. I need a fresh start.”

In a way, Abby was relieved that Megan hadn’t said more. Abby didn’t want the burden of knowing what had driven her mother to go. She loved and respected both of her parents, and she wasn’t sure how she would have handled careless, heated words capable of destroying that love she felt for either one of them.

“But where will you go?” she asked again. Surely it wouldn’t be far. Surely her mother wouldn’t leave her all alone to cope with the fallout. Mick was helpless with emotions. He could handle all the rest—providing for them, loving them, even going to the occasional ball game or science fair—but when it came to everyday bumps and bruises and hurt feelings, it was Megan they all relied on.

Then again, why wouldn’t Megan assume Abby could handle all the rest? Everyone in the family knew that Abby took her responsibility as the oldest seriously. She’d always known that her parents counted on her as backup. Bree, who’d just turned twelve-going-on-thirty, and her brothers would be okay. With Megan gone, Bree might retreat into herself at first, but, mature and self-contained, she would find her own way of coping. Kevin and Connor were teenage guys. They were pretty much oblivious to everything except sports and girls. More often than not, they found their exuberant, affectionate mother to be an embarrassment.

That left Jess. She was only a baby. Okay, she’d just turned seven last week, Abby reminded herself, but that was still way too young not to have her mom around. Abby had no idea how to fill that role, even temporarily.

“I won’t be that far away,” Megan assured her. “As soon as I’ve found a job and a place for all of us, I’ll come back for you. It won’t take long.” Then, almost to herself, she added, “I won’t let it take long.”

Abby wanted to scream at her that any amount of time would be too long, any distance too far. How could her mother not see that? But she looked so sad. Lost and alone, really. Her cheeks were damp with tears, too. How could Abby yell at her and make her feel even worse? Abby knew she would simply have to find a way to cope, a way to make the others understand.

Then she was struck by another, more terrifying thought. “What about when Dad goes away on business? Who’ll look out for us then?”

Megan’s expression faltered for just an instant, probably at the very real fear she must have heard in Abby’s voice. “Your grandmother will move in. Mick’s already spoken to her. She’ll be here later today.”

At the realization that this was real, that if they’d made arrangements for Gram to move in, then this separation was permanent and not some temporary separation that would end as soon as her parents came to their senses, Abby began to shake. “No,” she whispered. “This is so wrong, Mom.”

Megan seemed taken aback by her vehemence. “But you all love Gram! It’ll be wonderful for you having her right here with you.”

“That’s not the point,” Abby said. “She’s not you! You can’t do this to us.”

Megan pulled Abby into her arms, but Abby yanked herself free. She refused to be comforted when her mother was about to walk out the door and tear their lives apart.

“I’m not doing this to you,” Megan said, her expression pleading for understanding. “I’m doing it for me. Try to understand. In the long run it’s going to be best for all of us.” She touched Abby’s tearstained cheek. “You’ll love New York, Abby. You especially. We’ll go to the theater, the ballet, the art galleries.”

Abby stared at her with renewed shock. “You’re moving to New York?” Forgetting for a moment her own dream of someday working there, making a name for herself in the financial world, all she could think about now was that it was hours away from their home in Chesapeake Shores, Maryland. A tiny part of her had apparently hoped that her mother would be going no farther away than across town, or maybe to Baltimore or Annapolis. Wasn’t that far enough to escape her problems with Mick without abandoning her children?

“What are we supposed to do if we need you?” she demanded.

“You’ll call me, of course,” Megan said.

“And then wait hours for you to get here? Mom, that’s crazy.”

“Sweetie, it won’t be for long, a few weeks at most, and then you’ll be with me. I’m going to find a wonderful place for us. I’ll find the best private schools. Mick and I have agreed to that.”

Abby desperately wanted to believe it would all work out. At the same time she wanted to keep her right here answering questions until she forgot all about this crazy plan, but just then a taxi pulled up outside. Abby stared from the taxi to her mother in horror. “You’re leaving right this minute, without even saying goodbye?” She’d guessed as much earlier, but now it seemed too cruel.

Tears streamed down Megan’s cheeks. “Believe me, it’s better this way. It’ll be easier. I’ve left notes for everyone under their bedroom doors, and I’ll call tonight. We’ll be together again before you know it.”

As Abby stood there, frozen with shock, Megan picked up the first two bags and carried them across the porch and down the front steps to the waiting cab. The driver came back for the rest, followed by Megan.

Standing in the empty foyer, she tucked a finger under Abby’s chin. “I love you, sweetheart. And I know how strong you are. You’ll be here for your brothers and sisters. It’s the only thing that makes this separation okay.”

“It is not okay!” Abby replied vehemently, her voice starting to climb. Until now, she’d mostly kept it together, but the realization that her mom wasn’t even sticking around to handle the initial fallout from this made her want to scream. She wasn’t an adult. This wasn’t her mess to solve.

“I hate you!” she shouted as Megan walked down the steps, her spine straight. She shouted it again just to make sure her mother heard the anger in her voice, but Megan never looked back.

Abby would have gone on shouting until the taxi was out of sight, but just then she caught a movement out of the corner of her eye and turned to see Jess, her eyes wide with confusion and dismay.

“Mommy,” Jess whispered, her chin wobbling as she stared through the open doorway at the disappearing taxi. Her strawberry-blond hair was tangled, her feet bare, the imprint of her old-fashioned chenille bedspread on her cheek. “Where’s Mommy going?”

Calling on that inner strength everyone believed she had, Abby steeled herself against her own fear, tamped down all the anger and forced a smile for her little sister. “Mommy’s going on a trip.”

Tears welled in Jess’s eyes. “When’s she coming back?”

Abby gathered her sister in her arms. “I’m not sure,” she said, then added with a confidence she was far from feeling, “She promised it won’t be long.”

But, of course, that turned out to be a lie.

1

15 years later

Being an overachiever sucked, Abby O’Brien Winters concluded as she crawled into bed after midnight, mentally and physically exhausted after a roller-coaster day on Wall Street. She’d managed about twenty minutes of quality time with her twin daughters before they’d fallen asleep barely into the opening paragraph of The Velveteen Rabbit. She’d eaten warmed-over Chinese takeout for the third straight night, then pulled out a half-dozen voluminous market analysts’ reports she needed to absorb before the stock exchange opened in the morning. Her bedtime reading was a lot more challenging than what Caitlyn and Carrie chose.

She was good at her job as a portfolio manager for a major brokerage company, but so far it had cost her a marriage to a great guy, who’d tired of playing second fiddle to her career, and more sleep than she could possibly calculate. Though she shared custody of the twins with Wes, she often felt as if she was barely acquainted with her five-year-old daughters. It sometimes seemed as if they spent more time with the nanny—and even her ex-husband—than they did with her. She’d long since lost sight of exactly what she was trying to prove and to whom.

When the phone rang, Abby glanced at the clock and groaned. At this hour, it could only be an emergency. Heart thudding, she reached for the receiver.

“Abby, it’s me,” her sister Jessica announced. Jess was the youngest of the five O’Brien siblings and the real night owl among them. Abby stayed up late because it was the only way to cram enough work into a twenty-four-hour day. Jess did it because she was just starting to hit her stride when the moon and stars came out. “I called earlier, but the nanny said you weren’t home yet. Then I got distracted with a project I’m working on. I hope it’s not too late. I know you’re usually up till all hours.”

“It’s fine,” Abby assured her. “Is everything okay? You sound stressed. Is something going on with Gram? Or Dad?”

“Gram’s amazing. She’ll outlive us all. And Dad is off someplace building something. I can’t keep track of him.”

“He was in California last week,” Abby recalled.

“Then I guess he’s still there. You know he has to oversee every single detail when one of his projects is being built. Of course, then he loses interest, just the way he did with Chesapeake Shores.”

There was an unsurprising note of bitterness in Jess’s voice. As the youngest of five, she, more than the rest of them, had missed spending time with their dad. Mick O’Brien had already been making a name for himself as an architect and urban planner when he’d designed and built Chesapeake Shores, a now-famous seaside community on the Chesapeake Bay. He’d done it in partnership with his brothers—one a builder, the other an environmentalist. The town had been built around land that had been farmed by Colin O’Brien, a great-great uncle and the first of the O’Briens to arrive from Ireland in the late 1800s. It was to be the crown jewel in Mick’s body of work and the idyllic place his family would call home. It hadn’t turned out that way.

Mick and his brothers had fought over the construction, battled over environmental issues and even over the preservation of the few falling-down historic buildings on some of the property. Eventually they’d dissolved the partnership. Now, even though they all coexisted in or near Chesapeake Shores, they seldom spoke except on holidays, when Gram insisted on a pretense of family harmony.

Abby’s mother, Megan, had lived in New York since she and Mick had divorced fifteen years ago. Though the plan had been for all of the children to move to New York with her, for reasons Abby had never understood, that hadn’t happened. They’d stayed in Chesapeake Shores with their mostly absent dad and Gram. In recent years, one by one they had drifted away, except for Jess, who seemed to have a love-hate relationship with the town and with Mick.

Since moving to New York herself after college, Abby had reestablished a strong bond with her mother, but none of the others had done the same. And not just Jess, but all five of them had an uneasy relationship with their father. It was Gram—who’d been only a girl when her family had followed their O’Brien predecessors to Maryland—with her fading red hair, twinkling blue eyes, ready smile and the lingering lilt of Ireland in her voice, who held them together and made them a family.

“Did you call to complain about Dad, or is something else on your mind?” Abby asked her sister.

“Oh, I can always find something to complain about with Dad,” Jess admitted, “but actually I called because I need your help.”

“Anything,” Abby said at once. “Just tell me what you need.” She was close to all her siblings, but Jess held a special place in her heart, perhaps because of the big difference in their ages and her awareness of how their mother’s departure and their father’s frequent absences had affected her. Abby had been stepping in to fill that gap in Jess’s life since the day Megan had left.

“Could you come home?” Jess pleaded. “It’s a little too complicated to get into on the phone.”

“Oh, sweetie, I don’t know,” Abby began, hesitating. “Work is crazy.”

“Work is always crazy, which is exactly why you need to come home. It’s been ages. Before the girls came along, you used work as an excuse. Then it was the twins. Now it’s work and the twins.”

Abby winced. It was true. She had been making excuses for years now. She’d eased her conscience with the fact that every member of her family loved visiting New York and came up frequently. As long as she saw them all often, it didn’t seem to matter that it was almost always on her turf rather than Chesapeake Shores. She’d never stopped to analyze why it had been so easy to stay away. Maybe it was because it really hadn’t felt like home after her mother had left.

Before she could reply, Jess added, “Come on, Abby. When was the last time you took a real vacation? Your honeymoon, I’ll bet. You know you could use a break, and the girls would love being here. They should spend some quality time in the town their grandfather built and where you grew up. Gram could spoil them rotten for a couple of weeks. Please. I wouldn’t ask if it weren’t important.”

“Life-or-death important?” Abby asked. It was an old exchange, used to rank whether any crisis was truly monumental or only a temporary blip in their lives.

“It could be,” Jess said seriously. “At least in the sense that my whole future’s at stake. I think you’re the only one who can fix this, or at least the only one I’m willing to ask for help.”

Struck by the somber tone in her voice, Abby said, “Maybe you’d better tell me right now.”

“You need to be here to understand. If you can’t stay for a couple of weeks, then at least come for a few days. Please.”

There was something in her sister’s voice that Abby had never heard before, an urgency that suggested she wasn’t exaggerating her claim that her future was at stake. Since Jess was the only one of the five siblings who’d been floundering for a focus since reaching adulthood, Abby knew she couldn’t turn her back on her. And admittedly a break would do Abby herself a world of good. Hadn’t she just been bemoaning her workaholic tendencies earlier tonight?

She smiled, thinking about how wonderful it would be to breathe the salty Chesapeake Bay air again. Even better, she would have uninterrupted time with her girls in a place where they could swing on the playground her father had designed for the town park, build sand castles on the beach and run barefoot through the chilly waters of the bay.

“I’ll work something out tomorrow and be down there by the weekend,” she promised, giving in. She glanced at her jam-packed schedule and grimaced. “I can only make it for a couple of days, okay?”

“A week,” Jess pleaded. “I don’t think this can be fixed in a day or two.”

Abby sighed. “I’ll see what I can work out.”

“Whatever you can arrange,” Jess said at once, seizing the compromise. “Let me know when your flight’s getting in and I’ll pick you up.”

“I’ll rent a car,” Abby said.

“After all these years in New York, do you actually remember how to drive?” Jess teased. “Or even how to get home?”

“My memory’s not that bad,” Abby responded. “See you soon, sweetie.”

“I’ll call Gram and let her know you’re coming.”

“Tell her not to go to any trouble, okay?” Abby said, knowing it would be a waste of breath. “We’ll go out to eat. I’ve been dying for some Maryland crabs.”

“No way,” her sister countered. “It’s a little early in the season, but if you want steamed crabs, I’ll find ‘em somewhere and pick them up for Friday-night dinner. We can eat on the porch, but I’m not about to stop Gram from cooking up a storm. I say let the baking begin.”

Abby laughed at her enthusiasm. Gram’s baking—pies, tarts, cookies, scones, cakes—was pretty amazing. There’d been a time in her life when Abby had wanted to learn all those traditional family recipes and open a bakery, but that was before she’d discovered an interest in and aptitude for the financial world. That had been her ticket out of Chesapeake Shores.

Now, after more than ten hectic years away—years spent climbing a treacherous corporate ladder, marrying, giving birth to twins and divorcing—she was going home for a real visit, something longer than a rushed weekend with barely time to relax before it was time to fly back to New York. She couldn’t help wondering, based on the dire tone in Jess’s voice, if that was a good thing or not.

“Couldn’t you at least put on a tie?” Lawrence Riley grumbled, scowling at his son. “If you’re going to take over this bank, you need to set a good example for the employees. You can’t come in here looking as if you just climbed off the back of a Harley.”

Trace regarded his father with amusement. “That’s exactly what I did. My bike’s in the parking lot.”

His father’s frown deepened. “I thought I told you to drive your mother’s car. You have an image to uphold now.”

“What was Mother supposed to do?” Trace asked reasonably. “I couldn’t see her riding my Harley to her garden club meeting.”

“She has a dozen different friends who would have been happy to pick her up,” his father countered.

“And apparently not a one of them had any desire to run all her errands with her after the meeting,” Trace responded.

“You have an answer for everything, don’t you?” his father grumbled. “This situation is never going to work if you don’t take me or this job seriously.”

“I always take you seriously,” Trace said. “As for the job, I don’t want to take it at all. I have a perfectly good career in New York. Just because I don’t have to wear a suit or use a calculator doesn’t mean it’s not respectable.” In fact, his career as a freelance design artist not only paid well, enabling him to live and work in a large loft in SoHo, it didn’t require him to answer to his father. That was quite a perk in his book.

His father’s scowl deepened. “So, what? I should let this community bank get gobbled up by one of the big banking conglomerates?”

“Maybe so,” Trace said, knowing his response would only push his father’s hot button. “That’s the way the banking world is going.”

“Well, this bank won’t, not as long as I have any say about it,” his father said stubbornly. “Chesapeake Shores Community Bank serves the people in this town in a way that one of those faceless, impersonal behemoths never could.”

Trace couldn’t argue the point. He just didn’t want any part of running the place, family heritage or not. “Why not put Laila in charge?” he asked, referring to his younger sister. He warmed to the topic. If he could convince his father to put Laila in the job she’d always wanted, he could be on the road back to New York by morning. All he had to do was sell his father on the idea. “Think about it, Dad. She has a head for numbers. Her SAT math scores were through the roof. She aced all of her college business courses. She has a master’s degree from the Wharton School of Business. She’d be a natural.”

“I thought of that,” his father admitted. “I even spoke to her about it, but your sister told me to take a hike.”

That was unexpected, Trace thought. “Why?”

His father shrugged. “She said she wasn’t going to be anybody’s second choice, even mine.”

Trace regarded him with bewilderment. “But you asked her first.”

“When has your sister ever paid any attention to logic? She’s convinced I only asked her because I knew you wouldn’t want the job.”

“I don’t suppose you tried to convince her she was wrong,” Trace said.

“How could I when she was right?”

“Do you think you two will ever learn to communicate?” Trace grumbled. He and his dad might be at loggerheads ninety percent of the time, but Lawrence Riley and Laila were rarely on the same page about anything, from a choice as inane as breakfast cereal to a decision as critical as who ought to run the bank. It had been that way from the moment she learned to talk.

“You mean communicate the way you and I do?” his father retorted wryly.

“Yeah, at least that well,” Trace responded. “Look, I’ll talk to her. I’ll smooth things over between the two of you. Her pride’s been hurt because you’ve made it plain over the years that you want me back here, but she’ll come around.”

His father hit his fist on the desk. “Dammit, you’re the one who needs to come around, Trace. What ever happened to family loyalty? A man works his whole life to build up something good for his son, and you toss it aside without a second thought.”

“I’ve had a lifetime to think about it. You’ve never made a secret about what you expected. I’ve given it a second thought and a third, for that matter, ever since you called. Dad, come on, you know the whole nine-to-five drill would never work for me. I like a job that’s creative, a word that tends to make bankers nervous as hell.”

The faint hint of a smile finally touched his father’s lips. “True enough,” he admitted. “How about this? We give it six months. If you still hate it, you can take off again with my blessing. That’s fair, isn’t it?”

As a respected and in-demand artist working freelance for several of New York’s top ad agencies, Trace had the flexibility to do as his father asked. He could even keep up with a few accounts to keep himself from going totally stir-crazy in Chesapeake Shores. If it would buy him his freedom permanently, surely he could survive six months in a suit. He owed his father that much respect. And in the long run that short-term display of loyalty would be wiser than causing a family rift.

Moreover, he could spend the time trying to convince his sister to forget about her stupid pride and being second choice. She’d wanted this job since she’d learned to count. She ought to grab it, rather than wasting her talent by keeping the books for a few local businesses. Unfortunately she’d inherited their father’s stubbornness. It would probably take Trace every single day of the allotted six months to make peace between the two of them.

“Okay, six months,” Trace agreed. “Not one day longer.”

His father beamed at him. “We’ll see. You might discover you have an aptitude for banking, after all.”

“Or you’ll realize I’m incompetent when it comes to math.”

“I have your college test scores and grades that say otherwise.” He stood up and held out his hand. “Welcome aboard, son.”

Trace shook his hand, then studied his father intently. There was a glint in his eyes that suggested there was more to the negotiations than Trace had realized. “What are you up to?” he asked warily.

“Up to?” Lawrence Riley had a lousy poker face. Half of his pals at the country club would testify to that. For the past thirty years, they’d lined their pockets with his losses.

“Don’t even try to play innocent, Dad. You’re up to something, and it has nothing to do with me becoming your protégé around here.”

“We’ve made a business deal, that’s all,” his father insisted. “Now let me show you your office. It’s fairly Spartan now, but if you decide to stick around you can decorate it however you want. Meantime, I’ll have Raymond go through some loan folders with you. We have a meeting of the loan committee first thing Tuesday morning. You’ll need to have your recommendations ready then.”

Trace held up a hand. “Hold on a second. I don’t know enough to make recommendations on whether loan applications should be approved.”

“Raymond will show you the ropes. He’s been my right hand for years. And they’re not all loan applications. There’s a possible foreclosure in there, too.”

Trace’s stomach knotted. “You want me to decide whether or not someone’s home should be taken away and put up for auction?”

“It’s a business, not a home. And you won’t be deciding on your own, of course. The board will have the final say, but we’d likely act on your recommendation.”

“No way,” Trace said. Who was he to rip someone’s dreams to shreds? Businesses in Chesapeake Shores were small, family-owned operations. It would be like taking the food right off someone’s table, someone he knew, more than likely. He wasn’t sure he had the stomach to do that.

“You can’t be softhearted, son. It’s strictly business, a matter of dollars and cents. You’ll see once you’ve taken a look at the paperwork.” His father patted him on the back. “You start looking over those files and I’ll send Raymond in.”

Trace scowled at his father’s departing back, then turned to the stack of folders sitting neatly in the middle of the huge mahogany desk that took up most of the corner office. Right on top sat one with a large, ominous red sticker pasted on the front.

He sat down in the leather chair behind the desk, his wary gaze on that folder. Curiosity finally got the better of him, and he flipped open the file and stared at the first page.

“Oh, hell,” he murmured as he read it: Possible notice of foreclosure—The Inn at Eagle Point. Owner: Jessica O’Brien.

He knew Jess O’Brien, but it wasn’t her image that immediately came to mind. It was that of her older sister, Abigail, the woman who’d stolen his heart years ago on a steamy summer night, then disappeared without even a goodbye. Over the years he’d told himself it was ludicrous to cling to such an elusive memory. He’d tried to chase it away with other relationships, most of them casual, but even a couple that had promised a deeper intimacy. In the end, he hadn’t been able to shake his desire for someone with auburn hair, laughing eyes and a daredevil spirit that matched his own.

Now he was supposed to decide the fate of her sister’s inn? One thing he knew about the O’Briens, they stuck together. If he took on Jess, he’d be taking on the rest of them, Abby included. Was that what had put the gleam in his father’s eye earlier?

He shook off the possibility. His father couldn’t know that he’d been carrying a torch for her all these years. No one did.

Except Laila, he realized. His sister had been Abby’s best friend. She’d even covered for the two of them that amazing night they’d spent together in a secluded cove on the beach. Could she and his father be conspiring?

Damn straight, he thought with a shudder. Maybe he was finally about to get his wish and see Abby again. Or maybe he was about to land in a whole mess of trouble. He wondered if, with Abby involved, he’d actually be able to tell the difference.

An hour later with the inn’s dismal financial figures still in his head, Trace climbed on his bike and took a drive to see the property. He was hoping he’d find something—anything—to convince him to let the loan stand. He needed arguments he could take to the board and his father with total confidence.

Winding along the coastal road, he breathed in the salty air and relaxed as the sun beat down on his shoulders. It was late spring, but there was still the scent of lilacs on the breeze as he rounded the curve by the Finch property. Widow Marjorie Finch, who’d been bent and wizened when he was a boy, loved her lilacs. They’d been allowed to grow and spread until they formed a hedge all along the road. When honeysuckle had grown up in the bushes, she’d attacked it as if it were an alien invader. Her loving attention had paid off. The bushes were heavy with fragrant, delicate blossoms.

To his right, along the narrow strip of land that ran along the beach, ospreys were building their nests back in the same bare branches where they’d built them for years. To his amusement, one intrepid osprey was constructing an elaborate configuration of branches, bits of string and even a strand of yellow police tape on a post at the end of someone’s dock. The owner was going to be ticked as hell to discover that his dock would be off-limits for the rest of summer while the birds of prey took up residence.

Eventually he reached the turnoff to the inn, converted from what had once been a sprawling Victorian home on a pinnacle of land overlooking the bay. The last time he’d been here, the place had been badly in need of paint, its boards weathered by the sea air and harsh winter winds. The Adirondack chairs and rockers on the porch had been in an equally sad state of disrepair. The once perfectly manicured lawn had gone mostly to crabgrass, the gardens to weeds. The Pattersons hadn’t put a dime into the place for years, and the neglect had shown.

Now, though, there was plenty of evidence that Jess had been hard at work remodeling the inn. The exterior was a soft white that seemed to reflect a hint of blue from the nearby water. Shutters were a bold red. The grass wasn’t as lush as it had once been, but it was green and well-trimmed. The azaleas and lilacs were in bloom, and one overgrown purple rhododendron spilled its huge blooms over a porch railing at the back of the house. The inn’s sign had been freshly painted and hung from brass hooks on a new pole at the edge of the driveway. It looked to him as if the place was ready to make a comeback.

Jess’s payment record, however, told a different story. Since taking out the loan a year earlier, she already had a history of late payments, had missed several altogether. She’d spent every penny of her small-business loan, and no opening date for the inn had been set. Her cash flow was nonexistent. She’d already had a couple of formal warnings from the bank. Ever since the credit disaster in the mortgage industry, banks were getting jittery about loans that looked as if they were going bad. On paper, it appeared the bank had no choice except to issue a foreclosure notice. Trace cringed at the prospect.

Even as he sat on his bike in the driveway, the door opened and Jess stepped outside. She caught sight of him and frowned.

“What are you doing here, Trace?” she asked.

Scowl in place, she crossed the lawn, hands on hips, her feet shoved into a pair of rubberized, all-weather clogs from one of the big outdoor apparel companies. Her jeans and T-shirt were splattered with paint—white, plus something close to Williamsburg blue, if he remembered his color palette correctly.

When she was standing practically toe-to-toe with him, her defiant gaze locked with his, she reminded him of another O’Brien with a fiery Irish temper.

“Well?” she challenged.

“Just looking things over.”

“For your father, no doubt.”

“For the bank,” Trace corrected.

“I thought you’d left town years ago, that you wanted no part of the bank.”

“I don’t. I’m just filling in for a few months.”

“Long enough to make my life hell?”

He grinned at that. “Maybe longer.” He made a sweeping gesture toward the house and grounds. “You’ve been busy.”

“It’s taken a lot of work. I’ve done most of it myself to save money,” she said, her chin lifted with pride and a hint of belligerence.

“Might have made more sense to hire people and get it done sooner, so you could open.”

“I didn’t see it that way.”

“Obviously not.”

“Do you want to take a look around inside?” she asked, her expression hopeful, her tone filled with enthusiasm. “Maybe once you’ve seen how great it looks, you’ll be able to go back and tell your father to be patient.”

“It’s not that simple, Jess. I know he’s warned you that you’re getting too far behind. The bank looks at the bottom line, not at whether or not you’re doing a good job with a paintbrush.”

“When did you turn into a hard-ass, by-the-numbers guy like your dad? You weren’t that way when you were seeing my sister.” She gave him a considering look. “Or were you? Is that why the two of you split up?”

Trace stiffened. “You really don’t want to go there,” he warned. “Abby has nothing to do with this.”

“Doesn’t she? For all I know, you’re absolutely thrilled by the prospect of payback for whatever she did to you. She was the one who broke it off, wasn’t she?”

The comment was not only intrusive, it was insulting. “Dammit, Jess, you don’t know a thing about what happened back then and you sure as hell don’t know anything about me if you think I’d use you to get even with your sister.”

“Really?” she said, her expression innocent. “She’s coming back, you know. She’ll be here tomorrow.”

Trace tried not to let his immediate and unsteady reaction to the news show. “Tell her I said hey,” he said mildly. He started his bike. “See you around, Jess.”

Her show of defiance faltered. “What are you going to tell your father, Trace?”

“I have no idea,” he said candidly. He looked into her eyes. “But I will promise you this, it won’t have anything at all to do with Abby.”

She nodded slowly. “I’ll take you at your word about that.”

As he rode off toward town, though, he couldn’t help wondering if she should. When it came to his conflicted feelings for Abby O’Brien, his word might not be entirely trustworthy.

2

“Where are we going, Mommy? Tell us again,” Caitlyn commanded.

“When are we gonna get there?” Carrie whined. “We’ve been driving and driving forever. I wanna go home.”

“It’s barely been a half hour since we left the airport,” Abby told Carrie, her patience already frayed by the long security line at the airport in New York and the even more tedious wait at the car-rental counter in Baltimore. The flight itself, less than an hour from LaGuardia to BWI in Baltimore, had gone smoothly. The girls had been excited to be on a plane, but now they were tired and cranky and completely uninterested in the scenery as they drove south toward Chesapeake Shores. They might have been pacified by a stop for ice cream or some other treat, but Abby was determined not to reward them for bad behavior just to get a few minutes of peace.

“Why don’t you try to take a little nap?” she pleaded, glancing in the rearview mirror for a glimpse of them in their car seats. “When you wake up, you’ll be at Gram’s, and I know she’s going to have sugar cookies and milk for you. Remember how much you loved those when she baked them for you last time she visited us in New York?”

“I like chocolate chip better,” Carrie grumbled, clearly determined to be displeased about everything.

“Well, I love sugar cookies,” Caitlyn countered. “So I’ll eat them all.”

“No, you won’t!” Carrie screamed. “Mommy, tell her she can’t have all the cookies. Some are mine.”

Abby bit back a groan. “I’m sure there will be plenty of cookies for both of you. Now close your eyes. If you’re this impossible when we get there, you can forget about getting any treats. You’ll be going straight to bed.”

The girls fell silent, but another glance in the mirror revealed them making faces at each other. Abby let it pass. She needed to focus all of her attention on the traffic, which had increased at least tenfold since the last time she’d driven home. She could hardly wait to turn onto some of Maryland’s less-traveled roads.

Unfortunately, the traffic never completely let up. It seemed everyone had the same idea about heading to one of Maryland’s many seaside communities on a Friday night. Once, the only traffic nightmare had been getting to Ocean City or the other beaches along the Atlantic coast, but now it seemed people had discovered the smaller towns on the western shores of the bay, as well.

She pulled out her cell phone and hit Jess’s number on speed dial.

“The traffic is awful,” she said when her sister answered. “At this rate, it’s going to be another hour before we get there.”

“I’ll let Gram know,” Jess said. “I’m on my way over there now. Take a deep breath. I’m picking up crabs and I’ll have wine waiting.”

“Thank you, thank you,” Abby said. “See you soon.”

It turned out to be an hour and ten minutes before she could make the turn into the community of Chesapeake Shores. At last, though, the traffic had eased. She debated going straight to the house, but since the girls were finally asleep, she wound through downtown, getting reacquainted with the Main Street businesses that lined a four-block stretch from the waterfront up to the town square.

There was one visible vacancy, but all the other shop windows were filled with colorful displays. Barb’s Baby Boutique was next to Ethel’s Emporium, which carried everything from souvenirs and penny candy to fancy hostess gifts and locally produced jams and jellies. The Kitchen Store, which sold every gourmet gadget imaginable, was next to Seaside Gifts, where all the items had a nautical theme. There was a designer clothing store, which carried resort wear. And all of the stores had pots overflowing with colorful pansies and trailing vines by the doors and crisp blue-and-white awnings shading the windows. The pansies would be exchanged for bright red geraniums once spring turned to summer.

With her car window open, she drew in a deep breath of the familiar salt air, then heard the soft refrains of an outdoor concert drifting up from the banks of the bay. She’d forgotten about the tradition of free Friday-night performances in the band shell during the late spring, summer and early fall months when the weather drew crowds to the town. It was jazz tonight, a little heavy on the sax, it seemed to her.

She smiled, thinking of the debates she’d once had with her father about the appropriate mix of music for the early concerts. If it had been up to Mick and Gram, every week would have featured Irish singers and dancers.

“Mommy, I hear music,” Carrie murmured sleepily. “Are we going to a party?”

“Nope, but we’re almost home,” Abby told her. “Five minutes and we’ll be there.”

She turned away from downtown and took the shore road to the very end where it began a winding climb up a gentle hill. At the top she made a left into the long driveway that ended in back of a classic beachfront home with a wraparound porch, lots of glass to take in the spectacular bay views and lights shining from every window. Two figures, one spry, the other a bit more stooped, emerged from the shadows on the porch as she pulled to a stop.

“Gram!” Caitlyn shouted, already struggling to free herself from the car seat.

“And Aunt Jessie!” Carrie boomed, trying to get the door on her side open. Abby released the child safety locks and Carrie sprang free, racing across the lawn to fling herself at her favorite aunt.

Jess stumbled back, then caught her niece up in a massive hug, even as Caitlyn reached up to her great-grandmother for a more demure embrace, as if she knew instinctively to take more care with the older woman.

Abby took in the scene with a smile. Why hadn’t she done this more often? Was she truly so busy? Or had she been making excuses because of her mixed feelings about home and the way she’d forced herself to walk away without looking back? Until now she hadn’t realized how much she missed being right here, with the sea breeze rustling through the trees, the sound of waves lapping against the shore and the promise of a whole pile of Maryland crabs and cold wine waiting on the porch, along with whatever Gram had baked that day.

Her grandmother caught her eye and gave her a knowing smile. “It’s good to be home, is it not?”

“It’s better than I expected,” Abby admitted. “How are you, Gram? You look good.” She certainly didn’t look her age, which was somewhere near eighty by Abby’s calculations, though her grandmother wouldn’t admit to it. Whenever any one of them had tried to pin her down, even for the sake of genealogical research, the date of her birth shifted to suit her.

“I’m better with the three of you here for a bit,” Gram said. “Shall we feed the girls first, then have our own meal when it’s quieter?”

“That sounds perfect,” Abby said.

“Why don’t I take them inside and show them their room, then? I’ve put them in Connor’s since he has the twin beds in there. I can’t get your brother to take away a single one of his sports trophies and ribbons, though. It looks as it did when he was still sleeping there himself.”

Abby grinned. “Cluttered and messy, then,” she said. “They’ll love it.”

After the three of them had gone inside, she turned to her sister and gave her a fierce hug. “Now then, are you ready to tell me why I’m here?”

Jess gave her a wry look. “Always eager to cut to the chase, aren’t you? Can’t you even take five minutes to relax?”

“Not if you expect me to solve this problem, whatever it is, in a few days.”

“I think it can wait a little longer. I don’t want to get into it until after Gram’s gone to bed. I don’t want her worrying.”

Abby frowned. “It’s that serious?”

“I told you life or death, in a manner of speaking,” Jess said impatiently. “Come on. I need a glass of wine—maybe two—before we get into all this.”

Judging from her sister’s mood, Abby had a feeling she might need a few glasses of wine herself.

Jess wasn’t entirely sure how she’d made such a mess of things. All she knew for certain was that she dreaded admitting any of it to her confident, successful big sister. Still, when her plans had gone south and she’d realized just how deep a hole she’d dug for herself, calling Abby—the family’s certified financial whiz—had seemed like the only sensible thing to do.

She didn’t want to lose the inn. Even as a little girl, when she’d first seen the sprawling structure less than a mile away from their own house, Jess had imagined herself owning it. Just over a year and a half ago, right before Christmas, in fact, she’d spotted the For Sale sign in front of the inn as she was driving home. Bored silly by her job at Ethel’s Emporium, her heart had immediately done a stutter step. For the first time since she’d come home after college, she could feel a sense of anticipation and excitement building deep inside. This was it, her chance to grab the brass ring, to give herself a sense of purpose, to build the kind of future her family would approve.

Initially, she’d told no one in her family of her plans. She wasn’t entirely sure why. Probably because she’d feared their ridicule or their lack of faith that she could possibly succeed. She was, after all, the baby and the wild child. She’d never stuck with anything for long. Unlike her sisters or her brothers, she’d never displayed a real passion for work, never found her niche. She’d been drifting, and everyone in the family had known it. Worse, they’d expected nothing more of her.

“Oh, you know Jess. She never sticks with anything for long.” How many times had she heard some family member say that, especially her father? When it came from Abby or her brothers, she took it in stride. When Mick said it, it cut Jess to the quick. She’d grown up believing she would never measure up to the high standards he set for all of his children. The inn was her chance to prove him—to prove all of them—wrong.

Fortunately Jess, like her siblings, had a modest trust fund that had come due when she’d turned twenty-one. It had been invested wisely, the amount growing, especially since Abby had taken over managing the account. It was enough, she’d hoped, for a down payment.

Impulsively, she’d made an appointment the next morning with the Realtor. Naively and because she was caught up in the dream, she hadn’t asked to see the books or any other proof that the inn could be operated in the black. She’d done a cursory inspection and found it to be in good shape. After all, one thing she knew about her father and Uncle Jeff, they designed and built things to last. She’d made a conservative bid, which had been accepted at once. The Pattersons were anxious to leave. All that remained was to get the financing in place.

That’s when she should have called Abby, she realized now. Or her father. Even her brothers could have offered sound advice, but, stubbornly independent to the end, she’d handled it all herself. To keep the payments within reason, she’d accepted an interest-only loan for the short term, then planned to refinance once the inn was open and operating at a profit.

Best-laid plans, she thought now, sipping her wine as she waited for Abby to come back from tucking the kids into bed. Nothing had gone as she’d anticipated. The Pattersons had never installed any kind of up-to-date reservation system. The heating and air-conditioning systems were barely functioning and needed to be replaced with something more energy-efficient. While the building itself was sound, the rooms were shabby, the curtains faded, the linens unacceptable. The exterior looked dilapidated, which had been easy enough to fix, but even a coat of paint cost money.

The down payment had depleted her funds, so she’d applied for a business loan, using the inn as collateral. She’d been approved easily.

Filled with excitement, Jess had finally revealed her purchase to the rest of the family. Predictably, Gram and her siblings had been delighted for her. Mick had asked a thousand and one perfectly reasonable questions for which she didn’t have adequate answers. That was when she’d gotten the first nagging sense that she was in over her head.

Then, a few months ago, while she was still trying to complete the necessary redecorating, she’d gotten a letter from the bank pointing out that she was behind on her payments for the mortgage and for the business loan. She’d scrambled to come up with the cash, embarrassed that in her zeal to spruce up the place, she’d overlooked the due dates for those payments. It had happened again a couple of months later. With her funds depleted, she’d missed two payments in a row after that.

That’s when she’d received the warning notice that she was in violation of the terms of both agreements, her mortgage and her small-business loan.

“Meaning what?” she asked Lawrence Riley when she’d called the bank in a panic.

“Meaning with your very spotty payment history, we could start foreclosure procedures. I’ve been keeping an eye on things at the inn. You have no cash flow.”

“I’m renovating. The grand opening is scheduled for July first. I’d hoped to make it by Memorial Day, but it just wasn’t feasible.”

“How do you expect to make these next payments or the ones the month after?”

“I’ll find the money,” she assured him, even though she had no idea where.

“Maybe you should speak to your father,” he suggested. “I’m sure he’d be willing—”

Jess cut him off. “This is my project. My father’s not involved.”

Her comment silenced him, which she thought was a good thing. But then he said, “If I thought your father was backing you, I could look the other way for the short term….”

“Well, he’s not,” Jess repeated. “You’ll get your payments, Mr. Riley. You know what potential the inn has. You know it’s going to be a success.”

“With the right management, yes,” he said. “I’m no longer convinced you’re the person who can accomplish that.”

His condescension and lack of faith infuriated her. She would have told him off, but even Jess was wise enough to recognize her already precarious standing with the banker.

“Please, be patient,” she said instead. “These are good loans, Mr. Riley. You know me. You know my family.”

“As I said, if you want to bring your father in, we can discuss—”

“No,” she’d replied fiercely.

“It’s your decision, of course. I’ll expect the payments on my desk on time,” he said. “Good day, Jessica.”

That conversation had taken place on Tuesday. She’d called Abby on Wednesday, the minute she’d realized there was no way she’d have the money in time. She knew Abby was going to flip out when she heard the kind of deals Jess had made without consulting her, but in the end she’d help her fix things, because that was what Abby did. She made things right. Even when her marriage was falling apart, she’d found a way to keep her equilibrium, stay on track at work and give the twins the kind of attention they needed to get through the turmoil. If she’d handled all that, this would be a piece of cake, Jess thought confidently.

Of course, that was before she’d realized that Trace was part of the equation. She had no idea exactly what had happened between him and Abby all those years ago, but it hadn’t been good. There was a history there, and despite Trace’s assurance that he wouldn’t let it interfere with the bank’s decision, Jess wasn’t a hundred percent sure she could believe him. Nor was she certain how Abby would feel once she knew she’d be dealing with her old flame. It might be better not to mention that at the outset.

When Abby finally joined her on the porch, Jess asked about work, how the girls were doing in kindergarten, whether there were any new men in Abby’s life. Abby finally regarded her with impatience. “You’re stalling,” she accused.

Jess flushed. “Maybe a little, but I did want to catch up. We never get to have a real heart-to-heart anymore. I miss that.”

Abby’s expression softened. “Me, too. But a life-or-death problem tops catching up. Talk to me.”

An hour later, after Jess had spilled her guts and seen the dismay in Abby’s eyes, she wasn’t so sure this was going to be as easy to fix as she’d hoped.

“We can straighten this out, can’t we?” she asked her sister, unable to keep a plaintive note out of her voice. “I know I’ve made a mess of things so far, but when you see the inn again, you’ll understand why I had to do it exactly this way. It’s going to be amazing.”

“It will only be amazing if you can keep the bank from foreclosing,” Abby said direly. “Why didn’t you call me sooner? I would have loaned you the money.”

“I don’t need your money,” Jess insisted. “I can do this on my own. I just need to buy a little more time. A couple of months, max.”

“You have reservations coming in?”

“We’re booked solid the rest of the summer, and we’re starting to get reservations for the fall,” Jess said proudly. “Plus, once word of mouth kicks in about how cozy the place is and how fabulous the food is, that should take care of the rest of the year, at least on weekends. I’m going to offer some holiday specials, too, to try to boost bookings in November, December and even the long weekends in January and February. I really do have a great marketing plan, Abby.”

“In writing?”

“No, but I can put it on paper, if that will help.”

Abby nodded, her expression thoughtful. “Do that. Maybe it’s the bargaining chip you need. First thing tomorrow I’ll meet you over there and we’ll go over all your financials. We can put together some realistic budget projections, then I’ll go with you to the bank on Monday.”

Which meant, Jess knew, that she’d come face-to-face with Trace. Maybe that wasn’t such a good idea. “I know how busy you are. Once we put everything together, if you need to go back to New York, I can take the paperwork to the bank.”

“It’ll be okay. Let’s face it, I speak their language and you don’t. This is your dream, and you tend to get sidetracked by all your plans. I can talk hard, cold facts and numbers.”

Jess gave in, because she knew Abby was right. She’d get emotional, while her sister could keep her cool. “If you’re really sure it won’t be too big an imposition, then thank you. I’ll never be able to repay you for doing this for me, Abby. I have to keep the inn. I just have to. It’s the first thing that’s really mattered to me, ever. It’s my chance to prove I’m as good as the rest of the O’Briens.”

Abby stared at her with a shocked expression. “What are you talking about, Jess? Of course you’re as good as the rest of us.”

“Come on. I’ve always been the screwup, the hyper one with no ability to focus. You probably expected me to mess this up from the beginning.” The belated diagnosis that she had attention deficit disorder had come when she was ten and struggling in school. From then on, it had been her curse and, all too often, an easy excuse for her failure to follow through on things.

“That is not true,” Abby said, though her expression said otherwise. “Sweetie, you have ADD. We all understand that. Despite that, look at all you’ve accomplished. You graduated from high school near the top of your class. You got your college degree. Those are huge accomplishments for someone with ADD. You’ll figure out how to manage everything at the inn, too.”

“I barely got through college because I kept changing my major. And I’ve drifted through half a dozen dead-end jobs since then,” Jess reminded her, determined to keep it real. “I’m twenty-two and I’ve never even had a relationship that’s lasted more than a few months.”

“Because you haven’t found the one thing or the one person you were passionate about,” Abby argued. “Now you have the inn. I remember how you used to talk about it when you were little. You loved going over there. I was so excited for you when you told me you’d finally bought it.” Her expression turned determined. “Stop worrying. I intend to do everything in my power to see that you keep the inn.”

“Short of bailing me out with money,” Jess reiterated. “I won’t let you do that.”

“Let’s just see how it goes, okay? I have the money to invest in a sure thing and I have faith in you.”

Tears welled up in Jess’s eyes. “I love you, sis.”

“Love you more. Now let’s get some sleep, so we can get started on all this first thing in the morning. What time should I meet you at the inn?”

“Nine?” Jess suggested. She owed her sister one lazy morning at least.

“Make it eight.”

Despite her emotions being all over the place, Jess grinned. “Not bad. You must be relaxing. I was figuring you’d say seven.”

“Watch it, kid. I could change my mind.”

Jess was on her feet at once. “See you at eight,” she said hurriedly, then started down the steps. At the bottom, she turned back. “I’m glad you’re home, Abby, but I’m sorry I dumped all this on you.”

“That’s what family’s for,” Abby said. “Don’t ever forget that.”

Despite her sister’s words, Jess wondered if she’d ever truly believe that, at least where her disapproving father was concerned. Once Mick heard about this, there’d be plenty of I-told-you-so’s to go around.

And once Abby realized that she was going to be dealing with Trace Riley and that Jess had kept that fact from her, Jess was very much afraid she might walk away and leave Jess to fend for herself.

Abby walked into the kitchen shortly after dawn, awakened by the sound of the robins, bluebirds and wrens outside her open bedroom windows. She’d forgotten how noisy nature could be, especially in the spring. As early as it was, she wasn’t surprised to find her grandmother there ahead of her.