Falling For Zoe (The Camerons of Tide's Way #1) (3 page)

Chapter 4

JAKE STOOD ON his back porch, gazing sightlessly out over a lawn that needed mowing toward the glimmer of silvery inland waterway that passed well beyond his property line.

The meal Ava had prepared hadn’t been nearly as bad as she’d warned them it would be. In fact, the vinegar and herb marinade had been quite tasty, and the steak only a little bit charred from grilling too long. Ava tended to be a perfectionist and her own worst critic. Jake liked her cooking and always let her know when she’d done well, but she let his praise slide off her like water off a duck.

In Jake’s opinion, it was hard enough just being sixteen without having to feel like you had to fill in for a mother who didn’t care enough to hang around until you grew up. Jake did his best not to demand too much of Ava. He tried even harder not to let her take on too much responsibility. She needed to be her own person. To have the space and freedom to find out who she was, and what she wanted from life. Beyond being Travis’s girlfriend, anyway. Jake snorted in disgust.

Travis worried Jake. Travis was so much like Jake had been as a teenager—hell bent on enjoying life and equally hell bent on getting laid. And since Travis seemed to have set his sights on Ava, Jake had every intention of thwarting that goal. Jake had learned his lesson the hard way, and he wasn’t about to let his daughter follow in her mother’s footsteps if he could help it.

Which was why Travis, who’d stopped by unannounced just as dinner was finishing, was settled on the sofa in the den with his arm wrapped about Ava’s shoulders instead of in the back seat of Travis’s car parked on some dark, deserted, dead end road. At least the make out session couldn’t progress beyond some torrid kissing and a grope or two. Not with Ava’s father patrolling the porch outside the sliding glass doors. He’d give them another ten minutes, then go in and break up whatever steamy little scene they had going.

Jake walked to the far end of the porch and noticed the lit upstairs window in the old Jolee homestead. His mind raced back to the oddly expectant look that had lurked in Zoe’s eyes as they’d stood on her porch after he’d walked her home. He’d been caught by surprise at his own unexpected and entirely male response. He’d never responded to any woman except Marsha like that. Not even in the two years since she’d walked out on him.

He’d said a hurried good night and hustled home, trying to forget the sudden surge of desire. But Zoe wasn’t the kind of woman a man put out of mind that easily. From the sexy package to the sassy confidence. Or the easy, uncomplicated way she’d dealt with Celia, the twins, and Ava.

As they’d consumed Ava’s charred southern grilled steak and stir-fried vegetables, Zoe had chatted effortlessly with Celia about memories from long before even his time. She’d engaged the twins in an amusing discussion about the best color to paint Zoe’s mailbox and moved on to discuss the merits of a book she and Ava had both read recently. At Ava’s urging, Zoe had even managed to get Jake to recount his less than heroic rescue of a mother cat with three kittens when its owner had called the fire department in tears because they were trapped in the attic of her garage. It somehow felt as if they’d all known Zoe for years.

Jake gripped the railing and let out a heavy sigh. If he were smart, he’d do his very best to keep Zoe Callahan at arm’s length. That look she’d given him had stirred up needs he’d forgotten he had and wasn’t sure he was ready for right now. He didn’t want to ruin another woman’s life by giving in to his libido with the same lack of restraint he’d possessed as a teenager. Every gut instinct in him told him Zoe wasn’t the kind of woman who took sex lightly in spite of the inviting warmth in her eyes. Besides, he had an example to set for Ava and Travis. He was the adult now, and he needed to remember that.

The final divorce decree he’d received that afternoon was sitting on his dresser where he’d put it when he stripped down for his shower. He decided to leave it there to remind himself that screwing around might be temporarily enjoyable, but in the long run, it could mess up your entire life.

Marsha had been beyond pretty. She’d been hot—the kind of hot that drives teenage boys crazy. Which, of course, was why Jake had pursued her in the first place. But long before they’d lost their virginity together in the bleachers above the scoreboard, he’d mistaken lust for love. Love he’d thought would last a lifetime. Lust that had gotten her pregnant and seen them settled into married life before they were even out of their teens.

When Marsha had finally grown up, she’d discovered the last thing she wanted to be was a wife and mother. She’d avoided sex as much as possible after Ava was born, and the twins had been another mistake. Or so she’d informed Jake the night before she left, leaving him miserable and confused. He’d had no idea she was so unhappy, or that she no longer felt anything for him.

Jake didn’t understand it any better now than he had two years ago. Perhaps he’d never really been in love with Marsha, even though he’d spent over a dozen years of his life believing he was. Certainly, his reaction to the divorce decree proved he didn’t feel anything for her now beyond contempt. And he didn’t understand women any better now than when he’d been sixteen.

He barely knew Zoe. He had no idea what her plans and dreams were, but whatever they were, he couldn’t be a part of them. They were going to be neighbors. And maybe they could be friends. But that was the beginning and the end of it, so the quicker he got over this shockingly needy physical attraction, the better off they’d both be. He’d almost kissed her good night, for Pete’s sake! And he knew without the least bit of doubt, it would have been a kiss with a lot more to it than just a friendly peck on the cheek.

Zoe Callahan was a dangerously tempting woman.

Chapter 5

ZOE SPENT THE morning unpacking boxes and daydreaming about Jake.
Nothing will come of it
, she kept reminding herself.
Even if he thinks I’m halfway attractive right now, in another month I’ll start really showing, and any interest he feels now will dry up quicker than rain on hot pavement
. But that admonition didn’t stop her from remembering the warmth in his gray eyes, or the way they crinkled at the corners when he was amused. Or the flood of electric excitement that raced through her when his hand rested lightly against the small of her back as he escorted her home across the lawn in the dark.

Zoe wasn’t used to being treated with such gentlemanly gallantry. Porter hadn’t once walked her to her door unless he had expected to be invited in for a nightcap and some sex. Zoe had told Jake she could find her own way home, but he’d insisted. Having discovered that Jake didn’t have a wife after all, Zoe had wistfully hoped the courteous walk home might lead to a good night kiss. Although she hadn’t flirted exactly, she’d been approachable and willing, yet nothing had happened. They’d stood at the top of her steps while he finished telling a story about the twins, but then he’d turned away abruptly. With a brief wave, he’d taken the steps two at a time and disappeared into the gloom.

Just like one of her brothers. Now wasn’t that a dispiriting thought! Zoe gave herself a shake and hefted another box onto the table. “Enough already! You’re acting like a moonstruck teenager.”

An hour later, having finished unpacking most of the kitchen stuff, Zoe looked around at her new domain and decided she’d been cooped up indoors long enough. She could look for the pots and pans later. Right now, she needed to find a chore out of doors. She needed some sunlight and fresh air.

Then she remembered the twins solemnly advising her to paint her mailbox, ’
cause it might fall over if it doesn’t get painted!
Lynn, at least she thought it was Lynn that had the tiny birthmark beside her mouth, had lobbied for yellow. Lori had been quick to suggest orange.

“Well, it depends on what colors I have, girls,” Zoe muttered to her absent advisors as she burrowed through a carton of brushes and leftover paint her brother had donated to her experiment in home ownership. She found a small can of green outdoor paint. God only knew where that had come from since she didn’t recall anything painted dark green at Michael’s place. A half a gallon of white. A fraction of a pint of the sky blue his front door sported! And then . . . an unopened quart of exterior yellow enamel. “Yellow it is,” she said, straightening, then bent again to rummage for a brush. Up against the side of the box, behind the brushes, she found a sheet of orange gerbera daisy decals.
You both win,
she thought, shoving the sheet of decals into her shirt pocket.
I wonder what possessed Michael to buy a bunch of flower decals or yellow paint, for that matter?
Neither was his style. Must have been his wife Connie and whatever she’d had in mind, she’d abandoned for something else.

JAKE LEANED against the fender of the minivan with the hood up, contemplating his twins who sat on the bottom step of the front porch. They were communicating in the brief half-sentences that they often finished for each other and hand signals known only to themselves.

They’d always been close, but Jake had been told that twins often were, and until recently he hadn’t worried about their preference for each other’s company. But last week he’d gotten a letter from the elementary school asking for his decision on separate classrooms when they began kindergarten in the fall, and it suddenly seemed like it might be something he should have thought about.

Maybe he should have been making an effort to invite friends from their day care center over for play dates. Or setting up opportunities for each of them to spend time at other girls’ houses on an individual basis. But it had just never occurred to him until the letter from the school arrived.

Jake made a mental note to consult their doctor. Another social issue he knew nothing about. With a sigh, he lowered himself onto the brand new mechanic’s creeper his girls had given him for his birthday and returned to the task of changing the oil in the five-year-old minivan Marsha had abandoned along with her family. He’d long ago sold his beloved pickup truck with its big off-road tires and a roll bar in favor of keeping the only vehicle that could transport his entire family.

For several minutes, with his body half under the van watching the oil drain into an old dishpan, he thought about the women in his life and the nagging feeling that he was living on a tightrope, never quite understanding what any of them needed or wanted from him. Only his mother had always been there for him and never asked for more than he had to give. But maybe all men felt that way about their mothers? Finally, the slender column of dirty oil spluttered and stopped. He screwed the plug back in and backed his creeper out from under the van and into the sunlight.

Wiping his hands on a rag, he pulled himself to his feet and grabbed a new jug of oil. He glanced up and noticed the twins had disappeared from the steps. With a start, he looked toward the tree house, then spied them intently watching their new neighbor paint her mailbox.

Zoe smiled at them as she dipped her brush into the paint can. As Zoe spoke, Lynn cocked her head to one side, Lori to the other. Neither appeared to have anything to say in response. Zoe continued the one-sided conversation, her paintbrush steadily coating the mailbox. Once the box itself was newly and brightly yellow, she knelt and went to work on the post. When she was done, she gestured with the brush toward the twins, then toward her house. Eagerly the twins nodded and turned to run back in Jake’s direction.

Jake started to ask the girls what they had been talking about, but they dashed past him without stopping, tripped up the stairs, and disappeared into the house. What on earth had Zoe said to send them off with such single-minded determination? With a shrug, he upended another can of oil into his engine.

Whatever Zoe had said was probably based on years of experience. Ava had found an instant cohort and sympathizer when Zoe had revealed that her mother had died giving birth to her seventh child when Zoe had been the same age as Ava was when Marsha walked out. Zoe, like Ava, had ended up taking on the job of woman-of-the-house.

What an amazing coincidence that Zoe should just happen to move in next door at a time when Ava most needed a role model and a confidant who understood. Celia helped out some, but as the Alzheimer’s claimed more and more of her memory, Ava had taken on ever more responsibility.

Jake’s own childhood had been so very different. He’d been the baby, and both his parents were still living. Philip, the oldest sibling, was his senior by nine years. Then came Kate and the twins, Will and Ben. They’d all had a pretty carefree time of it, and Jake couldn’t imagine what it must be like to be suddenly thrust into mothering six kids when you were barely more than a child yourself.

Yet Zoe didn’t act like a martyr. Her cheerful, outgoing personality belied any idea that she felt put upon and used. He wondered what her teenage years had been like. Had she had time for girly things, hanging out with her friends, experimenting with makeup the way he’d seen Ava doing with her best friend? Shopping at the mall and gossiping about who was dating whom?

Had she had a steady boyfriend? Perhaps he should ask Zoe about the boyfriend thing and compare notes about what to expect from Ava. Find out what he should be worrying about from a woman’s point of view. Except that might be taking neighborliness a little too far . . . asking such personal questions of a woman he barely knew.

Jake wiped the dipstick on a rag and slipped it back into the engine, then drew it out again. He wished he knew even half as much about women as he knew about cars.

Just as he finished checking the oil level and shut the hood of the van, Lori and Lynn reappeared on the porch, clad in clothes from the dress-up box Ava had put together for them.

Lynn sported long white gloves pulled nearly to her shoulders with a lacy lavender dress that dragged on the ground. Lori had chosen a hat with a long feather curling away from its brim and a burgundy dress only marginally shorter than her sister’s. They clutched their favorite stuffed animals under one arm while carefully lifting the hems of their dresses with their fingertips. Jake caught a glimpse of sparkly shoes as they began their descent to the walkway.

Lynn paused at Jake’s side and tugged on the hem of his shorts. “We are invited to a tea party,” she whispered in awed tones.

“Is that so?” he answered, expecting to see them head toward their tree house. He felt a pang of surprise when the twins traipsed daintily across the lawn in their finery and climbed the stairs to Zoe’s porch.

When Zoe met them at the top of the stairs, Jake did a double take. Zoe had changed out of her paint-stained shorts and oversized T-shirt and into a pale pink sundress that set off her slim tanned legs to perfection. She looked young and innocent and unexpectedly pretty. Jake had a sudden inexplicable vision of himself dancing with her. Of the pink dress mingling with the darker fabric of his favorite halfway-dressy slacks. With her wholesome little body pressed against his as they moved to a slow dance tune. Jake ruthlessly cut the daydream off before it went any further and shook his head
. I don’t even like to dance!

Zoe bent to shake each small, gloved hand with solemn formality. Then she ushered them to a card table set up next to the railing and covered with a lacy tablecloth. As Jake watched, a tea set appeared, and something very pink was poured into tiny cups. Lori lifted hers gingerly to her lips and sipped. Jake smiled at the innocent picture. Lynn followed her sister’s lead, and shortly a plate of cookies was being passed about. His usually boisterous little girls were behaving with amazingly grownup decorum. Jake wished he were a fly on the wall so he could listen in on the conversation. He would have to ask Zoe what kind of magic she had performed.

Then Ava rushed down the stairs and dashed across the lawn to her bicycle, and Jake forgot all about the twins and their tea party with Zoe.