Villa Blue (25 page)
Authors: Isla Dean
Tags: #Literature & Fiction, #Genre Fiction, #Coming of Age, #Sea Stories
Instead of continuing through the door, she faced him squarely, and looked up at him. He was almost a foot taller than she was, so when her head tilted back, the chipper ceiling lights twinkled in her smoky eyes.
“This day was kind of a hard one,” she said to him. “You made it better.”
After a beat, she left through the door, walked swiftly down the sidewalk, then made a hard right at the end of the block and slipped out of sight.
People shouted his name from inside the pub, Ben was aware. But he couldn’t move, couldn’t take his eyes off the path she’d disappeared from.
And wasn’t that a wonder, he thought, mildly registering that a beer was being handed to him.
Not caring where it came from, he drank deeply, grateful—for the beer, for the exchange with the woman. Kara. The woman of sun and moon, the woman who’d stung him like a lightening bolt.
And he wouldn’t mind, he decided while draining the pint glass, being stung again. By her, he corrected. Not in general. General didn’t interest him.
But Kara certainly did. Interested didn’t even begin to explain it. Not even in the slightest of ways.
Or maybe there was just something in the air, something making his brain fog over from the abundance of sentiment and gushy matrimonial love from his sister’s wedding.
Maybe.
But he would damn well find out.
“
Now
are you glad I took the to-go order?” Beckett stood next to Ben, holding his own beer, both men looking out to the town green and the tidy shops and shadows that lined it. The day had turned to night, with the streetlights of the town shining in a steady gilded glow just as the gaslamps had in the eighteen hundreds.
And for that breath, Ben wondered how many a man had stood as he was, watching with intrigue as a woman disappeared from reach.
When Ben didn’t respond, Beckett drank from the IPA in his glass then continued. “So, you’ve met Kara.”
Of course his brother had met the woman already, Ben thought grimly. The boy used his charm as though it were his greatest asset. And, quite possibly, it was his greatest asset. “You know her?”
“I know a little.”
Finally, Ben glanced over. “Don’t make a man beg.”
“It could be fun. Especially from where I’m sitting.”
“Spill or you’re on cleanup indefinitely.”
“Kara Keaton,” Beckett said quickly, enjoying himself. “Moved here this week. Bought that old white dollhouse-looking place over on Maple. The one with all those willow trees in the front. The one we always thought was haunted.”
“The house across from Stacie Fleck’s place?”
Beckett winked knowingly. “How else do you think I know all this?”
“Naturally.” Ben took a deep breath of impatience. “What else do you know?”
“She lives alone, at least as far as I can tell, and she’s a widow. Her husband died a year ago. She’s a writer. A mystery writer.”
“You got all this from spending the night with Stacie Fleck?”
“I got all this when I talked Stacie into going over to Kara’s place with me. A neighborly introduction.”
Ben scowled. “You talked a woman into going with you to meet another woman?”
“Hey, it was a kind gesture.”
“If you used your powers for good instead of evil, you’d be a superhero by now.”
“Don’t beat up on me, man. I went there for you. She’s too old for me.”
“How old is she?”
“Twenty-seven.”
“That’s only four years from where you’re sitting.”
“I wouldn’t discriminate on that alone. In fact older women tend to know things. Maybe I will—”
Ben shot him a warning look.
Beckett bit back a chuckle. “Or maybe not. Plus, being a widow…that screams complex. I’m not into complex. That’s your department.”
Beckett handed Ben a piece of torn paper.
“What’s this?”
“Kara’s number. I asked for it when she called with the order. Figured it was her when she called. No other Karas around here that I know of.”
Ben stared at it.
“You’re welcome,” Beckett told him then sauntered off toward whatever trouble he could find.
Sliding the slim paper into his pocket, Ben finally closed the door to the warm-toned evening that still held hints of winter. It was that time in the season that fluttered between the two worlds—cold and hot, what was and what would be.
Unable to look away just yet, he kept watch through the paned windows in the door, looking out after the woman who’d fascinated him.
A widow… He heard the word echo through his mind. Must be a tough deal. Was that why she said she’d had a rough day? Or was there something else?
He didn’t know the answers, but he sure as hell wanted to find out.
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ISLA DEAN
Isla Dean is the #1 bestselling author of many romance and romantic suspense novels including
Hidden Harbor
,
Valor In Darkness, and One Autumn Night.
Her work has been featured in USA Today, Cosmopolitan, and PopSugar
.
Born in a small town, her residential adventures later took her to New York, Los Angeles, Atlanta, and San Francisco. She currently writes and plays with her puppy in her lair in the mountains of California.
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