First, the word sexy simply didn’t apply to her practically-proportioned body, which was better suited for softball than seduction. Her bland hazel eyes and generic brown hair had never turned heads. Even with contact lenses to halt the nickname of “Four Eyes” from high school, and a few golden highlights to give her ponytail some pizzazz, she still oozed smarts and sensibility—not sex appeal.
Second, her sense of humor and reliability, which made her a trusted ally when it came to pulling off practical jokes and keeping secrets, made her a dud in the come-hither department. Back in high school she’d learned that sweaty shortstops and salutatorians didn’t get asked to the senior prom if they lacked the boobs or legs or feminine mystique to compensate for an error-free season and nearly perfect GPA.
And third, in a small town like Ashton, Virginia, once you got labeled with a reputation for being a brainiac or tomboy or good ol’ gal, you were stuck.
Tess had been stuck for fifteen years.
“Hey, Tess. You upstairs?” Ah, yes. Her big sister, Amy, had much nicer labels. She had managed to get the right blend of genes to allow her to be smart, accomplished and sexy. Of course, she also wound up with the gene that allowed her to marry a real loser, and now the newly divorced school teacher had returned to her roots as much to heal from the nasty breakup as to support the Bartlett women’s summer tradition of helping out at the festival. “Tess?”
Tess drew back from the window as if the call might alert the McCormicks to her subtle spying. “In here.”
But she couldn’t walk away. Not until she saw for her own eyes that Travis was alive. That the bomb that had shredded his body hadn’t killed him. That his handsome mouth could still smile and those devilish blue eyes could still sparkle with mischief.
Tess answered the soft knock at her door without turning away from the scene visible through the lacy sheers at her window. “Come on in.”
“Getting a sneak peek before tonight’s festivities?” Amy asked, curling her long legs beneath her as she perched on the corner of Tess’s bed.
“I’m just anxious to see Trav,” Tess admitted, watching Travis’s father, retired Brigadier General Hal McCormick, climb out from behind the wheel of his silver Chevy Suburban and stride up the sidewalk to the front door. Even at age 60, with a dusting of silver in his short blond hair, the man’s military bearing was unmistakable. “The last time I talked to Travis in the hospital, he told me not to come visit. Said he’d be home soon enough.”
Amy frowned as she joined Tess at the window. “What was that—two, three months ago?”
“Try six.” She hugged her arms around her waist, trying not to feel the lingering sting of his rejection. “He’s been out of the hospital since then, but I doubt he’d be in Ashton now if he hadn’t finally been ordered to take some R and R. Hal said he’d been working a desk job, but that Travis was so gung-ho about getting back to his Special Forces unit and whatever mission they were prepping for that he overdid his physical training and actually set back his recovery.”
A pretty, perky brunette Tess identified as Travis’s sister-in-law, J.C., climbed out of the backseat and opened the back of the Suburban to retrieve a couple of suitcases. J.C.’s husband, Ethan McCormick, followed right behind her in his khaki and olive green lieutenant colonel’s uniform. He took both suitcases from her. She snatched one back. The argument that flared briefly between them ended with a perfunctory kiss. And then another, lingering this time. Then one more that lasted long enough for Amy and Tess to sigh in unison.
“You know, I always thought that at least one of us would wind up with a McCormick.” Amy crossed her arms to match Tess’s stance. They both giggled as Ethan’s independent wife let him have the suitcase he insisted on carrying, but then pulled another bag from the car and scooted around him to follow Hal before Ethan could stop her. “We’ve lived next door to those two hotties for how many years? Now I’m divorced from Barry Can’t-Keep-His-Pants-Zipped, and you’re…”
Doomed to spinsterhood? Sentenced to celibacy?
Amy pursed her lips, searching for the right word to finish her sentence. “Unattached.” Her brown eyes were full of honest regret as she looked down at Tess. “You know I don’t mean anything by that, right? You could have any man you wanted if you stopped listening to what the busybodies in this town have to say and just set your mind to it. Mom said you’d been dating Morty Camden,” she added hopefully.
“Sure. Rub salt in an old wound. Morty might be the one person in town who’s getting less sex than I am.”
Her big sister didn’t seem entirely relieved that Tess had made a joke of it. “But sex isn’t the only reason to go out with a guy, right? He’s a nice guy, isn’t he? Doesn’t he run his own business?”
“He’s nice enough,” Tess agreed. She was having a hard time picturing Morty’s earnest face and receding hairline as she waited for Travis to emerge from the vehicle below them. “He has his own accounting firm. But he’s just a friend. Basically, we’re each other’s escort whenever something comes up.”
They served together on the same committee that organized the fishing competition and other events for Ashton’s annual Summer Bay Festival. Slated to start the following Monday and run the first full week of July, the festival drew in tourists, locals and a slew of sailors, Marines and soldiers from nearby bases for a celebration both on and off the water of Chesapeake Bay. Her “dates” with Morty had been little more than friendly business meetings. The closest they’d come to bodily contact was a little hand holding and a few high-five’s.
But Tess didn’t elaborate. Ethan had closed the rear hatch and was circling the car now. Leaning forward ever so slightly, Tess peered through the slit in the curtains. “Don’t you think there’s something a little too big-brotherly about Ethan and Travis for us to get involved with either of them?”
Man, she wished she believed what she’d said. But she’d lusted after Travis for too many years. And that one collegiate kiss had confirmed that brotherly wasn’t really the way she felt about him. But it was the way she had to feel. He was her best bud. And since he’d never see her in any other way—not while sober, at any rate—
“I don’t know. I dated Ethan that summer after high school—before he took off for Annapolis.” Amy’s husky sigh left Tess wondering just how far those dates had gone, and whether she was the only Bartlett with lust in her heart.
“Did you and Ethan ever do it?”
“Tess!” Amy’s flawless skin darkened with a rosy blush.
Tess pointed an accusatory finger, but she was laughing. “Tell me.”
Her sister tucked her thick, honey blond hair behind her ears and bought some time before she answered. “Even back then, Ethan was all about being a Marine. As sweet and smart as he was, he was saving himself for the Corps. I don’t think he would have jumped my bones even if I had USS Amy tattooed on my boobs.”
Tess narrowed her gaze. She wasn’t getting the whole story. “But you blushed. You’re holding back.”
Amy arched a golden eyebrow in that mystery-woman expression that men found so irresistible. Tess had tried to duplicate the same maneuver for years, but could only manage to arch both brows at once and come off looking more like Larry, Curly and Moe than any femme fatale. “We never went all the way. Let’s just say, he scouted out the ship.”
“You rat. So…how was he? Is Ethan a good kisser?” Maybe it was a family trait.
Amy’s wistful smile gave the answer before she spoke. “J.C.’s a lucky bride. And not just because he’s such a stand-up guy.”
“So, are you okay with Ethan marrying someone else? Do you wish things had been different?”
“You mean do I wish I’d