And suddenly a skinny, freckle-faced urchin dropped out of the tree between them and stuck her face in his. “You can’t be Matt’s best friend. I already am!” She’d kicked him in the shin. He’d pulled her braid. It had pretty much gone downhill from there.
Lukas had two sisters already. He didn’t need another girl in his life, especially one who insisted on dogging his and Matt’s footsteps day after day after day.
“I was here first!” she had insisted.
“Go away! Grow up!” Lukas had told her over and over when he wasn’t teasing her because he knew her face would get red and she would fight back.
But it was worse when she did grow up. She got curves—and breasts. She traded in her pigtails for a short shaggy haircut that accentuated her cheekbones rather than her freckles. She made her already huge blue eyes look even bigger with some well-placed eye shadow. She got her braces off, wore lipstick and sometimes actually smiled.
But never at him.
Except...sometimes, obliquely, Lukas thought she watched him the way he watched her.
But her focus was always on Matt. “I’m marrying Matt.” Holly had said that for years.
Hearing her, Lukas had scoffed. And at first Matt had rolled his eyes, too. But he had never been mortified by her declaration as Lukas would have been.
“That’s Holly,” he’d said and shrugged. Then, when he was fourteen, he told Lukas that he’d kissed her.
“Holly?” Lukas felt as if he’d been punched. “You kissed Holly?” Then, hopefully, he’d asked, “Was it gross?”
Matt’s face had turned bright red. “Nope.”
It couldn’t be different than kissing any other girl, Lukas had thought. So he’d done that. And then he’d kissed another. And another. He couldn’t believe Matt kept on kissing only Holly.
Then, Christmas of Holly’s senior year in high school, they’d got engaged.
“Engaged?” Lukas hadn’t believed his ears. It was ludicrous, he’d told Matt fervently. He’d told Holly the same thing. “You’re crazy,” he’d said. “How can you think about spending the rest of your life with one person? You’re not in love!”
But they hadn’t paid any attention to him. And when he’d tried to make it clear to Holly, well, let’s just say she hadn’t got the message. In fact, she’d hated him even more.
Then, when Matt was twenty-two and Holly just twenty, they had tied the knot.
Lukas had been on the other side of the world when he got Matt’s call to come home and be his best man.
“I’m in Thailand!” Lukas had objected. He’d been crewing on a schooner that summer, basking in sunny days, balmy nights and the charm of a bevy of intriguing, exotic women. He hadn’t been home for three years, had no intention of going to the wedding.
“There are planes,” Matt had said. “Get on one.”
Lukas had argued, but Matt was implacable. “You’re my best friend,” he’d insisted. “You’ve always been there, always had my back.”
The words had stabbed his conscience. “Fine,” he’d muttered. “I’ll come.”
He’d done it. Had even managed a toast to the happy couple at the reception. Then he’d got the hell out of there, lying about the departure time of the plane he had to catch. He’d been back in Thailand twenty-four hours later—back to his real life, back to being footloose and fancy-free. Matt could have marriage with its boredom and sameness.
Lukas had been telling himself that for a decade now. Today was no different, he thought as he shaded his eyes with his hand and squinted out across the water. It was just a matter of putting the past to rest.
And then he saw her.
One minute he was scanning the water where everyone pretty much looked alike paddling their canoes and kayaks and pedal boats in the confines of the marina. The next moment his gaze locked onto a woman in the back of a canoe out near the breakwater. There were two kids in front. And in the back there was Holly.
His heart kicked over in his chest. He didn’t know how he’d missed her before. There was, as always, a purposefulness about her. Everyone else was splashing and floundering. Holly was cutting through the water with ease and determination, as if she knew what she wanted and aimed to get it.
She hadn’t changed a bit.
He remembered when she hadn’t known how to paddle a canoe, and, taking advantage of that, Lukas had refused to let her come with him and Matt.
Her chin had jutted. Her eyes had flashed. “I’ll learn.”
He’d scoffed. “From who?”
It turned out his oldest brother, Elias, was no proof against big blue eyes. Elias had taught her, and the next time they went canoeing, Holly had come, too.
Suddenly there came a whistle from the car park. A man wearing a green St. Brendan’s T-shirt waved broadly. “Bring ’em in!”
With greater or lesser skill, the paddlers turned their canoes and kayaks and headed for shore. Lukas kept his eyes on Holly. He could see her talking to the students, giving instructions to back off a bit and let the earlier arrivals dock first.
She still hadn’t seen him, but she was close enough now that Lukas could study her more easily. Gone were the luxuriant dark waves she’d worn at her wedding. Now she had the same pixie-ish look she’d had as a child. Most of her face was hidden behind a pair of sunglasses and she wore a sun visor for shade, as well. The boy in the front of her canoe said something that made her laugh. And Lukas’s breath caught in his throat at the husky yet feminine sound.
“Gimme a hand, mister?”
Lukas looked down to see a kayak alongside the dock and two boys looking up at him. One held out a line to wrap around the cleat. Lukas crouched down to steady the kayak while the boys scrambled out. Then he helped them haul it out so they could carry it up to the waiting van. Out of the corner of his eye, he kept an eye on Holly’s canoe where she was talking to her students. She was still several feet away from the dock.
One by one, as the canoes and kayaks came up against the dock, Lukas helped them all until finally when he turned back there was just one canoe left.
Holly sat in the stern, unmoving, her sunglass-hidden gaze locked on him. No question that she’d seen him now.
Lukas straightened nonchalantly. “Holly,” he said casually. “Imagine meeting you here.”
The boy and girl in the canoe looked at him, surprised. Holly’s sunglasses hid her reaction. She still didn’t move as the two students brought the canoe against the tires lining the dock, and Lukas grabbed the bow to hold it for them.
The boy scrambled out, followed by the girl. Holly stayed where she was.
“Thanks, mister,” the boy said.
“You’re welcome.” Lukas had seen all the St. Brendan’s canoes now, and this one, with its deep, narrow hull, was far nicer and swifter than the wide-bottomed trio he’d helped pull out earlier. He let his gaze slide slowly over it, then brought it to rest on the woman who hadn’t moved. “Nice canoe. Yours, Holly?”
“How come you know Ms. Halloran?” the girl demanded.
“We grew up together—I’ve known Ms. Halloran since she was about your age.”
The boy’s brow furrowed, as if he couldn’t imagine either of them being that young. “You kiddin’?”
“Not kidding.” Lukas held up three fingers. “Scout’s honor.”
“You were never a Boy Scout!”