Stacy Connelly – His Secret Son (страница 1)
“I’d like a chance for us to start over.”
“As friends?”
The corner of his mouth kicked up in a wry smile. “We were more than friends.”
For one night, they’d been lovers. One night that had changed both of their lives more than Ryder could possibly know.
Lindsay swallowed. “Ryder, I—I can’t. We can’t go back. It’s not possible.”
“And what about going forward? Is that impossible, too?” Reading the answer in her gaze, he came to his own conclusion as he eased far away from her on the crowded bench. “Because you can’t forgive me for what happened.”
“It’s not that,” Lindsay protested quietly. “It’s—”
* * *
The Pirelli Brothers: These California boys know what love is all about!
His Secret Son
Stacy Connelly
STACY CONNELLY has dreamed of publishing books since she was a kid, writing stories about a girl and her horse. Eventually, boys made it onto the page as she discovered a love of romance and the promise of happily-ever-after. When she is not lost in the land of make-believe, Stacy lives in Arizona with her three spoiled dogs. She loves to hear from readers at stacyconnelly@cox.net or www.stacyconnelly.com.
To Cindy Kirk and Vicki Lewis Thompson-Even though this book is set in the fictional town of Clearville, California, for me it will always be my “Tucson” book.
Contents
The place hadn’t changed, Lindsay Brookes thought with a touch of nostalgia as she drove her SUV down Main Street. The tiny Northern California town where she’d been born and raised seemed caught in a time warp. The Victorian buildings that housed eclectic shops and restaurants had stood proudly for well over one hundred years, surviving the passage of time and even the occasional earthquake. Had she really thought they would undergo some sort of drastic modernization in the mere decade since she’d been gone?
Just because she’d worked so hard to make over the shy, awkward girl who’d graduated from Clearville High didn’t mean the town had changed, too. Didn’t mean the people who lived there would see how much she’d changed.
Shoving away the old insecurities, she sucked in a deep breath and tightened her hands on the wheel. She had her reasons for returning to her hometown, and the faster she accomplished her goals, the sooner she’d be back in Phoenix, where she belonged. Where people only knew her as the strong, confident woman she was now and had no memory of the painfully shy, desperately lonely girl she’d once been.
As she glanced in the rearview mirror at one of her reasons for coming back, her heart filled with love—and yes, concern—at the sight of her son with his ever-present tablet in hand.
“Robbie? Robbie?”
“Huh?” He blinked as he looked up through his too-long blond bangs, his eyes slightly unfocused behind his Harry Potter–frame glasses.
It worried her a little, how fixated he was with his video games though she strictly limited them to ones she thought appropriate for a nine-year-old boy. She tried to monitor the time he spent playing them, too, but that was more of a challenge.
“What do you want on your pizza?” she asked even though she already knew the answer.
“Pepperoni and peppers.”
Lindsay didn’t know where her son’s craving for spicy foods came from. She could barely handle more than a few shakes of black pepper. Had to be from being born and raised in Phoenix, where Mexican restaurants dominated the landscape along with palm trees and cacti.
A sudden image teased the edges of her memory—a brown-haired boy with laughing green eyes popping jalapeño slices into his mouth like candy—but she shoved the thought away. “Okay, pepperoni and peppers, but only on half, okay? You know Grandma Ellie and I don’t like hot stuff.”
Lindsay found a parking place on the street outside the pizza parlor and cut the engine. Lowering the visor, she took a moment to check her hair and makeup. Not that she expected a fashion disaster to have taken place during the fifteen-minute ride from her grandmother’s house, but it never hurt to check.
Her honey-brown hair was still caught back in a clip at the nape of her neck despite Robbie’s request to ride with the back window down and her daytime makeup—a soft brown eyeliner to highlight her blue-green eyes, mascara and a touch of lip gloss—was still in place. She took a moment to wipe a small smudge from the inside corner of one eye and tucked a stray curl behind her ear.
In her job working at a PR firm, she’d learned how much appearance mattered. And though she was on vacation, she saw no reason not to look her best. Especially when she never knew who she might run into...
Her stomach trembled at the thought, and she ran her suddenly damp palms down her beige slacks. As she climbed from the vehicle, the late-afternoon sunlight warmed her face and she took a moment to enjoy a cool breeze blowing in from the ocean.
The summer temperatures rarely rose above seventy, a refreshing change from the scorching heat they’d left behind. Back home, she’d already dug up all but the hardiest of flowers she’d planted during the mild winter and early spring, but here towering red and yellow snapdragons, purple petunias and snow-white alyssum flowed from brick planters. The green-and-white-striped awnings above the plate-glass windows waved in welcome, as did the open doors along the street—few of the buildings needing or even having the air-conditioning that was an absolute necessity living in the desert.
She wasn’t alone in taking a moment to appreciate the gorgeous late-May day. Tourists strolled along the sidewalks and posed for pictures on benches outside the small shops. Families walked hand in hand—some heading toward the pizza parlor, others for the ice cream shop across the street. A group of laughing, roughhousing teenagers jostled by—all talking over each other in an almost indistinguishable babble—but Lindsay overheard one remark loud and clear.
“I can’t believe we’ll be starting college in three months!”
She did a quick double take at the trio. They all looked so young, sometimes it was hard for Lindsay to believe she’d ever been that age. Hard to believe that by the time she graduated, she’d already been—
“Oh, awesome! They have video games!” Robbie’s voice cut into her thoughts.
As if he hadn’t been playing a game the entire ride into town, she thought wryly.
Caught up in his excitement, he charged toward the restaurant doors.