Page 10 of The Glass Dolphin

ChapterFive

Julia ran her hands down the front of her skirt, wondering for the tenth time if she should even be wearing a skirt. “It’s Sunday brunch,” she said. “On an island.” People would be wearing skirts.

Maybe in the Hamptons. “Or Nantucket,” she said out loud, as she’d just relocated from the upscale island off the coast of Cape Cod.

Five Island Cove was quaint and beautiful, much like the Cape or Nantucket. It had a small-town feel neither of those other places had, and Julia had enjoyed the past few months here. She’d found a small place to rent on Diamond Island—the biggest island right in the middle of the chain of five—and the ferry ride to Sanctuary for her afternoon management job at the Cliffside Inn only took about a half hour.

The RideShare system on the island was impeccable, and she’d sold her vehicle in Nantucket and moved forward on her life adventure without a car.

This morning, she expected Liam to pick her up, but she spun away from the front door and hurried back into the bedroom. “Can’t wear a skirt,” she muttered as she ripped it off. She wished, at times like these, that she still lived with Maddy and could ask her opinion. But Maddy had rented a big house on an island two away from Diamond, and she’d very soon be living with her fiancé, Ben. Then they’d get married, and Julia would be left to her own devices again.

A surge of bitterness came with her thoughts, but she fought against it. She was happy for Maddy, because she knew what paths she’d trod in the past. No one had a perfect life, even if it looked like it from the outside.

She and Maddy had become close over the year they’d managed The Lighthouse Inn together in Nantucket, and she wanted to be happy for her friend. Shewashappy for her and Ben. She absolutely was.

Julia was the first person Maddy had called to tell her about the engagement, and if the tables were turned, Julia would dial Maddy first too.

She’d just pulled on a pair of black jeans when her doorbell rang. It really started out strong, but quickly faded and warbled as the seconds passed. “That thing is dead,” she muttered as she buttoned and zipped. “Coming!” she called as she dashed out of the single bedroom at the back of the house and hurried toward the front.

Her ankle boots sat waiting for her, but she didn’t want Liam to stand outside for one moment longer than necessary. Then he’d be out there without her instead of in here with her. She opened the door, feeling flushed and rushed, and looked up at him. “Hey.”

His smile already sat on his face, the lines of his jaw rugged and handsome. “Hey,” he said in return. He wore a pair of blue jeans, thick-soled work boots—but not the police kind—and a black leather jacket.

Black leather.

It felt so much like Maddy’s motorcycle-riding boyfriend to Julia. That kind of dark, dangerous man had never really been her style, which made the fact that Julia had once been married to Maddy’s former boyfriend all the more confusing.

“Wow,” she said before she could stop herself. “You look—” Her brain caught up to her mouth, and she cleared her throat before she could say something totally inappropriate. Or something someone thirty years younger than her would say. “Amazing.” She reached out and brushed her fingertips along the zipper of his jacket, just because she could. “Very handsome.”

“Passable?” he asked. He scanned her to her shoeless feet, his gaze rebounding to hers. “You look fantastic.” Liam crowded into the doorway now, fully entering her house. “Beautiful.”

“I just need shoes.” She realized her house had been filling with cold air, and she backed up. “Come in for a second.”

He dutifully did what she said, and Julia’s hair seemed to stand at alert as she walked the few steps to her shoes and retrieved them. She pulled out the small ball of her no-show socks, sat in a dining room chair only a few paces from the front door, and started to put on her shoes.

Liam stood there and watched, and while their first date had been full of fun, flirty conversation, this one felt charged in an entirely different way. Last time, she’d felt awkward, as a forty-something would on a first date with an incredibly good-looking cop.

This time, she felt like she might burst apart at the seams if she didn’t kiss him before they went to brunch. Or was nine o’clock still considered breakfast?

Good thing you changed into jeans, she told herself as she stood. With the added heel on the ankle boots, she stood a little closer to Liam’s height, but she still had to look up at him.

He took the few steps to her fluidly, the way she imagined he did everything, and took her into his arms as if he’d done it a thousand times before. “What I really wanted to say when I got here was how gorgeous you are.” His voice rumbled in his throat, not quite escaping but not quite staying silent either. “And how much I’ve missed you, and how not a minute has gone by since Appetizer Hour where I haven’t thought of you.”

Julia smiled, because oh, the man knew how to charm a woman. He’d been personable and easy to talk to on their first date too, and Julia wanted to be as nonplussed as Liam. She slid her hands up his chest and allowed herself to lace her fingers behind his neck. “Thank you, Liam.”

She hadn’t felt gorgeous very often in the past few years. She hadn’t realized how much she wanted to feel that way until she heard the sentiment come out of his mouth. In the calm, quietness of her tiny beach house tucked between several others, Julia dared to look up at him.

They moved simultaneously then, him pitching down slightly and her rising up to meet him. He kissed her hesitantly for the first stroke, almost like she was a fragile bird and would take flight with the merest of touches.

When she didn’t, he growled somewhere deep inside himself, pulled her closer, and kissed her like he meant to do it. Julia lost herself in the swirling embrace of his touch, the scent of his skin—like a cool ocean breeze and a hint of clean sweat—his cologne—like spices cooked over an open fire in the woods—and his jacket—like cotton and sunshine, like he’d hung his clothes out to dry in an island summer.

Julia got pulled back to reality when she remembered it was decidedlynotsummer. She breathed in through her nose, and Liam ducked his head enough to break their connection. Her heart hammered, and all she could think was she never wanted to leave this safe circle he’d enveloped her in.

Her phone trilled at her, a text from someone. It could’ve been one of her sons, or a friend here in the cove, or her new boss. It could’ve been her ex, or someone she’d left behind in Nantucket.

Right now, she didn’t care. Right now, she stood with Liam Coldwater. Right now, she looked up at him as he said, “Are you going to check that?”

She shook her head and somehow applied just the right amount of pressure to convey what she wanted without having to say anything. As she kissed him for a second time in as many minutes, Julia decided dating in her forties far surpassed the fun she’d had in her twenties.

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