The Girl From Summer Hill Read online

  “No. Jack will take care of him. That fierce act he shows in his movies is real. Are you sure you’re all right?”

  “Yes, I’m fine.” As he opened the door for her, she looked at him. “I’m sorry about falling apart.”

  His eyes were serious. “You were very courageous. If I’d let you go, you would have slid down the roof and hit the ground headfirst. It takes a lot of trust, as well as faith, to do what you did.” He smiled. “And a lot of muscle on my part. Where did you get quads like that?”

  Casey went into the hall. “You make me sound like an Olympic lifter. I just haul big, heavy pots off the stove, and I run around the kitchen for sixteen hours at a time.”

  “The trainer gets here tomorrow. Maybe you can tell him your technique. I want muscles like you have.”

  “Why, you—” She started to smack his shoulder but drew back.

  “Wise,” he said. “That electricity you put out hurts weak little me.”

  “That I put out? It’s you who thinks he’s Benjamin Franklin.”

  “Is that the Ben who was so jealous of you that he left in a very cowardly way?”

  Casey stopped at the head of the stairs. For months she’d been living with guilt, thinking that she’d been terrible to a really nice man, but Tate was making her see things differently. She smiled at him. “Thanks,” she said softly. “Thank you for not dropping me off the roof and for making me feel better about Ben. It was very kind of you, especially after I…I…”

  “Bawled me out after I saved your house from total destruction by a rampaging bird the size of a bear cub?”

  She laughed. “More or less.” When she went down the stairs, Tate was close behind her.

  Laughter, she thought. It’s what she most needed after the harrowing experience on the roof.

  At the foot of the stairs, she started toward the kitchen, but Tate stopped in front of her. He nodded toward her bare forearms. They were bleeding. Tate had so distracted her that she’d forgotten about them, but the sight of the blood brought it all back and she felt her knees giving way.

  Tate caught her with his hands under her elbows. “Let’s go to the truck and clean you up.”

  She nodded and followed him out the side door to the parking lot.

  Gizzy was sitting on the grass by the truck. She had a bandage on her forehead and gauze around her left hand. Her legs were now covered by her jeans, but Casey guessed there were bandages under there.

  “People know you’re here, so we need to leave,” Gizzy said to Tate. “Jack had a talk with the owner about his increase of prices. Seems like it worked, because everything we wanted is going to be put into the truck. We just need to wait until they bring it here.”

  “Actually,” Casey said, “I want some things from the kitchen before we go.”

  Tate was using wipes to clean the scrapes on Casey’s arms. When he put a bandage on one of them, she didn’t dare look at him. What he was doing now, this tender caring for her, and what he’d done earlier were having an effect on her.

  “There,” Tate said. “It wasn’t as bad as I thought. I need to speak to Gizzy for a moment.”

  Casey stayed on the truck while he went to Gizzy and squatted down beside her on the grass. They are a truly beautiful couple! Casey thought. Gizzy was tall and gorgeous, the same as Tate. Her blondeness matched well with his dark hair and eyes.

  Casey was appalled to feel a rush of jealousy. Ashamed of herself, she left the truck and went toward the house.

  Tate caught up with her. “I thought I’d play pack mule and help carry the copper pans you want.”

  “You’ll be recognized.”

  “After what you did today, you’re more likely to be asked for an autograph than I am.”

  When Tate smiled at her, Casey remembered how it felt to be in his arms—and how good he looked with Gizzy. Turning away, she tried to get her emotions under control. She told herself that the trauma she’d just been through would make any man look good.

  There were two women in the kitchen checking out old implements. Tate waited until they left before he entered the room. “So, which pieces do you want? Or shall we make a bid for all of it?”

  “I thought I’d hunt for chocolate molds. I might start collecting them.”

  “What do they look like?”

  She described them, and Tate began examining the highest shelves, moving things around as he searched. “You have a lot of them?”

  “Only one. Devlin Haines gave it to me.”

  Tate’s back was to her and for a moment he halted. She couldn’t see his face, but she knew he’d been affected by the name. “Did he?”

  “It belonged to his grandmother. I said he shouldn’t give me something of such great sentiment, but he did. What’s between you two, other than being ex-relatives, that is?”

  When Tate turned around, his face was expressionless. “He is my niece’s father.”

  “I know that, but what—”

  “I think I better go back to the truck and see if Jack needs any help.” He left so fast he almost raised a cloud of dust.

  Casey stood there blinking at the space where he’d just been. Obviously, he didn’t want to talk about his relationship with Devlin. Tate Landers would flirt, but it didn’t seem as if he’d share his real feelings.

  She stayed in the old kitchen for a while, trying to settle her thoughts and emotions. There wasn’t anything for chocolate, but there were two copper cake molds that had good tin linings. After paying for them, she started back toward the truck.

  Gizzy met her halfway and held out the inlaid jewelry box that Casey had so admired. “Tate had me buy this and he asked me to give it to you. I don’t know why he didn’t give it to you himself.”

  “This is what you two were whispering about?”

  “Yes. You didn’t think Tate was making a pass at me, did you?”

  “Of course not!” she said as she took the pretty box. “But you looked so good when you had your jeans off that I wouldn’t blame him.”

  Laughing, Gizzy took Casey’s arm in hers and lowered her voice, but she couldn’t contain her excitement—or her wonder. “Jack wasn’t turned off by what I did. And he wasn’t scared of me. Oh, Casey, I think this may be real.” Turning, she ran back to the truck.

  “Please be careful,” Casey said to no one. She needed to have a talk with Gizzy about not falling head over heels for a guy who would probably drop her when he went back to his home in Los Angeles. Gizzy was a small-town girl, a pastor’s daughter who went to church three times a week, while Jack was a movie star—and everyone knew what that meant.

  She got to the truck as Tate and Jack were closing the back doors. Jack walked away with Gizzy.

  “Thanks,” Casey said to Tate as she held up the box. “I didn’t realize you knew that I liked it.”

  He was smiling, but she saw that it was without warmth. “You’re welcome. Are you ready to go?” He didn’t wait for her answer, just turned away.

  “I’m sorry,” she said loudly.

  He glanced back at her. “For what?”

  “Being a Mean Girl. I know you and Devlin aren’t friends and I shouldn’t have mentioned him. But I’ll be honest and tell you that I’ve shared a couple of meals with him and I like him.”

  “Like him how?” There was such a deep scowl on Tate’s face that she took a step back.

  “We’re friendly,” she said. “That’s all. He talks about Emmie a lot.”

  That statement made Tate snort in derision. “How the hell would he know about her? She—”

  “You two ready to go?” Jack yelled. “Gizzy knows a place where we can picnic. Casey, did you bring enough food for lunch?”

  “We could feed a town with all she brought.” Tate opened the side door and held it for Casey. “You’re stuck in here with me.”

  She was glad that his anger seemed to have disappeared, but when she looked inside the truck, she halted. Half the seat was taken up by two huge boxes. “W