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  His smile curled into something more genuine. “I didn’t notice any force field on the way in.”

  “Oh. Good to know.” Emily waited for Wes to elaborate more, to finally explain why he’d waited so many years to come back. He was silent, smiling at her, studying her, as if taking inventory of the changes in her.

  Picking up the nearest dog bone, pink rubber with white spots, Emily fidgeted with the toy, trying to hide her shaking hands. She didn’t want shaking hands. She didn’t want any reaction to him whatsoever. So what if he was back now? He’d made his choice all those years ago, and over and over again with every year that went by without a word from him. She set the pink bone back on the rack, accidentally squeaking it in the process. She started at the unexpected noise, her face blazing as Wes chuckled softly.

  “You all right there?”

  Emily tried to muster the remains of her dignity. “I’m fine. But I have to go. Enjoy your visit.”

  “Stay.”

  “What?” For a moment she thought he was asking her to stay and talk to him, and the flutters in her stomach undermined all the years she’d spent trying to feel nothing.

  “I’m hoping to stay here. In Shelter Creek.”

  Emily swallowed hard. Her lungs seemed to have lost the ability to process oxygen. “As in…live here?”

  “It’s what I’ve always wanted.”

  “Could have fooled me.” She took a few steps back, trying to find a spot in the store with a little more air. “What exactly are you planning to do here?”

  “Work, I hope.”

  “Work?” Images filled Emily’s mind, of running into Wes while out grocery shopping, seeing him at Shelter Creek’s many holiday events. Saying hello in passing, just like any other resident of her town. The pastry she’d eaten earlier swam in her stomach.

  And her parents. She had to tell them. Her dad was recovering from a heart attack. Seeing Wes unexpectedly might trigger another one. “What kind of work?”

  “I’m a veterinarian.”

  The dog treat rack between them seemed to move. Everything else went slightly out of focus. “Wow. Good for you.” Emily had never fainted, but she might now. She had to get out of here.

  “It’s good to see you again, Emily.”

  “Yes, it is.” What was she saying? “I mean, it’s good to see you. Also.” She flapped her hand in an awkward wave as she turned away, forcing herself to walk calmly out of the store. To keep her balance. To keep her breakfast where it belonged.

  As soon as she was safely on the sidewalk, she put a hand on the outside wall of the feedstore to support herself. The rough texture of the wood under her palm grounded her. She pulled in a few deep breaths. A veterinarian? He had to be aware that she was a vet, too. They’d spent so much time helping her father at the clinic when they were young. She’d always planned to follow in her father’s footsteps.

  What was he going to do? Set up a practice here? Steal her clients? Was he serious? After sneaking away in the middle of the night without a word to anyone all those years ago, he was going to just move into her town? Except it had been his town, too, for a few years there.

  Breathe. Focus. Those questions would have to wait. Right now she needed to make sure that her father didn’t get a shock that might put him back in the hospital, or worse. She had to get to her parents’ house and give them a heads-up that Wes Marlow was back in town.

  * * *

  WHAT HAD HE EXPECTED?

  Wes picked a dog chew off the rack, examined the unappetizing rawhide, and put it back again. No dog toy could distract him from the disappointment curdling in his stomach. He’d known that coming back to Shelter Creek would be complicated. But he hadn’t prepared for the horror splashed over Emily’s features, or the way she’d tried to get away from him as fast as possible.

  Somehow he’d been delusional enough to imagine that he’d arrive in Shelter Creek, get settled and then go to find Emily, dressed well and driving his nice truck. He’d show her how successful he was. He’d explain himself in an articulate speech, prepared and rehearsed. She’d forgive him, and welcome him home.

  Ha. She’d caught him completely off guard and he’d made a mess of it. And there hadn’t been any welcome in her wide, blue eyes.

  But maybe Wes had set himself up for the disappointment he felt now. He’d held this town up as such a perfect place for so many years. Treasured it in his mind like a talisman to reach for whenever it felt like he couldn’t keep going. Every cramped room he and his brother, Jamie, had shared, every low-paying job he’d had, every run-down neighborhood they’d inhabited had been bearable because it had been a step toward the day he could come back here and belong, not as some nice family’s charity case, but because he was a hardworking professional who could bring something to the community.

  Wes ambled toward the cash register, still lost in thought. So his first meeting with Emily had been awkward. That didn’t mean that coming here was a mistake. Yesterday, after four days on the road from Houston, the sight of the sun slanting through the redwood trees—the hazy rays of light dappled with summer dust—sure hadn’t felt like a mistake.

  Wes had stopped the car and he and Rex had run out into the forest, bounding on the thick layer of fallen needles that carpeted the ground. While the dog wandered, Wes had looked up at the redwood branches reaching impossibly high into the blue sky. He’d breathed in the earthy scent and felt like he was finally home.

  But being here wasn’t going to be as simple as that moment in the forest. He’d hurt Emily, the girl he’d held so close in his heart for so long. He’d hurt her parents, who’d been so kind to him. They might not forgive him. They might not want him here. Yesterday was the last blissful moment of a fantasy he’d clung to for years. Now he had to deal with reality. And Emily’s reaction to him just now was a warning that reality might not include the happily-ever-after that he’d always imagined.

  CHAPTER TWO

  EMILY PULLED UP in front of her parents’ house and glanced at her watch. She’d driven here so fast she had about ten minutes to spare before she started work. Would her parents be up yet? Squinting through the passenger-side window, she could make out her mother at the kitchen sink. Probably just putting the coffee on. Good. Her mom might need the comfort of a warm drink when she heard Emily’s news.

  Jogging up the front walk, Emily knocked softly at the door, but her parents’ standard poodle, Mavis, wasn’t going to let her arrival remain a quiet affair. Big woofs resonated through the solid oak, along with her mother’s hurried shushing.

  “Mavis, it’s me,” Emily tried to reassure the dog. “Be quiet!”

  The door opened and Mavis came bounding out like a fancy floor mop.

  “Goodness, Mavis, settle down.” Meg Fielding wrapped the lavender fleece bathrobe that Emily had given her last Mother’s Day more tightly around her. “Emily, we don’t usually see you at this hour. Would you like some coffee?”

  Emily had downed the rest of hers on the drive over, but this was a day when the answer to “more coffee” was always going to be yes. She nodded and followed her mother inside, calling Mavis to follow. In the kitchen, Meg filled two mugs with coffee. The mugs had dogs on them, of various breeds. Meg handed Emily the Chihuahua, which seemed fitting because, faced with her mother’s inquiring gaze, she felt about as small as a Chihuahua. Not up to delivering news that would resurrect a painful part of her family’s past.

  Her mom offered Emily milk for her coffee and they sat down at the kitchen table. “So,” her mom said, getting right to the point. “What brings you here before work?”

  “Is Dad awake?”

  “I am now, thanks to Mavis and all her ruckus.” Her father walked through the door, dressed in his usual jeans and a T-shirt. “She’s better than a burglar alarm.”

  “I don’t know about that.” Emily smiled at him as he lean
ed down to kiss her cheek. “I still managed to steal some coffee.”

  He peered at her more carefully. “No offense, but you look like you could use it. Late night?”

  “Calving season.” That was all Emily had to say. Her dad had run the Shelter Creek Veterinary Clinic until he retired and left the practice in Emily’s hands.

  “Oh, I remember those nights,” her mom said. “I don’t miss the phone ringing at all hours.”

  “Aw, come on, Meg.” Her dad caught her mom by the hand. “It was an adventure, right? Especially when we were first married, and I’d drag you along to assist.”

  “Back before I knew better.” Meg pulled her hand away, but there was love in the teasing smile she gave her husband.

  Her parents had always been in love, but ever since her dad’s heart surgery, it seemed like he and her mom had a new appreciation for each other. Emily understood. She had a new appreciation for them, and terrifying firsthand knowledge of how easily life could change in an instant. Which was why she was here today. She couldn’t let Wes Marlow’s sudden arrival in Shelter Creek come as a dangerous shock.

  Her father sat down with his coffee. He had the Saint Bernard mug this morning and her mom had a collie. Perfect. Tom Fielding was so big and hearty, rescuing every animal that crossed his path. Meg was so pretty and refined.

  Emily stared at her Chihuahua mug, trying to think of how to say what she had to say. Words weren’t her strong point. Today, facing Wes, she’d only been able to summon a few. For her entire adult life she’d imagined what she’d say if their paths ever crossed again. Phrases like How could you? and Why? Instead she’d just asked him about his dog.

  Emily glanced at the clock on the microwave. She’d better hurry or she’d be late for her first appointment. She took one last fortifying sip of coffee. “I came by to tell you about something that happened this morning that really surprised me.”

  “Was it a calving issue? Would you like me to give you a second opinion on something?” Her father’s eagerness betrayed how much he missed his practice.

  “Tom, you are not going out on any calls right now.” Emily’s mom put her hand over his. “You promised you’d take it easy, and focus on exercise and eating well. I want you to be healthy so we can still go on our anniversary vacation.”

  Her father sighed, but smiled at his wife. “You take good care of me, Meg.” Then he turned back to Emily. “So was it calving?”

  “It was people, actually. Or, one person, really.” Emily gave up on trying to find the right words. “I was downtown getting coffee, and I ran into Weston Marlow.”

  Her parents both set their mugs on the table in the same instant. “Wes?” Her mom looked at Emily with wide eyes. “Visiting Shelter Creek? After all these years?”

  “Not just visiting, according to him. He wants to stay here.”

  Her father sat back in his chair, frowning. “I never expected we’d see him again.”

  “I didn’t want you to just run into him somewhere,” Emily bumbled on. “I didn’t want you to have a shock, like I did.”

  “You did the right thing, coming here,” her mother assured her, casting a worried glance at her husband.

  “I’m not made of glass, you two.” Tom patted his wife’s hand reassuringly. “I’m not going to break.” He looked at Emily. “Did you talk to him?”

  Emily told them the whole story, emphasizing the time she’d spent crawling behind her truck, spying on him, to get them both laughing. After the chuckles had ceased, her father sipped his coffee, looking thoughtful. “He became a veterinarian.” He smiled at his wife. “Meg, maybe we had a little influence on the kid, after all.”

  “Of course you guys did!” Irritation welled up on her parents’ behalf. “You opened up your home to him. You treated him like your own son. You did so much for him.” Emily’s emotions put a quaver in her voice. She gulped her coffee and stood up. “I have to get to work. But I’m glad you two know he’s here, so you’re ready if you see him around.”

  “I’ll walk you out,” her mother said.

  Outside the front door, Meg pulled Emily in for a hug. “Are you okay, dear?”

  Flustered, Emily pulled back. “Of course. I was just worried about Dad, you know? I didn’t want him to be startled and end up back in the hospital.” She glanced at her mother, suddenly suspicious. “Why are you asking?”

  “Because Wes broke your heart when he left.”

  Emily opened her mouth to protest, but her mother held up her hands. “I’m not blind, you know. I saw how sad you were. You two were very close…you were going to attend prom together, remember? You and I had so much fun picking out a dress in Santa Rosa.”

  Remember? She’d never forget. She’d skipped prom, telling her parents she had a headache. Really she’d spent the night crying and staring out the window and wondering where Wes had gone. She’d tried so hard to hide her feelings, because her parents were grieving, too. It scared her that they’d been hurt by Wes’s actions. She’d felt her parents were so invincible, until she saw how shaken they were when Wes ran away.

  Plus, she’d never told them that she and Wes were dating, or that the ring she’d started wearing on her finger senior year was the promise ring he’d given her. She’d never known how to tell her parents that she was madly in love with the boy they’d taken from the foster care system and nurtured as their own son.

  “I’m fine, Mom. Just surprised to see him this morning. I figured he was gone forever. Anyway, he’s not my problem anymore. Not our problem. So don’t you and Dad go getting involved with him again, okay?”

  “You have a good day at work.” Her mom held out her arms and Emily stepped in for another hug, noting that her mother had not answered her question. She gave her mom a kiss on the cheek. “Is having Wes in town going to upset you guys? If it does, I’ll go find him right now and tell him to leave.”

  Her mom stepped back, but kept Emily’s hands in her own. “Oh, honey, Wes was a troubled boy. We did the very best we could for him. It hurt that it wasn’t enough, and of course we worried about his safety for many years. But your father and I have taken comfort in the fact that we gave him a safe, healthy home for as long as he wanted one.” She smiled gently. “And maybe that really did mean something. Why else would he want to come back to Shelter Creek?”

  Emily gaped at her mother. She had spent all the years since Wes left assuming he’d disliked it here.

  He’d certainly started out disliking Shelter Creek. The cool city kid stuck in a quiet rural town. But he’d become happy here as time went on. Or at least, she thought he had. After he left, she’d wondered if he’d tolerated them all until he couldn’t stand it any longer. It would explain why he left in the middle of the night without a word to anyone.

  It was all too complicated for this early in the morning. She needed work, and animals, and the straightforward problems they presented in her clinic. She knew how to think about animals. She knew how to solve their issues and heal their pain.

  “I’ll talk to you soon.” Emily squeezed her mom’s hands one more time and headed to her truck. She had about three minutes to get to the clinic, which was basically impossible. She’d have to call and tell Lily, her receptionist, that she was running behind.

  She slid into the driver’s seat, made the call and then drove down the block, away from her parents’ quiet, shaded street. They lived right on the edge of town, with green hills on one side of the road and people’s front yards on the other. Everything looked just like it always did this time of year—lush, green and bursting with life. It was all completely normal and she should feel normal, too. Running into Wes today wouldn’t change anything. She’d had fifteen years to accept that they meant nothing to each other. That wouldn’t change, just because he was back in Shelter Creek.

  CHAPTER THREE

  NOT MUCH HAD changed on Manzanita L
ane since Wes had last walked the cracked and pot-holed pavement. Houses were still painted in pretty colors and had front yards full of flowers. The road still gave way to farmland and pasture, which in turn gave way to grassy meadows and patches of oak and bay trees that huddled close to the creek as it wound its way west toward the Pacific Ocean. This little street at the edge of town was home to the four happiest years of his life. Wes had thought about it so many times, wished he could come back here so often, that the sound of his boots on the pavement seemed almost unreal.

  Even if he hadn’t run into Emily this morning, he’d planned to pay her parents a visit. It was a reckoning long overdue. But just because he’d been resolved to speak to them when he left the inn fifteen minutes ago, didn’t mean he could find the courage now. He and Rex had already circled the block three times.

  Rex didn’t mind. The gray-and-white husky was so excited to be out in the country he had barely lifted his nose from the ground. His tail wagged nonstop at delights Wes’s human senses couldn’t perceive.

  Rex was a lot more comfortable transitioning from the city to Shelter Creek than Wes had been the first time he came to this town. Wes had shown up here with a chip on both shoulders, an angry young teenager who’d been kicked out of his grandparents’ home in Los Angeles and landed in the foster care system. Those first few weeks, he might as well have been set down on another planet. Here you could lie in bed at night and listen to coyotes and owls. Here you could start walking out into the hills and likely not meet another person for days. Here he felt about as big as a dime and about as hard, too, unable to bend or break or let anyone in.

  But Tom and Meg Fielding had been too kind to resist. From Meg’s homemade meals and compassionate care, to Tom’s fun, blustering love of animals and nature, everything about them had slowly brought Wes out of his shell. After a few months, he’d fallen in love with his life here. After a year or so, he’d fallen in love with their daughter. A love that felt like a betrayal to Tom and Meg’s generosity, so he’d insisted to Emily that they keep their feelings hidden.