Page 79 of Love Everlasting

Shannon glanced up from where she was hooking her nice-sized catch to the stringer, a smile tiptoeing around the edges of her mouth. A crisp sea breeze ruffled her hair while a pale white moon danced on the water, reminding her that these unseasonably warm October nights wouldn’t last forever. “Why, whatever do you mean, Lace?”

Cat popped her hook from her Adirondack chair, casting a sideways smirk at her sister. “She means, Shan-none,” she said with a wicked grin, employing the nickname she’d coined for her sister after Shan told them about her strict moral policy with Sam. “Your lips have been squirming all night like they’re just aching to laugh, and those stars in your eyes are so bright, I’m tempted to wear shades. So you may as well spill it, sis—what juicy facts are you keeping from us?”

“Nothing,” she insisted, unable to thwart the smile that inched across her lips. “I promise.”

“All righty, then …” Lacey strolled over to where Shannon was rebaiting her rod, and lasered her with a look that said Shan was on the hook along with her fish. “Then what do you think you know, Miss Squirmy Lips, because something’s up between you and Sam, and we want to know what it is.”

“Yeah, you two getting serious or something?” Cat said, tongue rolling inside her cheek. The gleam in her eyes assured Shannon there was a tease on its way. “You know, like maybe you’ve graduated from holding hands to a kiss on the cheek?”

The cheeks in question immediately heated over the memory of countless goodnight kisses at the door that focused on far more than her cheeks …

“Well …” Shannon plopped back in her chair between Lacey’s and Cat’s to deliver a sideways peek with a chew of her lip. “Maybe …”

Lacey whirled in her Adirondack chair, pinning Shannon with a threatening smile. “So help me, Shannon O’Bryen, if you don’t give us the scoop, I’ll get it out of Sam myself.”

“No!” The furnace in Shannon’s face cranked all the way up to flashpoint, her mortification blazing that Sam might think she put Lacey up to it. She put a cool palm to her heated skin. “Please don’t say a word to Sam, Lace, because I would just die if I was wrong, but I think …” She nibbled the tip of her pinky, the hint of a smile just barely sneaking through. “He may be pretty serious. Like … marriage serious.”

“Squeeeeeeee!” Lacey dropped her rod and launched to her feet to squeeze Shannon in a noisy hug while Cat stared, open-mouthed, a smile slowly curling on her lips.

“Well, holy bucket of worms, sis, that has to be some kind of record for a guy like Sam Cunningham or any guy!”

Shannon put both hands to her burning face, shoulders in a scrunch. “Stop it, you guys! Just because I think it doesn’t make it true. Sam and I are just dating, and for all I know, that’s all it might ever be.”

“Oh, puh-leez!” Lacey said with a roll of her eyes, retrieving her rod to make another cast. “Jack says the man is so far gone, he should be committed.”

Committed. Shannon caught her breath, her dream of Sam committed to her sapping all oxygen from her throat. Oh, Lord, if only …

Cat put her rod down to focus on her sister, shimmying her chair around till she was facing her dead-on. “So, why do you think that, Shan?” she asked with a probing stare, knees bunched and bare feet curled over the edge.

Shannon shrugged, almost wishing she hadn’t been born with this crazy sixth sense that could bode either good or bad. Good if she was right that Sam was serious enough to commit to her alone. But bad if this uneasy feeling she’d been having all night was more than indigestion. “It’s a bunch of little things, really,” she said carefully, hoping she wasn’t reading too much into Sam’s words or actions the last month.

“Such as?” Lacey laid her rod aside, now sideways in her chair with knees to her chest.

Shannon sighed. “I know this sounds silly, but he’s had this look in his eyes ever since Mom and Ben’s wedding last week. Kind of a heated intensity that defies his typically casual air.” She pursed her lips, head in a tilt. “It’s … almost like a horse at the gate, you know? Eyes searing the track while its body stills, every muscle twitching till the stall opens up.”

A husky chuckle tripped from Cat’s lips. “That sounds like Dr. Love, all right—a thoroughbred just waiting for that doggone gate to swing open.”

More heat pulsed in Shannon’s cheeks as her teeth tugged at the edge of her smile. “I hate to say it, but that’s it exactly. And then he keeps saying over and over how he wants to take the time to really get to know me better.”

“So?” Lips pinched to the right, Lacey peered at her through squinted eyes, as if trying to assess each word out of Shannon’s mouth. “That’s a good thing, right?”

Shannon tipped her head, mouth compressed in thought. “Yes, but it’s almost like the man doth protest too much, you know? Like he’s trying to throw me off track or something. Plus, I don’t know the details because Sam doesn’t like to talk about it, but he had a really bad experience with a girl he was engaged to in college that shook him up pretty good. So he’s made it perfectly clear that when he does get engaged again, he plans to take lots of time to make sure it’s the real thing.” She huffed out a sigh as she stared out at the water. “And let’s face it, one month does not a commitment make.”

“Ahem … almost six months,” Lacey corrected, “since you two forged a close friendship the night of the fundraiser.”

One side of Shannon’s mouth nudged up. “Driving a soused Romeo home with puke on his tie hardly qualifies as a close friendship, Lace.”

Cat grinned, eyebrows jiggling. “Apparently it does for Dr. Love.”

“Anyway,” Shannon said with a patient smile, “he’s taking me to 700 Kitchen Cooking School on Saturday night for our official one-month anniversary—”

“Wait a minute—a cooking-school date?” Cat’s feet thudded to the wood planking when she sat up in the chair, posture stiff as two tiny lines puckered above her nose.

The indigestion that had been churning in Shannon’s stomach all night kicked up a notch because she knew what Cat was asking. Why would Sam resurrect painful memories with a date that included a cooking class, when it was the very thing Eric had loved to do? “Sam already knows Eric and I loved cooking together and that since the breakup, I avoid it like the plague.” A wispy sigh drifted from her lips. “But he told me he doesn’t want anything to remind me of Eric, so he wants to erase those painful memories with good ones.”

“Or,” Cat said with a sly cock of her head, “he wants to make good and sure he eats well if you two do tie the knot.”

A shy giggle slipped from Shannon’s mouth. “I thought of that.”