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“About time you showed up.” Darlene Atwell stared over the top of her trendy leopard glasses and continued to stir the contents of a large pot. The Blackwell home smelled like heaven, though the only person in sight was the woman who’d helped raise the Blackwell boys after their mother died, and the woman who’d fallen in love with their father.
“Is that goulash?” Travis sniffed the air, eyes warming as he watched Darlene.
“It is.”
“Man, I haven’t had that in ages.”
“I know.”
He walked into the kitchen and dropped a kiss to her cheek. It was his brother Hudson’s, birthday, and along with the goulash, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d been present. Not surprising on account of their history. But he was trying. “Sorry I’m late. Where is everybody?”
“Wyatt took Regan out on the boat, but Hudson and Becca are down at the boathouse with your father. He hasn’t let that baby out of his sight.” She set the ladle down on the counter and turned to him, her face beaming. “I’m just so damn glad all you boys are here. And so is John.”
I bet.
The sarcastic response filled his head, but Travis pushed it away as quickly as it had come. It wasn’t the time to hash out old hurts, and maybe that time would never come. Maybe it didn’t need to. Maybe they were better off forgetting all the crap that had gone down in this house. Maybe it was time to move on.
“Where’s your friend?” Darlene tucked her silver hair behind her ear and set her glasses on the counter. She put a lid on the pot and reduced the heat, tossing aside an oven mitt as she did so.
“Friend?”
“The hockey player. I heard you were hosting a visitor.”
“Zach decided to golf.”
Darlene nodded. “Nice day for it.”
“Sure is.” He hid a grin. Travis wasn’t exactly sure how much golf Zach was going to get in. He’d taken a shine to Honey, the bartender, and the two were hitting the links.
“What’s that?” Darlene’s eyebrow rose quizzically as she stared at the bag in his hand.
“Something for Dad.”
“You should give it to him.” Her soft eyes filled with tears, and Travis looked away. He didn’t know how to react to Darlene’s feelings for his father. Mostly because his own were so damn complicated. “He’s outside.”
“Yeah.” He moved toward the patio doors. “I’ll see you out there.”
Travis headed outside and took a few steps before pausing on the sweeping deck to take in the scenery. God, he loved this house. Loved the land and the lake. As a kid, he hadn’t appreciated all that he’d been given. He was literally the kid with the silver spoon and hadn’t wanted for any kind of material thing. It was the other, the emotional stuff, that had disintegrated when his mother died. The father he’d known had left for work one day, and come home a different kind of animal. At first anguished, then angry and distant. If not for Darlene, the household would have fallen apart.
Travis gazed out at the midnight-blue water, a half smile on his face as he took in the familiar sight. Crystal Lake was bordered on both sides by a thick forest of evergreens, maple, and birch. They rose from the shoreline like soldiers, standing tall, hiding the many expensive cottages and homes behind their branches—the only evidence of their existence the boathouses and docks. Motorboats dotted the lake, zipping across the surface pulling water-skiers and kids on tubes, while Ski-Doos raced along, charting their own course. Laughter and shouts echoed on the water, jumping the waves and landing on the shore. In the distance, right smack dab in the middle of the lake, he spied Pottahawk Island. And directly across from that, Byron Campground.
Byron Campground.
He sighed and closed his eyes, head raised to the sun as a wave of memories washed over him. He thought back to the summer he’d turned sixteen. The summer he and his pals had swum from Pottahawk island over to the only public beach on the lake, the one in front of Camp Byron. He was one of the Blackwells, an anointed prince of Crystal Lake, and Ruby was unlike any girl he’d ever known. Up until that day, she’d been the scrawny kid with the big sad eyes. The girl whose biting tongue could cut a guy in two. The girl most guys didn’t mess with.
But something sure as hell had changed, and his young self wasn’t exactly prepared to handle it.
* * *
“Holy shit.” Jason Marsdale poked Travis in the arm. “Check out Ruby Montgomery.” The two of them, along with a couple of pals from the hockey team, had just dragged their asses out of the water. Travis shook drops from his eyes, his gaze wandering the beach. Ruby Montgomery? He hadn’t seen her in a couple of years and from what he remembered, she was a small little thing with a big mouth. But Shelli Gouthro sure as hell caught his attention. She was old, at least twenty-three or -four, and filled out a bikini like nobody’s business. At the moment, her ample assets were barely kept together by a black-and-pink zebra-print bikini.
Who said the public beach wasn’t fun? This was way better than at the resort or his father’s private club up the way.
“You’re kidding, right?” Jason shook his head and laughed following his gaze. “Seriously. You’re not in her league. She won’t give you the time of day.”
“Watch me,” he retorted.
At sixteen, Travis was already pushing six-three, his body hard and muscled from years of hockey. He didn’t look or sound his age. And ever since he’d had sex the summer before, it was pretty much all he thought about. Well, after hockey, of course, but still, getting laid was almost as important.
