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She shook her head. “I never asked for it. It’s always been Isla and me. We’re comfortable, thanks to my grandma’s legacy. We don’t need his money.”
“You’re a strong woman.”
Her glance was warm. “Thank you. But days like today I don’t always feel so strong. Every time I see my parents I feel like a scared kid all over again.”
“So why do you see them?”
She picked at a loose thread on her skirt. “I didn’t for a good part of a year. When I told them I was pregnant they disowned me.”
“They did what?”
“They told me I’d brought shame on the family. Asked me not to visit them or contact them.” She shrugged. “So I was all alone.”
Damn! The thought of her being so young and abandoned made him want to hit something. “What changed?”
“I went into labor when I was only thirty-three weeks pregnant. I had preeclampsia, and was rushed for an emergency cesarian.”
Rich blinked. “You went through that all alone?”
She nodded. “Isla was taken to the NICU and I was in the adult ICU. According to my doctor, they thought they were going to lose me. One of the nurses there went to church with my parents, and contacted them to tell them they had a granddaughter, and that I was very sick. So they came and took care of Isla while I couldn’t. They sat with her in the NICU every day. Held her and sang to her until I was well enough to do it myself.” She gave him a half smile. “So while I’ll never agree with how they live, or how they abandoned me when I needed them, I still owe them something. They’re Isla’s only family apart from me, and going through all that made me worry about what would happen to her if I got hurt or worse.”
“You’re amazing, you know that?”
“Says the guy who saves lives every day.”
“Yeah, but I get paid to do that. And I have a whole team around me. You’re bringing up Isla single handedly. And you’ve been doing it since you were almost a kid yourself.”
“And you’ve been taking care of your sister since you were a kid,” she reminded him, her voice full of warmth. “We’re not so different.”
Yeah, they were. None of this was her fault. She’d got abandoned by the guy who should have stood by her, then by her parents. He’d been a little shit who couldn’t care less about anybody else.
He breathed in, the sweet aroma of her perfume filling his senses. It was getting almost impossible to fight the attraction he was feeling toward her. It wasn’t only her beauty that pulled him in. It was the inside. The strong-as-hell woman she’d become. She made him want to be a better person. To be the one person she could finally rely on. To make her always smile the way she was right now.
But he couldn’t be. Everything about his life was too crazy for him to be dependable. But maybe he could be her friend.
And if it drove him a little crazy every time they were close? So be it. It was a small price to pay to spend time with his beautiful neighbor.
13
A week had passed since their trip to White City, and she hadn’t seen Rich in that time. Jeannie had taken some paid time off and Meghan was working long hours at the ice cream shop – the beach was getting fuller every day with summer tourists – and she assumed he’d been busy at work, because his car was rarely in the parking lot.
Her own car was fixed, and she was just coming back from picking it up from the garage, thankful that Gloria had offered to take Isla to the pool while she ran her errand.
Like everywhere else in Angel Sands, the pool was getting busier by the day, too. During weekends it was always packed, but as the days began to warm up, the evenings were becoming more popular. She smiled as she heard the shouts and laughter coming from the pool – Isla had made friends with some of the kids in the apartment building, and she was so pleased to see her daughter happy and fitting in.
When she pushed open the gate, she didn’t see Isla among the heads bobbing in the water. She frowned, and looked across the chairs, spotting Gloria sitting on one close to the pool. And next to her was Isla, chatting happily away to a third person on the other side.
Meghan’s mouth went dry when she saw who it was. How the hell had Carlyn gotten into the pool area? Isla was smiling at her, and Carlyn was clearly pouring on the charm, talking away with her like she was best friends with an eight-year-old.
Feeling her heart hammer against her chest, she stalked over to the trio. Her hands shook as she reached them, and Isla looked up with a huge grin. Carlyn didn’t look at all phased to be caught talking to a child she didn’t know.
“What’s going on?” Meghan asked, her voice low. “Are you okay, honey?” She sat next to Isla, trying to fight the urge to whip her up and carry her right back to the apartment.
“Oh hello, Meghan. I dropped over to see Rich, but he wasn’t answering. So I thought I’d see if he was in here, and then I spotted Isla sitting over here and I thought she had to be your daughter. The resemblance is unmistakeable.”
Meghan couldn’t remember even telling Carlyn she had a daughter.
