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Twyla, all of nineteen with razor-straight black hair and a penchant for too-tight jeans and too-short crop tops, bounced out of the kitchen tying a black apron around her runway-model-thin waist. Holly gave silent thanks that their recent conversation about appropriate diner attire hadn’t fallen on deaf ears.
“Usual drinks for the club,” Holly told her.
“Got it.” Spinning a tray out from under the counter, Twyla breezed off toward the coffee station.
Ursula’s “harrumph” brought a strained smile to Holly’s face as the bell above the door chimed. “Be with you in a sec.” Holly pushed the order through the window and tugged her hot pink T-shirt down over her jeans as she turned around to greet the next customer.
Holly’s entire body froze as if she’d locked herself in the walk-in freezer.
Then her knees wobbled, but she kept her spine stiff and her voice low as the anger she thought she’d buried over a decade ago rumbled up from her toes. “Luke Saxon.” She shoved her hands into her back pockets and tried not to notice how quiet the diner had become.
“Hello, Holly.” A tight, guarded smile softened dark, angular features. “Good to see you again.”
She pressed her lips together so hard they went numb.
Every town, even Butterfly Harbor, had its bad boy. That boy who wore a black leather jacket and snug jeans to the point of female distraction. The boy who exuded a mind-numbing combination of hostility and romanticized misunderstanding. The boy every girl wanted to date but none dared approach. The boy other boys wanted to emulate, but none thought to befriend. Yeah, there were bad boys.
And then there was Luke Saxon.
And he still wore a black leather jacket and carried himself with a self-assuredness that was both enviable and off-putting. His onetime too long ink-black hair had been shorn into shape, his pasty complexion replaced by what looked like years spent in the sun. The sad stone-blue eyes she remembered in the face of a sullen boy had turned to steel in the span of twelve years. She saw life painted on his handsome face.
He’d grown up. Holly straightened. They both had. While Luke stood before her as a man, she couldn’t help but see the troubled—and dangerous—youth she remembered. His reputation for skirting the thin edge of the law had become legend in Butterfly Harbor.
“I’ll understand if you’d rather I eat someplace else.” The low rumble of Luke’s voice sounded foreign to Holly’s ears and prickled her skin. In her mind Luke was still eighteen, smelling of beer, blood and guilt rather than the intoxicating combination of sea air and orange spice.
“You know what Grandma Ruby always said.” Holly forced the words from her tight throat. “Everyone’s welcome at the diner.” Even you.
“I heard she passed.” Luke pushed his hands deep into his jacket pockets, rocked on his heels as he kept his chin up, his gaze pinned to hers. “She was always very nice to me.”
Holly cleared her throat and wished her grandmother was here right now—she’d always known what to say. “Thanks. You eating alone?” She grabbed a menu out of the cubby at the end of the counter and tried not to notice how her hand trembled.
“No. I’m meeting—”
“Sorry I’m late.” Butterfly Harbor’s new mayor, Gil Hamilton, pushed through the door and swept his long sandy-blond hair out of his eyes. “Hey, Holl. Must be a blast from the past, huh? Having Luke back?”
“Not to stay?” Holly blurted.
“For a while,” Luke said.
“A year, at least.” Gil slapped a hand on Luke’s leather-clad back as Luke winced and stepped to the side, the color draining out of his windblown face. “That’s how long his term will be. This time around anyway.”
“His term?” Holly asked as her stomach churned. “What term?”
“Oh, sorry.” Gil blinked and cringed as if he’d betrayed a confidence. “I thought for sure your father would have told you by now. Luke’s serving out the rest of Jake’s tenure as sheriff.”
“Sheriff.” Holly didn’t recognize her own voice, not hidden under the layers of hostility and anger. “You’re not serious.” When Gil’s only acknowledgment was to grab the menus and head toward a booth at the far end of the diner, Holly swung on Luke. “He’s not serious?”
“Holly—”
“What? It wasn’t enough you almost killed my father all those years ago? You figured you’d come back and finish him off by stealing his job?”
Luke’s steely blue eyes narrowed. “It’s not like that.”
“From where I’m standing it’s exactly like that.” She moved in, keeping her voice low so her customers—so her son—wouldn’t hear. “Go back to wherever you’ve been for the past decade, Luke. We don’t have any use for cowards in Butterfly Harbor.”
CHAPTER TWO
“NOT THE BEST way for her to find out about you returning,” Gil said as Luke slid into the booth across from his new boss. “I guess the past isn’t as forgotten as I’d hoped.”
“You sound surprised.” Watching the eternal Cocoon Club texting away on their phones like overactive teenagers proved the rumor mill in Butterfly Harbor was as reliable as ever. By the end of the day he’d either be welcomed by a cavalcade of casseroles, or run out of town with pitchforks and torches.
He rolled his shoulders, but instead of easing the tension, the action stretched the burn scars on his back so tight he feared his skin might split open. He sucked in a breath, waited the few moments it took for the pain to subside. Maybe the doctor was right. Maybe he’d weaned himself off his pain meds too soon.
The past twelve years meant nothing when faced with the past he couldn’t change. He might have hoped for a more congenial welcome home, but he hadn’t expected it, especially when it came to Holly Campbell.
How could he have expected her to forgive him when he hadn’t been able to forgive himself?
Unwrapping the bundle of flatware on the table, Luke tore bits off his napkin. He’d spent extended time in war zones. He’d put his military training to use with the Chicago Police Department in their bomb squad. He’d been the department’s go-to when it came to potentially explosive domestic disturbances and had overseen rookie training for the explosive disposal unit. He could manage a year in Butterfly Harbor.
Or so he’d told himself on the cross-country drive.
Apparently Holly Campbell hadn’t gotten the memo.
Luke glanced over as she swept out of sight into the kitchen, her shoulder-length brown hair tumbling in waves. She’d been pretty as a girl, but as a woman she was stunning. Like a throwback to the glory days of vaudeville, with her big doll eyes and a small, pert mouth. Her curved, rounded figure set a man to thinking about late-night bonfires and moonlit swims in the ocean.
Luke caught the gaze of the boy sitting at the counter, questioning hostility shining in eyes so familiar he had to be Holly’s son.
“Jake should have told her,” Gil said. “Hiring you was his idea in the first place.”
“Don’t worry about it.” Luke was a big boy. He could take whatever punishment Holly and anyone else in town saw fit to dole out. And if there was one thing Holly Gordon—no, Holly Campbell—excelled at, it was getting her point across. Luke pretended to skim the menu Gil set in front of him.
“To be honest,” Gil said, “I’m surprised you took the job.”
The pencil-thin, raven-haired waitress set a mug and two glasses on the table. “Here’s your coffee, black, and water, no ice. And for you?” She batted mascara-thick eyelashes at Luke as she pulled out her notepad.
“Water’s fine, thanks.” He’d already drunk enough coffee this morning to keep him awake for a week. “I’ll have the BLT, hold the B, no mayo, sweet potato fries if you have them.”
“We do.” She nodded. “Mr. Mayor?”
“Burger, medium and loaded, Twyla. Garlic fries.”
“You got it.” Twyla bounded off to greet a new influx of customers that raised the noise level in the diner.
Luke relaxed enough to take in the polished diner’s surroundings. The space was brighter than he remembered. More welcoming in a way. The stainless steel sparkled and the orange and black hues were a tribute to the diner’s location on Monarch Lane. Classic retro with a twist of home. He flipped over the menu and smiled when he saw the list of Holly’s homemade pies, something she’d dabbled in as a teen, had expanded. Combined with the late-morning aroma of frying bacon and the early-afternoon promise of onions and garlic, the diner felt, and smelled, familiar. “While I’m grateful, I’m not entirely sure why Jake recommended me for the position.”
