First Time in Forever (Puffin Island 1)

It was like booking a flight to Europe and finding yourself in the middle of the African desert, unprepared and unequipped.

“I didn’t know she couldn’t read fluently. I don’t even know what age most children start to read.”

“It varies. Rachel was reading by four. Others take longer, but as long as they get there in the end, I don’t see why it matters.”

“You know a lot about children.” And she hadn’t expected that. He seemed like the type of man who saw children as nothing more than an inconvenient by-product of sex. And then something occurred to her, something that made her stomach lurch. “Are you divorced? Married?”

“You think I left my wife in bed to come here and eat breakfast with you? You have a low expectation of relationships, Emily. And I’m not married.” He looked at her in a way that made her heart beat faster and her insides melt, but what really worried her was the sudden and unexpected lift of her mood that came from the knowledge he was single.

Why should she care that he was single?

Her life was already complicated enough, and when she eventually got around to thinking about relationships again, it wouldn’t be with a man like him.

“You’re comfortable with young children. The sort of comfortable that usually comes from having them.”

“So now you’re asking if I spent my wild youth populating Maine?”

He was attractive and charming. She had little trouble believing he’d had a wild youth.

She watched as he unpacked the last of the bags. She was aware of every tiny detail of him, from the flex of shoulder muscle to the scar visible on the bronzed skin above his collarbone.

Feeling her scrutiny, he turned his head, and his gaze met hers. Slowly, he put the bag down, as if he could no longer remember why he was holding it.

Heat rushed through her, infusing her cheeks with livid color.

Oh, God, she was having sex thoughts about a man she barely even knew.

She felt as if she’d been caught watching porn.

“Did you ask me a question?” His voice was roughened, his eyes fixed on hers, and she knew he’d forgotten the conversation.

She’d forgotten it, too. “Sex. I mean, populating Maine,” she stammered. “Children, yes, that was it. Children.”

His gaze held hers steadily. “Children have never been on my wish list.”

“So you don’t have experience?”

“I have tons of experience.”

“Nieces? Nephews?”

“Siblings. Three of them. All younger.” He reached for the bottle of maple syrup he’d brought with him. “I was thirteen when my parents were killed. The twins, Sam and Helen, were nine, and Rachel was four. It was a typical Maine winter. Snow, ice and no power. They collided with a tree. It was all over before anyone could get to them.” He spoke in a modulated tone that revealed all of the facts and none of the feelings.

She didn’t know what she’d expected to hear, but it hadn’t been that.

The story saddened her on so many levels. It proved that even happy families weren’t immune to tragedy.

“I’m sorry.”

“My grandmother moved in and took over parenting, but three kids were a challenge, and her health has never been good.”

“Four.” Emily put down the loaf of bread she’d unpacked. “You were a child, too.”

“I left childhood behind the day my parents were killed.” His face was expressionless. “I remember the police coming to the door and the look on my grandmother’s face when she told me what had happened. The others were asleep, and we decided not to wake them. It was the worst night of my life.”

She knew exactly how he would have felt because she’d felt it, too, that brutal loss of someone who was part of you. Like ripping away flesh and muscle down to the bone, the wound going so deep it never really healed. Eventually it closed over the surface, leaving bruises and scars invisible to the naked eye.

“How did you cope?”