LITMIR.BIZ

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said. She took Lizzie’s arm. “This is my daughter, Lizzie. We’re going to be here for the summer.”

      “Wonderful. Staying out at the farm, are you?”

      Alex nodded. Everyone in the area knew about Dancing Falls. Most everyone had been to barbecues there or knew the medical skills of Martin Foster.

      Glen cupped his hand under his chin and appraised Lizzie. “You’re as pretty as your mother,” he said. “But your dark hair suits your olive complexion. You didn’t get that from the Foster girls.”

      Lizzie smiled. “I guess not, but my dad was fair, too. So who knows? Genetics is a mystery to me.”

      Alex quickly jumped into the conversation. “I thought Lizzie might want to audition. Do you have any parts left?”

      “You bet. One very important part. Zaneeta Shinn, the mayor’s daughter. It’s not a big role, but it’s vital to the production.” Glen took Lizzie’s hand and began walking her to the stage. “Read for me now, honey. I know it’s a cold reading, but you can take a script home and practice and come back tomorrow for a retry if you want.”

      Lizzie shot her mother a perplexed look as she was more or less propelled toward the stage. But she was smiling. Just like Alex was almost always smiling during that summer eighteen years ago.

      Just like she was smiling now—until she heard the door open behind her and turned to see who’d come into the theater.

      Later, when she had time to think about it, she would have to admit that recognizing Daniel after eighteen years from thirty yards away down a long aisle was as natural as breathing. Only she wasn’t breathing now. She felt light-headed and dizzy, fighting an urge to flee and a struggle to draw air into her lungs.

      Alex was aware of noise around her though she felt as if she were in a vacuum. Someone on stage, working on the set, pounded a hammer. Overhead a fluorescent light buzzed and pulsed. And Glen hollered, “Hey, Danny. You’re just in time, buddy. We’ve got a new audition for Zaneeta, and Larry needs a hand building the bridge.”

      “I came as soon as I could,” Daniel responded, walking down the aisle toward Alex. His voice was as familiar as the sound of the waves on shore that summer, or the soft beat of rock and roll coming from a window in the summer staff’s dormitory. Alex trembled, almost as if his words had been whispered into her ear.

      Of course he was nowhere near enough to whisper anything into her ear. But she could see he hadn’t changed. The years had been good to Greenfield’s native son, the young man who’d risen from humble roots to succeed in college and become the youngest state senator ever sent to Columbus from their district.

      He slowed his pace when he got to Alex, gave her a brief smile as he walked past, and said, “Morning.”

      Then he refocused his attention on the stage. A hint of silver threaded the dark, wavy hair at his temples. Hair the same color as Lizzie’s. He moved with the purposeful gait of a politician, each step determined and powerful. There had been nothing subtle about Daniel back then. There wasn’t now.

      And all the self-esteem and confidence Alex had acquired during her marriage to Teddy vanished in that one awful moment. Daniel Chandler didn’t have the faintest idea who she was.

      Eighteen years earlier

      “SO WHAT DO you think, Alexis? Does Birch Shore Resort look any different now that you’re going to be working here? You used to love coming here when you were a kid.”

      Martin followed the signs leading to the employees’ dormitory, keeping his large SUV within the twenty-mile speed limit.

      Alex’s anxiety had reached new heights in the last five miles. Granted, she was only seventy-five miles from Dancing Falls, but this home away from home seemed remote and alien, while at the same time exciting.

      Martin pulled up in front of Pelican House, a two-story wooden structure built for Birch Shore employees. “Remember, Alexis, the first floor is for girls only. The second is for the boys. No wandering around in the middle of the night.”

      Martin’s smile took the sting from his words. “Stop teasing, Daddy,” Alex said. “I’m here to earn money for college.”

      “And don’t I appreciate it!”

      Martin and Alex got out of the car, and he opened the back cargo door. She’d managed to cram her most necessary possessions and three months of clothes into two suitcases and three large boxes, but getting them to her room wouldn’t be such an easy task.

      “I don’t want you carrying this stuff,” she said. “We need a cart or something.”

      As if by divine miracle, one appeared, an old grocery basket steered by a tall, incredibly good-looking boy. Alex swallowed, blinked her eyes. Actually, he wasn’t a boy at all. She’d left all the boys behind in Fox Creek. This guy had to be two or three years beyond boy. Mature, handsome, smiling. Oh, my.

      “Hi,” he said. “Need some help?”

      “Thank you, son,” Martin said, giving the young man a thorough scrutiny. “You look familiar.”

      “I’m Daniel Chandler,” he said, shaking Martin’s hand. “I’m from Greenfield. I’ll be working here this summer.”

      “Aren’t you Gus Chandler’s kid? I’ve seen you at the hardware store.”

      “I am.”

      “Small world. My daughter Alexis will be working here, too. This is her first extended stay away from home.” Alex wished she had worn something much more fashionable than cutoffs and a T-shirt. She was mortified because her father made her sound like such a kid. Martin had told her this would be her chance for adventure, freedom, independence, and already he’d pegged her as an inexperienced child. And to this mature man!

      Daniel’s grin spread, showing remarkably cute dimples. “Sounds good,” he said. “Follow me.”

      The trio and their wobbly cart headed up the sidewalk to Pelican House. Daniel asked Alex for her room number and steered her belongings to a cramped bedroom for two at the end of the hall. The only furnishings were twin beds, two small dressers and one drying rack for towels and such. But to Alex it represented a whole new life, one where this wonderful boy would be living just upstairs.

      Once the boxes were unloaded onto Alex’s bed, Daniel wished her good luck and said he’d see her later.

      Alex wanted to say something clever to ensure that he would, but nothing cute or flirty or even intelligible came to mind. She didn’t know how to flirt, a skill she wished she’d perfected before this.

      She walked outside with her father, hugged him and assured him she would be fine. When she went back inside Pelican House, Daniel was in the small lobby. Was he waiting for her? She could barely breathe.

      “We’ve got a busy day tomorrow with orientation,” he said. “How about if I pick you up at your room this evening at five thirty and show you where the employee cafeteria is?”

      “Thanks. That would be nice.”

      She raced into her room and set her clock.

       CHAPTER TWO

      HAD THERE BEEN a place to hide, Alex would have run for it, but all the nonpublic places were backstage, and to get to them, she would have had to approach the three people on the stage. So, until the flare-up in her cheeks returned to normal—darn the curse of women with fair complexions—she sank into the audience seat and waited until Lizzie had auditioned.

      How ironic that Daniel, the guy who had suggested she join the musical revue at the Birch Shore Resort, the man who’d dazzled her and changed her life, was now about to offer an opinion on Lizzie’s immediate future. She couldn’t trap a sigh as more memories of that magical summer flooded her mind. Her

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