Home to Sparrow Lake (Harlequin Heartwarming) (11 page)

Besides, what could she do to him? He was practically an adult.

No matter what, Aunt Margaret would be on his side. At least he could always count on her.

Crossing through the kitchen, he tried to think about what he was going to say. Even if his sister didn’t have any power over him, his stomach was churning.

Why wasn’t Kristen saying anything? She was staring at him, and he prepared himself for an argument.

He sat at the island as far away from Kristen as he could manage. Still she didn’t speak.

Finally, he mumbled, “I thought you wanted to talk.”

“I do. I’m worried about you, Brian.”

“Sure you are.” Because she’d spent so much time with him before Mom got remarried and then moved him to California whether or not he wanted to go.

“Brian, we may not have been close distance-wise in the past few years, but that doesn’t change anything. You’re my kid brother and I love you.”

Uncomfortable now, he muttered, “And?”

“And I don’t want to see you making a mistake—”

“Well, just don’t worry about me, Kristen. Another couple months and I’ll be legal.”

“I’ll always worry about you, Brian. I only want good things for you. For all of us.”

He wasn’t going to let her get to him. He got up to leave, asking, “Is that it?”

Her “No, Brian, it isn’t” stopped him. “You know there’s a midnight curfew for anyone under eighteen. If you get picked up—”

“But I won’t be.”

“Brian, please. What could you possibly be doing out so late? This isn’t a big city where things stay open all night.”

“I’m just hanging with my friends.”

“Where?”

“Around.”

“That’s not good enough, Brian. You can’t keep doing this.”

His pulse began to tick faster. Did she know? “Doing what?”

“You tell me.”

“I don’t have to tell you anything, Kristen. You’re my sister, not my mother!”

“You want me to call Mom?”

“You wouldn’t!”

If she did, Mom might make him fly back to California, and then he’d have to deal with the man she’d married again. Mike tried to act like he was his father...telling him what to do, how to act. In one fell swoop, Brian had gone from being the man of the house as Mom had told him so often, to being nothing but a kid who annoyed the new husband.

“Look, Brian, I don’t want to be the bad guy here.” Kristen stepped close to him and touched his cheek. “I just want to make sure you’re safe and that you don’t do anything foolish that will get you into trouble.”

Brian clenched his jaw and pulled his head away. “I’m not in trouble!” And he wasn’t falling for her nice routine.

It sounded as if she did know what he and his friends had been doing, but for some reason she wasn’t saying so. So what if she knew? He hadn’t done anything wrong. Not really. He and Andy and Matt had just been messing with people’s heads. They hadn’t wrecked anything....

“I don’t want to see you get arrested,” Kristen said.

“I haven’t hurt anyone or stolen anything.”

“What
have
you been doing in the middle of the night?”

“Nothing!” He tore away from her and headed for the door. “If you don’t have anything else to say, I’m going to bed now.”

“Brian, wait, please. If something is troubling you, if you need to talk, remember you can always come to me with anything.”

Fat chance.

The last thing in the world he’d do was give his by-the-book sister ammunition against him.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

“I
T
’
S
A
PERFECT
day to play hooky,” Alex said, when he opened the car door for Kristen.

Kristen admired the sleek black Jaguar convertible parked in front of Sew Fine. It looked like an older model, though it seemed to be in perfect condition. “Is this yours?”

“It is,” he said as she slipped into the low passenger seat. “Why do you seem so surprised?”

“I’ve only seen you driving your patrol car.”

He swung her door shut. “But now I’m off the job.”

If he’d been on the job every time she’d seen him in the past week, he must be working as many hours as she was.

Kristen wiggled into the cushioned leather seat and buckled her seat belt, then glanced back at the store window where employees and customers alike watched. Heather’s face pulled into a big grin. Her sister had practically done a happy dance when Kristen had told her where she was going that afternoon. Good grief, they were just picking up Alex’s repaired window and having dinner before driving back to Sparrow Lake. It wasn’t like this was a big deal date or anything.

Still, when Alex got behind the wheel, buckled himself in and started the engine, Kristen couldn’t help the flutter of expectation that ran through her veins. His light brown hair brushed his sunglasses, making him look more casual than usual. And more attractive. For once, he’d completely shed his police persona. She liked it.

“You don’t mind if I leave the top down, do you?” Alex asked.

“You’re kidding. Don’t you dare put up the top on such a gorgeous day!”

He grinned at her. “Just trying to be considerate. Some women don’t like getting their hair messed up from the wind.”

“Just drive.” She was looking forward to feeling the wind in her hair.

A warm summer breeze rustled the air as they took off down the street and headed out of town. But when they passed a trio of teenagers riding furiously on their bikes, Kristen’s excitement at having a fun afternoon warred with her continuing worry over her brother. Her stomach swirled as she thought about her early morning conversation with Brian. She’d tried to keep the conversation as nonconfrontational as she could. She hadn’t wanted to accuse him of anything, rather had tried to get him to volunteer information.

And he hadn’t bitten.

Had she approached her brother the wrong way? She wanted him to feel free to come to her, to tell her what was on his mind.

Wishing she could talk to Alex about Brian, she didn’t know how to bring up the subject. She’d given him a hard time in the past when he’d tried warning her. Besides, Brian hadn’t confirmed anything. Her brother’s BuddyShare Network page worried her, but the boys had been vague about what they’d been up to. She’d found no proof of any actual wrongdoing.

They were on the highway headed for Lake Geneva before Alex said, “Are you okay?”

When he glanced at her as if to see for himself, she gave him a big smile. “I’m fine.” A small fib. She shoved her worry about Brian to the back of her mind, determined to enjoy the afternoon no matter what. “Just relaxing and soaking up the fresh air, something I can’t do in the shop.”

It was a perfect day for an outing. Kristen was glad she’d dressed down—white capris, yellow sweater set and beige walking sandals.
Sorry, Manolo Blahnik and Jimmy Choo. Can’t deal with your four-inch heels today.
Knowing she would want to explore Lake Geneva on foot—she hadn’t been there since she was in high school but remembered it as a fun walking town—Kristen had decided to wear practical footwear, for once.

Alex turned on the radio. “Any particular music you like?”

A classic rock piece was playing.

“Great guitar. That’s my kind of music.”

Alex nodded. “Even if it was recorded before we were born.”

Laughing together felt good.

So did talking about preferences—not only music, but movies and art. She was enjoying getting to know Alex a little better. They had more in common than she’d ever imagined. She couldn’t believe how quickly the time passed. Before she knew it, they were in Lake Geneva and parking in back of a building a block off Main Street.

Glasstique took up the whole lower level, so it was large enough to display everything from stained-glass windows to hand-blown carafes to fused-glass jewelry. While Alex spoke to the owner, Kristen checked out the place. Aunt Margaret loved any kind of art, so Kristen looked for something that her modest budget would allow and found a thick, multi-colored glass teardrop that would look great hung in one of the windows that overlooked the lake.

She was taking it to the counter when the owner brought out the stained-glass transom for Alex’s inspection, and Kristen had a chance to admire the piece with its beveled glass and leading.

“Gorgeous,” she said.

“And a great job making it look new again,” Alex told the owner, who placed it in a protective frame.

A few minutes later, they were back at the car, carefully putting their packages in the trunk.

“Walk or drive to the lakefront?” he asked.

“Walk. That way I get to poke my head in all the stores.”

Alex was quite a good sport about it, Kristen thought. He came inside each store she wanted to check out. Not that she bought anything for herself. Still, she enjoyed the diversion as they made their way toward the lake.

They were getting along so well, she could hardly remember why they’d ever been at odds.

* * *

“T
HIS
REMINDS
ME
of the view I had from my apartment balcony,” Kristen said with a sigh. They had just finished dinner on an outside terrace of Geneva Lake Manor, a century-old mansion that had been turned into a popular restaurant, and were coming down the stairs, facing the lake on the other side of the street. “I used to eat out there whenever possible. Of course, my apartment was quite a bit higher up. Eighteenth floor.”

“I can understand why you would miss it,” Alex said, though he thought this view was pretty spectacular.

They were crossing the street not far from the pier where the tour boats docked. Motorboats cut through the bay and farther out, he spotted several sailboats.

“I miss everything about Chicago,” Kristen said. “I wonder how long it’ll take me to find another job there.”

Alex couldn’t help wondering why Kristen was so hung up on getting back to the big city. He checked his watch. “How about a sunset boat ride before heading back to Sparrow Lake—that is, if you’re up for that sort of thing.”

“What? You mean drooling over all the fabulous lakeside estates from the water? Hmm. I think I can handle that.”

“Great.”

The sun was low over the far end of the lake as they approached the pier. Shards of gold and red cut through the sky. A breeze skipped over the water, ruffling her hair. Kristen lifted her face and Alex’s chest tightened at the thought of just being with her. A sunset cruise would be the perfect way to end a perfect day.

Their timing was perfect, too. The boat was scheduled to leave the dock in five minutes, and since it was a weekday there were tickets left. Alex quickly bought them and escorted her onto the half-empty boat as the crew got set to shove off.

They found two seats near the prow, and when the boat started its tour of the bay, Kristen sighed. “It’s like being in another world.”

Alex continued their conversation. “I’m not from a small town, Kristen. I lived my whole life in Chicago until two years ago. That’s when I moved to Wisconsin.”

He could see that surprised her.

“Why did you choose Sparrow Lake?”

“My grandfather was from Sparrow Lake. Our family used to visit him for a couple of weeks each summer. I always loved the town, but I never thought about moving there until a few years ago. My immediate family—my brother and his wife and kids included—lives in Chicago, and ever since I was a teenager, I wanted to be a cop behind the wheel of a blue-and-white.”

“What changed your mind?”

“Actually
being
on the job in the inner city. I worked in a gang unit, and I saw all those kids with wasted lives.”

She nodded. “That had to be tough.”

“More so than you can imagine. I wanted to make a difference, Kristen, and by the time we got to those kids, it was too late for them. They get on the wrong road young in gang territory. Nine. Ten.”

“You must have seen some terrible things.”

“Unfortunately. And when we caught the offenders, they’d crossed so many lines that it meant jailing them or worse rather than giving them a chance.” He couldn’t talk about the incident that had made him leave Chicago—it still made his gut clench and his heart pound every time he thought about that kid. “It became too much for me, and I started wondering what it would be like working in a smaller police department where I could actually make a difference.”

The farther they got from the dock, the more elaborate the lakeside homes became. Some were modest in size and architecture, but many were multimillion-dollar mansions with incredible landscaping. They overshadowed the homes on Sparrow Lake, making even Margaret Becker’s look humble in comparison.

“I thought about moving to Sparrow Lake because a local cop steered me back onto the straight path one summer when I was a kid headed for trouble.” And they hadn’t just been playing innocent pranks, he remembered. “The police chief was a friend of Grandpa’s. He took me in hand, straightened me out, made me want to be like him.”

Kristen said, “Growing up, my brother never had a male figure to set an example for him. Brian was a little kid when our father abandoned us. He was always a good kid, though. Then Mom met her new husband and I guess Brian resented a stranger suddenly in his life, telling him what to do, trying to father him. That’s why, after he graduated high school, Mom sent him back to Wisconsin to go to college. But if he really has gotten himself into trouble...”

Realizing Kristen was vulnerable where her family was concerned, Alex said, “Brian is lucky to have someone like you
in his corner, but you need to be realistic about what is going on in town.” He hoped she was ready for some straight talk. He didn’t want to see Brian waste his life, and he didn’t want to see the heartbreak on Kristen’s face if her brother got into hot water. “If Brian is heading himself for trouble, then you may be the only one who can get him to straighten out.”

Silent for a moment, she hesitantly said, “You can’t ever let him know I did this, but...” She took a big breath and went on. “I got hold of his computer and looked at his BS page.”

“He admitted to something in writing?”

Shaking her head, she said, “The conversation with his friends was vague, full of boasting and seemingly empty threats, but it was enough to make me uncomfortable. And concerned. I realized something weird was going on. So I waited up for him. He didn’t come home until three. I asked him where he’d been, what he and his friends had been doing out so late.” She sighed. “Of course he gave me nothing but vague answers. I told him that I was concerned, and that if he needed to talk, I would be there for him.”

Alex was glad she’d finally believed him enough to pursue it. “Sometimes being there is all you can do. That and keeping an eye on Brian and his friends. You can always let me know if you suspect something might be wrong before the situation gets worse.”

She thought about that for a moment before saying, “They’ve just been playing pranks, though, right?”

“So far. My fear is that they’re going to cross the line, and because there are some truly bad people around, even in the small towns in this neck of the woods, I want to channel those negative energies into something positive before anyone gets into serious trouble.”

“I’ll do what I can. I just don’t know what’ll happen to my brother once I move back to Chicago. Heather already has too much responsibility. And it wouldn’t be fair to heap this on Aunt Margaret’s shoulders.”

There it was again—Chicago—the thing that threatened to stand in the way of developing a real relationship with her. Alex would never return to the gang violence and misery he faced in the big city, but Kristen seemed determined to go back.

How could they ever have the relationship that he was just beginning to think was possible if she got a job that took her away from Sparrow Lake? Was it just her career or something else luring her back?

That idea threatened his good mood.

He couldn’t let it happen, Alex thought. To his surprise, he realized he was developing feelings for her, and he thought they could have something good together.

He would just have to find a way to convince Kristen she didn’t want to leave Sparrow Lake.

Or him.

* * *

W
HEN
THE
BOAT
circled the bay to run along the bluff on the opposite shore, Kristen moved to the railing for a better look at the estates. Alex joined her. The occasional fine spray of lake water felt great. So did Alex’s arm casually draped across her back. Being in the shelter of his arm felt so right. Why had she been keeping him at a distance?

She gazed up into his eyes. “I want to thank you, Alex. This has been a beautiful day. The most relaxing that I’ve spent in a long time.”

“No regrets?”

“What’s to regret?”

He grinned at her. “Playing instead of working.”

Kristen laughed. “I do occasionally take time off to play. I mean, I used to in Chicago.”

“Alone?” When she gave him a puzzled look, he said, “I was just wondering if the reason you’re so anxious to get back to Chicago is that you have someone special waiting for you.”

A few weeks ago, that question might have bothered her. “Not anymore.”

“Oh. Sorry. Sounds like it was serious.”

“I thought it was. And I mistakenly believed Jason thought so. But someone who cares about you stands by you when you’re in trouble. My worries about not finding a job, going through my savings and losing my condo were all too much for him.”

“This Jason broke it off with you because you were in trouble? Not much of a man. You’re well rid of him.”