considered the environs of Blue Arrow Lake truly home—that had been the beach house where he’d lived with his parents and siblings until he was nine—yet coming back four days ago he’d experienced an unexpected settling of his restless soul.
It should worry him a little, he thought, as he stepped up to the register and gave the order for his drink. Christ, did it mean he was getting old?
Then he moved toward the pickup counter, his gaze landing on the man standing directly in front of him—and suddenly he was a boy again.
Aware of the grin stretching his mouth, he clapped his hand on Brett Walker’s shoulder. “So you’re a husband now. It boggles the mind.”
Brett turned, and his familiar gray eyes widened, then narrowed. “Zan.”
“In the flesh.” He rocked back on his heels, studying his old friend. While he’d seen Brett at a distance when he’d crashed the wedding reception, he hadn’t been near enough to completely register the changes the years had wrought. The other man’s hair was shorter now, and scars slashed his eyebrow and across the bridge of his nose. He’d probably gained thirty pounds of pure muscle. “I’m not sure I’d beat you at arm wrestling like I used to.”
“That’s revisionist memory, pal,” Brett said, then turned back when the barista called his name. Swiping up his drink, he didn’t give Zan a second glance before strolling around a corner to the seating area.
“Well,” Zan said to the empty space around him, “thanks for the effusive welcome. It’s great to see you again, too.” Not sure if he should be amused or affronted, Zan shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans. Apparently Brett wasn’t interested in hashing over old times.
Not that Zan mulled over them very often himself. He wasn’t a person who liked to look back, and it didn’t take a genius to understand it stemmed from the family tragedy he wanted to forget. Still, he’d had many good times with Brett. He’d been living with his grandfather just a few weeks when after school one day the towheaded oldest Walker had casually asked him, “You fish?”
Zan had lied, of course, and said yes. Little time passed before they were fishing buddies, and biking buddies, and, later, chasing-after-girls buddies. Nearly inseparable, though their temperaments were not completely aligned. When Zan had proposed trouble, Brett had counseled caution. Zan ran red lights, Brett took note of stale yellows. During the execution of Zan’s wildest pranks, Brett had participated only as lookout.
But they’d both had a dogged determination, so when his own tall Americano was ready, he took the same path as his old friend. He really wanted to have a conversation with the other man. What was the story about his wife and marriage? How were the rest of the Walkers faring?
Sue him, but he was curious about what Poppy and Shay had been up to during the past ten years.
Not to mention their older sister.
Turning the corner into the seating area, he caught sight of Brett in the far corner at one of the brightly painted picnic tables set on the scarred cement floor. Across from him sat dark-haired, blue-eyed Mackenzie Walker.
Zan’s world spun again as a thousand memories assaulted him.
Cheeky little-girl Mac, with her gamine grin and her resolve to do anything and everything along with her big brother and his best friend. Like Brett, he’d ignored her, teased her and even went to great lengths to ditch her until her pouting lower lip would melt his will.
Coltish preteen Mac, all skinny arms and legs and big eyes that followed his every movement. She’d had dark mutterings about every high school girl who caught his and Brett’s attention freshman year.
Then she’d been in high school, too, and other boys were fixating on her. For a time, he’d fooled himself that his own interest in Mac was merely brotherly—and that the eye daggers he threw at the guys who hit on her were because he only had her best interests at heart. Then one summer afternoon, a playful wrestling match rocked his world when he flipped her to her back and found himself hovering over her, his hips between her spread legs.
This is Mac, he’d tried telling himself. Mac, who in winter had a habit of shoving snow down the back collar of his jacket. Mac, who’d once pretended to have a leg cramp while swimming in the lake so he’d jump in to save her—wearing his favorite leather boots. Mac, who’d hidden his car keys when he was sixteen so he was late to pick up Hot Body Harmonie Ross the night he was her date to her senior prom.
Mac, he’d thought, as he’d lowered his head and kissed her.
She’d tasted like cinnamon candy and paradise. Sweet, burning heaven.
He and Brett had gone a round or two about the change in circumstances until Mac herself waded in and made clear—with a fist to her big brother’s gut—that being with Zan was her choice. And no one was fiercer about getting what she wanted than Mackenzie Marie Walker.
They’d been together as a couple for two years while he finished up his college degree. After fulfilling that promise to his grandfather, he’d left town, hell-bent on quenching his wanderlust.
A decade had passed since he’d held her in his arms...until the night of the wedding reception. Impulse had directed him to slip behind her and pull her against him. He’d breathed in her scent and enjoyed the slight weight of her against the frame of his bigger body.
But he’d resisted allowing her to look at him then.
And now, as if she sensed his presence and his thoughts, her head shifted slightly and her gaze left her brother’s face for his.
He went dizzy and for a moment she wavered in his line of sight like a mirage.
When his vision cleared, his pulse was going too fast and there was a clammy sweat on the back of his neck. He hauled in a steadying breath and reminded himself that this beautiful woman was the same old Mac of his youth.
At the wedding, she’d naturally looked different in her bridesmaid getup and her hair in a fancy twist. But he hadn’t taken the opportunity to notice other changes. Now they were all he could see.
Without thinking, he walked slowly toward her, drawn to the fine-boned elegance of a face that, in the past decade, had lost all remnants of childhood. Her cheekbones were etched, her nose straight and small, her lashes and her mouth lush. Her blue eyes, he saw, were the icy shade of water beneath the thin frozen surface of a mountain lake.
And he didn’t remember them ever looking so cold.
Brett must have noticed his sister’s switch in attention, because he glanced over his shoulder as Zan approached their table. When Zan put his cup on the table, the other man didn’t say anything, but he did slide along the bench to allow Zan space beside him.
The movement was begrudging and Mac’s stare still so very chilly.
“Is this any way to greet the guy who knows your deepest, darkest secret?” he joked, settling into place.
When they didn’t answer, he tried out a smile. “The hollowed-out log near the cabins? The secret compartment to keep hidden treasures?”
Brett’s mouth twitched. “God, what must be in there? Mac, didn’t you stash that unicorn Beanie Baby in the hole, sure it would be worth a mint in a few years?”
She
