The Cliff House. RaeAnne Thayne

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      Her gaze drifted to his mouth, firm and well shaped and beautifully familiar. She wanted to kiss him. Right now, even with Mari playing with the dogs on the stretch of grass outside the pool area.

      “Shane,” she began, not at all sure what she wanted to say after that one word. Whatever she intended was lost by the dogs’ sudden barks and her daughter’s exclamation.

      “Daddy!” Mari cried.

      If Shane hadn’t been holding Bea already, she would have toppled to the ground in shock.

      Cruz. Here? She whirled around and found the man, the legend, the last person on earth she wanted to see right now walking toward them.

      Out of all the moments out of any day, Cruz would naturally pick this particular one to make an entrance.

      “Hey, Mari Mia!”

      Shane’s arms tightened around her for just a moment before he helped steady her so she could stand on her own.

      “Hola, Beatriz, my lovely wife.”

      Ex-wife, she wanted to tell him. Don’t forget those all-important two letters.

      He didn’t look any happier to see Shane than vice versa. His long-lashed dark eyes seemed to go flat, his lean features to tighten.

      “And Landry. Hey. Fancy seeing you here.”

      “Shane lives here now,” Mari piped up, so very helpfully.

      Cruz greeted that information with a scowl. She probably should have mentioned that fact to him before now, she suddenly realized, especially where she was so very diligent about vetting everyone staying with Cruz when he had visitations with Mari.

      “Temporarily,” she said, then wished she hadn’t when Shane’s mouth firmed.

      She was suddenly annoyed with both of them for this dance they always did, circling around each other like bighorn sheep, ready to bang horns at any moment.

      “He’s renovating his father’s house next door to Stella’s and it was faster to move out so he could gut it and start over, rather than working room by room, living in a construction zone. The guesthouse has been sitting there empty, so I offered it to Shane while the work is being done.”

      She didn’t owe him any explanations. It wasn’t like anything was going on with her and Shane. Even if it were, she and Cruz had been divorced for years and she didn’t doubt her ex-husband had slept with plenty of women in that time. Tabloids like the one she had picked up earlier were always posting pictures of him with some young beauty or other.

      Shane was her oldest and dearest friend. If she wanted him to move into the guesthouse here at Felicidad permanently, Cruz had no right to object.

      “Are you okay, Daddy?” Mari asked, oblivious to the tension between the two men. “We’ve been so worried about you, ever since we heard you were attacked.”

      “I’m fine, mija. Just fine.”

      “The tabloids said you got stabbed. My friend Jamie said you almost died.”

      “That’s an exaggeration. I’ve told you not to pay attention to what you read online or in magazines. I just had a scratch. A couple of stitches, that’s it.”

      He sank down onto the comfortable glider next to their loungers and Mari sat down beside him, still holding his hand. “I’m not saying it wasn’t scary,” Cruz went on. “If it hadn’t been for a friend of mine who pushed me out of the way, things could have been much worse.”

      Like many celebrities, Cruz had plenty of acolytes and hangers-on, but she couldn’t imagine any of them risking their lives for him.

      “We tried to call you and left like a hundred messages.” Mari didn’t bother to hide her frustration with her father. A frustration Bea certainly shared.

      “I’m sorry, mija. Things have been crazy with all the press calling for comments, so I ended up turning off my phone and going silent. Lenny said he called you regularly with updates.”

      “He did,” Bea said. But hearing from a third party wasn’t enough when a girl was worried about her dad.

      She was familiar with that from firsthand experience and it made her heart ache that she and her daughter both knew what it was to suffer from parental neglect. Bea’s own father had been a piece of work. Unlike Daisy, Bea at least knew who her father was, but their relationship had been minimal.

      Her stepmother had disliked her intensely and made sure Steve Hidalgo devoted his time and energy to the children they shared and had as little to do with his love child as possible.

      That was the main reason she did all she could to keep Cruz in their lives. Girls needed their fathers, if at all possible. Without their influence, the scars from that neglect could lead them to do crazy things, like get pregnant when they were seventeen and marry their rocker boyfriends.

      Not that she knew anything about that.

      “Next time you’re stabbed, do a better job of updating those who are worried about you, okay?” Bea said.

      “Sorry,” he said again. “I’m here now, right?”

      “I guess.” Mari hugged him, always quick to forgive.

      “The good news is, I’ll be around for a while. I’m taking an extended break here at Casa Del Mar.”

      As usual, her desire for her daughter to have as healthy a relationship as possible with her father warred with Bea’s desire to live outside the shadow of Cruz’s notoriety.

      “How long are you staying?” She had to ask. Forewarned was forearmed, right?

      He beamed at her and at Mari. “At least a month. Maybe longer. Won’t that be great?”

      Bea did her best not to gulp. “That long? Aren’t you in the middle of a concert tour?”

      “We have two weeks left for the new album. I postponed them and will make up the dates in the fall. My fans understand. After what happened in Dallas, I need a few weeks to recover.”

      Why did he have to recover here?

      She knew she hadn’t spoken aloud but he answered as if he read her mind. “I couldn’t imagine anywhere better to recharge my batteries than here in Cape Sanctuary, with my two favorite girls.”

      Shane made a sound that could have been a scoff or a laugh, she couldn’t quite tell. He wrapped the towel around his neck and reached a hand out to Cruz.

      “It’s good to see you, but I should go,” Shane said. “We’re working on some new plays for the season. I’m glad you weren’t seriously hurt.”

      “Any knife wound is serious. That’s what the doc says. The risk of infection is huge.”

      “Right. Well, let’s hope that doesn’t happen. Thanks for the game of hoops, Sunshine. You get better every СКАЧАТЬ