Chapter 1
It was a terrible, no good, horrible day to die. For one thing, Lexi Clark hadn’t yet eaten the rack of double-fudge cookies in her purse. And for another, her entire existence was still circling the drain after being fired and dumped all those months
ago. Going toes up before she fixed her life would suck.
“Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking” came from the overhead speakers. “When we left Greensboro, the weather in Reno promised a fair day, but coming in for our approach, we’ve got high winds and a dropping temp. So buckle up, Buttercups,
it’s going to get a little bumpy.” He clicked off, and then came back on, the speakers screeching, making everyone groan.
“I nearly forgot the silver lining—those of you on the left have a gorgeous view of Lake Tahoe, which is deep enough to cover the Empire State Building. In fact, if the entire lake spilled out, it’d cover the state of California under fourteen inches
of water. But no worries, since it’s also two million years old, the odds of that happening are pretty slim.” He gave a little laugh. “Okay, guys, hold on tight. We’re coming in hot.”
Awesome —and then a squeak of shock escaped her as the plane dropped, right along with her stomach. Her lungs suddenly refused to suck in air as her entire body broke out in a cold sweat.
“I need a snack,” the woman on her left whispered, eyes squeezed shut, white-knuckling her grip on the armrest. “We flew all the way across the damn country without a courtesy snack and now I’m going to die hungry. Why didn’t I just buy food?”
“Because a bag of chips costs seven bucks,” Lexi gritted out, also white-knuckling the armrest, though she kept her eyes wide open because she had some twisted need to see death coming for her.
“Oh, right.” The woman let out a breathless laugh that turned into a scream when the plane dipped again, yanking shouts, gasps,
and Hail Marys from the other passengers as belongings went flying through the cabin.
Lexi reached out at the same time as the woman did, their hands blindly clasping tightly to each other. The cabin felt like a cyclone around them, the air filled with flying debris and more screams. When she’d boarded, she’d walked past first class
with a twinge of envy, but now, seeing drinks and trays whip around while they fell out of the sky had her stomach reversing direction, getting stuck in her throat, making her glad she hadn’t eaten.
They dipped again, so hard her body went airborne, giving her the unnerving sense of being a balloon on a string—until the seat belt yanked her back.
The woman at her side whispered, “The universe is going to keep us safe. The universe is going to keep us safe. The universe is going to keep us safe...” She squeezed Lexi’s hand tight enough to crack bones. “Say it with me.”
Lexi didn’t want to blaspheme, but believed in the universe caring about her about as much as she believed in love. “Talking the universe into doing anything for me is over my pay grade.” Like waaaay over.
“It’s not,” the woman said with sweet sincerity. “The universe provides for anyone who puts their troubles out there.”
The plane leveled out and everyone gave a gasp of relief as the woman turned to look at Lexi. “See?” she said. “You just need to ask.”
Okay, worth a shot. Lexi closed her eyes. Can I have a new job? How do I lose the anger from being betrayed by someone I’d been stupid enough to let into my life? Or soften the emotional blow of this trip to visit my perfect stepsister, while I’m the opposite of perfect?
The plane promptly banked right hard enough to rattle Lexi’s teeth and nearly roll them in a somersault.
“You might just be mouthing the words,” the woman said, squeezing Lexi’s hand. “You have to truly believe nothing that can stop you to be... well, unstoppable.”
“Okay, then, I believe we’re not going to crash and die in a fiery death.”
The woman’s laugh was breathless. “I like you—” She ended that sentence in a gaspy scream as the plane’s nose dipped and then—free fall.
More screams of terror pierced Lexi’s ears. Her own. Everyone’s from all around her. They were heading down, down, down, right to rock bottom, where her life still sat.
“We’re not going to die,” her neighbor cried. “We’re not. I’m a professional manifester, so I’ve got this. We’re not going to die—”
Another terrifying drop and more wailing.
“Not going to die,” the woman said, on repeat. “Not going to die. We can’t, because I haven’t had a man-made orgasm in at least a month.”
A month was nothing. Lexi couldn’t even remember the last time she’d had an org—
The plane dropped again, along with Lexi’s organs ... just as the plane hit the runway.
Hard.
They bounced a few times, the cabin utterly silent now, struggling against the g-forces as they screeched to a halt at the very end of the runway.
The woman still squeezing Lexi’s hand let out a shaky breath, then turned her head and graced her with a big smile.
“Whew. See? I manifested the no-death thing for all of us.”
“Um... Thank you?”
She smiled. “I’m Summer, by the way.” She dug through her pocket and came up with a business card.
Summer Roberts, CPO Chief Professional Manifester
“Fifteen percent discount for friends and family,” Summer said. “Contact me any time. What do you do?”
At the moment? A lot of whining, filling out applications that seemed to go nowhere, and more whining. But until six months ago, she’d been an overachieving, naive art appraiser, working for a company that handled closing down estates.
She’d loved the found treasures, loved the histories of each and every piece, but to do the job, she went into homes after someone had died, where people were grieving, to put price tags on their belongings. To do that effectively, she’d had to learn to disengage herself emotionally.
Turned out, it wasn’t a switch she could easily turn on and off.
Not that it mattered now since she’d lost the job.
The pilot was talking, apologizing for the rough landing as Lexi stared at Summer’s card, wondering if she was desperate enough to believe she could actually manifest a better life for herself.
“Are you okay?” Summer asked.
Lexi nodded. “Yes.”
Summer gestured beyond Lexi. The plane door had opened and people were scrambling to disembark. As the one in the aisle seat, she was blocking Summer from getting out.
Letting out a breath, she grabbed her carry-on and joined the herd. She found herself standing in a crowded terminal, heart still pounding in tune with the headache behind her eyes.
For a minute she’d forgotten why she was even here as she made her way through the throngs of people toward the escalator to exit the airport.
As she began the downward descent, she shook her head, still feeling shaken and lost. Her life. She could’ve lost it today, and while she was a hot mess, she didn’t want to die. She wanted...
What? What did she want? Her sad little truth was that she no longer knew. Not with everything, every single corner of her world, turned upside down and inside out. Her own fault, of course. She’d disappointed herself, let herself down, which felt...
unforgivable.
The escalator seemed to crawl down two full floors toward ground level, and she didn’t even care, for once her impatience gone, beaten back by the lingering nerves from the flight. She had a case of vicious jitters, her limbs trembling like she’d consumed too much caffeine.
She shouldn’t have come. But her stepsister Ashley, twenty-three to Lexi’s twenty-eight, had called her out of the blue and asked her to. No, begged. She’d begged her to come.
And for reasons Lexi didn’t want to think about too hard, she’d agreed.
She hadn’t been back to her childhood home since she’d been ten. And would she even recognize Ashley?
They talked on the phone every month without fail and texted in between, but they’d only seen each other a handful of times over the years, the last being at least five years ago. She pulled out her phone to access her Uber app, feeling anxiety tighten her chest.
Below, on the ground floor, she caught sight of a woman holding a huge bouquet of flowers and balloons that spelled out “HAPPY BIRTHDAY, STAN!”
Lexi grimaced in secondhand embarrassment for poor Stan, grateful that no one would ever confuse Lexi for a flowers or balloons kind of girl. She hated being the center of attention—
“Lexi! Lexi, over here!” the woman behind the huge flowers and balloons bounced up and down. “Welcome home!”
Dear God. No. No, it couldn’t be. Because not only was the petite redhead in the white tank top and flower power skirt her stepsister Ashley, but she also appeared to be videoing as well as narrating—
“Here she comes, guys, my big sister Lexi! Wait until you all meet her, she’s awesome!” Ashley was saying, looking so happy it hurt to take her in.
Lexi stumbled off the escalator, not even looking at the guy who reached out and steadied her. “Ash? What are you doing here?”
“Picking you up, silly! As for this”—she tilted her head at her phone, still in Lexi’s face—“I’m introducing you to all my friends.”
Oh, for... Lexi reached out and hit the stop button.
“Hey, I was live.”
Lexi eyed the balloons. It wasn’t her birthday, nor was her name Stan. “Did you steal those?”
“Didn’t have to. The grocery store gave them to me for free. The clerk told me the wife ordered them for her husband, but caught him cheating. Just another reason I don’t date anyone with a penis.”
Ashley grinned and threw herself at Lexi, hugging her hard, smelling like cotton candy and forgotten dreams as she rocked them back and forth, making happy noises.
“Hi! It’s really you! You’re here, you’re finally back in Sunrise Cove after all these years!”
Lexi, who’d buried her heart six feet under years and years ago, told herself she felt nothing. A lie, apparently, since her arms came up and returned the hug. Catching herself, she tried to step back, but Ashley shook her head and tightened her grip.
“Not yet.”
Lexi let out a dramatic sigh, but the truth was, the unexpected human contact brought her something she hadn’t felt in a while—comfort.
Feeling eyes on her, she lifted her head and took in the guy standing at Ashley’s side, the one who’d steadied her off the escalator, his gaze calm, quietly assessing, and looking... amused? He was tall. Clearly extremely fit in Levi’s and an
untucked dark blue button-down, a white T-shirt beneath that said Fixologist .
Whatever that meant. He had wavy dark brown hair, a few days of scruff on his face. Eyes a shocking blue gray— No.
No way.
But she’d only ever seen eyes that searing on one person. Heath Bowman, her elementary school rival and archnemesis. Only, it couldn’t be. How had the too-gangly, scrappy, trickster ten-year-old kid grown up looking like... that ?
“She’s turning purple, Ash,” he said mildly. “You might want to let up on the grip.”
Her sister’s name shortened, matched with the affection in his tone, implied the two of them were close. Her sister was close with the kid who’d made Lexi’s life a living hell.
At whatever he saw in her expression, his mouth quirked on one side, disarming enough that two women walking past tripped over each other. But his gaze never left Lexi. “Been a long time, Lex.”
She wanted to growl at him for the nickname that no one else had ever called her. They’d been kids when he’d first used it, the boy who’d beaten her at everything she’d tried for:
their second-grade ski race, the lead in their third-grade play, the fourth-grade spelling bee tournament, and the fifth-grade class presidency—for which he’d cheated by handing out candy for votes.
The rivalry between them hadn’t been born from a crush. Nope, they’d been true childhood mortal enemies.
Not that it’d mattered because that summer she’d gone to live with her dad on the other side of the country—and had ended up staying when Daisy, her mom, had let her gambling addiction blow up her life.
That had been when she’d first realized she’d had much bigger problems than one annoying Heath Bowman. “And you’re here why?”
she asked him.
Ashley’s smile faded a bit. “He’s my emotional support.”
Lexi’s heart stuttered as she turned to her sister. “Why? What’s wrong?”
Ashley shored up her expression and shook her head. “Nothing.”
Fine. Lexi would get it out of her later. In private. But if someone had set off Ashley’s debilitating panic attacks again after she’d been free of them for years now, Lexi was prepared to go to war against them.
“You didn’t have to come,” she said in her softest voice, one she didn’t get much use out of these days. “I was going to Uber. Neither of you needed to take time away from your jobs.”
“I didn’t,” Ashley said. “School just got out for summer. I would’ve loved to teach summer school, but kindergarten doesn’t offer it.”
Lexi turned to Heath, who lifted a lazy shoulder. “Being a nine to fiver isn’t my thing.”
Ashley gave him a look, and he smiled. A real one that met his eyes and everything—which she refused to acknowledge.
Once upon a time, everything had come easy to him, making friends, melting teachers’ hearts, schoolwork, everything, and clearly, he’d skated on charm and charisma right into adulthood.
“And I wanted to pick you up,” Ashley said. “I wanted you to have a big welcome committee when you arrived, surrounded by people who love you.”
Lexi bit back the urge to point out there were only two of them here, especially since she’d bet her last dollar that the taller of them had been dragged here against his will.
“I really appreciate you coming,” Ashley went on. “I know you’re far too busy for a visit, but...” She glanced at Heath.
“Well, there’re some things we need to fill you in on.”
The “we” was deeply disturbing, but here wasn’t the time or place. She’d dropped her heavy duffel bag while they talked, but reached down for it now, ending up in a tug-of-war with Heath.
Ashley laughed. “Mom once said you two could argue over what color the sky was. I didn’t believe her.”
There’d been a time when Lexi had been rotten enough to resent a five-years-younger Ashley, the daughter of Daisy’s new husband, the one who called Daisy “Mom.”
But that had been a reflection of Lexi’s complicated feelings when it came to Daisy, a woman who hadn’t been the best mom—and absolutely nothing against Ashley, whose genuine sweetness and affection had easily torn down Lexi’s walls. “That was all a long time ago.”
Her sister smiled and nudged her closer to Heath. “If bygones are bygones, where’s the nice-to-see-you-again hug?”
Lexi opened her mouth to say hell no, but caught Heath’s gaze. His amused gaze. Dammit. Then Ashley nudged her again and she bumped right into the man.
She really wanted it to be repugnant, but brushing up against his warm, solid frame, something equally warm unfurled in her gut. It felt like a live wire between them, and for the first time in months, she felt a tingle of something she didn’t want to acknowledge.
Attraction.
Shock and annoyance as a betraying flutter went through her. And the only thing that made her feel better? Heath staring down at her, his amusement long gone, something pensive in his gaze now.
Ha! If she had to suffer, then she was glad he would too.
Ashley was watching them, surprise in her gaze. “Huh,” she murmured. “Interesting.”
Heath was still looking at Lexi. “It’s... surprisingly good to see you.”
She blinked at the words, at the surprisingly genuine tone, which threw her off guard. Had she misjudged him?
Had he grown up into a more decent man than the boy had ever been? It certainly wouldn’t have been the first time her instincts had failed her.
Whether that came from her currently empty confidence tank or exhaustion, she needed to set it aside. Especially if he was going to be... nice.
When he leaned in close, she found herself more breathless than the rough plane landing had caused, getting goose bumps where she had no business getting goose bumps.
She blinked up at him, head spinning. Wow, those eyes. They were warm and kind, and her smile came utterly unbidden as he whispered, “ Shotgun. ”