Scandal on the Sand (The Billionaires of Barefoot Bay #3)(37)
Author: Roxanne St. Claire

“You know he’s living over there in Barefoot Bay,” the checker chimed in as she started ringing up Liza’s bananas. “In fact, my aunt’s going to the baseball groundbreaking thing this afternoon to get a chance to see him.” She laughed. “What is it about that guy?”

“He’s hot,” offered the woman in the back.

“He’s loaded,” Mike added.

“And he’s…” Liza looked at the paper right before she relinquished it to the checker to ring it in. “In love.” And so, according to her insanely wild heartbeat, was she.

Laughing, the checker took the paper and squinted at the picture. “Let me read that. ‘Despite the Ivory Glass billions,’” she read in a newscaster tone, “‘Nate says the only family that matters to him is the one in his future with a lady he calls a wonder woman.’” She gave an exaggerated eye roll. “Gag me with the cheese, please.”

“I think it’s romantic,” said the lady in back.

“I think—”

Liza whipped around and stopped whatever joke Mike was going to make. “You’d be wrong. And so would you,” she said to the checker. Then she pointed to the woman behind him. “But you’re right. He’s romantic and hot. And I”—she gave an apologetic look to the cashier—”don’t have time to pay for this.”

They stared at her, shocked, but she didn’t wait around, pushing the cart fast enough to get a gleeful shriek from Dylan. “Aunt Liza! Where are we going?”

“To your daddy,” she whispered, scooping him out of the cart. “And we aren’t going to almost-quite-not make it there in time.”

* * *

The crowd around the patch of dirt in the central part of Barefoot Bay was sizable but still full of familiar faces to Nate. Zeke and Mandy stood arm in arm while the mayor made a speech. Becker and Frankie held hands, sharing jokes and teasing looks next to him. Several of the resort staff and townspeople had joined in and, of course, there was Julia Simpson, the reporter from The Mimosa Times who’d done such an incredible job with his story, and lots of folks from the local political scene.

But no Liza Lemanski.

After a few minutes, Nate stopped looking and concentrated on his job, which was to keep this little event rolling. He handed the mayor some facts and figures he’d been drawing up for the past week. He provided remarks for the local architect, too, but Clay Walker Jr., who’d also designed Casa Blanca Resort & Spa, spoke extemporaneously about the new project.

As Clay neared the end of his brief speech, Nate mentally checked off what came next, then opened his file for the list of county commissioners’ names to thank. Flipping the papers, he didn’t see the list.  He knew it was in here. He straightened the folder and examined the papers again. Had he forgotten that? Once more, he looked, sensing he had about five seconds before Clay finished and he had to—

“It’s right here.” Two slender fingers reached into the file folder and slid out the list of names. “I put it right behind the commissioner’s letter.”

Nate snagged those fingers, squeezing as if they—and their owner—might disappear in a flash of his imagination. But she didn’t. Instead, two beautiful blue-green eyes looked up at him, smiling, shining, and incredibly…real.

“Liza.” He barely breathed the name he’d thought so many times in the last few weeks it felt like the four letters had been tattooed on his heart.

“I read the tabloids,” she whispered as if she knew the hundred questions in his head. “You really need to be careful what you say to the media.”

A slow smile curled his lips, a smile he felt it all the way down to his gut. “I told the truth.”

“You’re in love?”

Around him, the world faded away. The sights and sounds and worries evaporated as he gave his entire focus to the one thing that mattered. Could he tell her right here and now?

Could he not?

Somewhere, a throat cleared. A woman said, “Aww.” And Becker snorted.

Only then did Nate look up and realize that Clay had stopped speaking, and everyone gathered around the soft dirt and oversized groundbreaking shovel was staring at him.

Nate pulled the list the rest of the way out of the folder and turned to Zeke. “Could you read this list and recognize these people? I’m kind of busy right now.”

Zeke smiled and walked to the center of the ceremony while Nate closed his eyes with a soft laugh. “Yes,” he finally answered her question. “I’m in love.”

Her eyes widened along with her mouth, opening to a sweet little O that he desperately wanted to kiss. “What about you, Wonder Woman?”

For a long time, she didn’t answer, holding his gaze and letting the air between them crackle with expectation. “I am, too,” she whispered.

He couldn’t wait any longer. Pulling her into him, he kissed her mouth with all the pent-up certainty that had been in his heart since she drove off and left him shattered.

Huge applause broke out, along with plenty of hoots and hollers. “I have a feeling,” he mouthed into the kiss, “that isn’t for the county commissioners.”

She laughed and folded into him, wrapping her arms around him while they listened to Zeke announce that it was time for the first shovel of dirt. Holding Liza’s hand, Nate walked forward and picked up the gold-painted spade, cameras humming and snapping all around.

Holding the shovel over the dirt, he glanced around, then settled on the only face in the crowd that mattered to him—the woman at his side. “I’ve never been more happier to be part of a great team,” he announced.

As he stuck the shovel in the soft dirt, another cheer rose as he tossed the dirt to the side, one voice louder than the rest.

“D-I-G! Dig, dig, dig!”

Dylan’s little legs were flying, but Liza’s mother had a good grip on him, holding him in the back of the crowd. Nate gestured him over. “C’mere, buddy!”

Paulette let him go, and Dylan shot through the crowd straight to Nate, falling in the soft dirt the minute he reached it. That caused another eruption of crowd noise and cameras snapping, but all Nate saw was the beautiful face of his child.

Without thinking, he dropped to his knees, and Dylan reached up and threw filthy hands all over him, smearing his white Polo with dirt.

“Dylan!” Liza laughed, kneeling next to both of them.

“N-A-T-E!” he cried, smacking his hands on Nate’s chest, making him howl with laughter.