Guarding His Heart Read online

Georgie turned and glared at its owner as she dropped the kayak. She put her hands on her hips and stood over him. “I don’t know who you are, mister, but here in Nebbiton, we do the neighborly thing and look out for someone who needs a hand.”

  By the time she’d finished speaking, he’d pushed himself to his feet and she took a step back to look up at him. She was tall, but he towered over her and stared at her before she dropped her gaze and turned away.

  “Come on, Mutt. It’s time for us to go home.”

  She shot him a final look to make sure he was still standing before she headed toward the path, through the orange grove, and back to the cottage, Mutt close at her heels.

  House-sitting Ana and Blake’s cottage until she left for Hawaii was opportune, as Georgie had given up the lease on her small apartment in Nebbiton. She had also offered to look after both Mutt and Sooky the cat while she was there. Mutt was supposed to be going into town to stay at Uncle Renzo’s house until Blake and Ana came back from New York in the spring, but until Georgie left he could stay by his beloved beach and Sooky could also stay in her familiar surroundings. Now Sooky wrapped herself around Georgie’s legs, meowing for her dinner. Georgie threw Mutt’s leash onto the table on the porch. By the time she’d walked up from the beach the sun had set, and she flicked the light on after she opened the door.

  She couldn’t get the guy on the beach out of her head. Maybe she should have stayed with him, no matter how rude he’d been. There was no sign of a car anywhere along the road. He could have paddled for miles before he’d come ashore.

  With a shrug, she tried to put him from her mind. That was the old Georgie; always the worrier, always the caretaker of everyone’s feelings and well-being. The new Georgie, with strong resolve and thick skin, would forget all about him and let him look after himself. She’d always hated confrontation, but her soft side would have given in and she would have stayed to see if he was okay, no matter what he’d said.

  Yes, that’s a big step forward. Turning my back on him and leaving him to look after himself.

  Brent’s comments had toughened her up. Knowing that he had used her sealed Georgie’s determination to change. Supposedly, what didn’t kill you made you stronger, so now she was a new, stronger Georgie. No more looking after guys in need. Mr. Kayak Paddler was her first test. Okay, she’d sort of rescued him—but now he could go it alone.

  No longer was she going to try to make everything right for everyone.

  And I passed with flying colors.

  Now for an early night, to get ready for an early start at the house next door, while she worked up the courage to take on her trip around the world.

  I can do it. But the last thing to flit through her mind as sleep claimed her was a gaunt, unshaven face with ice-blue eyes.

  Chapter Two

  Liam sneezed and put his hand up to his forehead as he felt the pull on his skin. His hand came away smeared with a streak of blood. The small wound had begun to bleed again. He’d managed to staunch the slow bleeding last night once he’d climbed the hill, stripped off his wet clothes, and showered, but he’d ended up with a raging headache. Now he swung his bare legs over the side of the bed and sat for a moment until the throbbing eased. Then he pulled on his jeans and padded barefoot down to the kitchen. He rummaged in the medicine cabinet above the stove and found some of the Tylenol he’d unpacked a couple of days ago. He swallowed two, and chased them down with a large glass of water. He stood there for a moment, debating whether to put the coffeemaker on or go back to bed. A shiver ran through him as he registered the chill of the cold tiles beneath his bare feet. He glanced up at the clock and sighed. It was close to seven o’clock and it wouldn’t be long before the restoration company arrived to start work on his bookshelves. He had to get to the computer today. He couldn’t afford to let another day slip by without putting some words on paper—or screen.

  After he put the coffee on, Liam crossed to the window and looked out over the ocean. There was not a breath of wind, and the silver sheen of the calm water soothed him. Nothing moved; the trees were still in the quiet before sunrise, and there was no birdsong. He’d been relieved to only occasionally hear the dull roar of traffic when the wind blew from the east, but he had been dismayed last night to see lights on at the house next door. It looked like there was someone in it. He’d avoid them and keep to himself. The last thing he felt like doing was being neighborly. This house was perfect for him. He grinned to himself. Okay, he might be too young, but he saw this cliff top house as his place to settle and be happy as a recluse. He’d had enough of traveling and the experiences that went with it. He was here in Northern California to stay. If the neighbors thought he was a hermit, that would suit him just fine.

  That thought reminded him of the woman down on the beach last night. He knew he’d been rude, but overturning his kayak had been a stupid, careless thing to do, and he’d been angry at himself. When she’d tried to help, it had been the last straw, and she’d borne the brunt of his ill temper. It was bad enough that she’d retrieved the kayak while he’d lain on the sand. He hadn’t needed her to administer first aid to him. God, he was lucky she hadn’t tried mouth-to-mouth on him. Even though he’d told her he was okay, the headache this morning was bad enough to make him suspect he had a touch of concussion.

  A flash of bright color along his fence caught his attention and he leaned forward and peered through the glass. Damn, it was almost as though he’d conjured the woman up. He stepped back into the shadows as the woman from the beach followed the dog along the back of his fence line. He’d discovered who lived in the house next door. She was dressed in jeans today, with a long-sleeved red-and-white-checked shirt hanging loose over them, and a small bag slung over her shoulder. The red in her shirt clashed with the deep auburn hair he’d noticed yesterday. He waited for her to turn onto the beach trail but she headed for his back gate. The clang of the metal latch told him she was coming onto his property, and he groaned.

  What the hell is she doing here and why so early in the morning?

  He definitely was not feeling neighborly this morning.

  …

  As Georgie opened the gate to the house next door to Ana’s cottage, an unfamiliar ripple of fear ran through her.

  Alone. It had been almost two years since she’d last been out on a building job, and back then she’d always had Sienna and Ana with her. Since the three girls had sold their restoration business and gone their separate ways, she’d worked in the office of Blake’s hardware store. Ana had settled down to look after her new baby and Sienna had immersed herself in her sculpting and her gallery in Carmel.

  Now Georgie stood inside the gate and took a deep breath as she curled her hand in Mutt’s fur. He put his head against her leg and looked up at her with his deep brown eyes.

  Alone, completely alone. And she knew it wasn’t just the experience of being alone on a job that was making her legs tremble. It was accepting that being alone in life was what she wanted. It was the decision she’d made. What she’d pushed herself into in the last two months finally hit her as she stood outside this dark, forbidding house. She was similar to her mother. Marietta had pretty much died alone, and it looked like her own life was going in the same direction. Her mother had been unhappy, but that wasn’t going to be Georgie’s way.

  I am going to be positive about my life alone. It wasn’t about being alone; it was about independence, and she would embrace it. No more mooning about for her. No more men to make her life complete.

  It was certainly not a prediction any of them would have made a few years ago. The standing joke among the three friends had been Georgie’s determination to get married and live the suburban dream.

  Who would have imagined their current situations? Ana had Blake and their gorgeous little baby, Faith. Sienna was madly in love, settled into domestic bliss and running the gallery with Jack, her artist partner.

  And here am I. Not alone…just independent.

  “Y
ou are such a coward, Georgie Sacchi.” She fought back the tremble in her legs and took a deep breath as she gripped the gate with shaky fingers and pulled it shut behind her with a firm click. “Get over it. That is your new mantra. Forget ‘it’s not you, it’s me.’ From now on it’s going to be, ‘I value my independence.’”

  As she looked around, her muscles slowly relaxed and the panic began to subside. The sun cleared the treetops over Portola Redwoods State Park to the east, and a glimmer of confidence filtered though her as the early-morning sunlight hit the water of Half Moon Bay. The bay was a mirror of unruffled silver water, and it calmed her. She swallowed and headed for the front door of the old mansion. She and the girls would have loved to have gotten their hands on this place when they were in the restoration business but old Mr. Humphries had hung on to it until he’d died. When the house had finally gone on the market, it had sold within a week. No one even knew who’d bought it.

  All Georgie knew was that it belonged to some author who now wanted two whole rooms of bookshelves built. She’d dropped the contract off for Blake in Carmel a few weeks back.

  She had no doubt she could do the job. She’d brought her tape to measure up this morning. After she did the measuring, she’d take Mutt back to the cottage and head into the hardware store to pick up the supplies to get started. Georgie let a grin cross her face; the new owner would soon find out there were a lot more jobs needed in the old house. It could keep her cousins, Tony and Johnny, the new owners of the restoration business, in work for years, if the man could afford it.

  “Are you lost?” The deep voice pulled her out of her reverie and she looked up at the open door and stifled a gasp. It was the guy from the beach. She hadn’t even considered that he might be her new neighbor.

  “You’re still bleeding,” Georgie said stupidly as the smile left her face.

  She stared at him as he brushed his hand through his longish hair and pressed the pad of his thumb against the small cut. With his hair dry and some color back in his face, he was even better-looking than yesterday. The angles of his face, which had appeared gaunt and harsh in his pallor yesterday, when his hair had been wet and plastered to his skull, now settled into high cheekbones that were accentuated by the dark stubble on his jaw. His light brown hair curled slightly and reached past the base of his neck, brushing his bare shoulders. Pale blue irises in almond-shaped eyes were fanned by long dark lashes, but his eyes were still as cold and unfriendly as they’d been yesterday. He had the most beautiful lips she had ever seen on a man, but they were set in a straight line.

  “What do you want?” His voice was terse.

  Georgie pulled herself together and closed her mouth as he stared at her. “I’m here for the, er…the job.”

  He ran one hand through his hair at the same time he eased the door closed. “Look, I’ve got no idea what you’re talking about. And yes, I’m bleeding and I have the mother of a headache. Good-bye.”

  The door shut in her face and she looked down at Mutt. At least her sad thoughts and panic had fled. She grinned and rapped on the door. Showing the rude man up was going to be enjoyable.

  “Go away.” Even when he was being rude, his husky voice sounded sexy.

  Neighborly, too.

  She lifted her hand and knocked again, and waited. The door opened slowly and he stared at her without speaking.

  “Knock, knock,” Georgie said.

  “What?” Mr. Kayak Paddler frowned and put his hand up to his forehead.

  Maybe the guy had a concussion?

  “You’re supposed to say ‘who’s there?’”

  “Who’s there?” Gritted teeth and not even a glimmer of a smile.

  “The bookshelf.”

  “The bookshelf who?” There was a tiny twitch at the corner of his gorgeous mouth.

  “The bookshelf builder. I am here”—Georgie enunciated each word clearly—“to build your bookshelves.”

  “What?” The look on his face was priceless, and any sympathy she had for his injury had disappeared.

  “I’m from BB Hardware. You ordered two rooms of bookshelves to be built?” She grinned down at Mutt when he supported her with a loud bark.

  “Yes. Yes, I did.” The hunk holding the door looked from her to Mutt and frowned. “You’re the handyman?”

  “Yes, I’m the tradesperson. That’s correct.” Georgie held out her hand as she bit back the nasty retort that had sprung to her lips. Brent had had a problem with her doing a “man’s job,” as he’d called it

  “Now let’s start again. I’m Georgie Sacchi and I’m here to measure for your bookshelves.”

  He looked at her through the open door and scratched his head, ignoring her outstretched hand. Georgie kept her eyes away from his bare chest.

  “So? Are you going to let me in…or don’t you want the job done anymore?”

  “Yes, of course I do.” He opened the door a little and she took a step forward. “Where’s your car?” The frown was deepening the furrows at the top of his nose. “And why did you bring the dog?”

  “My car is at the cottage and I knew if Mutt saw me come over here without him, he’d howl all day.”

  “The cottage?”

  “Look, are you sure you don’t have a concussion from your accident yesterday?” It was time to take control. “Hold that door open. I’ll be back in a minute.” She grabbed Mutt’s collar, led him around to the back of the house and opened the gate to the small garden. There was a bowl beneath the garden tap, and she filled it with water. She took a quick look around to make sure nothing had changed and that the garden was still secure before she closed the gate behind Mutt and hurried back around to the front door.

  The door was wide open but there was no sign of Kayak Man. Georgie took a hesitant step inside and called out. “Can I come in?”

  She waited, but all was quiet. Taking a tentative step toward the hall, she looked around and shook her head; the place was in even worse condition than she remembered from her last visit here.

  The sound of running water drew her to the kitchen. She’d visited here with Ana when they used to drop meals off for Mr. Humphries when he’d been homebound, and she knew her way around the place. Kayak Man stood at the sink holding a small cloth to his head.

  “The blasted cut won’t stop bleeding.” He threw her a look but she couldn’t read his expression.

  “Sit down.” She pointed to the stool at the breakfast bar. “Where’s your first aid kit?” She might have forgotten how to do CPR, but she was more than capable of putting a Band-Aid on a wound. He lifted his head and those piercing blue eyes held hers for a moment before he inclined his head to the left and winced. “There’s a small plastic basket in the cupboard above the fridge.”

  Georgie walked across the kitchen and opened the cupboard he’d indicated. The basket was at the front of the shelf, and overflowed with boxes of bandages, tubes of lotion, and packets of medication. She dug through until she found a box of small circular bandages. “One of these should do the trick.”

  He sat on the stool as she’d directed, but if the look on his face was any indication, he wasn’t at all comfortable with the handyman administering first aid.

  She picked up the Band-Aid and walked slowly around the counter. “The quicker you let me do this, the sooner I can get to work and leave you in peace.”

  Georgie pulled a bandage from the box and ripped it open. The snap of the plastic filled the uncomfortable silence in the room. She looked down at the bandage as she peeled the adhesive cover from the back, without once looking directly at him. “What’s your name? The guys at the store didn’t tell me, and I haven’t collected the job sheet yet.”

  She grinned. I’m not going to tell him I call him Mr. Kayak Man. The expression on his face gave little hint of a sense of humor.

  “Liam. Liam Wyndham.” At least he answered her. The name was familiar, but she couldn’t place it.

  Deftly, she reached out and lifted away the small towel he
had pressed to the wound. The cut was small and surrounded by a deep blue bruise. Georgie’s legs went to jelly. As much as she was acting as though she could do this, she looked away from the jagged sides of the cut, which was still slowly seeping blood.

  “You did a good job on yourself there. That’s a nasty cut and you have a spectacular bruise. Do you think you should go to the hospital?”

  “No.” He reached his hand out. “If you can’t do it, give me the Band-Aid and I’ll put it on.”

  “I can do it.” She leaned forward and tried to concentrate on placing the bandage carefully across the wound without getting the adhesive edges on the broken skin. She ignored the warmth from his bare shoulders as she leaned over him.

  “There, that’s it.” She looked at his forehead and waited for a minute. The uncomfortable silence stretched between them and he kept his gaze averted. “There’s no sign of fresh bleeding.”

  Liam pushed himself up to his feet and turned toward the door on the far wall. “Follow me.”

  And that’s all he said, not even a thank-you. She followed him down the hallway, up two flights of stairs, and across another small hall before he stopped outside a set of solid carved double doors.

  “This is going to be my office.”

  He flung open the door and stepped into the room without checking to see if she was behind him. Despite his injury, he’d taken the stairs two at a time and she’d had to hurry to keep up. The room was huge and she spun around slowly, looking at the bare plastered walls.

  “So where do you want the shelves?”

  “All around.” He gestured with a sweep of his arm.

  “On every wall?” She knew she sounded skeptical. It was a huge room that Joe had used as a spare bedroom. The room was bigger than the apartment in Nebbiton she’d just vacated.

  “Yes, and butting right up to the side of both the windows.” The windows were large and pushed out and there was a magnificent view of Half Moon Bay from this side of the old house.

  “How high?” She waited for his answer, knowing what he was going to say before he answered.