Dare to Love

  Dare to Love

  Jill Sanders

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Text copyright © 2019 Jill Sanders

  Printed in the United States of America

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  * * *

  Published by Grayton Press

  Digital ISBN-13: 978-1-945100-02-4

  Paperback ISBN-13: 978-1-091684-95-9

  Summary

  Head back to Pride Oregon to find out what some of your favorite Jill Sanders’ characters are up to.

  * * *

  Riley was living the dream: running her own business, being her own boss, and finally moving into her own place. Things couldn’t be any better, with the exception of catching Carter Miller’s attention. If only the sexy man next door would make his move. Maybe she’d just have to nudge him along.

  * * *

  Carter was in deep. Holding in his feelings for Riley was becoming too difficult. Especially when his brother’s wedding was less than a month away, and he was forced to work one-on-one with the woman who made his body, mind, and heart betray his better judgment.

  Chapter One

  Carter stood behind the counter and glanced up, the heat from the pizza oven hitting him full force. He felt his heart skip the moment the petite blonde strolled in the front door of Baked, his pizzeria. He knew his brother, Corey, would take Riley’s lunch order and no doubt chat with her while she waited, but for just a moment, he wished it was him that she’d come down the street to see.

  He turned away as she approached the countertop, unable to look at the woman he’d been thinking and dreaming about for the past two years. Instead he tried to focus on his work.

  His ears perked when he heard Riley say his name. He glanced towards her, and the side of his wrist touched the hot oven as he slid a pan of lasagna into place.

  Cursing under his breath, he rushed towards the sink and ran chilly water over the growing red mark. It wasn’t the first time he’d burned himself and it wouldn’t be the last. It certainly wasn’t the worst burn he’d ever had, either.

  “Oh, here, let me help.” Riley was beside him quickly, taking his arm and twisting his wrist until she could see the burn. When Carter glanced towards Corey, his brother smiled at him and shrugged.

  “I’m taking a break. Emma, take over for me, will you?” Corey said loudly to their employee. He tossed down his apron and walked around the counter without another word.

  Carter watched over Riley’s head as his brother left out the front door without looking back. He knew Corey would be making his way over to visit Lilly, his fiancée, who worked in the boutique next door, Sassy and Classy Boutique, which she owned and ran with Riley. The cousins had opened the store almost a year ago, and the place was always busy.

  “Hold still,” Riley told him softly, gaining his attention again.

  “Sorry,” he mumbled, turning back towards the sink. He watched her blonde head as she cleaned the burn on his arm, which he’d already forgotten about. Her hair was longer than when he’d first seen her, but still her signature bright blonde color. Her skin already had a warm glow from the sun, even though spring had just officially bloomed around town.

  She worked on his wrist as he assessed the rest of her. She was always dressed stylishly. Owning a boutique didn’t hurt, but she’d dressed like that prior to opening her store. Maybe she’d opened it because she liked to dress well. Either way, he’d never seen her looking anything less than perfect, not even when she and her cousin had been working on remodeling the building next door.

  She’d been covered in construction dust and had still looked like an angel.

  “It doesn’t look bad,” she said after drying off his skin with a clean towel. “But you’ll want to put some salve on it when you get home.” Her fingers were still resting on his arm. His eyes moved to her fingertips, and he noticed that her nails were a soft powder blue.

  “What?” he asked. He could barely hear past the loud booming heartbeat in his ears; the sound was almost deafening.

  “Put something on this when you can,” she said more slowly, her eyes running up and down him. “Are you okay?”

  “Sure.” He snapped out of the daze. “My brother left so… if you wanted to order…”

  “I was actually here to see you.” She glanced around. “Can you take a break?”

  He frowned. “Why?”

  She put her hands on her hips, a move he knew meant that she was annoyed. “Because I need to talk to you,” she said more slowly and a bit louder, like one would with a child. He could hear the annoyance in her voice, which caused him to smile. He didn’t know why, but he told himself he was far better off with her hating him.

  He glanced around and waved Robin over. “I’m taking ten.” He motioned to the ovens. “Cover for me?”

  “Sure thing, boss.” Robin, the first employee he’d hired over a year ago, took over at the oven and started the next order. Shortly after hiring Robin, they had hired her granddaughter, Emma. Then a few months back they had brought on two high school students, Mike and Jay, to help out in the evenings.

  He must have stood there too long for Riley’s liking, because she gripped his hand and tugged him towards the rear of the building.

  He and his brother shared a small office in the back, but it was mostly Corey’s, since he was in charge of the books. Carter used it occasionally to take phone calls from suppliers, but that was it.

  Stepping into the small room with Riley seemed like asking for trouble, especially when she shut the door behind her.

  He didn’t have a moment to think about what being so close to her did to him before she turned on him. The scent of her soft perfume surrounded him, making his mind dull and full of wonderful daydreams of holding her, touching her, kissing her… and more.

  “We have to do something,” she said in a desperate voice, causing his eyebrows to shoot up.

  “We?” he asked, leaning back on the desk, those images going even crazier now.

  Riley started pacing the small space and talking quickly. He stood back and waited. He’d tried a few times in the past two years to get Riley to speed up her storytelling and get to the point, without any success. The best way to make her get to the point was to wait it out. So, he leaned against the desk and tried to follow her logic.

  She mentioned his twin a few times and Lilly. His brother’s wedding to her cousin was in less than a month.

  He’d helped his brother secure a little place down the beach for the wedding. Since their inheritance from their grandfather had started flowing to them, his brother had been busy with the legal aspects of franchising Baked, their pizzeria. There was a lot of legal paperwork to start the process, but his brother was taking on most of that burden. The least Carter could do was help him out with his wedding.

  Lilly had filled him in on what she wanted, and Carter had found the place himself. Sunset Weddings was a new business just outside of Pride, started by sisters less than three months ago. From what he could tell, his brother and Lilly would be their first clients. He hoped the sisters were up for the task.

  “You’re not listening to me.” Riley stood in front of him, her hands on her hips as her blue eyes glared at him.

  “Sorry,” he muttered, standing up straight. Riley’s chin rose so she could look up at him. He and Corey weren’t as tall as her father Iian’s six and a half feet, but since Riley was only five four, he figured she looked up to practically everyone in the small town of Pride.

  “Did you hear any of it?” she asked.

  “The part about…” He thought and then shook his head. “No, none of it,” he admitted when her eyes heated.

  Between clenched teeth, she said, “We are going to throw your brother and my cousin a joint pre-wedding party.”

  “We are?” His eyebrows shot up. “Why?”

  “Because it is expected from the best man and maid of honor,” she continued, still with clenched teeth.

  “You?” he asked. He knew that Riley was acting as Lilly’s maid of honor, so he didn’t know why he was asking that. He couldn’t think straight around this woman.

  “Of course.” Riley sighed and rubbed her forehead. “I don’t have much time to discuss this with you.” She glanced towards the door. “My lunch break is almost over, and I haven’t even ordered yet.”

  “You should have told me.” He started towards the doorway, but she stopped him by putting a hand on his arm.

  “No, this first. Food can wait.”

  He looked down at her. “Never say that to a restaurant owner,” he joked, getting a slight smile from her.

  “The party?” she asked.

  “When?” He pulled out his phone.

  “Saturday, two weeks from now.”

  “We can have it—”

  “Don’t say here,” she warned. “As I just explained, if you’d been paying attention, we can’t have it here.”

  “Why?” he asked, earning a glare from her. “Fine, then where? The Oar?” The Golden Oar was her family’s restaurant. The place sat right along the coastline and was a staple in the small town.

  “No.” She shook her head. “I was hoping…” She bit her lip
and a massive wave of desire hit him, the same desire he’d been fighting for the past two years. He had his reasons for fighting it. To begin with, she was much younger than him. He was a few months shy of his twenty-eighth birthday, and she’d just hit her twenty-second a few months back. What was the acceptable age difference nowadays, anyway?

  Six years didn’t seem like a lot, but still, it had been enough to make him back off. Even without the age difference, he’d told himself that it was just strange to want the cousin of his brother’s fiancée. Wasn’t it? His brother told him that he was just fighting it because he was afraid of Riley. That, of course, was laughable.

  Sure, she was short and a whirlwind of energy most days, but him, afraid of her?

  “Go on,” he hinted when she continued to look up at him, her full bottom lip tucked between her white teeth.

  “I was hoping to have it at your new place,” she finally said.

  “Sure,” he agreed, easily.

  “Really?” Her eyes went wide.

  “Why not?” He tucked his hands into his jeans to fight the urge to reach out and run them through her hair, pull her close, and cover that sexy mouth with his own.

  “It’s just, you just moved in. Won’t you need some time to, you know, unpack?”

  “I didn’t have much to unpack.” He chuckled. “Blake’s over there right now, putting the finishing touches on the place.”

  The first thing he’d done after receiving their first inheritance check was to buy the massive old house, which sat near its own private beach. The second thing he’d done was to hire Blake Shelby, soon to be Stevens, to redecorate it. It had been worth every penny.

  “She’s done already?” she asked.

  “Well, she will be, later this week.” He ran his hands through his hair, remembering the mess that his house was soon to be. Still, he figured he could work a couple extra hours during the night to finish it up himself if he had to.

  He knew that his brother and Lilly had started building a new house on her family’s land. Apparently, the Jordan clan owned a lot of it just outside of town.

  Buying his new place was, by far, the biggest thing he’d ever done, besides opening Baked with the little money he and Corey had saved after years of hard work.

  But he’d taken one look at the old place and had fallen head over heels. The classic Victorian home sat on a cliff overlooking the small town of Pride along the Oregon coast. There was a small yard, which needed a lot of work. He planned on starting that weekend. There was also a long set of stairs that led down the hillside to a secluded beach of his very own.

  But if he had Robin fill in for him so he could work through the weekend, he figured he could have the yard looking good enough for an evening party two weeks from now.

  “Will it be ready for about a hundred guests?” she asked, worry still filling her eyes.

  “One…” He sucked in his breath at the thought of that many people at his home. It was big enough, but so far, he’d only had his brother and Lilly over. Riley hadn’t even seen the place yet. “Sure,” he said. The way she was looking at him, with hope in her eyes, he would have agreed to anything. “Listen, why don’t you come over later this week and check it out. That way—”

  “Okay,” she jumped in, touching his arm.

  His eyebrows shot up. “Wow, no argument there.”

  She chuckled. “I’ve been dying to see the place, to see what Blake has done to it. And…” She elongated the word to last several syllables. “I’ll need to make a list of things we’ll need for the party.”

  He nodded. “Good, how about Friday night then?” He instantly wished he could take it back. Fridays were the busiest nights at Baked. Besides, he didn’t think he could get most of the work done by then.

  “Perfect.” She reached for the door. “I’ll bring dinner.” Her eyes narrowed at him as her cheeks turned a slight pink. “You know, because it could take some time.” Her face turned even brighter. “To go over… everything.” She turned away and yanked open the door, but it didn’t budge. On the third try, her hand broke free from the handle and her momentum sent her sailing back into his chest.

  His hands came up to her shoulders, holding her so that she wouldn’t land on the floor.

  “Easy,” he warned. “The door gets jammed every now and then.”

  “Oh.” She was facing away from him. The smell of her inches away from him had his fingers tightening slightly on her skin. Bare skin, he realized, and he dropped his hands quickly, but not before he felt her shiver at his touch.

  “Sorry,” he said softly, then he stepped around her and tried the door himself. On the second try, it flew open, smacking him solidly on the chin.

  “Are you okay?” she asked, moving around to check his chin. Now her fingers were lightly playing over his jawline.

  “Great.” He gripped her wrists. “I’ll get your order.” He dropped her hands and moved past her, hoping she’d follow him back out to where they wouldn’t be alone with one another.

  Why had he invited her over to his place Friday? What had he been thinking? Now he was going to spend a whole evening alone with her. How the hell was he supposed to get through that?

  Chapter Two

  Riley straightened her shirt, making sure not to tip over the tray of lasagna she held in her other hand. It had been stupid of her to offer to bring food. The moment the words were out of her mouth, the look in Carter’s eyes had made her realize it.

  After all, it wasn’t like this was a date or anything. This was her checking out his home to make sure the place would be perfect for Lilly and Corey’s party.

  The fact that she wanted to check out its owner at the same time made her act like a teenager with a crush.

  Okay, she wasn’t a teenager anymore, but the crush part…

  The front door swung open quickly, and she almost fell backwards. She was thankful she caught herself in time.

  “How long were you going to stand out there?” Carter asked as he leaned against the doorframe.

  She swallowed the rush of lust that caused her throat to close. She’d seen him plenty of times in his work uniform and had even seen him in a suit and tie once for a Christmas party, but this was the first time she’d seen him in a faded t-shirt and worn jeans with a hole in the knee.

  Damn, he looked sexy as hell.

  “I…” She shook her head. “Just…”

  By the way he was smiling at her, she realized he’d meant to catch her off guard. “Come in.” He reached out and took the container of food from her. “Stopped by the Oar first?” he asked, as she stepped through the massive front door. Windows arched over the glass door, and there was smoked glass on either side of the doorway. The entry hall of the house was everything she’d imagined it would be.

  A long staircase took up the entire right wall, with a small classical fireplace tucked neatly under it. An iron statue of a mermaid sat in the fireplace, one that her cousin had purchased at an estate auction. Riley had sold the piece to Blake just last week. The mermaid looked good in the abandoned fireplace.

  Her eyes ran over every detail of the room as Carter closed the door behind her.

  To the left stood a simple entry table and bench. Shoes were lined up under the bench, making the place feel warm and lived in.

  A large chandelier hung in the entryway, another piece Riley had obtained for Blake.

  “Do you like what you see so far?” Carter asked from beside her.

  “Yes.” She smiled.

  “Blake says there will be rugs here.” He motioned to the old hardwood flooring. “She just hasn’t found the right ones yet.” He shrugged. “Come on back.” He started walking down the hallway.

  She slowly followed him, passing French doors to an office on the right. Bookshelves lined the back wall of the larger room, while a desk and chair sat in the middle of the room. The walls and bookshelves had been painted a warm greyish blue, making the room look more modern.

  The next doorway was smaller, and she figured it housed a small bathroom. Stepping into the main room of the house, she sucked in her breath.