Midnight Kiss (Virgin River #12)(4)

“Well,” Nate said. “I guess you probably have a lot in common.”

“Uh-oh. Bad breakup?”

“Let’s just say, you ever been around a good one?”

“I should’ve known. She didn’t give me a chance. And here I thought I’d bungled it.”

“Gonna go for round two?” Jack asked him.

Drew thought about that a minute. “I don’t know,” he said with a shrug. “Maybe I should wait until she gets a little more wine in her.”

Nate slapped a heavy hand on Drew’s shoulder. “That’s my niece, bud. I’ll be watching.”

“Sorry, bad joke. I’d never take advantage of her, don’t worry about that,” Drew protested. “But if she shoots me down twice, I could get a serious complex!”

CHAPTER TWO

DREW NURSED HIS BEER slowly and joked around with Jack and Nate over a plate of wings, but the subject of breakups had him thinking a bit about Penny. There were times he missed her, or at least he missed the idea of what he thought they would be.

He had met her while he was in med school. She was a fellow med student’s cousin and it had been a fix up. The first date had gone smoothly; the next seven dates in as many weeks went even better and before he knew it, he was dating Penny exclusively. They had so much in common, they grew on each other. She was an RN and he was studying medicine. She was pretty, had a good sense of humor, understood his work as he understood hers and in no time at all they had settled into a comfort zone that accommodated them both. And it didn’t hurt that the sex was satisfying. Everything seemed compatible.

Penny had been in charge of the relationship from the start and Drew didn’t have to think about it much, which suited him perfectly. He was a busy guy; he didn’t have a lot of time for flirtation or pursuit. Penny was very well-equipped to fill him in on their agenda and he was perfectly happy to go along. “Valentine’s Day is coming up,” she would say. “I guess we’ll be doing something special?”

Ding, ding, ding—he could figure that out easy. “Absolutely,” he would say. Then he’d get a reservation, buy a gift. Penny thought he was brilliant and sensitive and all was right with his world.

It had been working out effortlessly until he asked her to go to Southern California with him, to live with him. His residency in orthopedic surgery was beginning, he’d dated Penny exclusively for a couple of years and it seemed like the natural progression of things. “Not without an engagement ring,” she’d said. So he provided one. It had seemed reasonable enough.

But the move from Chico changed everything. It hadn’t gone well for Penny. She’d been out of her element, away from her job, friends and family, and Drew had been far too stressed and overworked to help her make the transition. She was lonely, needed attention, time, reassurance. And he had wanted to give it to her, but it was like squeezing water out of a rock. It wasn’t long before their only communication was in the form of arguing—make that fighting. Fights followed by days of not speaking or nights in which she cried into her pillow and wouldn’t take comfort from him, if he could stay awake long enough to give it.

Drew shook off the memory and finally said to Nate, “So, tell me about Sunny, who, if you don’t mind me saying, might be better named Stormy….”

“Well, for starters, jokes about her name don’t seem to be working just now,” Nate replied.

“Ahh,” he said. Drew was distracted by a sudden flash and saw that it was none other than Stormy Sunny herself with the camera, getting a shot of a couple in a toast. “What’s with the camera?”

“She’s a photographer, as a matter of fact. A good one,” Nate said. “She started out studying business in college but dropped out before she was twenty-one to start her own business. My sister Susan, her mother, almost had a heart attack over that. But it turned out she knew exactly what she was doing. There’s a waiting list for her work.”

“Is that a fact?” he said, intrigued. “She seems kind of young…”

“Very young, but she’s been taking great pictures since she was in high school. Maybe earlier.”

“Where?”

“She lives in L.A. Long Beach, actually.”

Long Beach, Drew thought. Like next door! Of course, that didn’t matter if she wouldn’t even talk to him. But he wasn’t giving anything away. “Is she a little artsy-fartsy?” Drew asked.

Nate laughed. “Not at all—she’s very practical. But lately she’s been trying some new stuff, shooting the horses, mountains, valleys, roads and buildings. Sunrises, sunsets, clouds, et cetera.” Nate looked over at Sunny as she busily snapped pictures of a happy couple. “It’s kind of nice to see her taking pictures of people again.”

Drew watched Sunny focus, direct the pair with one hand while holding her camera with the other. Her face seriously lit up; her smile was alive and whatever it was she was saying caused her subjects to laugh, which was followed by several flashes. She was so animated as she took five or six more shots, then pulled a business card out of the pocket of her jeans and handed it to the couple. She was positively gorgeous when she wasn’t giving him the brush. Then she retreated to her spot by the hearth and put her camera down. He noticed that the second she gave up the camera, her face returned to its seriousness. The sight of her was immediately obscured by partiers.