Need You for Mine (Heroes of St. Helena)(86)
With a final kiss that held so much promise, Adam took Harper’s hand and led her through the vineyard and toward their families—and the best kind of extraordinary that Harper could have dreamed.
acknowledgments
Thanks to my agent, Jill Marsal, for your advice, dedication, and unwavering friendship. And to my editors, Maria Gomez and Lindsay Guzzardo, for taking the time to push me to grow as a writer and dig deeper with each story I tell. To the rest of the Author Team at Montlake, thank you for making every book special, and for welcoming me into the amazing Montlake family.
As always, a special thanks to my husband, who is not only a real-life hero, but my real-life hero. I love you.
Read on for a sneak peek of Marina Adair’s next heartwarming romance from her Sequoia Lake series
it started with a kiss
Available early 2017 on Amazon.com
Editor’s Note:
This is an uncorrected excerpt and may not reflect the final book.
chapter one
If life was an adventure, then Avery Morgan needed to fire her travel agent and demand a refund.
She wasn’t a demanding person by nature, but that’s what happened when the universe issued an early expiration date on living, it gave you cojones. So Avery issued herself a new passport on life, and was ready to put some stamps in each and every column.
Her first destination required crisp mountain air, fireside s’more-tinis, and a real get-back-to-nature kind of adventure—one that would hopefully give her the skills needed to live out loud.
Avery looked through the windows of the local Moose Lodge at the imposing Sierras, a rugged mountain range that cut through Northern California and towered over her quaint hometown of Sequoia Lake.
“Before you begin your climb, you want to make sure you give the chest harness a final tug to ensure it’s secure,” she said as if she were the foremost expert on extreme adventures. As if her entire world—up until a year ago—hadn’t consisted of managing retirement portfolios at her family’s bank and listening to couples talk about their senior cruise to Alaska.
She bent over slightly to click the last carabiner into place, securing the leg straps to the chest harness.
There was something so poignant about that sound, about how with one click the device restricted her freedom and pressed down on her scar, a reminder that she was strapped in and fully committed to the climb.
“I’ll tug it,” Mr. Fitz offered, his bony fingers already reaching out to help. Or grope. Avery couldn’t be sure, so she stepped back out of range.
Mr. Fitz was three thousand years old, with teeth too white to be real, and, even though he looked like a harmless old-timer in his TOO BIG TO THROW BACK fishing hat, his eyes were laser pointed at Avery’s chest—which was prominently on display because of how the harness fit her body.
“I’m fine.” Avery swatted his hands away right before they made contact. “But thank you for the offer.”
Mr. Fitz backed off, taking his seat, but looked awfully disappointed.
Senior X-Tream Team, the town’s invitation-only fly fisherman’s club, had asked Sequoia Lodge to their monthly meeting, since the first topic on their agenda was to finalize their big summer excursion. And since Avery was Sequoia Lodge’s newly appointed adventure coordinator, it was her job to go out into the community and solicit new customers. If she secured all twelve members for this excursion, then she’d meet her entire quota for September in one fell swoop.
She straightened her shoulders—an impossible task due to the climbing harness—and held out a clipboard to the crowd. “Now, if that answers all the questions, let me tell you about the amazing views from—”
Mr. Fitz’s hand went up.
“Mr. Fitz?” she said thinly since this was his ninth question.
“If I fall on this climb, will you be there to catch me?” he asked, and a dozen gray heads bobbed in support.
“Your harness is secured to a safety line and a main line,” Avery said, reiterating verbatim the lodge’s safety manual of the precautions taken in any excursion that included chest harnesses. But to ease the concerned looks, she added, “Plus your adventure guide is with you every step of the way to make sure your trip is exciting and safe.”
Another hand flew up. The captain, as he preferred to be called, was the president of Senior X-Tream and seemed to be the ladies’ man of the group. With his silver-streaked hair, captain’s hat, and deck shoes, the man looked as though he’d just stepped off his boat and was ready to impress. He was also trying his hardest not to look at Avery’s chest. “If you fall, can I catch you?”
“I don’t go on excursions. I just coordinate them,” she said, leaving out the part that with every party confirmed, she got a bonus adventure for herself.
A series of disappointed mumbles filled the room, and she dropped the clipboard to the table, silencing the room with a bang. “Now, can all of those in favor of Senior X-Tream starting off their fall season with the River Rock climb please raise their hands?” she asked in a tone that usually had her customers signing on the dotted line.
Not a single hand went up. Which was odd since she’d come here to pitch the Fern Falls fly-fishing day trip and the group had specifically asked her to explain the River Rock climb, even going as far as having her demonstrate how the harness worked. And since that trek had a special place in her Living for Love passport, she’d suited up.