Page 23 of Forbidden Kisses
The kid, who wasn’t such a kid, waved and headed toward his truck. Jack finished off his water and tossed the plastic bottle into the recycling container under his truck’s toolbox. Then he drove home, got cleaned up, and headed to meet the rest of the Sawyer clan and Grace for their monthly business meeting at Castaways.
Grace had been with the company little more than a week, and Noah had been avoiding her the entire time. Jack pretended not to notice because he had no idea what to do about it. He couldn’t make his younger brother forgive and forget. It wasn’t that easy. Although Grace’s reentering Jack’s life had been pretty damn easy so far.
The five of them sat around a table at Castaways and sipped their beers.
“Grace, you’ve done a good job,” Pete said. “It’s good to have you with us.”
Sam and Jack nodded their heads. Noah, on the other hand, stared into the crowd and drank his beer.
“Thank you.” Grace looked between them. “It’s good to be at the company…So, getting straight to business, you have three guys interested in joining a fall crew for theSummerly,after the high schoolers return to classes.”
Noah didn’t look at her. “Or Jack could return to the boat and we could move on with our lives and catch some fish.”
Jack frowned.
“Um, I’ll post another ad,” Grace continued. “I would handle the interviews, too, but—”
“But you don’t know anything about fishing,” Jack said, cutting her off. “You could end up hiring someone with, I don’t know, as much experience as you to work on theSummerly.”
Grace lifted her chin and turned to him. “I still think I could do it.”
Sam put his beer down. “Wait. You want to work the boats now?” he asked Grace. “I thought you were our office manager.”
“I am. I just…I want to enter the East Coast fishing tournament.”
Everyone, including Noah, turned to look at her.
“You’re kidding, right?” Sam asked.
“You’re a woman,” Pete said.
“That’s sexist, Dad,” Jack said, running a hand through his hair. Even though he didn’t like the idea of Grace out on the water, either.
“I can take care of myself, Mr. Sawyer. You taught me everything I need to know. I just need a boat and a crew. We could do this.”
Sam’s jaw dropped. “We?”
Grace shrugged. “I thought you guys were fishermen. You should be jumping at opportunities like this.”
“I mentioned it to Jack earlier,” Pete said. “It’s good for the company to have a representative out there. I think it’d be good for you, too, son,” he told Jack.
“I told you I’d think about it,” Jack snapped. He’d thought about it, though, and there was no part of him that wanted to do the tournament.
“We understand if you can’t hack it this year,” Sam said, sparking anger inside Jack.
“I can hack it. I just don’t want to, all right?”
“No offense,” Sam said, turning to Grace, “but—”
“If you call me a woman I’m going to knock you senseless.” Grace folded her arms over her chest.
Jack couldn’t help but laugh. Grace was determined, and he had no doubt that she wasn’t going to let this drop. She’d get herself killed if she went out there without someone who knew what they were doing, though. Concern for her safety trumped everything. He groaned into his beer and then set it down. “Fine. I’ll do it,” he said, knowing he’d regret this right along with his next several beers in the morning.
Grace smiled. “Good, because I’ve already entered you as my crew member.”
Jack frowned. “What?”
“I entered you as my crew. I put myself down as the captain.”
