Barefoot Bay_Shelter Me Read online

  Table of Contents

  Letter from Roxanne St. Claire

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  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Ten months later

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  About Elana

  Text copyright ©2017 by the Author.

  This work was made possible by a special license through the Kindle Worlds publishing program and has not necessarily been reviewed by Roxanne St. Claire. All characters, scenes, events, plots and related elements appearing in the original Barefoot Bay remain the exclusive copyrighted and/or trademarked property of Roxanne St. Claire, or their affiliates or licensors.

  For more information on Kindle Worlds: http://www.amazon.com/kindleworlds

  Shelter Me

  A Barefoot Bay Kindle Worlds Novella

  Elana Johnson

  AEJ Creative Works

  Contents

  Letter from Roxanne St. Claire

  Get free books!

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Ten months later

  Leave a review

  About Elana

  Letter from Roxanne St. Claire

  Dear Reader,

  Welcome to Barefoot Bay Kindle World, a place for authors to write their own stories set in the tropical paradise that I created! For these books, I have only provided the setting of Mimosa Key and a cast of characters from my popular Barefoot Bay series. That’s it! I haven’t contributed to the plotting, writing, or editing of Shelter Me. This book is entirely the work of Elana Johnson, an author new to Barefoot Bay but certain to become a favorite.

  This book has so many elements I adore in a romance novel! Secrets, scandal, sparks…and dogs. I think readers will adore this lively new voice on our island and will be rooting for snowbird hero Noah to find his tropical shelter with one very special woman. Enjoy!

  Roxanne St. Claire

  PS. If you love this island paradise, be sure to pick up one of eighteen titles I’ve written set in Barefoot Bay. And there are more than sixty novellas in the Barefoot Bay Kindle World penned by other authors in the same setting. Come for a short visit or lose yourself on the beautiful beach and fall in love over and over again! All the books are listed at www.roxannestclaire.com.

  Get free books!

  Elana writes contemporary cowboy romance under the pen name Liz Isaacson. And she has a special preorder available now! COMING HOME TO STEEPLE RIDGE is coming in January 2018, and you won’t want to miss this special preorder price of only 99cents!

  Tap here to check out the special pricing, preorder bonuses, and more!

  Join Elana’s newsletter to stay updated with new releases, get a free novella, access to exclusive bonus content, and more!

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  Tap here to see all of Elana’s books.

  1

  “Come on!” Abby Thames extended her arm a little further, but the ring stayed determinedly out of her reach. The tip of her middle finger brushed the diamond, but her shoulder felt like it was being wrenched from its socket by a chiropractor bent on torturing her. She knew; she’d been in a car accident years ago and the resulting “therapy” to align her bones had caused more tears than the crash itself.

  But she needed that ring. The fabric of her party dress bunched under her knees as she pressed herself further into the porcelain bowl of the toilet she’d cleaned only hours ago. Rockrose was her favorite villa to clean, though if she were being honest, having a day off was better.

  But having a day to herself didn’t happen anymore, and while Abby mourned that fact at certain times, she normally didn’t mind this new life she’d carved for herself on Mimosa Key. Today, though, with that stupid text coming in the middle of the night—LA never sleeps, she thought—she wanted to jump in her car, cross the causeway, and leave the beach in her rearview mirror.

  All beaches. Everywhere. The way she’d done before.

  But before she could do that, she needed the blasted diamond she’d dropped behind the toilet. If only this luxury resort didn’t have such—

  A noise behind her propelled her forward, desperation clogging her throat now. She needed to get this ring and get out. Maybe she could slip out to the pool deck before whoever had entered the villa spotted her.

  Her finger had just touched gold when a man said, “Who are you?” from behind her.

  Abby latched onto the ring, sliding it onto her left ring finger in the same swift motion she used to stand and face…the gorgeous stranger.

  A male stranger who was tall, athletic, with his dark-as-ebony hair pulled back into a man-bun. She licked her lips, finding her throat dry. Her voice scratched as she said, “Sorry, I dropped—left—something in here yesterday.” Not entirely a lie.

  He swept his gaze from the top of her blonde head to her pink-sandaled feet and back. Abby had the distinct feeling he was sizing her up in the five seconds it took to take her in, and she didn’t like it.

  Especially because a frown pulled at his eyebrows. “How did you get in here?”

  “Oh, I…” Her fingers wound around and around one another. “I borrowed the key from the maid.” He didn’t need to know that she and the maid were one and the same. Abby glanced over his sizeable shoulder to the exit behind him. The need to leave filled her, clouding her reasoning. Or maybe that was the salty sea breeze scent this man had brought with him.

  He folded his arms, which only accentuated the muscles in his biceps. Definitely an athlete. Definitely time to go.

  The feeling of suffocation she’d left behind in California filled the room the same way this man’s presence did. The same way Marcus always had whenever he stepped through a doorway.

  “I’ll go,” she said, shooting forward, the fabric of her dress rustling around her legs. “Sorry to bother you.” At least she wasn’t wearing her uniform anymore. She’d changed into this dress to attend a brunch put on by the chef at the resort’s restaurant for the Sunday morning staff. The clothes weren’t even hers, and she resisted the urge to itch her neck where the fabric scratched.

  She didn’t like this dress. She hadn’t liked the eggs benedict either, though she’d been assured by another maid that they were divine.

  “It’s fine,” the man said as she gave him a wide berth. No need to take in another intoxicating lungful of his fresh scent. “Did you stay here recently?”

  Not technically, but she gave him the brightest smile she could muster. “You’re definitely the reason I had to vacate the premises earlier than normal.” She ducked out of the master bath, through the bedroom, and onto the pool deck before she breathed again.

  Making sure she had her Mimosa Maids keycard tucked securely in her pocket-sized purse, she hurried out to the beach and away from the upscale villas of Casa Blanca.

  A tang of guilt sat on her tongue, but she couldn’t tell him she was the maid who’d cleaned his villa at the crack of dawn that morning so he could check in before noon. Couldn’t tell him she’d worn the ridiculous diamond to work just to get Etta off her back about her engagement. That hadn’t helped, because she’d dropped it before the blasted brunch and couldn’t even prove to the thorn in her side colleague that she indeed possessed a diamond ring. Couldn’t get back to her car fast enough to call Mandy and confess.

  She’d clear
ed her entrance to Rockrose with the owner of the maid service, of course. But Mandy would still want to know Abby had encountered the guest. She cursed her bad luck—again—as she dialed her boss and told her everything.

  “Do you know who he is?” Abby asked once she finished.

  “No idea,” Mandy said. “Someone who wanted early access to the villa and didn’t want housekeeping during his entire stay.”

  “How long will he be there?” Abby checked to her left before pulling onto the road that led away from Barefoot Bay and down to the south side of the island, where her aunt was surely waiting for her tea. Aunt Macey didn’t seem to know she wasn’t English and didn’t need tea before she could consume lunch.

  “Let’s see…” Tapping came through the line as Mandy checked the reservation on her computer. “Looks like he’s in town for the duration of the veterinarian conference. Four nights. Wait. He’s extended to five nights.”

  Abby nodded like that made sense, though Mandy couldn’t see her and Abby didn’t really care how long it would be until she had to replace his Egyptian cotton sheets.

  “Did you find what you lost?” Mandy asked, jolting Abby out of her thoughts.

  “Yeah.” She nodded again, a ball of emotion sticking in her throat and eradicating her ability to say more.

  “All right, well, see you tomorrow.”

  Abby hung up, her mind lingering on her side-by-side job with the owner of the cleaning company tomorrow. Mandy made sure she got out with every maid in her company, into all the rooms and villas at Casa Blanca. She wanted her employees to know she cared about them, wanted to ensure they were all dedicated to providing quality service to the high-end resort, needed to make sure the all-green products they used were being well received by the guests.

  Abby admired Mandy. In a lot of ways, she wished she were more like the small business owner. More satisfied with simple things. More sure of herself.

  But as Abby arrived at her aunt’s house where she’d been staying for the past six months, she still didn’t know who she was—and she needed to figure that out before anything else. Simply being on this tiny island without her normal distractions had helped immensely.

  She flipped the diamond around her finger, the band too big. She looked at the princess cut of the gem, wondering if she even liked it. Or had she squealed over it because Marcus had been down on one knee? Because the gem was practically the size of her fist? Or did she truly like the shiny gold band, the cut of the diamond, what it stood for?

  Abby shook her head. “I don’t like any of it.” She yanked the ring off her finger and stuffed it in her tiny purse, satisfied that she’d made her own decision about the ring. It seemed like moments such as this one were hard to come by in her life, and she was tired of being tossed about by whatever wind happened to be blowing, whatever man happened to be walking by, whatever happened to be on trend at the moment.

  As she marched up to her aunt’s door and entered the house that time had forgotten, Abby felt like she’d found another little piece of her identity.

  Noah Benson stared at the toilet where the woman had been bent over, that pale blue party dress hiked almost all the way up around her hips. He glanced over his shoulder like she’d still be standing there, though the sliding glass door that led to the pool had closed a good thirty seconds ago.

  She’d seemed nervous and confident at the same time, and he wondered if he could learn her name from housekeeping. Just as fast as that traitorous idea had entered his mind, he shook her from his thoughts. He didn’t need to torture himself with the fact that she wore her blonde hair in the same pixie cut his ex-girlfriend did, exuded a sweetness he wanted to taste, and had looked at him and not seen a snowboarding god.

  She’s not here, he told himself. And Jules wasn’t. Would never be. Not after she’d—

  His phone saved him from spiraling into the dark recesses of his mind, a loud chirp followed by a bl-l-ling! to let him know his meeting was about to start. He looked at the calendar notification, a sour taste entering his mouth. He was about as excited about this veterinary conference as he was about getting his teeth pulled.

  He sighed, left behind the master bathroom with all its tasteful design, and moved outside to face the Gulf of Mexico. The air here entered his lungs differently. Breathing should’ve been easier at the lower elevation, but Noah felt like every breath was filled with concrete and not oxygen.

  He wasn’t born for beaches, but for mountains, ski slopes, pine trees. The palms here didn’t soothe him the way they probably did most of Casa Blanca’s ritzy guests.

  Of course, he wasn’t ritzy, even if he had opted to stay in a private villa instead of the block of rooms reserved for the veterinary conference guests in the main, three-story building.

  He couldn’t help feeling like a fraud. He’d never practiced veterinary medicine. Didn’t have a clinic. The closest he came to animal care were his two dogs, Barksdale and Lord Pawton—only adopted last month. A bark drew his attention from the turquoise waves—not nearly big enough to surf on—and toward a golf cart that cruised to a stop in front of him.

  His black lab—Pawton—leapt from the back of the cart like it had caught fire. The golden retriever, Barksdale, licked the driver, who laughed and swung his legs out of the vehicle. “You’re Noah Benson?” He scanned Noah like he didn’t believe it.

  “Yep.” Pawton nosed his hand and that seemed to appease the bellhop.

  “Sign here for the dogs.” He handed Noah a clipboard, and he signed that he’d received his animals.

  “Thanks. C’mon, Barksdale.” But the golden retriever stayed on the cart, inching his paws forward and then back, too nervous to leap down.

  Maybe too old. Noah moved forward and lifted Barksdale easily into his arms and set him on the sidewalk. “Let’s go, guys.” He’d adopted the dogs only a month ago, in Naples, before landing in Mimosa Key at this conference.

  He felt very much like the two strays he’d rescued: lost, adrift, alone.

  Barksdale and Lord Pawton gave him comfort. Provided hope that maybe he’d be able to pick up the shattered pieces of his life and move forward. The mid-February sun shone down on him, much hotter here in Florida than it would probably ever be in Jackson Hole.

  Don’t think about it, he lectured himself as he took the dogs into the villa. If he allowed himself to think too much about a different kind of luxury resort, he’d only get angry. And anger only led to one thing: too much alcohol. And that led to sleeping with the wrong woman.

  He wouldn’t do that. Wouldn’t be like his deadbeat dad who’d left five fatherless kids from one side of the country to the other as he tried to “find himself.” Whatever that meant.

  Noah watched Pawton leap into the swimming pool with wild abandon, a smile tugging at his lips. He did love dogs. So he might as well get on over to the conference and see if he could pass himself off as a reputable veterinarian.

  2

  “Now?” Abby whispered into the phone, glancing over her shoulder to where her beloved aunt sat. Her fingers seemed made of flight as they worked the knitting needles. “I promised my aunt I’d spend the afternoon with her.”

  “This is a big job,” Mandy said, her voice set on boss-authoritative. “Lacey’s asked for more help, and you’re one of my best girls.”

  “But you said—”

  “It’s not maid work,” Mandy repeated. “It’s hostess work, and you’re great at that.”

  Abby could use the money, sure. She just didn’t want to earn it by doling out drinks and carrying trays of hors d’oeuvres around to a bunch of animal doctors. Even if the blindingly good-looking one she’d met in Rockrose would be there. Especially if he’d be there. Explanations would have to be made. Identities revealed.

  She sighed, a sure sign that she was about to give in. “I need a half an hour.”

  “Get here when you can.” Mandy hung up, leaving Abby alone to face her aunt. She tucked the phone in her back pocket as she re
turned to the TV room where Aunt Macey spent most of her time.

  She crouched in front of her, but the knitting needles didn’t slow or stop. “Aunt Macey, that was my boss. I have to go into work for a few hours this evening.”

  The yarn stilled. “I thought you said you had the day off after going in so early.” Her dark eyes clouded with confusion.

  “I did, but they need me to come in.” She sighed as she stood. “It’s good overtime money.”

  Not that her aunt cared about that. Her husband had died five years ago, leaving a large life insurance policy. The house in the Keys was paid for, and Aunt Macey had her friends and her church group to keep her company. So Abby had been somewhat shocked to find her in such a disheveled state when she’d arrived six months ago.

  She’d gotten the yard cleaned up, the house cleaned out, and her aunt to a couple of doctors in Fort Myers.

  She coughed, the lingering symptom of the walking pneumonia she’d had for months before Abby had arrived. Other than that, though, Aunt Macey was doing just fine.

  “You’ll be okay?” Abby asked. “There’s leftovers in the fridge.”

  “I’ll be fine.” Aunt Macey waved like she’d been the one taking care of the house, the dishes, the bills. She beamed up at Abby. “You go on,” she said like Abby was going to a grand party. Well, technically she was. But not as a guest.

  She bent down and gave her aunt a quick squeeze. “Love you.” A familiarity between the two women pulsed through her, and she was reminded of how good it felt to be here with Aunt Macey. No, she didn’t have Internet. The TV only blared six channels. And her phone only made calls if she hovered near the front of the house.