All i need, p.1
All I Need, page 1
part #1 of Haven’s Bay Holiday Series Series
All I Need
Haven’s Bay Holiday Series
J.H. Croix
Contents
1. Sasha
2. Noah
3. Sasha
4. Noah
5. Sasha
6. Noah
7. Sasha
8. Noah
9. Sasha
10. Noah
11. Sasha
12. Sasha
13. Noah
14. Noah
15. Sasha
16. Sasha
17. Noah
18. Sasha
19. Noah
20. Sasha
21. Noah
22. Sasha
23. Noah
24. Sasha
25. Noah
26. Sasha
27. Sasha
28. Noah
29. Sasha
30. Noah
31. Sasha
32. Noah
33. Sasha
Epilogue
Find My Books
Acknowledgments
About the Author
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
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Copyright © 2022 J.H. Croix
All rights reserved.
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Cover design by Cormar Covers
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Created with Vellum
To letting go.
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Reader’s Note: a short version of this story (17,000-ish words) was released as part of a time-limited free anthology, Holiday Ever After, in Nov/Dec 2019. That anthology was only available for a limited time. This expanded version is over 45,000 words.
Chapter One
Sasha
My headlights offered a narrow path of visibility through the falling snow. Fortunately, my little SUV navigated easily through the roughly six inches of snow piled up on the driveway. I also knew this driveway was a straight shot to the house from the road.
“Hello, Haven’s Bay,” I murmured to myself.
My dog’s tail thumped against the seat, and her furry face appeared in the rearview mirror. “We’re almost there, Matilda.” Her tail thumped in reply.
Although Boston, where I lived, was roughly four hours away from my old hometown, I’d only sporadically come back to the town in Maine where I grew up. The few visits I’d had over the years had been very brief.
The stately house came into view. It stood tall in the snowy darkness with my headlights illuminating the front steps. There wasn’t a single light on. It somehow made sense that my return to Haven’s Bay would be dark, snowy, and without anyone to welcome me.
The sound of my tires was muffled as they rolled through the snow, creating a little path in my rearview mirror. I came to a quiet stop. I didn’t wait because it was cold, and I needed to get inside and turn the heat on.
I left my headlights on, let Matilda out, and hurried toward the front steps. Blessedly, I was wearing a pair of practical black leather boots. Even then, the snow was cold over the tops. Light and fluffy, it slid down into my boots, dampening my socks as I dashed along the path lit by my headlights and up the stairs. I stumbled slightly, but I managed not to fall.
My friend Thea had mailed me the house key, and I fished it out of my pocket, fumbling to find the lock on the heavy front door. In another moment, I finally got the key in and turned it. I pushed the door open, the sound of my footsteps echoing in the tiled entryway.
I reached for the light switch to one side of the door. “Hello,” I whispered to myself as I pushed the switch up. Darkness reigned as nothing flickered on.
“Oh, shit.” My muttered imprecation echoed in the dark foyer.
This grand old colonial home belonged to my closest childhood friend and her siblings. They hadn’t lived here in years either, but they occasionally used it for vacations. Although it had been years since I’d been here, I recalled how it looked. I was standing inside a two-story foyer with a curved staircase along one side with a hallway straight ahead. Along one side of the hall lay the kitchen and the dining room, while what was once a formal parlor room was on the other side.
Despite its familiarity, the entire house now felt spooky and dark and decidedly cold. “Fuck.”
Thea must not’ve known the power was off. I didn’t know what to do. Should I call her? Double fuck. I hadn’t brought my phone in. It was sitting in my warm SUV, plugged into the charger.
I closed the heavy front door behind me, leaning against it and taking a deep breath. So much for my escape to the Maine coast.
I unclipped Matilda’s leash. She was going to sniff like crazy. Her claws skittered on the floor as she dashed forward. She was sniffing so hard that the sound of it echoed in the quiet space. If a serial killer was hiding somewhere in this house, she would find them.
Taking a deep breath, I pushed away from the door. My eyes had adjusted to the darkness, and I could make out the shape of the staircase and the banister I used to slide down with Thea when we were little girls. It was a most excellent banister for that, wide and glossy. The curve made it fun.
Once upon a time, we’d dragged out a mattress and put it at the bottom. We’d landed in a giggling heap. Those were the days. Our childhoods were anything but perfect, but our friendship had been just about flawless. We didn’t see each other much anymore, but we stayed in touch. Thea was one of those friends, the kind I could call no matter how much time had elapsed, and we could fall into a conversation as if we’d just spoken the day before.
When my teenage daughter had begged to go on a ski trip with her aunt for the holidays, I had hemmed and hawed because it would be my first Christmas without her. As a single parent who’d become a mother at the scandalous age of sixteen, it was hard to let go. Thea had told me it was the perfect time for a vacation and some time to myself. I couldn’t argue against that, and I didn’t want to be the kind of mom who clung too hard. My daughter, Quinn, was on her way to Vermont, and I had a week here on the windswept coast of Maine.
Thea had said, “It’ll be perfect. You can have the house to yourself and finally enjoy the pretty views again.”
At the moment, it wasn’t looking so perfect. I had no power and wasn’t quite sure what to do. Luckily, it wasn’t actually Christmas. It was a week before, so I had time to salvage this.
I decided to venture outside to get my phone and use it as a flashlight. It had one of those flashlight apps on it, although I hadn’t ever imagined needing it.
I could still hear Matilda sniffing about, so I stepped out quickly, dashing through the snow and following the tracks I’d created before. I grabbed my down coat out of the passenger seat and my phone before rushing back in. I knew where the fuses were in the basement. I also knew this house didn’t have one of those scary old basements.
The year before I was banished from town because I got pregnant, Thea’s parents had upgraded the basement. Matilda followed me as I carefully descended the stairs in the darkness, the carpeted stairs quiet under my footsteps. Memory was a funny thing. It kind of surprised me that I knew the old fuse box was in the back corner of the basement by the door that led to a set of stairs and another door that went outside.
Shining my phone flashlight on the fuse box, I scanned the rows of fuses. As far as I could tell, they were all on. My hopes for power tonight were dimming.
Turning, I made my way back up the stairs with Matilda bounding ahead of me. Her claws clicked on the hardwood flooring once she crested the top stair. I closed the basement door behind me and stood still in the middle of the hallway, wondering what to do.
Just then, I heard a soft click, followed immediately by Matilda’s sharp bark.
“Who the hell are you?” The voice was male, with the words delivered in a low, commanding tone.
Great. There was no power, I was alone with my exuberantly friendly dog, and now there was a strange man here. I was pretty sure I was being held at gunpoint in the dark. I was also getting cold.
Chapter Two
Noah
The woman squeaked. Her dog started sniffing my feet, its tail thumping my legs as it circled me excitedly. After its initial bark, this dog didn’t appear inclined to be intimidating.
“You know, it’s bad form to bring your dog to a break-in,” I commented.
Even though I didn’t know who this woman was, I was pretty sure she wasn’t a threat. But she was in my family’s old home, deserted and quiet in the darkness. Considering that the driveway was long enough that the front of the house wasn’t visible from the road, it didn’t really matter that she’d left her headlights shining on the house outside.
Maybe having my gun out was overkill, but then, when I came into the back of the house, I didn’t know she had a dog, nor that she was a woman. I watched her hands slowly lift in the shadowy hallway.
“My hands are up,” she said in a shaky voice. “I promise I didn’t break-in. I have a key. Thea gave it to me.”
The second she said my little sister’s name, I lowered my gun and tucked it into my holster. I shouldn’t have even been wearing my holster, but old habits die hard and all that. I’d left at the end of a long day at work in the FBI in Boston and come straight here. “Who are you?”
“Sasha, Sasha Hilts.”
“Sasha?”
“I think it’s only fair you tell me who you are,” Sasha returned.
“It’s Noah, Noah Tate. You know, Thea’s older brother.”
Sasha let out a giant sigh that echoed in the hallway. Her dog was still circling me, and I leaned down to stroke the dog’s head. “What’s your dog’s name?”
“Matilda.”
“Hey, Matilda,” I said conversationally as I scratched behind her ears. Matilda loved that and leaned into my hand.
“There’s no power,” Sasha announced.
“There’s power. I just have to turn it on outside.”
“Oh. Well, that’s good. What are you doing here?”
Sasha followed me as I turned and walked toward the back of the house. I went through the archway that led into the kitchen and straight to the screen door at the back. I’d left it open when I came inside.
“Do you need help?” Sasha asked as we stopped at the doorway.
“Nah. Give me a sec.”
The snow was still falling as I tromped through it to the outside power box about ten feet away from the kitchen doorway. Using a small flashlight I’d slipped in my pocket for the sole purpose of doing this, I held it in my teeth and quickly turned on the main switch to the house. Since my siblings and I, who shared our childhood home, were rarely here, we always turned off the power outside at the main circuit. We also drained the pipes and turned off the water main. I’d turn the water on once we had some light.
In a few seconds, the hallway light Sasha must’ve switched on when she came through the front turned on, along with the kitchen lights. Sasha held the door open for me as I walked through and closed it behind me. I knocked the snow off my boots. Matilda was busy sniffing around the edges of the kitchen.
I lifted my head, and my eyes collided with Sasha’s. I hadn’t seen Sasha in years. She was one of Thea’s closest childhood friends and four years younger than me, just like my sister. She’d been cute when she was a teenager, but now, she literally grabbed my breath and snatched it right out of my chest.
Her dark hair was pulled up in a messy bun with loose tendrils dangling around her face. Her cheeks were pink from the cold, and her green eyes were bright as she stared back at me.
I gave myself a mental kick. “Well, long time, no see,” I finally said.
Her eyes searched my face. “It’s definitely been a while.”
After a beat, I noticed she had her arms wrapped tightly around her waist and was shivering slightly.
“Let me make sure the boiler is up and running. We need some heat, and I’ll turn on the water.”
Striding past her, I crossed into the hallway and down the basement stairs. Matilda followed me, with Sasha coming as well. I turned on the water main and flicked on the switch to fire up the boiler. Like the power, we turned it off when we weren’t here.
After a minute, I nodded as I heard the sound of it starting up. Turning, I looked at Sasha again, startled at the jolt that sizzled through me.
“Let’s get a fire started in the living room and kitchen. It’s probably gonna take a few hours for the house to warm up. I had no idea you’d be here,” I called over my shoulder as I walked up the stairs.
“Obviously, I didn’t know you were going to be here,” Sasha replied. “Thea offered to let me stay here for a week. I guess I need to make other arrangements.”
We crested the top of the stairs, and she followed me into the kitchen. This home was old enough that we actually had a freaking fireplace in here. When I was growing up, my parents had updated it with a wood stove insert for efficiency. This, in addition to the large fireplace in the living room, would do a nice job of throwing off some heat.
“No need to make other arrangements,” I said as I began to gather wood stacked neatly in a rack right beside the stove. I presumed my older brother, Dallas, who had been here last Christmas, had enough sense to leave the wood behind. He was that kind of guy, always organized and planning ahead.
“Are you sure? Are other people coming?”
“Nobody else will be here until next weekend. Lord knows, there’s plenty of room.”
When I straightened, Sasha was chewing on her bottom lip. Fuck me. She had a mouth made for sin. Her lips were plump and full, and a little dimple was right in the center of her bottom lip. Her teeth dented the smooth pink surface as she stared at me.
“Are you sure?” she repeated.
“Absolutely.”
At that moment, her stomach growled. She slapped her palm over it, her cheeks flushing pink. This woman was a walking distraction. In the corner of my mind, I wondered if it was crazy that I’d just told her it was no problem for her to stay here. But she was one of my sister’s best friends, so I wasn’t about to kick her out in the snowy darkness.
“Hungry?” I asked dryly.
“Apparently,” she said with a sheepish smile.
“I picked up a pizza on the way through town. I’ll help you unload what you have, and then we can heat it.”
By the time Sasha set the empty paper plate on the coffee table and leaned back into the couch cushions, the living room was warm and cozy. The snow was still falling outside with gusts of wind buffeting the house while we ate. She’d fed Matilda in the kitchen, and Matilda had trotted into the living room with us and was currently napping in front of the fireplace .
“So what are you doing here a week before Christmas?” Sasha asked.
Thus far, we had covered the basics. We’d investigated the options for bedrooms. Only one room actually had a bed in it. My two brothers, my sister, and I were slowly getting the house furnished after almost losing it in a legal mess our father created, but the house had been stripped of everything by the time Dallas had managed to save it from the creditors.
I’d insisted Sasha take the room with the bed, and I would sleep on the couch. Maybe we didn’t have the whole place furnished yet, but Thea and I had picked out this cushy sectional last year. I had no worries about sleeping comfortably on it.
After I’d helped Sasha carry her things in, she’d insisted on helping me with mine. All the while, I managed to notice far too much of Sasha. She was wearing jeans, and the fabric hugged her lush bottom. My palms itched to slide over her curves and savor their feel.
Considering she thought no one would be here, I knew she wasn’t dressed for my attention. Unfortunately for me, and decidedly inconveniently, Sasha in jeans and a faded V-neck T-shirt did nothing but rev my body’s engine.
