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  Praise for Denise Hunter

  “Can romance be any more complicated than a bride who doesn’t remember running away from her groom? Denise Hunter’s take on a woman’s attempt to find her way back to happily ever after again is sweetly endearing. Readers will keep turning pages, wanting to know how true love ever went so wrong . . . and if The Goodbye Bride gets her chance to say ‘I do.’ ”

  —BETH K. VOGT, 2015 RITA FINALIST AND AUTHOR OF CRAZY LITTLE THING CALLED LOVE

  “I’ve been a long-time fan of Denise Hunter’s, and The Goodbye Bride has everything I’ve come to love about her romances: a plucky heroine with lots of backstory, a yummy hero, and a terrific setting. Her fine attention to detail and the emotional punch of the story made me want to reread it immediately. Highly recommended!”

  —COLLEEN COBLE, USA TODAY BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF MERMAID MOON AND THE HOPE BEACH SERIES

  “Denise Hunter has done it once again, placing herself solidly on my must-read list! The Goodbye Bride is a tender, thoughtful look at the role memories play in a romance. The clever plot kept me up way past my bedtime—and happy to be so!”

  —DEBORAH RANEY, AWARD-WINNING AUTHOR OF THE CHICORY INN NOVELS

  “The Goodbye Bride is one heart-stopping, page-turning romance that will leave the pickiest romance reader delighted and asking for just a few more pages.”

  —CARA C. PUTMAN, AWARD-WINNING AUTHOR OF WHERE TREETOPS GLISTEN AND SHADOWED BY GRACE

  “[Married ’til Monday] . . . leaves one knowing that love is worth fighting for.”

  —RT BOOK REVIEWS, 4-STAR REVIEW

  “Hunter is a master romance storyteller. Falling Like Snowflakes is charming and fun with a twist of mystery and intrigue. A story that’s sure to endure as a classic reader favorite.”

  —RACHEL HAUCK, AUTHOR OF THE WEDDING DRESS AND THE ROYAL WEDDING SERIES

  “A handful of authors dominate my must-read list, and Denise Hunter is right at the top. Falling Like Snowflakes is a taut romantic thriller that will warm you to the core.”

  —JULIE LESSMAN, AWARD-WINNING AUTHOR OF THE DAUGHTERS OF BOSTON, WINDS OF CHANGE, AND HEART OF SAN FRANCISCO SERIES

  “A beautiful story—poignant and heartwarming, filled with delightful characters and intense emotion. Chapel Springs is a place anyone would love to call home.”

  —RAEANNE THAYNE, NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING AUTHOR ON THE WISHING SEASON

  “. . . skillfully combines elements of romance, family stories, and kitchen disasters. Fans of Colleen Coble and Robin Lee Hatcher will enjoy this winter-themed novel.”

  —LIBRARY JOURNAL ON THE WISHING SEASON

  “This is an emotional tale of overcoming the fear of loss to love again and God’s love, made manifest through people, healing all wounds. The heroine’s doubts, fears, and eventual acceptance of the gift God has given her are told in a sympathetic and heartwarming way. The hero’s steadfastness is poignantly presented as well.”

  —ROMANTIC TIMES, 4 STARS ON DANCING WITH FIREFLIES

  “Romance lovers will . . . fall for this gentleman who places his beloved’s needs before his own as faith guides him.”

  —BOOKLIST ON DANCING WITH FIREFLIES

  “Hunter’s latest Chapel Springs Romance is a lovely story of lost and found, with a heroine struggling to accept that trusting God doesn’t make life perfect—without loss or sorrow—but can bring great joy. The hero’s love for her and willingness to lose her to save her is quite moving.”

  —ROMANTIC TIMES, 4 STARS ON BAREFOOT SUMMER

  “Jane Austen fans will appreciate the subtle yet delightful Austen vibe that flavors this contemporary cowboy romance—and not just because Pride & Prejudice is protagonist Annie’s favorite book. The Trouble with Cowboys is a fast, fun, and touching read with the added draw of a first kiss that is sure to make my Top 5 Fictional Kisses of 2012. So saddle up, ladies: We have a winner!”

  —USATODAY.COM

  OTHER NOVELS BY DENISE HUNTER

  SUMMER HARBOR NOVELS

  Falling Like Snowflakes

  The Goodbye Bride

  THE CHAPEL SPRINGS ROMANCE SERIES

  Barefoot Summer

  Dancing with Fireflies

  The Wishing Season

  Married ’til Monday

  A December Bride (novella)

  THE BIG SKY ROMANCE SERIES

  A Cowboy’s Touch

  The Accidental Bride

  The Trouble with Cowboys

  NANTUCKET LOVE STORIES

  Driftwood Lane

  Seaside Letters

  The Convenient Groom

  Surrender Bay

  Sweetwater Gap

  Novellas included in Smitten, Secretly

  Smitten, and Smitten Book Club

  © 2016 by Denise Hunter

  All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, scanning, or other—except for brief quotations in critical reviews or articles, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  Published in Nashville, Tennessee, by Thomas Nelson. Thomas Nelson is a registered trademark of HarperCollins Christian Publishing, Inc.

  Thomas Nelson, Inc., titles may be purchased in bulk for educational, business, fund-raising, or sales promotional use. For information, please e-mail [email protected].

  Publisher’s Note: This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. All characters are fictional, and any similarity to people living or dead is purely coincidental.

  ISBN: 978-0-71802-377-5 (eBook)

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Hunter, Denise, 1968- author.

  Title: Just a kiss / Denise Hunter.

  Description: Nashville, Tennessee: Thomas Nelson, [2016] | Series: A Summer Harbor novel

  Identifiers: LCCN 2016013633 | ISBN 9780718023751 (softcover)

  Subjects: LCSH: Disabled veterans--Care--Fiction. | Man-woman relationships--Fiction. | Amputees--Fiction. | GSAFD: Christian fiction. | Love stories.

  Classification: LCC PS3608.U5925 J87 2016 | DDC 813/.6--dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016013633

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  Contents

  Author’s Note

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Discussion Questions

  Acknowledgments

  An Excerpt from Barefoot Summer

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

&n
bsp; Chapter Three

  About the Author

  Author’s Note

  Dear friend,

  I can hardly believe we’re at the last book of the Summer Harbor series! Even if you haven’t been along for the whole journey, I think you’ll enjoy Just a Kiss. It’s written to stand alone, so you won’t feel lost at all.

  If you’ve been following the series, I hope you’re eager to find out what happens next. I’ve been planning Riley and Paige’s story since the very beginning of the series, and I can’t wait to share it with you. And let’s not forget Aunt Trudy and Sheriff Colton! They’ve been waiting a long time for their happily-ever-after. Will they find it? I’m not telling! You’ll have to read and see.

  Lastly, friend, I want to say thank you. Thank you for reading my stories. Thank you for telling others about them. And thank you for all the kind notes you send. You make it all worthwhile. I’m ever grateful for your encouragement and support and so honored that you choose to spend a few of your precious hours with me.

  Blessings!

  Denise

  Chapter 1

  Paige Warren checked her watch, then peeked around Miss Trudy’s silver head for the dozenth time. Riley’s plane had landed, and the steady stream of passengers moving toward Bangor Airport’s baggage claim had begun to dwindle.

  Beau and Zac Callahan, Riley’s black-haired brothers, stood just alike a few feet away, muscular arms crossed, broad stances, faces set as they scanned the unfamiliar faces.

  “Shouldn’t he be here by now?” Paige fiddled with the ring hanging from her necklace.

  “Stop your worrying,” Miss Trudy said. “He’ll be out soon.”

  Stop her worrying? She’d done nothing but worry since the midnight call three weeks ago. Beau’s words had sent her heart into palpitations, and it hadn’t stopped racing since.

  Miss Trudy grabbed Paige’s hand, stilling it. Only then did she realize she’d been frantically zinging the ring on her necklace back and forth.

  “You’re about to drive me up the wall with your fidgeting.”

  “I can’t help it. I won’t feel okay until I see he’s okay.”

  “He’s coming home,” Miss Trudy said. “It’s going to be fine.”

  “Yeah, but—”

  “Don’t borrow trouble. Beau said he was in good spirits, and we should thank the good Lord he’s coming home at all.”

  “I know. I know you’re right.”

  Who would’ve thought when Riley left for Afghanistan fifteen months ago he’d be coming home in June? And like this? There’d been so many decisions and arrangements to make since the phone call, and Paige had taken on the lion’s share. It had soothed her to be doing something.

  Riley was a strong man—always had been—but she couldn’t imagine anyone taking this in stride. There were big adjustments ahead, but she was determined to be there for her best friend every step of the way, just as he’d been there for her through every difficulty she’d faced since she was fourteen—especially the death of her father. Riley had spent many nights just listening as she tried to untangle the knots of unresolved anger.

  “Where is he?” Beau wandered back over. In his shadow was Zac, towering over them all.

  “Y’all are starting to make me nervous with all your fidgeting and pacing,” Miss Trudy said.

  Beau slipped his arm over his aunt’s shoulders. “Everyone’s out. He should be here.”

  “Maybe he didn’t make the flight,” Paige said. The thought made her stomach sink like an anchor. The past few weeks of waiting had been torture for all of them. Beau had wanted to fly to Germany to be with his brother, but Riley insisted he stay.

  “He’ll be here.” Zac ran a hand over his tightly trimmed beard. He looked almost out of place without Lucy at his side. The two had been joined at the hip since their fall wedding.

  Between Zac and Lucy’s recent nuptials and Beau and Eden’s engagement, Paige was feeling a little fifth-wheelish lately. It’d be good to have her Riley back home. Nothing had felt quite right since he’d left. She had girlfriends, sure. But no one who knew and understood her like Riley.

  It might be touch-and-go for a while, she reminded herself. She couldn’t expect the old Riley to come strutting around the corner. She’d done some research and, despite what Beau said about his brother’s spirits, she expected some fallout. It was time for her to be the strong one.

  Riley Callahan gave the attractive brunette his most charming smile as she pushed an empty wheelchair down the Jetway toward him. She was tall, slender, about his age, and heck, the sight of any female was a treat these days. She reached the bottom of the Jetway where he waited in the onboard wheelchair.

  “Mr. Callahan? I’m here to assist you.” Her professional tone matched her bland expression.

  His lips drooped at her flat-eyed smile.

  Reality check, idiot. Girls don’t dig guys in wheelchairs.

  A month ago her response would’ve been different. She might’ve even flirted with him. Maybe tried to slip him her number. All that was different now. People saw the chair first and then him. And the him they saw was the same him he saw in the mirror.

  She wheeled the chair beside him and set the brakes. “Need some help?”

  “I got it.” Taking a deep breath, he made the awkward transition to the chair, his arm muscles tightening under his weight. He gritted his teeth against the pain as his body finally settled in place.

  During the transfer his duffel fell, landing right beside his dignity. The bag he retrieved; the other was gone for good.

  “You comfortable, sir?”

  “Fine. Thanks.”

  He’d slept two hours last night, his leg was aching like a son of a gun, and he was stuffed into a wheelchair like an invalid. Not to mention a woman was tending to him. Everything about that seemed backward.

  She released the brakes on his chair and set it in motion, pushing it up the Jetway.

  At least he was off the plane. The trip to the lavatory in the onboard wheelchair had been humiliating. In between, people thanked him for his service, for his sacrifice. He’d wanted to crawl under the seats.

  As they reached the gate, the cool whoosh of air-conditioning brushed his skin. Good old US of A. He was home. Back in Maine. His family was waiting just down the way. His brothers. His aunt. Paige. For months he’d ached to see them—especially Paige.

  But not like this.

  His chest tightened, his breathing was as labored as if he’d just run a marathon. Ha. Wouldn’t be doing that anytime soon. He’d be lucky to reach hobbling status, and not even that without months of painful therapy. His eyes dropped to his legs.

  Leg.

  The trouser leg on his right side drooped into the hollow space where his knee used to be. Now the leg ended in a grotesque stump that alternately ached and itched. The past three weeks had been a nightmare. The surgery, the painful recovery. The nightmares. His emotions teetered on edge, dark thoughts pushing him deeper into the shadows.

  Just coming home was an act of courage. He didn’t want them to see him like this. Didn’t want Paige to see him like this. Who knew when he left that he’d return half a man?

  He tightened his fingers on the metal armrests, swallowing against the hard lump in his throat. A sweat broke out on his back and forehead. The bleak thoughts threatened to take him under, and he fought them with everything he had.

  Improvise. Adapt. Overcome.

  The words had been beaten into him for fifteen months. Had gotten him through some pretty bad stuff. But they did little to help him now.

  Come on, man. Buck up. You can’t let them see you like this.

  His brothers had spent all this time worrying over him, all because he’d been stupid enough to enlist on the heels of their dad’s death. On the heels of—

  No. He couldn’t think about that now. Suffice it to say he’d left for all the wrong reasons. But that was his own doing. His family had already been through enough.

&
nbsp; The wheelchair bumped over something, jostling his leg. He winced, his hand moving over the left pocket of his trousers where he kept her picture. His heart thudded at the realization that he was about to see her, and not her image on Skype. It seemed like an eternity since he’d looked into her sea-blue eyes. Since he’d heard the feminine lilt of her voice or breathed in her sweet, flowery smell.

  If things had gone differently, he’d be anticipating their reunion. He’d be strutting toward her on his own two legs, anxious to tell her the truth as he’d planned. But one IED had changed everything. Now his only plan revolved around figuring out how to put some space between them without hurting her feelings.

  Chapter 2

  Is that your family?” the woman pushing Riley’s chair asked.

  His eyes darted toward the baggage claim entrance where his family clustered. He set his shoulders back, lifting his hand. Made his lips widen to a full-fledged smile, made sure his eyes crinkled at the corners like they were supposed to.

  Beau waved back, his other arm curling tightly around Aunt Trudy. Zac grinned, a tall shadow behind them. Riley’s eyes slid to Paige, and his breath left his body.

  Man, she was even more beautiful than he remembered. Her silky hair was blonder and longer, and he’d forgotten the way her subtle curves softened her athletic build. The sight of her tanned legs stirred up thoughts he had no business thinking.

  She cupped her hand around her mouth, her eyes tearing up as he rolled closer.

  When he was still a car’s length away, she leaped forward, falling onto her knees. Her arms came around his neck, and the soft weight of her melted into him.

  He held her close, his eyes falling shut. In an instant it was just the two of them. Old times. Kindred spirits. Callahan and Warren. Man, he’d missed her. He pulled in a deep breath of her. Flowers. Sunshine. Home. He buried his nose in her hair and soaked her in, remembering every night he’d lain in his rack staring at her picture, longing for a moment just like this.

  His throat emitted a choking sound, and he disguised it with a hearty laugh. Forced energy into his voice. “Hey, now. What’s all this, Warren? You’re not crying, are you? You know you go straight to the ugly cry.”