Had To Be You
Release Date: 08/05/14
Swoon Romance
After college, Rory Finn left behind the
familiarity of her quiet, picturesque hometown to pursue a professional career
in the city. With her sights firmly on the future, Rory pressed on in hopes of
forgetting the past until a jarring bit of unwelcome news forces her to
confront it.
Her first love, the one she'd tried so hard to forget, is about to marry
someone else. That pang Rory feels isn't envy, it's not even regret. It's love.
But Rory can't be that girl. She won't. But if she doesn't, she'll never know
what could have been. She'll never have another chance to tell him how she
feels.
As she embarks on an impulsive, desperate bid to win him back, her mission
turns into an unexpected and emotional journey of rediscovery.
HAD TO BE YOU
explores a history of love from its tentative beginnings to what may just turn
out to be its final bittersweet end, as Rory ignores her head and follows her
heart.
The bus
finally rolled to
a stop, tires
crunching over gravel
at the end
of the drive
before the door creaked
to fold open. Rory already had her
duffle bag slung over
her shoulder, perched eagerly on
the edge of her seat. She was up and out with barely a thank you and goodbye.
Camp
certainly hadn’t been her idea, especially not the exclusive, elite one her
father insisted she attend
just because it
was the place
all his big
shot business colleagues
sent their kids. Per usual,
however, he didn’t exactly take her wishes into consideration when making the
decision. Rory knew
he just liked
the idea of his daughter
being there. Much like the idea of a daughter in general, really—great in
theory, but not so much in practice.
She
took the front porch steps in two short leaps, bursting into the house to head
straight for her room. She dumped the bag on her bed and quickly shed her green
polo and cuffed khaki shorts, replacing them with a pair of denim cutoffs and
pulling a plain white tank over her head. Her
long skinny legs
were dark with
a tan and
her light brown
hair brightened to
a sunlit-streaked blonde.
On the
kitchen table was
a plate with a
wrapped
sandwich along with a note
that her mother would be home by
five o’clock. Rory grabbed a ripe peach from the fruit bowl on the counter
instead before she flew out the back, the screen door slamming shut behind her.
Three
full weeks of campfires, bug bites, swimming, sunbathing, sailing, archery,
hiking, tennis, and now her real summer was finally about to begin.
She
ran all the way to the end of the street, skirting the stone seawall until she
reached the rickety steps
leading to the weathered wood
dock. She smiled
when she spotted
the small Boston Whaler tied up
to a slip, bobbing in the water.
They
were all there, doing flips into the cool blue waves.
“Rory!”
She
grinned, lifting her hand to wave. “Hey, Kev!”
Suddenly
Matt emerged from the water, smiling as he climbed up the ladder to the dock
and hiked up his board shorts. He looked taller somehow, even dripping wet, his
short dark hair sticking up in
spikes as he
swiped a hand
down his face.
His eyes were
as blue as
the ocean against his smooth,
bronzed skin.
“How
was it?” he asked.
She
lifted a shoulder to let it drop. “Okay.”
“I’ve
been taking care of your boat.”
“I
see that.”
“Matt!
Let’s go!”Murph appeared from around a cluster of tall pilings in his dad’s
Aquasport, calling out to him with a slight scowl. From the sound of his
impatience, Rory assumed Matt must have been swimming out to meet him when she
arrived.
“We’re
heading over to the island,” Matt explained. “You in?”
“Sure.”
“I’ll
meet you guys there,” he called back to Murph. “We’re taking Rory’s boat!”
Despite
the fact he already carried a full crowd, Murph didn’t seem too pleased with
the unexpected change of plans.
Matt waved
his brother Kevin
along with the others before
grabbing his t-shirt
and sneakers from the
dock. He dropped
them into the
blue interior of the
waiting skiff and
then offered Rory a steadying hand as they both stepped aboard.
“Check
this out,” he said. “I worked taking out the trash and stocking shelves and
stuff like that for my dad, until I had enough to buy some parts.” Grinning, he
took a seat at the stern and revved the little motor.
“I
can’t believe it!” Rory laughed, taking a seat on the polished wood thwart. “It
finally works.”
She
wondered exactly how many hours he’d put in at his dad’s marine store to make
this happen. Mr. O’Shea wasn’t the type to let his sons off easy.
As Matt
instructed her on how to
guide it out
of the busy
afternoon harbor traffic, warning her
about the chop,
talking a mile a
minute with his
typical enthusiasm, their
arms gently brushed and bumped against each other. Although his body
seemed so lean and hard, his warm skin, still dotted with water, was surprisingly
soft.
“You
got it?” he asked.
“Yeah.”
Leaning
back, he draped an arm over the side of the boat and smiled as he watched her.
“So,
what else?”
Motoring
across the bumpy currents, she shook her head in the salty spray. “Not much
else to tell. It was summer camp. That about sums it up.” She narrowed her eyes
when she noticed he was staring. “What?”
“You
look different.”
“I
do?” Rory frowned skeptically and pushed the windswept hair off her face,
although she had been thinking something similar about him. “How?”
“I
don’t know.” He brushed it off with a dismissive shrug of his shoulder. “Did
you miss me?”
“Oh
yeah.” The corner of her mouth curved up. “I cried myself to sleep every
night.”
“I
figured.”
They
eased away from home port, heading across an open stretch of water to the
offshore rocky outcropping of
sandy beach and
shady gnarled pines
at the very
tip of Lighthouse
Point that they called their island.
Rory
snuck another glance at him before quickly returning her attention to the water.
“I
didn’t miss you either—in case you were wondering,” he said finally.
She
just smiled.
A
lifelong New Englander, I divide my time between the North Shore and Cape Cod.
My favorite things are beaches, boats, books, bars, the Boston Red Sox and
boys, but not necessarily in that order. Consequently, you’ll probably find
that these are the things I write about, too.
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