Emergency at Bayside by Carol Marinelli

pick you up on Saturday? We could go together.’
    ‘I’d like that, but…’
    In the darkness he couldn’t see her features, but Flynn just knew that she was nervously chewing her lip. The endearing image brought a smile to his face. ‘But what?’
    ‘If we arrive together…’ Meg hesitated. How could she explain this without sounding as if she was fishing? How could she ever expect him to understand the strange unwritten rules of her family? ‘If we arrive together, my mum will expect…she’ll think…’ Meg was practically stammering now, and Flynn put her out of her misery and finished her sentence for her.
    ‘She’ll think we’re an item?’
    Her blush was so deep that even if he couldn’t see it Meg was sure he must at least be able to feel the heat radiating from her. ‘Something like that,’ she mumbled. ‘Mum doesn’t know the meaning of the words ‘‘casual date’’.’
    ‘Would it help make up your mind if I told you that there’s nothing casual about the way I’m feeling?’
    Nervous but pleased, Meg nodded as Flynn continued. ‘Would you believe me if I told you that nothing your mum’s going to be thinking hasn’t already crossed my mind?’
    She did believe him. After all, the last few weeks all she had thought about was Flynn. However reluctant, however suppressed, her mind had been only on him, and now he was telling her he had felt it too.
    ‘So.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Am I coming to get you or not?’
    Suddenly, her reasons for holding on to her heart seemed woefully inadequate; so she might live to regret it, might rue the day she succumbed to his charms, but nothing would ever compare to the regret she would feel if she turned and walked away now. ‘Yes, please.’ She hesitated for a moment, longing to ask him again to join her, but knowing if she did this time he would say yes. ‘I’d best get inside.’
    He nodded as she closed the car door, then sat and watched as she walked up the driveway. Only when he saw the light on the top floor flick on did Flynn start the engine and drive slowly home.
    The house, always silent, always empty, now had a slightly different feel—the lingering scent of Meg’s perfume, the two glasses side by side on the coffee table. It was the first time in two years Flynn actually felt he’d come home.

CHAPTER SIX
    ‘W HAT did Mum say?’ Meg asked nervously as Kathy breezed in.
    ‘Oh, she thinks you’re covering for me and I’m off for a midnight rendezvous with Jake. The fact she caught me swiping a bottle of cream liqueur didn’t help much.’ Producing a bottle from under her flimsy cardigan, she grinned. ‘I thought it might loosen your tongue a bit. I’m warning you, Meg. I want all the details. Don’t leave a single thing out.’
    ‘You’re here to fill me in, Kathy, not the other way around.’ Meg grinned.
    ‘We’ve got all night. Now, come on, Sis, I need food.’
    They had to make do with toast, but there was something strangely therapeutic about a pile of warm buttered toast and a glass of ice-cold liqueur.
    ‘Why didn’t you tell me he was widowed?’ Meg started.
    ‘I did. I’ve often spoken about Jake’s friend. You probably weren’t listening, as usual.’
    She had a point. The minute Jake appeared in a conversation Meg had more often than not changed the subject or simply switched off.
    ‘Though I haven’t brought him up recently,’ Kathy admitted.
    ‘Why?’
    ‘You said you didn’t want baggage, remember? And, as much as Flynn might deny it, he comes with a pretty big load.’
    ‘Lucy?’
    Kathy nodded.
    ‘Did you ever meet her?’
    ‘No, she died a couple of months before I met Jake. It’s actually how we first became close. He was having a tough time with his friend, and I guess I provided a pretty good sounding board. I’d just had my last operation so my physio sessions were pretty long. Sometimes Jake would be tired, or a bit flat, and you know how nosey I am—I just sort of dragged