Lantern Lake by Lily Everett Read Free Book Online

batter. “I only wish I could stay here.”
    The thud of chair legs hitting the cracked linoleum floor confirmed her earlier vision, and Vivian smiled a little. “What do you mean? You just bought this house. Sick of playing poor already?”
    The harsh edge to the words had Vivian tensing, defensive. But he didn’t know, she reminded herself. Not yet.
    And maybe now was her chance to be the one to tell him. Surely that would be better than having him find out another way.
    Right. There was no way this was going to be anything other than humiliating. But even as she steeled herself for the mortifying moment of truth, Cooper blew out a breath. An instant later, she felt his big, warm palm sliding around to cup the bend of her waist. He dropped a soft kiss on the side of her neck, just above the gaping collar of her robe, and Vivian’s tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth.
    “I’m sorry,” he said roughly. “I’m being a jerk. Don’t listen to anything I say until I drink at least one more cup of coffee.”
    “That’s okay.” Vivian twisted her head to give him a quick smile before turning back to flip the pancakes. “It’s not a big deal. I just…I didn’t buy the cabin to live in. It’s more of an investment.”
    Cooper’s hands slipped away, and she immediately felt a chill in their wake. “I never got the appeal of a summer home,” he said, wandering over to the coffeemaker to pour himself another steaming cup from the pot. “Doesn’t that basically just mean that whenever you have time off or want to take a vacation, you feel like you have to go back to the same place? You’ll never see anything new.”
    He thought she’d bought the cabin as a vacation house. It was a reprieve—but for how long? Swallowing thickly around the white lie, Vivian pointed out, “But if you go back to the same vacation spot year after year, you build relationships there. You make friends you get to see over and over, and you can learn to really fit into the place. It can be a home away from home.”
    Not really a lie, she consoled herself. She hadn’t confirmed that the cabin
was
her vacation home. She’d just argued that a vacation home could be a nice thing to have.
    Although, to be completely truthful, she hadn’t enjoyed it all that much when Gerald took them back to the Hamptons every single summer. It never felt like home—more like yet another stage where they could play out the elaborate drama of her marriage and Gerald’s business dealings.
    “I guess. But you’d probably have to have a home first, before you could have a home away from home. Got any sugar?” Before she could caution him, Cooper put his hand on the brass pull of the cabinet over the coffeemaker…and the entire cabinet door jerked off its hinges.
    “What the hell!” Off kilter, Cooper fumbled with the unwieldy door until it clocked him in the side of the head, then clattered to the floor.
    Rushing to his side, Vivian exclaimed, “Are you okay? I’m so sorry, I should have warned you about my temperamental cabinets.”
    Cooper shook his head as if to rattle his brains back into place. “Cats are temperamental. That cabinet is psychotic. Your house is trying to kill me.”
    Putting a gentle hand to Cooper’s temple, she nudged him to tilt his head so she could examine the red mark left by the falling cabinetry. “Don’t be a baby,” she said automatically. “You’re fine. It’s just a bruise, and my house is not trying to kill anyone. It’s just a little…old. And in need of some TLC.”
    “I could use some, too,” Cooper told her, leaning closer. “You could kiss it and make it better.”
    Heat rolled up Vivian’s spine, tingling and good. “Show me where,” she murmured, lifting up on her tiptoes to reach the sore spot on his temple. She kissed where he pointed, her lips following his fingertip from temple to jaw to nose, and finally to the masculine fullness of his bottom lip.
    Instead of a kiss, Vivian nipped that