Determined Kisses (Love in Sandy Beach Book 4) by Jessica Gray Page A
Authors: Jessica Gray
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legs.
No, she couldn’t sleep in his bed. Not without him. And certainly not with him if she wanted to stay away from him. With a sigh she settled into the guestroom.
Chapter 11
Ethan boarded the plane for Santa Clara and settled into his seat just as the flight attendant came by to take his drink order.
His first meeting would be with Peter Shaw, the CEO of an IT company that had shown remarkable growth from a startup several years earlier, and was now one of the big companies in Silicon Valley.
Peter had come highly recommended to him by Dean Armstrong, a childhood friend. Ethan respected Dean’s judgment, and if he said Peter was trustworthy, he had no doubts about trusting him to do the programming work for his new investment portal.
Before Ethan’s parents had moved to Sandy Beach about ten years earlier, they’d lived in Chicago, next to the Armstrong family with their seven kids.
Dean and Ethan were the same age and had gone to school together, but they had lost contact after high school, when Dean had moved to Princeton to follow his passion to study insects and had later on become a renowned professor of entomology.
Ethan leaned back in his seat and took a sip of his tomato juice with salt and pepper, and grinned as he remembered the times when he and Dean would scare their sisters with spiders or insects. Dean had sourced the animals, but it was Ethan who’d put them to use in scaring the girls. His friend had always been more worried about the well-being of “his” insects than interested in the thrill of seeing a girl run screaming out of her room.
He and Dean had just recently reconnected when Ethan’s brother Grant got engaged to Dean’s sister Samantha. At their engagement party, he’d also met Dean’s wife Melissa and their kids Happy and Emerson.
The thought of their happy little family tugged at his heart. Never one to even consider settling down, the appearance of Hazel had turned his world upside down. While he knew she was “the one,” he was also scared. And not a little.
The plane took off and his mind began to wander – back to Hazel. It stabbed his heart to see the pain in her eyes, but she was a very private person, and so far, she’d kept the cause of her pain to herself.
That bothered Ethan more than he liked. Why? He’d tried to make sense of his feelings for Hazel on the drive to the airport, but he always came back to the same conclusion. He was falling for her. In a big way. It felt like being sucked into a vortex, and everything he ever thought to be true suddenly felt wrong. Like that being monogamous was boring. Or that he didn’t do relations and sucked at commitment.
He continued to think about her, wondering how her interviews were going, and hoping that whatever was bothering her could soon be put to rest. More than once he wished he’d asked for her phone number to send her a text once his plane landed. You must be the most stupid man on earth. Why didn’t you get her phone number?
The pilot announced they were beginning their descent into California, and Ethan forced his mind to focus on business. He had only two days to make the specifications for the programming team in Peter’s company.
Disembarking the plane, he grabbed his carry-on and headed straight for the car rental desks. Once he had his car, he activated the GPS system and headed for Peter’s office in the center of Santa Clara.
He arrived ten minutes before their scheduled meeting, but wasted no time in going up to the proper floor.
“Good afternoon,” the receptionist greeted him as he stepped off the elevator.
“Good afternoon. Ethan Paxton. I have a meeting with Mr. Shaw.”
“Thank you. I’ll let him know you’re here. Can I get you something to drink?” she offered.
Ethan smiled, “A bottle of water would be great.”
“Be right back.”
Ethan walked to the windows and looked out over the city. It was much different than living in Sandy Beach, and while he
No, she couldn’t sleep in his bed. Not without him. And certainly not with him if she wanted to stay away from him. With a sigh she settled into the guestroom.
Chapter 11
Ethan boarded the plane for Santa Clara and settled into his seat just as the flight attendant came by to take his drink order.
His first meeting would be with Peter Shaw, the CEO of an IT company that had shown remarkable growth from a startup several years earlier, and was now one of the big companies in Silicon Valley.
Peter had come highly recommended to him by Dean Armstrong, a childhood friend. Ethan respected Dean’s judgment, and if he said Peter was trustworthy, he had no doubts about trusting him to do the programming work for his new investment portal.
Before Ethan’s parents had moved to Sandy Beach about ten years earlier, they’d lived in Chicago, next to the Armstrong family with their seven kids.
Dean and Ethan were the same age and had gone to school together, but they had lost contact after high school, when Dean had moved to Princeton to follow his passion to study insects and had later on become a renowned professor of entomology.
Ethan leaned back in his seat and took a sip of his tomato juice with salt and pepper, and grinned as he remembered the times when he and Dean would scare their sisters with spiders or insects. Dean had sourced the animals, but it was Ethan who’d put them to use in scaring the girls. His friend had always been more worried about the well-being of “his” insects than interested in the thrill of seeing a girl run screaming out of her room.
He and Dean had just recently reconnected when Ethan’s brother Grant got engaged to Dean’s sister Samantha. At their engagement party, he’d also met Dean’s wife Melissa and their kids Happy and Emerson.
The thought of their happy little family tugged at his heart. Never one to even consider settling down, the appearance of Hazel had turned his world upside down. While he knew she was “the one,” he was also scared. And not a little.
The plane took off and his mind began to wander – back to Hazel. It stabbed his heart to see the pain in her eyes, but she was a very private person, and so far, she’d kept the cause of her pain to herself.
That bothered Ethan more than he liked. Why? He’d tried to make sense of his feelings for Hazel on the drive to the airport, but he always came back to the same conclusion. He was falling for her. In a big way. It felt like being sucked into a vortex, and everything he ever thought to be true suddenly felt wrong. Like that being monogamous was boring. Or that he didn’t do relations and sucked at commitment.
He continued to think about her, wondering how her interviews were going, and hoping that whatever was bothering her could soon be put to rest. More than once he wished he’d asked for her phone number to send her a text once his plane landed. You must be the most stupid man on earth. Why didn’t you get her phone number?
The pilot announced they were beginning their descent into California, and Ethan forced his mind to focus on business. He had only two days to make the specifications for the programming team in Peter’s company.
Disembarking the plane, he grabbed his carry-on and headed straight for the car rental desks. Once he had his car, he activated the GPS system and headed for Peter’s office in the center of Santa Clara.
He arrived ten minutes before their scheduled meeting, but wasted no time in going up to the proper floor.
“Good afternoon,” the receptionist greeted him as he stepped off the elevator.
“Good afternoon. Ethan Paxton. I have a meeting with Mr. Shaw.”
“Thank you. I’ll let him know you’re here. Can I get you something to drink?” she offered.
Ethan smiled, “A bottle of water would be great.”
“Be right back.”
Ethan walked to the windows and looked out over the city. It was much different than living in Sandy Beach, and while he
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