Sunlight on Cedar Creek
About Sunlight on Cedar Creek
Their two broken souls could complete one another if only they dared.
When, at sixteen, Zoey Beckett lost her parents in a plane crash, her aunt took her in. More than a decade later, Zoey still suffers from the resulting anxiety. She has protected herself from the pain of loss by keeping relationships distant. Now a teacher, she fills the emotional void by devoting herself to her students. But when the school board implements changes that negatively affect the schoolchildren, she refuses to be a part of it and resigns.
Tyler Farrington knows no fear. In his ten years as a foreign news correspondent, he has rushed into places most people would flee from. But at the apex of his career, years of covering violence and suffering have taken a toll, and he resigns. Desperate to recharge, he buys a mountain cabin in the charming small town of Cedar Creek and takes some extended time off.
When Tyler volunteers at the town’s historic theater, he and the owner’s niece, Zoey, work together to repair the crumbling plaster. From the start, their chemistry is undeniable. But so are their polar-opposite lives. The two broken souls could complete one another if only they dared. But it would take a leap of faith, and that might be one leap too many.
An endearing, sweet small-town romance about finding the courage to love.
Also by J.L. Jarvis
Cedar Creek
Christmas at Cedar Creek
Snowstorm at Cedar Creek
Sunlight on Cedar Creek
* * *
Pine Harbor
Allison’s Pine Harbor Summer
Evelyn’s Pine Harbor Autumn
Lydia’s Pine Harbor Christmas
* * *
Holiday House
The Christmas Cabin
The Winter Lodge
The Lighthouse
The Christmas Castle
The Beach House
The Christmas Tree Inn
The Holiday Hideaway
* * *
Highland Passage
Highland Passage
Knight Errant
Lost Bride
* * *
Highland Soldiers
The Enemy
The Betrayal
The Return
The Wanderer
* * *
Highland Vow
* * *
American Hearts
Secret Hearts
Runaway Hearts
Forbidden Hearts
* * *
For more information, visit jljarvis.com.
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Sunlight on Cedar Creek
J.L. Jarvis
Contents
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
Thank You!
The Cedar Creek Trilogy
Acknowledgments
About the Author
SUNLIGHT ON CEDAR CREEK
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Copyright © 2021 J.L. Jarvis
All Rights Reserved
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
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The scanning, uploading and distribution of this book via the Internet or any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author's rights is appreciated.
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Published by Bookbinder Press
bookbinderpress.com
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ISBN (hardcover) 978-1-942767-49-7
ISBN (paperback) 978-1-942767-46-6
ISBN (ebook) 978-1-942767-45-9
1
The people who sat in unhurried contentment in coffee shops were not Zoey’s people. But being unremarkable had its rewards. She could wind her way around all the sleekly styled furniture with its bright colors and curves and pass by their conversational groupings unnoticed and unscathed by nonverbal judgment.
The usual characters hovered in the periphery as though coffee shops were life’s waiting rooms. In a dark corner, two weathered and ink-smudged hands clung to a daily newspaper. Both wrinkled skin and paper were relics of an era gone by. A few tables over, a young guy in short sleeves with a sticker-laden computer drummed at the keyboard. The old hands and clacking fingers framed two young lovers leaning over another small circular table. They wore tangled hair and creased clothes like a badge, and their foreheads practically touched as they shared a phone, a pair of earbuds, and intimate smiles.
Joining the line now three deep, Zoey gazed blankly ahead. Before her, a young mother stooped to retrieve a pacifier from the floor, licked it clean, then returned it to her fussing baby. Zoey winced and looked toward the window, where a high school–aged girl sat at a counter and stared outside with ennui.
Zoey’s turn came. “Two coffees, please.”
The barista stared with an odd combination of bored expectancy.
“Oh, sorry. Medium.”
“Medium what?” He pointed to the columns of handwritten text on the large chalkboard menu.
Zoey furrowed her brow. “Two coffees. One black, one with cream and sugar.”
The barista gestured to the condiment bar at the end of the line. “So just regular coffee?”
Zoey lifted her chin and nodded, offering an apologetic half smile. After paying, she sidled along to the waiting area at the end and glanced at her watch. She had enough time to make it to work, with a few minutes to spare. When her order was up, she added the cream and sugar herself, topped each cup with a lid, then headed for the door. She looked forward to a leisurely walk to work, sipping the hot liquid in the crisp morning air, the cool breeze gently tossing the tips of her sandy-blond bob.
As she reached for the door, it flung open.
“Oh!” Zoey took a reflexive step back yet still found herself face-to-face—or rather, face-to-chest—with a stranger. She lifted her eyes to meet his. Firm jaw, deep-blue eyes, and straight, uncombed black hair. Hmm. Probably a tourist. Definitely attractive. Their gazes locked for a moment.
He rallied first with a confident smile, took a step back, and pushed open the door. He gestured for Zoey to pass underneath his long, sturdy arm.
“Thank y-you.” Her words came out in hoarse, broken tones. She inhaled his scent as she ducked under his arm. Is that deodorant or soap? Whatever it was smelled good. She hadn’t been so close to a man in a long time. Heat rushed to her cheeks. Please don’t see me blushing.
She left quickly, but not before a backward glance to catch sight of his apparent amusement. Ugh.
Tossing aside her original plan, Zoey sped up. She tried to ignore the familiar sick, anxious feeling that now gripped her chest.
Soon, she made it to the back of the Cedar Creek Opera House, an old vaudeville house her great-grandfather had won playing poker. With a good business sense coupled with his life’s savings, he’d converted it to a movie theater, and the business had gotten the family through the Depression. After that, family lore built it into something lucky. They’d passed it down until it fell into Aunt Minnie’s hands. An outsider might look at the threadbare se
ats and moth-eaten velvet stage curtains and see little more than a nostalgic money pit. But for Aunt Minnie, it was her legacy. It might be on its last legs, but she would never sell.
Buoyed by townspeople who revered it as a treasured local landmark and her aunt’s dogged resourcefulness, she kept it afloat. Fridays and Saturdays were vintage movie nights unless the local community theater troupe was in residence. On Sundays, a small church rented the space for its weekly worship services. During the week, the lobby catered to tourists and weekenders as a gallery and gift shop featuring the work of local artists. The combined revenue barely covered the bills with enough to set aside for the annual property taxes.
As Zoey walked in through the stage door, her mind lingered on the brief coffee shop encounter. He’d looked about her age, pushing thirty, although his confident air had made him seem older. If he was her age, then he wasn’t a local. She would have remembered him from Cedar Creek High. People changed after high school, but no one she knew had changed that much.
Zoey sighed. Look at me, fixating on some random guy in a coffee-shop doorway. I must be really lonely. She chided herself. After all, she was only human. She might be an anxiety-ridden quasi-agoraphobe, but she still had eyes. He’s exactly my type. Tall with strong features and defined shoulders, he was probably most people’s type. And he’d held the door for her, but that had probably just been self-preservation.
Had she arrived one second sooner, she would have bumped into him, doused his lumberjack-plaid shirt with not one but two cups of scalding coffee. Or his jeans. She winced at the thought. Her mind wandered. His jeans… It had happened too fast to get a good look at those. Now, that was a shame.
“Good morning!”
That time, Zoey did nearly spill the coffee. She coughed as Aunt Minnie set a box down on the concession counter.
Poor Aunt Minnie had the misfortune of an ironic name. Her parents hadn’t anticipated how uncommonly tall she would become. Then again, she’d had over sixty years to adjust to the name. Besides, everyone in town knew her, so Zoey imagined by then it must be a nonissue.
“Good morning!” Zoey grinned and held out the other coffee.
“Thank you. Just what I needed.” Minnie’s eyes lit with the warmth that had always made Zoey feel safe despite all that had happened. “Today marks one week on the job. What do you think?”
“What do I think? I think I’m grateful!”
Her aunt must have seen Zoey’s eyes misting up, because she shrugged it off and blew air through her lips. “So you’ll stay?”
“Yes, of course—if you’ll have me.”
Aunt Minnie waved off her remark. “Have you? I’m delighted you’re here. You’re doing me a great favor.”
Zoey looked past her aunt’s kind assurances. “Thank you for taking me in.”
Aunt Minnie held out her arms and gave her a hug. “Don’t be silly. We’re family.”
But she was taking her in and not for the first time. When Zoey had lost both her parents to a plane crash, Aunt Minnie had driven down to Tarrytown, settled things there, and brought Zoey home with her to Cedar Creek.
“I’m so glad you’re here.” Aunt Minnie’s eyes crinkled as a broad smile creased her face. She sighed. “Well, I’ve got some errands to run. You remember how to handle the register?”
Zoey gave her a confident nod. She had worked there part-time through high school and during vacations from college. In those years, she had taken tickets, run the concession stand, and climbed the dimly lit stairs to the projection booth, where she’d threaded spools of film through the projector and spliced the occasional broken bit back together. Late at night, she would linger after the last customer left and clean the sprockets with a toothbrush and a spray bottle of rubbing alcohol.
“Good,” Aunt Minnie said. “If anyone comes in, all the merchandise is barcoded. But if anything comes up, I’ve got my phone.”
“I’ll be fine.”
“I know you will.” With that, her aunt left.
Zoey looked around. Aunt Minnie had done an impressive job of converting the lobby into an art gallery and gift shop. She had cleverly displayed all the merchandise on racks with wheels, which were easily rolled into a locked storage area when the space was rented out.
Zoey tidied up the counter then took an empty box to the alley out back. She had just come back inside and closed the door behind her when a loud knock sounded. Her aunt must have forgotten something. She swung open the stage door and gasped. Instead of her aunt, there stood the guy from the coffee shop, looking equally startled.
His mouth spread to that same smile as he looked into her eyes. “Hello again.”
“Hi.” Her eyebrows furrowed. She couldn’t manage to smile as easily as he did. “Sorry. I was expecting someone else.”
“No problem.” He walked past her and into Aunt Minnie’s office.
Hold on. Zoey followed him. “Excuse me! Can I help you?”
“No, I’m good.”
Zoey stared, slack-jawed, but couldn’t seem to find words. She was too distracted by the nervous fluttering in her stomach.
She arrived at the office and met him in the doorway as he turned to come out.
“Have you seen Minnie?”
“She stepped out.”
His eyebrows knitted together. “Oh.” He glanced back, returned to the filing cabinet, then lifted the sweater draped over the top to reveal a power drill. “There it is.”
Zoey frowned. He seemed to have made himself a little too at home for a hired handyman. Zoey straightened her posture and parked herself in the doorway, blocking his exit. “Was she expecting you?”
“Yeah.” He lifted the drill. “But I’ve got what I needed.” He looked down at her and smiled.
Not only did his smile disarm her, but the butterflies in her stomach took flight to her chest. She stepped aside, hoping she’d done so before revealing how flustered she felt. It was different when he was just some guy in the coffee shop that she could look at and even admire. But now that he was a walking, talking person making himself at home in her aunt’s theater, she didn’t know how to react. To compound matters, he seemed completely at ease, which only highlighted her discomfort.
He headed for the storage room.
Zoey pulled out her phone and texted her aunt. There’s a guy here acting like he owns the place.
An answer came back almost immediately. Young, dark-haired, good-looking guy—a cross between Montgomery Clift and Gregory Peck?
Zoey typed, Who?
Oh… a cross between Tom Sturridge and Theo James?
Yeah. I guess.
Aunt Minnie wrote, His name’s Tyler. Tell him I’m on my way.
Zoey went to the storage room and called inside, “Hey, what’s your name?”
He popped into the doorway, a bucket of assorted supplies in one hand, a toolbox in the other, and the power drill under his arm. “Tyler.”
“Okay.” Zoey looked up from her phone. “Aunt Minnie’s on her way.”
“No worries. I’ll just get started.”
He had gentle eyes, but they weren’t enough to put Zoey at ease. Although the theater was well within her comfort zone, interacting with strangers was one of her issues. Good-looking ones made it worse.
Tyler took a step forward and stopped. “Would you grab that?” He nodded toward the coffee cup he’d left sitting on a shelf.
Zoey didn’t react quickly enough to say no, so she watched him walk past and was forced to pick up the cup and follow. He stopped at the foot of the carpeted stairs that led up to the theater balcony.
Feeling uneasy and somewhat annoyed, she waited, coffee in hand, while he set everything down. Just when she was ready to gripe about not being his assistant, he straightened and took the coffee.
“Thanks.” He flashed her another smile.
If she was going to get stupid every time he used that winning smile on her, there was only one thing to do. Leave.
Zoey headed ba
ck to the office. She stopped inside the doorway. Exhale-two-three-four. Hold-two-three-four. Inhale-two-three-four. Hold-two-three-four.
She continued to her aunt’s chair to wait for her return, but when Zoey rounded the desk corner, there he was, in the doorway. He had followed her back.
“Is something wrong?” He looked genuinely concerned.
That gave her pause. Do I look like something’s wrong? Panic shot through her. The breathing exercises. He heard them. Realizing her fixed gaze must give her a deer-in-the-headlights countenance, she glanced away. “No. Everything’s fine.”
His eyes softened, and he looked down as though he were at fault. Then his face lit with a revelation, and he grinned. “You must be Zoey!”
Thoroughly confused, she said, “Yes?”
He extended his hand. “Tyler Farrington.”
She shook it, all the while hoping her palm wasn’t too sweaty. “Zoey Beckett. Oh, right. You knew that.”
2
Tyler’s expression brightened. “So you’re Minnie’s Zoey.” He gazed at her as though she were a fascinating museum specimen. Apparently realizing he still held her hand, he let go and offered a self-deprecating smile that was too charming by half. “Good to meet you.”