Fall For Me

  Fall For Me

  Light My Fire Series

  J.H. Croix

  Contents

  1. Phoebe

  2. Phoebe

  3. Archer

  4. Phoebe

  5. Archer

  6. Phoebe

  7. Archer

  8. Phoebe

  9. Archer

  10. Phoebe

  11. Archer

  12. Phoebe

  13. Archer

  14. Phoebe

  15. Archer

  16. Archer

  17. Archer

  18. Phoebe

  19. Archer

  20. Phoebe

  21. Phoebe

  22. Archer

  23. Archer

  24. Phoebe

  25. Archer

  26. Phoebe

  27. Phoebe

  28. Archer

  29. Archer

  30. Phoebe

  31. Phoebe

  32. Archer

  33. Archer

  34. Phoebe

  35. Archer

  36. Archer

  37. Phoebe

  38. Archer

  39. Phoebe

  40. Epilogue

  Find My Books

  Resources

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

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  Copyright © 2022 J.H. Croix

  All rights reserved.

  Cover design by Najla Qamber Designs

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  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  To anyone who has walked through darkness to find light.

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  Chapter One

  Phoebe

  I stared at the text message, actually extending my arm and blinking at my phone before pulling it back into close vision again.

  Phoebe, it’s Archer Cannon. Remember me? Moving back to Willow Brook soon. I'd love to see you.

  I set my phone down and crossed my arms, tapping my foot on the floor. Of course, I remembered Archer Cannon. He was one of my best friends in elementary school—those halcyon, innocent days that you could never recapture once the busyness of adulthood took over.

  Archer had moved away after fifth grade, and I'd missed him so much. Standing from my kitchen table, I turned and crossed over into the living room area. Stopping in front of the small bookshelf, I fetched out an old photo album. My mother had made photo albums throughout my childhood, and she'd given me this one when I graduated from high school.

  Flipping back to the early years, I found a picture of Archer and me covered in mud, standing in the mud flats along Turnagain Arm. Our rubber boots were muddy, and clay was smeared on our cheeks and arms. We held a bucket of clams between us with beaming smiles plastered on our faces. Another picture was taken on my birthday in second grade. Archer had helped my mother decorate the cake, and it was a disaster. I wasn't even sure what it was supposed to be. But once again, we were both smiling. We were almost always smiling in those photos.

  I flipped forward to fifth grade. Middle school was weird. Some kids still seemed caught in the tethers of childhood, while others had growth spurts that sent them leaping ahead of their peers physically. Archer had started to sprout in height shortly before he moved away. In the last picture I could find of him, he was a good foot taller than me, and we were laughing while we played ping pong in my parents’ basement.

  Archer moved away from Willow Brook, and we stayed in touch sporadically, but this was before the era of cell phones, so our connection faded. I was older, wiser, and definitely more cynical than I'd been back in those days. I laughed to myself because it seemed strange to me that we'd ever become so close. My parents did okay, but we scraped by financially at times. There was lots of love in our family. Archer’s family, on the other hand, was wealthy. Like seriously rich.

  I didn't really grasp what that meant at the time. I knew he had more than we did, obviously, but now, I knew his family owned a sprawling international collection of businesses, one of which had been a mining operation outside of Willow Brook. His parents had run that portion of the family business. Their house was big but not too ostentatious, and his parents were blessedly down to earth and kind. I hadn't understood any of that when I was little. All I knew was he was one of my favorite friends, and then they moved away after the mine closed down.

  I hadn't even thought about it lately, but the business name popped up here and there in the news. A legal fight was brewing over reopening that very mine. I wondered if that was why he was coming back.

  Photo album in hand, I returned to the table, lifted my phone, and tapped out a quick reply.

  Hey, Archer. I hope this is really you. I'm back in Willow Brook, and I'd love to see you. Willow Brook is still small, but it’s grown a little. When will you be here?

  Roughly an hour later, my phone rang, and I eyed it suspiciously. I'd already memorized the number where that text came from and knew it was Archer’s number. I slid my thumb across the screen to answer. “Hello?”

  “Phoebe.”

  The second I heard Archer’s voice, my heart contracted. His voice had a rasp to it now, which was kind of sexy and a little weird. Butterflies flitted about in my belly. This was my old friend, and he was on the other end of this line.

  “Hey, it's you!” I exclaimed, my voice pitching up with a squeak at the end.

  “Did you doubt it was me?” he teased.

  “Not really. We haven't talked in years, though. How did you get my number?”

  “I still have your parents’ number, so I called them.”

  “Oh, wow.”

  “I know. Moving away in fifth grade doesn't make it easy to stay in touch,” he deadpanned.

  I laughed, warmth spreading through my chest as my lips tugged into a smile. “So, tell me what’s happening. Why are you coming back, and when will you be here?”

  “Well, if you haven't seen it in the news, there's kind of a thing about my family's business there.”

  “I know. Are you going to be public enemy number one here? There’s lots of local opposition to that mine reopening.”

  “Oh, I know. I’m trying not to be, but I'll be there dealing with the situation one way or another.”

  “And you're really moving here?”

  “That's the plan. Tell me what's going on with you.”

  I filled Archer in on the bullet points of my life, both surprised and not at all surprised how easy it was to fall back into our comfortable friendship. I even told him the nightmare I was facing. It was mostly a nightmare to my pride, but still.

  “He’s a fucking asshole, Phoebe,” Archer said flatly after I explained that my ex turned out to have been screwing around with my high school and college best friend from Willow Brook. Now, they were engaged and getting married here in town.

  “I know he's an asshole, but it still sucks. Ta
sha even wants me to come to the wedding,” I said with a weary sigh.

  “I think you should go.”

  “What?” I squeaked.

  “Absolutely. It sounds like she wants to save face by trying to talk you into forgiving her. Instead, if you’re there, it’ll be like waving a flag about what she did.”

  “She wants me to be in the wedding, Archer.”

  “Oh, well, don't do that. That's her trying to get you to sanction their cheating. That's shitty. You need to show them up.”

  “Right, and how am I going to do that? I'm a firefighter. It's not exactly a sexy career.”

  “It's totally hot. You're a badass,” he said.

  I rolled my eyes even though he couldn't see me. “I'm not a badass, Archer.”

  “I beg to differ, but we'll debate that later. I have an idea.”

  “What's that?”

  Chapter Two

  Phoebe

  “Archer Cannon?” Janet prompted.

  “Yes. He's moving back to town.”

  Janet smiled, but it faded as she drummed her fingertips on the counter. Janet James was basically the spiritual and emotional center of Willow Brook, Alaska. She owned and ran Firehouse Café, the local favorite coffee shop, where I presently stood in line for coffee.

  “Archer’s parents are lovely people. Is he coming back because of that whole mess around the mine?” At my nod, she asked immediately, “What's his position on it?”

  “I haven't gotten into that with him.”

  “That’s going to be touchy if he’s trying to re-open it. When will he be here?”

  “Today. He's meeting me here for coffee, and I'm kind of freaking out,” I said honestly. Because I was. It was so awesome to have Archer back in town, but I didn’t know what to expect. There was also the matter of his proposed plan.

  Janet smiled. “You two were besties when you were kids. Have you seen him at all?”

  “I've seen his picture online. Don’t you dare tell anyone, but I looked him up.”

  “Of course, you did,” she replied with a shrug. “I've seen him too. That boy has turned into one handsome man.” She waggled her eyebrows, and I ignored the flare of heat in my cheeks.

  “I know. It's kind of weird.”

  “Let me get your coffee.” Janet spun around to prep my order.

  I was waiting at the counter when I felt goosebumps rise on my skin and a sizzling prickle race down my spine. The chime on the door rang, and my body sensed this was Archer. Which made no sense because I hadn’t seen him since the fifth grade. I couldn’t even play it cool. I turned around immediately, a smile breaking across my face as soon as I saw him. “Archer.”

  His smile kicked up at one corner and then spread to the other, and those butterflies went absolutely wild inside my stomach. My breath became short, and my pulse fired off with the force of a rocket going into space. I barely had time to register his appearance before he stopped in front of me and tugged me into a hug.

  Oh my, wow. An Archer hug, a full-on clench from this manly man who'd once been a fun, affectionate friend when I was a little girl. It was weird and discombobulating, and all of my cells felt as if they were sparklers spinning through my body.

  He stepped back, his hands resting on my shoulders as I soaked in his appearance. Oh. My. God. Archer in fifth grade was funny, kind, and on the gangly side. Now he was something else entirely. His features were cleanly defined. His once kind of boxy-looking jaw was now chiseled. Was that the word I would use to describe my old childhood best friend? Yes, yes, it was. His nose was clean and straight, still a little big, but now that was sexy. His messy blond hair was darker now, almost amber with flecks of gold scattered throughout. His eyes—oh, dear god.

  I didn’t remember thinking about his eyes before. They were silvery gray, piercing, and intense. And his mouth? Gah! His mouth was sensual. His upper lip was narrow, accentuating his full bottom lip. I tried to take a breath, but my lungs had forgotten how to function, and I had to suck in air.

  Meanwhile, he was speaking. “Phoebe, it’s so good to see you.”

  His voice, which I already knew was kind of sexy, slid over me like warm honey. My belly was spinning in flips, and I was pretty sure I thought Archer was hot. It wasn't just because of his pictures online. This was no longer an academic, objective view. What the actual fuck was happening to me?

  Chapter Three

  Archer

  Phoebe knocked the breath right out of my chest. Fuck me.

  Okay, so I'd looked her up. Yes, I had. I knew, objectively speaking, she was beautiful. But seeing her again in the flesh was something else altogether.

  This was not what I expected. Her blond hair fell around her shoulders, and her sapphire eyes were big. Her eyes searched mine, and her cheeks were a little pink. The urge to kiss her was fierce.

  Holy hell. I had seriously underestimated my ability to manage this situation, and managing situations was my expertise. I was the problem solver for my family's sprawling business. I’d come up with a solution. It involved Phoebe and a technical deception, but I’d have to sort that out later. For now, I needed to get a handle on my body's raging reaction to her.

  “It's so good to see you,” I repeated, meaning it on a level I hadn't expected.

  My old childhood best friend was still that, but she was also beautiful and delectably sexy. “I'm getting coffee. Do you need to get something? Have you eaten? We should get something to eat,” she said, slipping her hand through my elbow and tugging me toward the counter. “You remember Janet, right?”

  Janet smiled over at me. “Of course, I remember Janet.”

  “Good to see you, Archer.” She rounded the counter in a hurry, pulling me into a warm hug. This was the kind of hug, except for the mothering quality, that I had expected from Phoebe, warm and friendly and familiar. Janet's dark hair was straight, more liberally salted with silver than I recalled. Her brown eyes crinkled at the corners, and she felt comfortable.

  “It’s great to see you too,” I returned as Janet stepped back and around the counter.

  “I don't think you ever got to have coffee here. You were too young. Do you drink coffee?” she asked.

  “Absolutely.”

  “What's your preference?”

  “Something dark and strong.”

  Janet nodded. “An espresso then. Do you like it sweet?”

  “Definitely not.”

  “What do you want to eat?” Phoebe asked, nudging me lightly on the forearm with her elbow.

  That. That very gesture of hers was so familiar it caused emotion to rush through me. Back in elementary school, Phoebe and I always tried to sit together in class, and she poked me with her elbow whenever she was teasing or wanted to tell me something. Now, the subtle touch had a zing of fire chasing in its wake. That was not familiar. The sensation threw me off-kilter. Needing something other than Phoebe to focus on, I looked up at the chalkboard.

  “Oh, wow. It looks the same, but I’m sure the menu’s updated,” I commented. Janet chuckled as she prepped our coffees. “Do you still have the sandwich I got when I was a kid?”

  “A bagel with tomato and melted muenster cheese was one of your favorites,” Janet offered. “You loved that and peanut butter and jelly.”

  “Do you still have that?”

  “Of course, I do! It’s popular with the kids. Are you going to get that for breakfast?” Janet teased as she handed Phoebe her coffee. “Yours is coming right up.”

  “I think I'll pass on the peanut butter and jelly, but I'll take the bagel with smoked salmon cream cheese. That sounds good.”

  “It is. I smoke the salmon myself.”

  “You do?” I couldn’t keep the surprise out of my tone.

  Janet rolled her eyes. “Just kidding. I don’t have the time, but I get it from a local place, and it’s excellent.”

  “Are you getting something to eat?” I asked Phoebe.

  “I'm getting the bagel extravaganza.”

/>   “I don’t know what that is. Should I get it too?”

  “Are you going to eat two bagels?” Phoebe’s brows hitched up as she looked up at me.

  “Yes, I landed in Anchorage this morning after flying in overnight. I'm freaking starving,” I replied bluntly.

  Phoebe’s lips twitched with a smile. “The egg extravaganza is perfect then.”

  “Would you like it with extra bacon and cheese?” Janet asked.

  “Bacon makes everything better, so extra bacon is extra better,” I teased.

  Janet rolled her eyes. “Here's your coffee. I'll get your bagels over in a little bit.”

  Phoebe started to pull her wallet out of her purse, and I shook my head. “This is on me.”

  She opened her mouth to argue. “You can try to argue, but I'll just sneak behind your back and put something on a tab to pay for you in the future. Do you do tabs?” I asked Janet.

  Her grin was wide. “I do. You’d better be good for it.”

  Placing a hand over my heart, I grinned. “I promise.”

  “I think your parents actually still have a tab with money on it,” she replied.

  “Are you serious?”

  She shrugged. “Probably. I haven’t checked in years, but they used to keep one.”