Free Magic Kiss (Hope Falls Book 11) by Melanie Shawn

some things out.”
    For the first time since she’d arrived, Logan noticed the dark circles beneath her bright-blue eyes.
    Breathing in deeply then exhaling loudly, she ran her hands through her damp hair. “How about we eat and then we can talk about it later.”
    Not dissuaded by his mother’s attempts to put the conversation off, the kid doubled down. “Can I at least go tomorrow? Justin said if I came back tomorrow, I could ride Unicorn. I wanted to ride Thunder, but he said that I needed to start with Unicorn. Please, Mom. I never got to ride a horse before, and Justin said I did a really good job fixing the fences today, and tomorrow, he would teach me how to patch the rafts that they use for river rafting and maybe even work at the snack shack if I keep—”
    Emma interrupted her son’s all-out campaign. “Okay.”
    “Okay, I can go tomorrow, or okay, we can stay the rest of the summer?”
    Logan hadn’t been listening earlier, but Drew must’ve asked his mom if they could remain in Hope Falls until school started. Both Logan and Drew silently stared at the woman who—Logan was beginning to fear—held both of their destinies in her hand.
    She didn’t say anything for several beats, and Logan’s chest constricted, which made him realize he was holding his breath in anticipation of her response. Which was ridiculous. If anything, he should want her to go. Logan was supposed to be using this time to unwind, reset, decompress. Emma’s presence made that impossible. Around her, he was wound tight, unsettled, on edge.
    Emma was the epitome of the itch he couldn’t scratch.
    Since he’d picked Drew up at Mountain Ridge earlier that day, and the kid had been talking about wanting to finish his summer break there to work in the Junior Ranger program, an idea had been planted in Logan’s mind. All evening, every time Drew had opened his mouth—which was a lot—that seed had been watered, so it had begun to grow. But finding out about Emma’s deadline situation had caused it to take root and mature.
    Drew could stay in California with Logan and Emma could head back to Seattle to write. It was kind of brilliant. Logan would finally get the opportunity to live up to the promise he’d made to Andrew and be there for the kid. Emma would have uninterrupted writing time—which, after having the last couple of days with Drew, he now knew was probably hard to come by. And the kid would get to have the summer of his dreams.
    It was win-win-win.
    He had wanted to talk to Emma privately about his plan, but it looked like he might need to speak now or forever hold his peace.
    Just as he was about to throw his triple-win scenario out, though, Emma began speaking.
    “You can definitely go back tomorrow, and I’ll look into rentals after I meet my word count. I’m not promising anything , but I’ll see what I can do.”
    “Really!?” Drew squealed.
    “Really.” She nodded, a small grin appearing on her angelic face.
    “Why don’t you both stay here?” Logan heard himself offering. He hadn’t just thrown his win-win-win scenario out the window. He’d catapulted that sucker into deep space.
    “What?” Emma’s eyes widened, and her jaw dropped so wide that it would’ve hit the floor if not for the table.
    “Really!?” Drew’s eyes also widened, and his jaw did some dropping of its own.
    Logan looked between the two jaw-droppers as he himself tried to process what he’d just said. The difference between the son’s and the mother’s similar expressions was that Drew’s looked to be born from excitement whereas Emma’s appeared to be spawned from horror.
    Logan could relate. He really hadn’t meant to say that. Even so, he continued full steam ahead.
    “Yeah. I have the extra rooms, and I’m not doing anything. I can help take Drew back and forth to Mountain Ridge and make dinners. I not only know how to grill up some mean burgers, but I have also mastered the art of pizza ordering.”
    Drew’s head