Catch of the Year Read Online Free Page A

truth? As far as Jade was concerned, anyhow.
    Picking up the can of pop, she pursed her lips around the straw and sucked.
    â€œAw, come on,” he coaxed. “We’ll trade. Yours can’t be worse than mine.”
    This was tempting. How many times had she wondered what his middle two initials stood for?
    â€œOkay. How about this?” She took a last sip of her beverage and set the can aside. “Serendipity.” She emphasized the sibilant sound and let the plosives pout her mouth. What she didn’t add was that her family called her Dipity. That was far too close to dippy. She waited for his reaction, knowing from experience how her first name stopped people in their tracks.
    He looked amused. “Yeah, I agree. It’s serendipitous that we met again.”
    â€œNo, you don’t understand. That’s it. My name.”
    His ginger cat’s eyes opened. His mouth quirked. There was that killer dimple.
    â€œSerendipity?”
    He chuckled. She was lost.
    Lifting her hands, Jade made come-on gestures with her fingers. “Give.”
    He drew in an audible breath. Out came the information.
    â€œPaul Ringo George Johnson.”
    Jade gave a crow of delight. She clapped her hands. “I get it … hippie parents. Just like mine.”
    â€œWere they ever.” He shook his head slowly.
    â€œThey’ve both passed on?”
    â€œNot exactly, although you could say that about my dad.”
    Paul explained the situation with his father and told her his mother lived out West. She got the impression of a lonely little boy. And picked up the possibility of abandonment issues.
    â€œHow about you?” he asked.
    â€œOh, I have both parents,” she said airily, not wanting him to pick up on any undercurrents. “That’s been the only stable thing in my life — that they’ve stuck together all these years. Otherwise, you might say they were the original anti-establishment dropouts.”
    No way was she going to end up drifting vaguely through life, a lost flower child like her mother or always changing jobs like her father. Much better to be bourgeois, own a house, settle down, have regular employment, all those things she believed in.
    And she was this close to achieving it all.
    She gathered up the paper napkins, shoved them into the cardboard box, and rose.
    Aware of Paul’s gaze on her, she dusted her hands on her shorts and set off again. It seemed he needed a few seconds to realize she’d left … . Or was he merely checking out her back end?
    He soon caught up with her.
    â€œThis worried you?”
    â€œYou bet.” She tossed the garbage into a convenient trashcan. “As a child I was never in one place long enough to make any friends.”
    â€œSo you moved around a lot.” He sounded thoughtful. Sympathetic.
    â€œYeah. Over these last few years, things have changed, though. At least my parents have a reasonably steady income and a reliable roof over their heads.”
    Which was to some extent, thanks to Jade. She helped with the mortgage and was now putting money toward a university education for her thirteen-year-old brother. Adrian was extremely bright. She was determined he shouldn’t carry the same burden of years of worsening student-loan debt as she had.
    Enough about her. Paul was surprisingly easy to confide in. She hadn’t meant to tell him anything at all about her home life and background.
    Time to turn the tables.
    â€œYou’ll be staying on Manitoulin?”
    â€œNo, I’m headed farther north. I’ve taken a week off to do some fishing.”
    She paused to look at him. “Really? Somehow you don’t strike me as the type to take up fishing as a hobby.”
    â€œNo? What would I strike you as?”
    Words popped into her head, almost as if she’d been unconsciously preparing the answer for weeks. The type who’d make a woman very happy. But that phrase couldn’t be