Romance Rematch: Perfect Match, #3

By EmKay Connor

Brodie Benton considers his impetuous Vegas wedding that quickly ended in divorce more of a learning experience than an actual marriage. Ten years later, he's older, wiser and ready to make a committed relationship work. Lust got him into trouble the first time he said I do, so this time he's going with a scientific formula—even though it requires an appearance on a nationally syndicated TV reality show.

Isla Murdock still gets the tingles when she thinks about the sexy med student she met during a bachelorette bash in Las Vegas, although a splash of cold reality douses the giddy rush within seconds. In fewer days than it took to realize she was pregnant, he'd wooed her, wed her…and walked out on her. After learning her 9-year-old daughter submitted her name to the dating show Perfect Match, Isla figures maybe it's time to let go of old hurts and find a guy who's man enough to love her and her child forever.

Don't miss this very special holiday episode of Perfect Match, the TV reality show taped at Barefoot Bay, that guarantees soul mates—and families—a happy ever after.

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This story is set in a world based on Roxanne St. Claire's Barefoot Bay Series; it is published with the permission of Roxanne St. Claire. Visit her website for links to her books and more information.

• Language: English
• Publisher: EmKay Connor
• Release date: Oct 10, 2016
• ISBN: 9781386285977

Book preview

1

Isla Murdock loved teaching kindergarten but the first week of a new schoolyear was exhausting. When the final bell rang, dismissing her and the students for the weekend, she sent them off with a bright smile then collapsed into a bright red beanbag chair, one of several in the reading corner of her classroom.

One week down, thirty-five more to go. Jody Fuller, the other kindergarten teacher at Pasadena’s Brookside Academy, an exclusive K-8 school, sauntered in from the hallway and joined Isla on the floor, choosing a banana-yellow beanbag.

I never used to crave the weekends like I do now, Isla mused. I think I’m starting to feel my age.

Rubbing a hand through her short, silvery spiked hair, Jody shook her head. You’re too young to complain about feeling old. What are you, twenty-four? Twenty-five? Besides, age is just a number.

This was Jody’s first year at Brookside. She’d retired after thirty years with the Los Angeles Unified School District, spent a few years traveling the U.S. in an RV with her husband, then decided to return to teaching. Brad, her husband, also found retirement overrated so he’d taken a part-time handyman job with the school. Isla thought it very romantic how the couple had lunch together every day and Brad showed up promptly at 3:45 p.m. to carry Jody’s satchel when they were ready to leave. Unable to have children of their own, the older couple lavished their affection on the students, especially Skylar, Isla’s nine-year-old daughter, who attended the academy.

She remembered Jody’s question about her age. This is a benchmark year for me and Skylar. I turn thirty and she’ll be ten. She grimaced good-naturedly. Technically she’s nine, but she acts more like a sixteen year old.

Jody reached over with a reassuring pat on the shoulder. Don’t let her brilliant IQ fool you. She may be studying at a ninth-grade level and sound mature, but deep down, she’s still a little girl. Don’t let her grow up too fast.

We’re both growing up too fast. Isla sighed. I’ve been doing this single parent thing for a decade. Ten years ago I was free to do or be anything I wanted. One wild weekend in Las Vegas changed everything.

The minute the declaration slipped out of her mouth, Isla wished she could snatch it back. The words made her sound as if she regretted—or worse, resented— Skylar, when her daughter was the best thing to ever happen in her life.

She’d once thought the same thing about Skylar’s father. His image popped into her mind, just as vivid as the first time she’d seen him. After a night of club hopping for a friend’s bachelorette weekend, they’d ended up at The Peppermill Restaurant and Lounge, a classic Vegas landmark. The lobby was packed with people waiting to be seated, and she’d been shoved up against the back of a tall, lean, dark-haired guy. As he turned around, she’d opened her mouth to apologize but nothing came out. Instead, like an idiot, she stared up into the purest blue eyes she’d ever seen.

His irises were aquamarine, like polished blue topaz gems, ringed by narrow navy bands and streaked with shards of lapis. He blinked, momentarily hiding those gorgeous eyes and jolting her from her daze. His fair skin had flushed with embarrassment and she felt a matching blush heating her own cheeks. She could still picture the thick, blunt lashes framing his eyes and the over-long, shaggy black hair that contrasted with his neat, white button-up oxford. Her skin prickled with sexual awareness just as it had done the instant she laid eyes on him more than ten years ago.

What would you have done differently? Jody asked, pulling Isla out of her reverie.

I was studying to be a marine biologist, she said with a soft laugh. I wanted to be a dolphin trainer at SeaWorld. After I learned I was pregnant, that didn’t seem like a very practical career choice. My mother suggested teaching so that I could have summers and holidays off.

I never would have guessed that teaching wasn’t your first choice. You’re a natural with the children. Jody settled into the beanbag and crossed her ankles, as if she had all the time in the world.

There was something soothing about the other woman’s presence, a trait Isla noticed the first time they met. She