At Bluebonnet Lake (Texas Crossroads Book #1): A Novel by Amanda Cabot Page A

seriously. Being with them had been comfortable. They’d enjoyed the same activities, moved in the same circles. Not once had Kate considered playing tennis with them, and not once had either one made her breathless.
    Greg was different. Though his name sounded vaguely familiar, Kate couldn’t put her finger on the reason. Perhaps she should google him. At a minimum, she could check Facebook to see if he had a page. That was what she did for potential clients. But the simple fact was, Kate had never liked the idea of researching her friends. Even though they would go their separate ways and probably not see each other again when April ended, she hoped she and Greg could be friends for the month. No googling, no online sleuthing. She would wait to see what Greg told her.
    He extended one of the racquets to her. “How does it feel?”
    Kate wrapped her hand around it, somehow not surprised that it was a perfect fit. Greg had shaken her hand only once, but that seemed to have been enough for him to guess her hand size.
    “I feel as if I ought to be at Wimbledon,” she told him. “There’s only one problem: the racquet is far better than I am.”
    The corners of his mouth twitched, and she wondered whether he was downplaying his own prowess. “So, we’ll practice. Let’s get started.”
    Greg took his position on one side of the net, waiting for her to serve the ball to him. Within a few seconds, Kate realized that he hadn’t lied. He wasn’t any better than she was. Half the balls hit the net; the majority of the rest went out of bounds,but the few times they managed to volley felt good. There was an unexpected satisfaction in being able to return a serve, even though Kate knew that tomorrow her arms and legs would protest the unusual exercise.
    Her regular workouts at the gym hadn’t prepared her for tennis. Half an hour of running around the court, stretching to hit a ball and bending down to retrieve the ones she’d missed, had left her more winded than her usual routine. What she needed now was a hot tub.
    Kate glanced around. There was plenty of space between the tennis court and the closest cabins to put a hot tub. If she owned Rainbow’s End . . . but she did not.
    “That was fun,” she told Greg as she accepted the towel he pulled from his bag and dabbed at her face.
    “Enough fun to do it again tomorrow?”
    “Sure.” Her muscles might protest, but she wasn’t going to give up the opportunity to burn calories in such an enjoyable way. Playing tennis with Greg was decidedly more fun than running on the treadmill at her gym.
    He reached back into his bag and withdrew two bottles of water, handing one to her. Instinctively, she turned the bottle to read the label.
    “Something wrong?”
    Kate shook her head. “No. I just wondered what brands were available here. My firm does the advertising for a competitor.”
    A frown crossed his face, deepening the green of his eyes. “It’s hard to escape work, isn’t it?”
    Greg sounded as if he understood, confirming her belief that whatever he had done before he’d come to Rainbow’s End, it hadn’t been a nine-to-five-forget-the-job-when-you-walk-out-the-door position. The truth was, Kate hadn’t thought of the office once while they’d been playing. If anything, she’d spentmore time today worrying about Sally and Rainbow’s End than she had her clients.
    “Work’s an important part of my life.” When Greg merely nodded, Kate continued her explanation. “I’ve worked hard to get where I am. If things go right, I may be made a partner by the end of the year. That’s been my dream ever since my grandfather took me to work with him.”
    She and Grandpa Larry had left their coats in his cubicle, then had toured the office. Though ten-year-old Kate had been impressed by the drafting tables and the conference rooms lined with pictures of the firm’s most successful ads, it was the end of the tour that had defined her life. When Grandpa Larry had