Echoes of Summer Read Online Free PDF

right?”
    Madison struggled to keep her emotions in check. Oh, how she wished she could forget it all. She nodded slowly. “I remember.”
    “Oh my goodness. I can’t believe I didn’t recognize you after all the fun we...” He cleared his throat. “I feel so foolish. But I’m so excited to see you again. I can’t believe we’re actually working together. We really need to catch up.”
    Before Madison could find a way to avoid the requested date she knew he was going to ask for, Mr. Carlson interrupted. “You two know each other?”
    Stephen cleared his throat. “We dated a few years back for a while. Knew each other as teens.”
    Madison looked at Mr. Carlson, who raised a brow then looked them both over. “You both good to work together?”
    Madison nodded. “Yes. There will be no problems at work.”
    “Good. I’d hate to think the past might interfere with your future here. You two are a perfect team.” He patted Madison on the shoulder then did the same to Stephen as he positioned himself between the two.
    How could he have thought that? The whole presentation had ended up with Stephen taking control of it all, talking over her in every one of her ideas, and she’d succumbed to it without doing anything to show she still knew what she was doing. Mr. Carlson had never seemed like a sexist kind of guy who didn’t value a woman’s input.
    “I have a wonderful idea,” Mr. Carlson continued. “I’d like you two to join efforts while Stephen’s here. I think with you both coming up with ideas and presenting them like this, we can bring in more big-name companies. Madison, I know you can keep up with the accounts for a while, but I’ll look into hiring someone to assist in that aspect. In fact, Robert might be able to do a lot of that kind of stuff from home. You can take it back when he returns. I’ll run it by him, but I want the two of you to brainstorm on the potential client list I showed you. You’ve got great chemistry together, and I’d love to see how fast our business can explode with you two.”
    Madison closed her eyes. Explode was right. There was no way she could work with Stephen like that. Too messy, and how could she keep Milo a secret if she was always with him? She didn’t want to explore those feeling for him, knowing he wouldn’t return them, or if he ever did, she didn’t trust them to stay. He’d tossed her away so easily before, how could she survive the hurt if it happened again? Besides, his time here was temporary. Just like it had been in King.

 
     
     
     
    Chapter Six
     
    Stephen stared at the computer screen in his office. He couldn’t believe Madison was Bea from years ago. He’d thought of her on occasion, but had usually ended up remembering the last time his family had been complete. They’d found out his mother had cancer right after returning to Hawaii after finalizing the sale of his grandparents’ farm. Her cancer had already advanced to stage four, and there had been nothing they could do. It had been quick and brutal, stealing his mother’s life away from his family.
    And though he’d wanted to contact Bea, her parents had made it clear she was off limits. They’d caught him sneaking out of her house one night and had threatened to charge him with everything they could think of if he didn’t clear out and stay away from her. They’d listed all his faults, knowing from his grandparents about some of the trouble he’d gotten into at home and why he’d been sent to King, Montana, every summer. They were still livid about Bea and him getting arrested for throwing water balloons at a car during the Fourth of July parade the summer before. How were they supposed to know the cold water would shatter the hot windshield?
    He’d tried calling and sneaking over to see her, but her parents had taken her on a shopping trip in preparation for college, but he knew it had been to get her away from him until he’d gone back home.
    He’d lost his phone in