Chase took a few hesitant steps forward. “Speaking of alcohol, Todd thinks we should celebrate our successful day. Care to join us across the street at the pub? To thank you again for all your help.”
She glanced at the floor behind the counter. “I can’t.”
Disappointment crashed over him like a rogue wave, but he tried to keep it off his face. “Because of your boyfriend?”
Her grin faded to a deep frown. “He’s not my boyfriend. Get it through your thick head. And he’s not the boss of me, so he can’t tell me who I can or can’t hang with. But…I do need to get Hershey home and feed him. Poor guy’s been cooped up in the shop all day!” Proving her point, the lab walked out from behind the counter and gave a vigorous shake, loose fur flying into the air around him.
Chase stooped to scratch the scruff around the dog’s neck. Hershey’s tail wagged in a giant circle, and Chase couldn’t help but smile. “It’s a beautiful night for a walk. Why don’t I come along while you take the dog home? Todd’s still at the Center cataloging today’s haul. I’m meeting up with him in half an hour.”
She looked down at the dog before training those turquoise pools on him. “I don’t think I should.”
He straightened to meet her gaze. “Why not?”
She hesitated. “You said yourself, you’re only here for a few days. I wouldn’t want you to get the wrong idea about me.”
He took another step, close enough to feel the heat emanating from her body like pulsing waves. The smell of her honey-lemon shampoo made him dizzy with need. “What wrong idea?” She looked up into his face and licked her lips, seeming at a loss for words. He watched her tongue trace its way around her mouth. Todd’s misquoted words repeated in his head.
All’s fair in love and war.
The only wrong idea would be to walk away.
He took a long steadying breath, and decided he didn’t want to walk away. Not this time. Not ever again.
****
She tilted her head to stare into those same stormy eyes that haunted last night’s dreams…and totally lost her train of thought. For the life of her, she couldn’t remember what she’d been saying. Her mind flickered through random thoughts, but couldn’t grasp onto any one thing, except the memory of yesterday’s kiss.
She desperately wanted to kiss him again. Wondered what it would feel like. Scorching like yesterday’s surprise encounter? She licked her lips, contemplating his mouth. Why was it a bad idea to go next door for a drink with this guy?
On the phone earlier, Kathy seemed to think it sounded like an awesome idea, but reason lurked on the edge of her consciousness, reminding her all the reasons she should say no.
He’s not here for long. He’s going to leave. And
Tony. Remember your promise to Tony
.
Emma’s pulse raced from his proximity. Before she could make up her mind how to answer his question, he gently brushed his lips against her mouth. Awareness shot through every nerve ending, head to toe. She sucked in a ragged breath before he claimed her again more fully, deepening the kiss and pulling her tight against his hardened body. Any thought of resistance melted away, her body awakening to overwhelming sensations radiating throughout. Need flamed like white-hot lightning as she pressed against his hard planes, her palms smoothing up the back of his denim shirt, winding through his mop of brown curls.
Finally, he slowed the kiss and nipped at her lower lip. A small smile quirked his lips. “Sorry, I’m a scientist. I’ve been wondering all day.”
“About what?”
“Whether our kiss yesterday was an anomaly.”
“Am I an experiment?”
“In a way.”
“And?”
“Too small a sample set to make conclusions. But definitely worth further investigation.” His husky voice made her tremble in his arms. He pulled her closer, warm hands planted firmly near her waist while his lips explored the sensitive skin below her ear. Heat seared through the thin fabric of the broomstick skirt, the same way his kisses seared through her rational thoughts. At the moment, all she wanted was more.
More kisses. More heat. More Chase.
Her eyelids fluttered shut as she pushed that idea to the back of her mind and tried to regain control of her traitorous body, even as her fingers twisted in his damp hair. He smelled of soap and sunshine, a far cry from how most guys came home from a day on the ocean. A stray image of Chase soaping up in the shower flitted through her head and she bit back a groan.
So not helping
.
She took a deep breath and moved her neck away from his teasing tongue, finding her voice. “I’m not sure I want to help NOAA with experiments.”
The corners of his eyes crinkled with amusement. “This particular scientific study is definitely not government-funded. More of a personal investigation.”
“Even so.” She extracted herself from his embrace and took a shaky step back. “Hershey still needs to go home and eat dinner.”
Hearing his name paired with talk of food, the dog jumped up and whined, suddenly anxious to leave the shop. Chase laughed and ran a hand through his hair. “You’d think he knew you were talking about feeding him.”
“Of course he knows his own name! He’s pretty smart despite being a Labrador.” Emma took the opportunity to step further away both physically and mentally. She babbled on about the dog while looking for the leash and her purse, pushing small items around on the countertop and locking the cash register, looking anywhere but at Chase. Doing anything except acknowledge what happened between them.
What just happened? Oh, right. He kissed me silly. And I kissed him right back! What’s gotten into me?
She cleared her throat, focusing on the dog again. “Hershey has a large vocabulary. Mom calls them his ‘magic’ words, and those are words we usually spell instead of saying out loud. Anything to do with mealtime falls in that magic category.”
“Really? You have to spell out lunch and dinner? Or all food words?”
As if to prove her point, Hershey bounced in place, whimpering in his excitement.
“Do you mind? You’re torturing the poor guy.” Emma finally looked at Chase again, and couldn’t help but smile at the look of doubt on his face. “Seriously, haven’t you ever had a dog?”
“Actually, no.”
“Not even when you were little?”
“Nope. I went away to boarding school at a young age.”
“How young? Like, high school?”
“Younger.”
“Junior high?”
“Kindergarten.” He focused on the dog, not looking at Emma. “It didn’t stop me from asking Santa Claus for a puppy every year, but the man in red never came through. By nineteen, I had my Master’s degree and my first research position at sea, so there was never time to adopt a dog.”
“Then I guess you totally missed out on Dog Logic 101.” Her words teased, but her heart went out to him. Never mind not having a dog, it didn’t sound like he had much of a childhood. “Come on, I’ll let you hold the leash since you’re the one who stirred him up.”
“You changed your mind?”
“Maybe. Now let’s go before I change it again.” She flipped off the last switch for the overhead lights, leaving only the soft glow from the lighted window display to combat the shadows. Outside, the bright reds and oranges of sunset had given way to the darker shades of twilight. Pulling the door shut, she turned the key in the deadbolt and shivered at the cool breeze coming in off the water. The tank top and thin skirt offered little in way of warmth.
“Cold?” Chase wrapped an arm around her shoulders and rubbed his hand on her bare arm.
“I always forget how the temperature drops when the sun goes down, even in August.” Emma soaked in some of his body heat. “If we walk quickly, I’m sure I’ll warm right up.”
Hershey set a brisk pace, no doubt eager to eat. Chase kept his arm around Emma, which helped her stay warm but also caused a different kind of sensation to run through her.
What am I doing? Did I really invite him home with me? What do I really know about him?
Similar thoughts seemed to occur to Chase. “You said yesterday that you grew up here in Provincetown, and you seemed right at home in your family’s store. What do you do back in New York City?”
“I work for the mayor, actually.”
“That must be interesting. Have you been there long?”
“Since the beginning of the year. I did public relations work for a non-profit my first year out of college, then went to work at a start-up environmental company. We did a few things in conjunction with the new mayor’s campaign and when he took office in January, they called me to interview for a job in his fundraising department.”
“Fundraising. So, you plan cocktail parties and get dolled up to schmooze with political donors?”
She couldn’t tell if Chase was teasing her or being serious. “There’s more to it than that. Yes, most of it’s political. But we also work with a lot of non-profit groups and get the word out about a lot of good causes. My best friend Kathy works for one of the big PR firms in the city, so we’re at a lot of the same events.”
“A friend from Provincetown?”
Emma shook her head. “She’s from Holyoke, out in western Massachusetts. I met her at NYU and we bonded over our Cape Cod connection. Her family had a summerhouse on the Cape. We used to be roommates.”
Chase’s frown looked puzzled. “But not anymore?”
“She recently moved in with her fiancé. The wedding’s in September.”
“And now you live with that Tony guy?”
“That part’s complicated.”
Chapter Twelve
The follow-up questions practically burned Chase’s tongue.
Why is it complicated? What does “complicated” mean in terms of living arrangements?
Science was all about asking questions and seeking answers. Defining terms in a black and white way. Relationships, however, often require a more nuanced approach. But he’d been burned before for not asking the right questions.
Too soon. I have no right to demand answers to questions I have no right to ask
. He tried to stay grounded in the moment. She felt so good tucked against him, so soft and comfortable, and those kisses absolutely rocked his world. He’d never connected so deeply or so quickly with anyone in his entire life.
Well, that wasn’t quite true. There was Sarah.
A PhD candidate with huge brown eyes and a quick, dry wit, they’d hit it off immediately. She was a few years older than Chase, who was technically the senior research associate on the trip, having finished his dissertation the prior year. The three-month research journey took them down and around Cape Horn mapping changes in ocean currents and weather patterns, one of his first serious introductions to the effects of climate change. And to love. He tumbled into bed wrapped in her arms one drunken night, sometime after the first leg of the journey. She was insatiable, and he fell hard. Young and naïve, he thought he’d found his happily ever after and started mapping more than weather patterns, planning a future together with Sarah.
The problem waited on the California dock at the end of the trip, in the form of a family she’d completely neglected to mention. Not once in three months did he have the foggiest notion or inkling that Sarah had a husband.
Or a child.
Watching her swing the giggling two-year-old in her arms, his heart broke into a million pieces. She’d been his entire world for three months, and now he discovered it was all an illusion.
Chase walked away and let Sarah publish the research solo.
Since then, he’d been on a few dates but nothing ever felt right. The women his mother set him up with in the Hamptons only seemed interested in his family name and money. His fellow scientists were more interested in co-publishing opportunities than getting to know him as a person.
The day before, all kinds of internal warning bells triggered when Emma mentioned living with Tony. Suddenly the scene of Sarah and her little happy family waiting on the dock replayed in his mind, blocking out the hustle and bustle of Commercial Street. He walked away from Emma without explanation. But something drew him back.
Emma seemed different. Genuine. Not interested in him to further her own career or for his parents’ wealth. After knowing her less than a handful of days, he didn’t want to lose her. At least not without giving whatever it was between them a chance.
But.
She had a boyfriend.
And a complicated situation.
He steeled himself, deciding it would be better to know. Get it over with, like ripping a bandage off your arm. “So, about that boyfriend of yours. Is it serious?”
She groaned. “What can I say to make you believe when I say he’s not my boyfriend?”
“The empirical evidence would point to a different conclusion.”
“Are you Italian too?”
Chase narrowed his eyes. “Excuse me?”
She paused and stepped away from his side. He felt the loss immediately, like a piece of him was missing. “Tony told me last night that his Italian family doesn’t believe men and women can be friends without being lovers. I thought the rest of the world was more progressive, but I guess I was wrong.”
He tugged the dog’s leash, bringing him to a stop beside them. Hershey grunted and began to investigate a patch of grass between the sidewalk and the street.
She took a deep breath and continued. “Tony and I have been friends almost a year. In all that time we’ve never exchanged more than a kiss on the cheek. He doesn’t mind coming along to all the fundraising events and he looks good in a suit.” She looked away, obviously uncomfortable, as if there was something she wasn’t saying. “When Kathy and Jim got engaged, it left me in sort of a bind because no way can I afford that rent by myself. I tried to find a new roommate, but the people who answered the ad?” She shuddered. “Tony offered his spare bedroom. As friends.”
“So you live together?”
“Not until the end of the month. But then again, why would it even matter?”
He contemplated her explanation, trying to formulate an answer. Her situation differed from Sarah’s in several key ways—first and most importantly, Emma wasn’t married. That didn’t mean he liked the idea of her living with that Italian pretty boy, but he understood. Rent in New York City bordered on the outrageous.