Authors: Jill Shalvis
“You prefer to live in your head instead of the here and now,” he said.
“Correct,” she said back, and gave him a long look from beneath her lashes. “And anyway, you’ve asked your questions. Where’s my
worthwhile
?”
His gaze heated about a gazillion degrees as he leaned in and kissed first one corner of her mouth, and then the other.
She tightened her grip on him, closed her eyes, then moaned and dropped her head to his shoulder when he stopped.
“You still work for me?” he asked, voice gruff.
Great. They were back to that. “Unless I’m fired.”
“If I fired you, would you go get a job that better suits your abilities?” he asked.
“Like?”
“Like . . . being a full-time music teacher. Or writing more jingles.”
“Because I just love writing about feminine products.” Damn it, she hadn’t meant to let that slip. “If you laugh,” she warned, “our friendship—or whatever this is—is over.”
He paused, as if doing his best to bite back his amusement. “How about doing whatever floats your boat?”
“Why do you care about what floats my boat?” she asked.
He didn’t have an answer for that, apparently, since he said nothing, just looked at her with those eyes that seemed to see far more than she wanted him to.
“Stop worrying about me,” she finally said. “It’s not your problem.
I’m
not your problem.”
“I don’t know what kind of men you’ve had in your life, Becca, but that’s not how I work.”
“What are you saying? You’re in my life?”
“Yes.”
She didn’t know what to make of that, so it was her turn to say nothing, but she couldn’t help but stay a little too close. It was his warmth, she told herself. In any case, she wasn’t the only one feeling . . . things. She could feel him still hard against her. “Your body doesn’t agree with the not-sleeping-with-your-employee decree.”
“You know I still want you,” he said. “That’s not exactly a secret. But I want to know what happened today in my office more.”
She pulled back, but he caught her. “It was nothing,” she said.
“Becca.” His eyes were still on hers, his voice low but oddly gentle, as if he knew she’d just told a big, fat whopper.
And then, oh God and then, he cupped her face yet again and lowered his head, brushing his lips across hers. “It was a lot more than nothing,” he said with another soft, devastatingly gentle kiss.
She sighed and pressed her face into his neck.
“I get that you don’t know this about me yet,” he said. “But you can trust me.”
She lifted her head. “I do trust you.”
“Not yet, you don’t.” He let his thumb glide over her lower lip, the one tingling for more of his mouth. “But you can,” he repeated.
“Sam—”
“You’ll tell me when. I won’t push, Becca.” And then with one last soul-warming kiss, he was gone.
Over the next few days, the guys were busy nonstop and nearly always gone. During that time, Becca had plenty to keep her occupied. Her mind was something else entirely. She wondered what Sam would do if she said
When
.
She wondered if she even could say
When
.
Lucille stopped by to visit.
“Thought I’d see about trying paddleboarding,” the older woman said.
Becca tried to picture Lucille on a paddleboard in the harbor, but mostly all she could see was the Coast Guard trying to rescue her. “Um. . .”
“You don’t think I’m too old, right?” Lucille asked.
“Well. . .”
“Because I keep in great shape.” Lucille pointed to a biceps. “I’ve been hauling cans of prunes to the senior center all morning—”
“It’s just that the guys are out of town,” Becca said. “And first-timers need instruction.”
“Oh.” Lucille sighed. “Damn. That’s a shame.”
“A big shame,” Becca agreed.
“I’ll just come back another time.” But she didn’t leave. Instead, she made herself comfy on a stool. “So how’s the jingles going? What are you working on?”
Becca sighed. “Feminine products.”
Lucille grinned. “Sorry, honey, can’t help you with that one. I don’t need ’em anymore. Why don’t you get something good to write about, like denture glue? I need a new brand and could use a suggestion.”
Once Lucille finally left, Becca took a lunch break and
went to work on a curriculum for the kids at music hour. She needed to keep them busy, she discovered, or tiffs broke out among their ranks over who got to play what. So in addition to teaching them basic chords, they were working on how to respect other people’s space bubble. The latter was a far more difficult lesson, but it would come along.
Everything would come along.
Or so she told herself in the deep, dark of the night when her insecurities beat the crap out of her.
After another homemade meal with Olivia—to-die-for lasagna this time—Becca finally wrote a passable jingle for the feminine products and sent it off.
And late at night, when she couldn’t sleep, she played. Afterwards she’d walk home from the Love Shack at two thirty in the morning, alone with the salty ocean breeze and the moonbeams and her own troubled thoughts. A few nights back, on her first night playing, she’d heard something, someone, and she’d run the half mile to the warehouse, slammed into her loft, and with the lights still off plastered herself to the side of one of her windows.
Just in time to watch Sam vanish into the shadows.
The second night, she’d felt him as well, but when she’d stopped in the middle of the street and spun a circle to confront him, she’d been alone.
The next morning, when he’d come in for coffee, she’d searched his calm, even, handsome features for some sign that he was walking her home every night, but he gave her nothing.
So she kept it to herself. Because she knew what he was doing. He was just trying to give her back something
he thought she was missing—her music. She appreciated that, even as she resented the fact that she was also missing something else.
Him in her bed.
You’ll tell me when
.
The man confused the hell out of her. But denial had always been her friend, and that hadn’t changed. Early one morning, she unlocked and opened up the hut. She might have been hired to answer phones and greet customers, but she’d taken over handling their website, too. And then there was the ongoing planning for the upcoming Summer Bash, which had taken on a life of its own.
She started the coffee, brought up the schedule, handled all the charter’s online email and site correspondence, and then got to the Summer Bash stuff. Sam had reluctantly signed off on the pyrotechnics contract, the band, and the promos on Facebook and Twitter.
Becca was still planning out the logistics, hiring high school kids from the rec center for the setup on that day, renting tables and chairs and awnings. She was figuring out the decorations, too, some of which she’d found in the back storage room. She’d hauled out a big duffel bag filled with strings of white lights, wanting to use them along the dock and to decorate the boat. Problem was, the lights were literally in a huge ball, a tangled mess.
She’d been working on that here and there, and was at it again, sitting cross-legged on the floor, when Sam came in. He strode straight for the coffee. Saying nothing, he brought his mug up to his delectable mouth and eyed her over the rim as he drank. When the caffeine sank in about two minutes later, he finally spoke. “Mornin’.”
“Morning.” She paused, wondering which direction to
take this conversation. Were they mad at each other? Still circling each other? Ignoring each other?
She gestured to the stack of paper, napkins, and whatever else they’d been writing email addresses on for months. “I realize you all had a system going here with this lovely pile, but I have good news—my system’s better. I’ve got you all caught up.”
He smiled. “Glad to hear that. You’ve been busy.”
“More than you know. Right now I’m working on the decorations.” She gestured to the big mess of lights in front of her. Stuck on yet another knot, she swore beneath her breath. “And by the way, this is a really stupid way to store your lights.”
“Yeah, and if Tanner sees that mess, he’ll kill Cole. Tanner’s pretty fanatical about the equipment.” Sam hunkered in front of her, took the ball, shoved it back into the duffel, and rose, slinging it over his shoulder.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Taking care of it.”
“You’re going to untangle that mess?” she asked.
“I’m going to take care of it,” he repeated.
Okay then. So she rose, too. “How’s your dad?”
“Sprawled out on my couch watching movies and eating me out of house and home.”
“So he’s . . . okay?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “I’m seeing his doctor later today.”
Sam didn’t give off a whole lot of “tells,” but neither did he hide much. If he was feeling something—anger, amusement, arousal, whatever—he didn’t seem to have much of a problem showing it. When his gaze met hers, she saw hints of worry mixed with irritation.
He didn’t yet know what to think, and he was withholding judgment until he knew.
Which made him a whole lot smarter than her.
She tended to react first and think later. Hence the dreaming about him. The yearning for him. The kissing him the other night. . .In order to not repeat that mistake, she tore her eyes off his fine-ass self and instead looked at the walls.
There were a bunch of pictures, and she’d had a lot of time to study them. Most were of clients, some holding up large fish, others in scuba gear or just mugging for the camera on the boat and dock. There was one of a younger Sam, along with Cole and Tanner and another guy, the four of them on what appeared to be an oil rig, looking pretty badass. The next picture was in the same locale, but just Sam, Cole, and Tanner, with Tanner on crutches. “Seems like it must have been a real rough job,” she said. “And dangerous.”
Sam nodded, though to which she couldn’t say. Maybe both.
“Did Tanner get hurt out there?” she asked.
“Yeah.” He came to stand next to her, his gaze on the picture. “We nearly lost him along with Gil in a rig fire.”
“Oh, my God.” She turned back to the pic of the four men. She looked at Gil, so young, so full of life, and felt a pang for what they’d been through. “I can’t imagine how awful it must have been.”
“It sucked.”
Sam didn’t use a lot of words. He didn’t need to. The few he chose were effective. She imagined
It sucked
covered it all. She took in the rest of the pictures, one with
the three of them on a smaller boat than the one currently moored outside. “You’ve upgraded,” she said. She turned to face him. He was wearing black board shorts today and a plain gray T-shirt. No ball cap this morning, but his sunglasses were in place. “You’ve given yourself a great life here,” she said, realizing she was more than a little envious. “Working with your closest friends. All the adventures. . .”
A customer walked in. Actually, four customers, college buddies who wanted to rent surfboards along with Sam’s expertise to tutor them. Becca logged the equipment rental, and Sam headed out with them.
On the beach, all of them stripped out of their shirts, but Becca had eyes for only Sam. She tried not to look but she honestly couldn’t help herself.
Then he turned back, and caught her staring.
She considered dropping to the floor like she’d done when she’d gotten caught staring at him before, from her apartment, but it was far too late for that.
“Hey, Peeper,” he called, and crooked his finger at her.
Damn. She met him halfway on the dock.
“You got a suit?” he asked.
She tore her gaze off his chest. “Suit?”
“A bathing suit,” he said, looking amused. “Are you wearing a bathing suit under all those layers you’re so fond of?”
“Yes,” she said. “But I don’t know how to surf.”
“Lesson number two, in five minutes.”
Oh, my God. “I don’t—”
“You’re still living in your head,” he said. “Can’t live in your head when you’re surfing. On the water, you live
for the here and now. Log yourself out a wet suit so you don’t get cold. Five minutes,” he repeated. “Give yourself an adventure.” And, as it turned out, he gave her the adventure. She wasn’t ever going to become a pro surfer, but she’d had the time of her life.
Late that afternoon Sam walked into the town medical building for a meeting with his dad’s doctor.
Dr. Josh Scott had been ahead of Sam in school by about five years, but they’d gone rock climbing together a bunch of times, so Sam expected to spend a few minutes bullshitting before getting to the nitty-gritty of his dad’s health problems.
What he didn’t expect was to find his dad in the waiting room.
With Becca.
“Hey,” she said, coming to him. “Your dad asked for a ride.”
Mark nodded but didn’t rise. It was hard to tell if his small smile was the usual
I’m up to shenanigans
, or an apology. “Next time,” Sam said, looking into Becca’s eyes. “Call me. You don’t need to spend your time driving him around.”
“I don’t mind.”
“I do,” he said.
Her eyes narrowed a little bit, but she said nothing. She turned to his dad. “You take care of yourself,” she said. “And if you need another ride, or anything, you know how to get me.”
Mark gave her a real smile. She leaned in and kissed his cheek, and then, without another look at Sam, headed to the exit.
“Becca,” he said.
Her response was to shut the door, with her on the other side of it. Great. Sam turned his head and met his dad’s gaze.
“Son, seriously,” Mark said. “I really believed you had all the brains in the family.”
A nurse brought them to an exam room, and Josh came in wearing a white doctor jacket with a stethoscope around his neck and a ready smile. “Mark. Sam,” he said. “Good to see you both. Sorry about the circumstances.”
“And what exactly are the circumstances?” Sam asked.
Josh looked at Mark.
Mark looked guilty.
“You didn’t tell him?” Josh asked.
“You do it so well,” Mark said.
Josh gave him a pained look and turned to Sam. “Liver’s failing. Slow, long deterioration, most likely caused by alcohol abuse. It’s not acute. I’ve put him on meds and requested a diet that includes no alcohol and a moderate exercise plan. A lot of the time, the meds work and slow the deterioration down, but sometimes they don’t.”