Authors: Lorelie Brown
T
wo days later, Tanner had already had enough of Avalon. For being such a cutie, she could be hella annoying when she got something between her teeth. For now she seemed to be following him like Little Bo Peep’s lost sheep.
It might be okay if she talked now and then. But she’d gotten that stuck in her craw too. “Pretend I’m not here,” was the most she said as a periodic reminder.
So he’d snuck out. It was nothing more than he’d done to any other photographer a time or two.
Besides, it was practically a requirement. He needed a chance to get hold of the surf. To make it behave under his board in a way he’d be able to channel come competition time. Not like it was working, though. Not yet.
Board under his arm, he trudged up the beach, sand sticking to his bare feet and flicking up onto the back of his calves.
All he’d needed was one good set on his own. In peace. How the hell was he supposed to nail the World Championship if he wasn’t given enough time to fucking surf?
The points were too damn close to let this one go.
Jack Crews was five hundred behind him. If Crews won, he and Tanner could go neck and neck for the last two events of the season. If Tanner won, he’d be so much ahead of the rest of the pack that no number of Crews’s wins could take the title away from him. He’d have it completely sewn up.
“Nice to see you too.” The unspoken “asshole” didn’t go by unheard.
Avalon perched on the back railing of his deck, the ubiquitous camera bag slung across her chest.
Christ, her shorts were tiny. Or, more important, her legs looked amazingly long beneath them, her toes tucked into the vertical slats of the railing. The slim, hugging T-shirt she wore had some sort of bear monster on it and her hair had been scooped up into a messy ponytail again. Tendrils skimmed along her slender neck.
“I woke up earlier than I meant to,” he lied. “Headed out before dawn.”
“‘I’m going to sleep in, probably hit the gym later in the morning.’” She even mocked his facial expression, putting on a pseudoserious mien.
He shrugged as he propped his board up next to the door. He dug a key out of the pocket on the inside of his shorts, then unlocked the door. “Changed my plans.”
The house he’d rented was pretty awesome. Definitely a step up from the WavePro flophouse he’d shared with seven other surfers his first years after breaking with his dad. The beachside house was cool and dim after a morning of hard work. He fished a Powerade out of the fridge, then chugged it down while he leaned against the marble counter. He was shedding sand everywhere probably, but it didn’t matter. The floors through the lower level were all made of reclaimed wood in small, highly polished
rectangles that looked and acted like tile. It could take a beating and only look better for it.
Avalon followed him inside a moment later. “Thanks for the invite.”
“WavePro made sure you didn’t need one.”
Her bag went down on the counter next to him. He’d seen that dark gray canvas bag so often the past couple days, it felt almost as familiar as his own skin. But this time, there was something different. The corner of a black portfolio case poked out the flap this time. He tugged it free another couple inches. “What’s this?”
“My work.”
“Let me see.”
She grabbed a glass from an overhead cabinet while giving him a slant-eyed look. “I don’t take orders well.”
He hadn’t even known he had the stubby, flat-sided glasses she grabbed. The rental had come fully furnished, and it wasn’t a tiny place. There weren’t a lot of rooms but they were all spacious, airy, and perfectly decorated. Easier that way when he only needed it for a month. But at the same time, it was more comfortable than a hotel room.
When his kitchen wasn’t occupied with a faintly hostile female, that was.
Though he fully admitted part of that was his fault. He should have taken her surfing with him. It was bound to happen eventually. But between seeing both Jack and Mako, and then the shit Mako had sprung on him . . . He needed to take the edge off, pretty much.
He could go for a lot more time on the waves alone too.
She poured orange juice into her glass, then leaned
against the far counter. In a kitchen as big as this one, that put plenty of distance between them. The smile that curved her mouth was all sharp angles and a tiny bit of contempt.
“Please, let me see your pictures,” he gritted out.
“Sure.” She grinned, but hid it behind the glass of juice. Seemed she liked making him twist. “Go ahead.”
He tugged the case free, then flipped it open. The shots were beautiful . . . but cold, in a way. Bright blue ocean, surfers doing their thing. Some of them were black-and-white and gritty in a style he’d seen a million times before. All very competent. “Nice,” he eventually said.
She put her juice down with a clink. The tendons climbing up the back of her neck popped into stark relief as white lines carved under her cheeks. She silently walked across the kitchen, flipped her portfolio closed, gathered up her camera bag, and then walked out of the kitchen without saying another word.
Shit, there was only one way to interpret that one. He’d hurt her feelings in a way he hadn’t meant to at all. In the heavy silence of the room, he sighed.
He couldn’t let it go. There was a vast difference between her being annoyed with him because he’d snuck out to surf or stolen an inappropriate kiss and her being actually hurt.
He found her in the living room.
She’d laid out two cameras, including their waterproof housings, and was quietly wiping away sand. Her mouth had acquired an upward turn, but it didn’t look real. Almost as if it had been scribbled over her real expression.
He leaned a shoulder against the stucco wall. The paint was cool and rough. “Look, I’m sorry.”
The look she angled up at him from under her brows seemed intentionally blank. She was sharper than that. He much preferred her being a smart-ass.
“I’m not sure what you’re talking about.” She snapped a lens from a camera body, then pulled out a soft brush. “Do you think you’ll be surfing a set again this afternoon? One I can actually photograph, I mean.”
“About your pictures. They’re nice, really. As good as anything I’ve seen in
Surfer
.”
“You said that.” She flashed another smile. “It’s fine. I get it.”
Something didn’t add up. “What do you get?”
Her mouth twisted into a bitter knot, but her gaze dropped to her hands. “Same shit I’ve been hearing from everywhere around me. I’m missing the spark. Fine for commercial. Maybe I should stick to magazine ads. But, you know, fuck that noise. I’m not giving up.”
“No one said you should.” Shit, the last thing he needed to do was give her more ammo, but he couldn’t help himself. “I’m not giving up on my goals, either.”
She lifted her eyebrows. “Says the man who’s one competition away from winning the World Championship, pretty much. Good to know you’ll stick to it.” Her voice practically dripped sarcasm.
He wondered if she’d be quite that snarky if she knew her thin shirt revealed quite the view. Her breasts were small enough that she’d gone without a bra. There was nothing beneath her worn-soft T-shirt but her bare skin and the gentle swells of her breasts.
“Yeah. Make fun. That’s fine,” he managed to say.
He was probably one injury shy of over-the-hill. Didn’t it figure that the first time he managed to admit it to someone, she’d blown him off?
The hamstring injury that had kept him away from San Sebastian last year had been no joke, no exaggeration. Maybe previous years he’d made excuses to stay away, but not a year ago. No one but his physical therapist knew how hard it had been to come back from that injury, either.
He wasn’t some green kid fresh from the juniors anymore. Not made of rubber. If he didn’t nail the championship this year, he was pretty sure he’d never get another chance and he wouldn’t forget that.
One World Championship might be enough for most people. But he’d been twenty-one when he’d won his, barely conscious of a world beyond the nose of his board. Now he wanted to go out on top.
Retire in his thirties. The idea was a joke. But that was what he wanted. Take life all sorts of easy. Coronas on the back deck of a beach house, no more physical therapy or training or watching every move.
He scrubbed a hand over his head, breaking loose some of the sand. “Whatever. Not so easy for us old guys on the circuit, either.”
She snorted. “Old? Kelly Slater is forty-one.”
But he’d already walked out of the room, headed up the stairs to the master suite. There was a walk-in shower with his name all over it. He flicked the spigots on, then yanked his board shorts down and tossed them over the hamper in the corner. Then remembered he’d left his towels on the bench at the foot of his bed.
A surprise waited at the door to his bedroom. Avalon had followed. Bright red flashed over her cheeks. She slapped a hand over her mouth.
But she didn’t look away, either. Her eyes sparkled.
Tanner picked up one of the fluffy, dark gray towels
from the bench. Deliberately, he took his time flicking it out, then wrapping it around his hips. Avalon bounced on her toes, excitement buzzing through her very pores.
“Can I help you?” he purred. The last thing he should do was sleep with her, not while she was officially covering him for WavePro but he didn’t mind setting the groundwork for later, either. Avalon was too luscious to pass up.
She lowered her hand but had to tap her sternum once or twice as she coughed. The red finally faded from her cheeks. “The door was open. I didn’t think . . .”
He lifted an eyebrow. “Don’t let me stop you.”
She coughed again, glancing off to the side. “I wanted to say I’m sorry. I know you’ve had a few injuries. They must be getting harder and harder to bounce back from.”
Christ, that was true. He didn’t want to think about them any more than he had to, but that was why he had to win this year’s championship, why he couldn’t give up even a handful of points. He wasn’t likely to have another shot.
That didn’t mean he needed to listen to Avalon tell him how he was over-the-hill, either. He turned his smile sharp. “Don’t tell me you’ve been following my career.”
Another hot wash of pink rolled over her cheeks, even as she puffed an annoyed breath and flicked a glance up at the ceiling. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
Except he’d seen it. The quick flash that gave her away. “Holy crap, you have.”
Then she genuinely laughed. “God, not like that. Don’t make it any more than it is. You’re Sage’s brother and I already have to keep up-to-date for market research. That’s it.”
He tucked the towel a little more snugly around his
hips and looked out at her from under his brow. Was she really so relaxed, or was that her pulse fluttering wildly at the base of her throat? “You sure about that?”
In half a second, her eyes went wide and her lips parted on a quiet gasp. “Oh gee, Tanner. Don’t make me say it. How I’ve always felt.”
He couldn’t help but step forward, close enough to smell her sweet fragrance. “How’s that?”
“I’ve felt—” She rose up on her toes. The wash of her breath sent goose bumps down his neck. “I’ve felt like you were a huge jackass with an ego too big for your own good.”
With a giggle, she patted his cheek, then swished her way out of the room. Her ass twitched with each step she took, laughter echoing along behind her.
Tanner couldn’t help but chuckle as she walked away. Yeah, he’d deserved that one.
He tossed the towel onto the rack by the shower and stepped into the glassed enclosure. Water struck him from both sides, steaming away the stiffness of a morning of surfing. More proof he wasn’t as young as he used to be.
Hell, maybe he even needed to think about settling down. Damned if he’d hook up with a chick as smart-mouthed as Avalon, though. He knew what was good for him, and it wasn’t listening to crap like that for the rest of his days.
N
ot once since she was fourteen had Avalon been nervous walking up the front path of the Wright residence. They’d been her second home, her saviors. The very first time she’d spent more than two nights in a row had been when she’d been sixteen and her mom took off for Bakersfield. No one in her right mind willingly went to shitty, landlocked Bakersfield, never mind to follow a boyfriend who had to be back in time to make a parole check-in. But Candy took off with barely more than four hours’ warning. The fact that Avalon had midterms the next week hadn’t meant anything to her.
So she’d crashed on Sage’s floor.
Eventually the “guest” bedroom had morphed into hers. First a spare toothbrush in the upstairs bathroom, then extra clothes for after surfing.
The whole time she kept expecting her mom to raise a fuss. Claim the life she’d made and was supposed to raise. But Candy hadn’t.
Avalon had become part of the Wrights in everything but name. When things had gone wrong with Matthew, her postcollege boyfriend, and Avalon had found herself
without a place to live after she’d been dumped, she’d been welcomed back without even a question. She’d luckily been close enough to help when Hank died. Hell, she’d been there last night, left this morning. It was only that she was arriving in time for Tanner’s party that made anything odd.
Which meant that standing on the front stoop smoothing down her skirt with damp palms was ridiculous. Asinine.
Unavoidable.
Her heart seemed ready and willing to thump its way out of her damn chest, never mind her need for it. She really had to get her mind off Tanner’s body. The man had no shame at all.
God, she was fucked up, but she was beginning to like him for it.
He was completely and totally assured of his place in the world. She could do with a little of that. Though most of the time she was sure she hid it well, it felt like she was scrambling. Trying to grab at what she
could
get, not what she deserved. Like she’d snag scraps while no one else was looking.
Even she knew it was what was wrong with her photography. That missing spark had to do with her. She couldn’t get too mad at Tanner earlier today because—while she’d hoped he’d adore her photos—she hadn’t been surprised at all when he hadn’t.
That train of thought killed the frothing waves in her stomach easily enough. Walking into the house became nothing. So what if she saw Tanner? It was his welcome-home party; he was bound to be there eventually. Instead she found Eileen and Sage bustling around the kitchen, putting together trays of vegetables and pitchers of drinks.
Eileen dropped baby carrots and opened her arms to Avalon. “Baby! I heard, I’m so proud of you.”
Stepping into Eileen’s hug was one of the easiest things in Avalon’s world. She smelled faintly of patchouli from a holistic antiarthritis cream that she swore by but it wasn’t enough to be overpowering. A tiny reminder that Eileen wasn’t always the businesswoman she’d had to be to run a surf store for twenty years.
She closed her eyes and sucked up the comfort. Let her bones unclench for a moment. When she’d hugged Candy the other day, it hadn’t felt like this. They’d been all inflexible angles and stiff shoulders. That almost made her more sad.
Chasing Tanner all over Southern California meant she hadn’t had a chance to talk to Eileen about the assignment. “You don’t mind?”
“Mind you following my handsome son around for over three weeks? Not at all.” She leaned back, her smile lit with easy relaxation. Tiny wrinkles fanned out from the pale eyes both her children had inherited. “Slip me a few that I can put up on my walls and I’ll make that chocolate turtle pie you like so much.”
“Pinkie swear?”
“Of course.”
Sage poured blush wine into glasses, then pushed two across the counter. “Celebration time.”
She smiled past the prickle at the back of her eyes. This was home. These were the people she’d do anything for. Even if it meant coping with Tanner or, more specifically, not letting him get under her skin. Tanner would eventually leave for the circuit. She needed this family.
“I probably shouldn’t,” she protested but a glass of
wine might relax the knot of nerves between her shoulder blades.
Eileen kept trying to teach her how to relax and let go. She wasn’t exactly the type. Three hours later, when the house was crowded with people and her cheeks were tired from holding a smile, she’d had enough.
She’d been following Tanner around—of course—and he’d been completely working the room. Chatting, laughing, talking surf conditions with old buddies. Some of the guests had been on the pro circuit with him for years, and some he hadn’t seen in almost a decade. He treated them all with the same strangely empty surface cheer.
Framing him between the targets of her lens, it was almost like she saw him differently from everyone else. She wondered if anyone could see the odd buzzing within him, the way the corners of his eyes tightened every time he looked away from whomever he was talking to.
When he walked by a cabinet filled with his father’s old surf trophies, it was like a low-level bomb went off under his skin. His shoulders went sharp and hard, the back of his neck flushed faintly red.
She snapped off a few shots.
Tanner was back to ignoring her again, but that was fine too. She liked it better that way. At least then she wasn’t picturing the heavy sweep of his muscles, the sleek tendons that dove down his ribs to his waist. A vein to the left of his hipbone. God, that had been a yummy view, one that had made her mouth water. Inappropriately. Her mouth watered
inappropriately
over a photography subject.
She had to keep that line up. Somehow.
People were used to her buzzing around parties with a camera in hand. Hardly anyone even asked about the fact that Tanner was her target. She didn’t mind that. There’d be enough fallout and behind-the-back whispering once her spread hit
SURFING
.
A satisfied smile tucked up the corners of her mouth. She flicked her bangs out of her eyes as she traded out cameras up in her room. This? Was going to be so damn sweet. Best job of her life.
The level of payoff was worth ten times the hassle from Tanner.
For example, by the time she made it back downstairs, the frustrating man was gone. Disappeared. Bodies of all shapes and sizes—though almost everyone dressed in shorts and slim T-shirts—filled the space almost wall to wall.
But nowhere among them was tousled blond hair over a harshly hewn smile. Nowhere was the scar she found so intriguing. A taste of rough danger in an otherwise beautiful man.
Muttering under her breath, she dashed back upstairs and searched the bedrooms. Nothing. Even the room that had once been his was empty. It didn’t even hold a trace of him anymore, all blue-walled guest room with white furniture. Eileen had kept most of Tanner’s high school and junior surf trophies, but Hank had insisted they be packed away. Said if the boy couldn’t be bothered to step foot in the family home, he shouldn’t be a part of it.
They were both about as bullheaded as possible.
It hadn’t been a surprise to anyone when they’d butted heads—you can’t have two alphas in the same household—and the shock hadn’t set in until they’d both failed to get over it.
Avalon had almost given up searching for Tanner and was in the process of pulling the door closed behind her, when a flash of white caught her gaze.
Except it was outside the window.
She stepped back into the room. “Tanner?”
There was no answer, but the white shifted again. The corner of a sleeve, she figured. The window was open to the evening’s breeze coming in off the ocean a block away, and it smelled of salt. More home.
As she got closer, she realized the screen had been popped out of the window and rested against the wall in the dim shadow of the bed. Tanner sat outside the window on the low, gently sloping roof of the garage. His knees were pulled into his chest, his wrists draped over them so his fingers dangled between. His shoulders made a thick curve of muscle under his gleaming white shirt.
He glanced at her out the corner of his eye. “Hello, Avalon.” The way he said her voice was half purr, half caress. All tease. In it she heard a reminder of this morning and the view she’d been privy to.
She wasn’t one to back down from challenges. Never had been. Especially not when they were so damn delicious looking. She ducked her shoulders under the window and hitched one hip on the roof so she was pretty much sitting next to him. “Mind if I join you?”
The camera was an almost unnoticeable weight in her hand. Practically an extension of the way she blinked. She ran off a couple shots, barely even pointing the lens. That angle of his jaw, the way his skin glowed with health and happiness wasn’t something she could pass up. Her camera whirred in quick succession with the
snap-snap-snap
of the button.
His chest lifted on a sigh. “First rule. If you’re coming out here, you’ve got to put the camera down. Or go down to the party. I’ll be back in ten, and you can get all the shots you want.”
She bit her bottom lip, then wiggled the tip of her tongue over the tender flesh. Putting the camera down was harder than she’d expected but she’d always been there for her friends. Even if he was difficult—even if she had dirty thoughts about what she’d like to do to his body if he were any other man—she wanted to consider him a friend.
She needed to, on some level. Friends were safer than the strange animosity and lust they bounced between.
Ducking back inside the room, she set the Fuji down on the nightstand, next to a brass lamp. When he’d been living in this room, there had been a Hawaiian hula girl there. The first season he’d gone off to surf in Tahiti, Avalon snuck in nightly and swished the girl’s skirt. Not anymore.
She wondered what he thought about having been wiped out of what used to be his home.
It wouldn’t have happened if he’d stuck around. Sage’s room had stayed the same until she’d needed to come home. After Avalon couldn’t put up with Matthew’s whining anymore and came home, her room had been waiting. She’d thought her relationship with Matthew was headed toward an engagement at any moment, but they’d had a blowup instead. At least she’d had her own bed and the room she’d decorated to keep her company while she dealt with admitting her blindness. It had only been Tanner’s room that had been completely redecorated.
She slipped back out onto the tiered roof of the garage. The slope wasn’t too extreme, but it was certainly
noticeable as she settled onto her ass. Tanner had the wall of the house to lean against, but she had to plant her hands flat at her hips to feel more secure. She settled into the feeling like she settled into a heavy slab of a wave.
“I knew you weren’t much of a party boy, but this seems extreme.”
“This actually isn’t about them. Not much, at least.”
He stared off past the roof of the house across the street. She followed his gaze. For a minute, all she saw was suburbia, neatly tiled and slated roofs all lined up in a row, and past that the dark glimmer of the water under a half moon. The water frothed white in the surge she loved so much.
Avalon didn’t poke. There was a special element to a summer night where the warmth never left the air, but the dark could fix problems. Or at least soothe them for a little while. Minutes stacked up in quiet companionship.
Tanner sighed contentedly. “Now I’m home.”
“What?”
“I used to come out here and sit when I still lived here. Watch the water. Think about that day’s waves. Feel exhausted or upset or whatever drama my teenage self was rolling around in. Just . . . process. Almost every night. Mom gave up on keeping a screen on the window.”
Carefully, slowly, she lifted her feet and folded her knees to her chest. She still felt fairly steady. In body, at least, since her mind was rolling. “Not surfing, not your mom, not the house itself. This rooftop. This is home?”
“Yeah. I guess in a way it is.”
“You, Tanner Wright, are an idiot.”