Now, Saturday afternoon, he was at South Beach Park schmoozing with people the organizers wanted to spend money on silent auction tickets or to donate money to the organization. It was a good cause, and some of the kids were pretty funny. The way they hung on every word he said and stared at him worshipfully made him want to laugh, but also humbled him. Weird.
He tipped a can of pop to his lips, watching Brooke from behind his shades as she talked to a couple of people from Daytrippers. She’d worked the crowd, subtly directed him where to go and what do to, all the while looking so goddamn hot he wanted to drag her around behind one of these tents and roll around on the grass with her. Her long brown hair shone in the sun, her face half hidden behind big sunglasses, her lips shiny and perpetually smiling. She wore knee length shorts that left slender calves bare, and a loose top with little straps.
And he thought
that
was sexy as hell? Christ, he was used to tanned, blonde beach bunnies with serious breast implants. He shook his head. Maybe he’d grown immune to those kinds of charms.
He spotted a couple making their way across the grass toward him. Shit. Matt and Corey. What the hell were they doing here? He straightened and shot a glance toward Brooke. Probably Matt and Corey hadn’t realized he’d seen them, so he legged it over to Brooke. “Excuse me,” he said, taking her arm to draw her away from the conversation she was having.
She gave him a brief frown that she quickly turned to a polite smile. “Dylan. What can I do for you?”
“Need to talk to you.”
She shot the two men she’d been talking to a brighter smile and said, “Excuse us,” as he dragged her away. “What’s going on?” she asked in a low, tight voice.
“My friends are here. The ones who’re getting married.”
“Oh.”
He paused, wrapped his arms around her and planted a big kiss on her mouth.
Startled, she didn’t respond. Then she slapped a hand on his chest. Before she could shove, he murmured in her ear, “Please. Play along. Remember? I want to keep them off my back about finding a girl.”
“Oh for
–
” She sighed. “We could have done that without making a big scene in front of all these people. Now the whole world will think we’re together, not just your friends. I’m not sure how that would go over with my boss.”
“Oh. Yeah.” Shit, he hadn’t been thinking about that. He’d just panicked seeing them. And there they were.
“Hey, Dylan.”
“Hi guys.” He gave them a beaming smile. “What brings you down here?”
“We heard you were here. It’s been in the news that you’re working with Daytrippers. Great cause. Thought we’d stop by and show some support.”
“Awesome. It is a good cause, and the kids are great.”
He saw Matt and Corey looking at Brooke, whom he still had his arm around, with expectant smiles. “Matt, Corey, this is Brooke Lowry. Brooke, my friends Matt Ferber and Corey Fenwick. Soon to be Corey Ferber.”
“Hi.” Brooke reached out to shake hands with them, smiling. “Nice to meet you. I hear you’re getting married next weekend.”
“That’s right,” Corey said, studying Brooke. “And Dylan’s bringing you to the wedding.”
“Yes. I’m looking forward to it.”
Corey looked at him, back at Brooke, back at him and he knew she was assessing Brooke. She grinned.
Okay.
“Hey, I think we went to high school together,” Matt said. Then he looked at Dylan. “You didn’t mention that.”
“Oh yeah. We figured that out as soon as we met,” Dylan said, sliding his arm from around Brooke’s shoulders then running his hand down her bare arm to take her hand. “Not that we knew each other that well in high school.”
“Yeah,” Matt said to Brooke with a grin. “Weren’t you involved with all kinds of clubs and committees at school?”
She smiled at him. “A few.”
“And we were out surfing and getting drunk.”
“Hey,” Dylan said. “
I
was surfing.
You
were getting drunk.”
Corey laughed. “I love hearing you guys talk about stuff like that.” She looked at Brooke. “They’re such good friends.”
Dylan caught Brooke’s smile. Totally fake. What was up with that?
Dylan, Matt and Brooke reminisced a little more about high school, chatting about some of the people they all knew and where they were now. Corey listened and laughed, not appearing to feel left out at all. Being from San Diego, and since she and Matt hadn’t met until they were in college, she didn’t know the same people they did. But that was Corey—interested in other people, warm, funny…he sighed.
“What’s wrong?” Brooke asked, looking up at him.
Huh? “Wrong? Nothing.” Shit.
“So what’s going on here?” Matt asked, turning to survey the event.
Dylan welcomed the change of subject. “It’s pretty cool,” he said. “Check out the silent auction. Some awesome prizes are up for grabs. Let’s go look.”
The four of them made their way over to the silent auction, and Matt bought a bunch of tickets, spending a fuckton of money. “Thanks, man,” Dylan said, shooting Matt a glance. “You didn’t need to do that.”
Matt shrugged. “Like you said, it’s a good cause. Hey, is that one of your surfboards?”
“Yeah. Autographed. Want to win it?”
Matt laughed. “There must be better prizes.”
Dylan rolled his eyes but smiled.
Matt and Corey checked out the prizes, choosing which ones they wanted to spend their tickets on.
“You should have asked me for a donation,” Corey told him. “I would have put together a gift basket of chocolates.”
“Um. Well, I wasn’t that involved in organizing this,” he said, uncomfortably aware he’d had nothing to do with it, even though people kept complimenting him. “But for sure, next time I will. Corey makes chocolates,” he said for Brooke’s benefit. “She owns Decadent Indulgence.”
“Oh my God, I love those chocolates,” Brooke said. “They’re amazing.”
Corey gave her a pleased smile. “Thanks.”
“And Matt owns the Laguna Dorada Brew Pub,” Dylan added.
“I knew that,” Brooke said with a smile. “It’s a great place.”
They wandered around and listened to the band that played. A ten-year-old boy came up to Dylan. “What’s your favorite maneuver?” he asked.
Dylan grinned. “Hey dude. I like any kind of air—airs and barrels. Backside Finner.”
“Cool.”
“You surf, buddy?”
“Yeah. I’m coming to learn from you next week.”
“Awesome. I can’t wait. What’s your name?”
“Cody.”
“Mondo, Cody. I’ll see you then.” He fist-bumped the boy. Straightening, he caught Brooke’s eye, surprised to see a look of soft warmth on her face.
“I have to go talk to the people from Daytrippers again for a few minutes,” she said abruptly. “Excuse me.”
“She’s gorgeous,” Corey said to him when she’d left.
He smiled. “Yeah. She is.” And that wasn’t him faking.
But Corey was looking at him searchingly. “So you two met in Tahiti, but she’s from here.”
“Yeah.”
Her mouth kicked up at one corner. “But you’re only here for a couple of weeks.”
“True that. Why?”
“I was just thinking, that makes it kind of hard for anything long term to develop between you.”
Oh hell. Long term.
Get those ideas out of your head, Corey
. “I don’t do long term,” he said lightly. “You should know that. I’ll be off in a few weeks for the next event. But we can have fun while I’m here.”
“Sure. Okay.”
The way she looked at him made him want to squirm. He pasted on a big grin to assure her he was fine.
“We should all have dinner tonight,” Corey said, glancing at Matt. “We could go to the brew pub.”
“Sure,” Matt said. “Great idea.”
Hell. “I’d have to check with Brooke,” Dylan said. “I’m not sure what’s up for tonight.”
“Okay. Where is she?”
He wasn’t going to get out of this, apparently. He scanned the crowd and spotted her near the stage. She was laughing and then she looked right at him and said something, and the people she was talking to looked at him too. He lifted his eyebrows and started towards her. “Be right back,” he told Corey and Matt.
“This is Leila Cruz from Channel Six news,” Brooke introduced him when he arrived at her side. “They’re interested in doing a little spotlight piece on you for the news next week, about you being home for the San Amaro Pro. Hometown boy has a chance to win it all.”
Oh man. He’d had a million requests for that kind of thing.
“Oh. Well, sure.” He smiled and shook hands. “Sounds great.”
“We want to highlight your involvement in local organizations,” Leila said. “Like this one today. We try to support those kinds of things.”
“That’s great,” he said. “Appreciate that. This is an awesome cause.” God, how many times could he say that? “I’m happy to contribute and if you can shine more light on it, all the better.”
He caught Brooke’s open mouth and raised eyebrows.
“I hear you’re working with Oceans Alive too,” Leila said.
“Yes I am. I haven’t yet had a chance to be very active but I’m very aware of the issues facing our oceans. Oceans are the largest ecosystems on Earth, our biggest life support systems. We need healthy oceans to survive and prosper.”
Brooke’s eyes widened even more. What? Wasn’t this what he was supposed to be doing?
“I spend a lot of time in oceans,” he continued. “Which makes it even more important to me.”
“Definitely,” Leila agreed.
“Dylan being here has really added some star power to this event,” Brooke said, her eyes still fastened on his face. “The folks from Daytrippers are thrilled with the turnout today.”
He met her eyes and held her gaze with a challenging look. She tipped her head to one side and pursed her lips.
They chatted for a few more minutes, Brooke talking him up and making him look like a freakin’ saint.
He knew he wasn’t a saint, he was nowhere damn close to being a saint, but her praise and smiles made something warm and soft expand in his chest. It made him smile too, and stand taller and regard the TV news reporter more benevolently.
“My agent looks after things like that,” he said, giving the reporter Holden’s card. “But I’ll tell him we talked.”
“Thanks so much,” she said. “I appreciate it.”
When Leila had left, he turned to Brooke. He found himself feeling very warm toward her now too. “Thanks for your support. I know you were just doing your job, but…thanks.”
She gave a slow nod. “You did great, Dylan. I’m impressed.”
Her comment made his chest swell even more. Maybe she really meant all those things. “So, this is going the way you wanted?”
“So far. As long as we get some positive attention, it’s all good.”
“Well, I’m not drunk or stoned or stripping my clothes off in public, so it should be positive.”
She rolled her eyes, but he caught the twitch of her lips.
“Holden has all kinds of things lined up,” he said. “ESPN, Extreme Sports.”
She nodded. “Yes, I know. That’s good too. These are just some things to emphasize the things about you that make you a positive representative for Jackson Cole.”
“Business,” he said.
“Of course.”
He nodded. “Matt and Corey want us to have dinner with them tonight,” he said. “But you don’t have to. If you have something else planned. Or even if you don’t, we can make some excuse.”
She blinked.
“Because I only asked you to come to the wedding with me,” he explained. “Just to keep them off my back. I don’t expect you to do more than that.”
“Oh no?” She smiled. “Just kiss you right in front of hundreds of people, that’s all.”
He grimaced. “Oh yeah.”
She narrowed her eyes at him. “Maybe it would be a good way for me to keep an eye on you tonight.”
“You want to keep an eye on me?” He moved closer, deliberately turning the comment into something more.
Her eyes flashed. “You know what I mean.”
“You think I might get into trouble tonight?”
She studied him. “I don’t know.”
“Haven’t I been a good boy all week?” he asked, a touch of bitterness edging into his voice.
“I’m sorry,” she said, surprising him.
“Sorry for what?”
“For making it seem like I don’t trust you.”
He hesitated. “Do you trust me, Brooke?”
Brooke’s heart thudded lightly in her chest, just fast enough that she could feel it. Did she trust him? That all depended on what they were talking about.
“You’ve never been unreliable,” she said finally. “You always do what you say you will.”
He nodded, his usually smiling, happy face looking unusually serious. “Yes.”
“But you
do
like to have fun.”
“Doesn’t everyone?”
“Of course. Everyone likes to have fun. But—”
“Even you?”
She frowned. “What’s that supposed to mean? Of course I like to have fun.”
“I mean…” He leaned closer and stroked some of her hair off her face and down behind her shoulder. Her skin quivered. “You’re so professional, so serious. So buttoned up.”
“Buttoned up?”
He nodded. “The first time I saw you, that’s exactly what I saw.”
Her cheeks flamed as she remembered walking in on him and those two women. “That might have been because you were naked and in bed with two women,” she said stiffly. “And I was dressed.”
“Oh yeah.” He grinned. “I was hoping you were going to join us.”
“As if.”
“No threesomes for you?” He shook his head, a sorrowful look on his face. “And you just said you like to have fun.”
Her eyes went wide and then slitty. “A threesome is your idea of fun?”
“Hey, it’s just one of many.”
“Along with drinking, drugs, partying…”
“Dancing,” he added helpfully. “I like to dance.”
She gave him a look.
“And surfing,” he said. “Don’t forget surfing. The most fun there is.”
“More than sex?” Oh holy guacamole, why had she said that?
“Hmm. I’d have to give that some thought…okay, no. Sex is the most fun there is. Surfing is the most fun I have with my shorts on.”
She choked on a laugh, then demanded, “How did we get talking about sex?”