Summer at Seaside Cove (21 page)

A frown pulled between his brows. “You may have a point.”

She widened her eyes as far as they would go. “Heavens. Are you saying I'm . . .
right
?”

His frown deepened, but humor lurked in his eyes. “Don't be a smart-ass. I'm saying you're . . . not completely wrong. I'll think about it. And now I'm going to grab a quick shower. I don't want to sprinkle sawdust on the scampi. Did I mention that shrimp scampi is my favorite dish?”

“No. But I have to warn you, this isn't traditional scampi—more something I made up as I went along.”

“If it tastes even half as good as it smelled, I'll be in heaven. See ya in a few, princess.” He climbed the stairs, a sight that once again distracted her from breathing. The screen door banged closed behind him, jerking her from the ass-staring stupor she'd fallen into.

Annoyed with herself, she stomped back to Paradise Lost, determined to make the best damn scampi she'd ever prepared. Not because it was Nick's favorite (
Yeah, right,
her inner voice sneered), but because the damn man continued to knock her socks off and it was about time she returned the favor.

Fifteen minutes later she heard his footsteps coming up the kitchen stairs. “Your date is here,” her mom whispered.

Jamie nearly dropped her wooden spoon. “He's not my date,” Jamie said in a horrified hiss. “And you can't whisper worth a darn—whenever you try, it comes out louder than if you just spoke normally, so knock it off.”

“Sorry,” Mom whispered with all the quietness of a sonic boom.

Jamie pointed the wooden spoon at her. “Behave yourself. No matchmaking. And
stop
whispering.”

A knock sounded and Jamie called, “C'mon in, Nick.”

The screen door opened and Nick stepped into the kitchen. And two words walloped Jamie like a wooden spoon to the solar plexus.

Whoa, baby.

Dressed in a clean white T-shirt and jeans that bore the sort of fade patterns that came with lots of wear rather than a designer label, he could be summed up in one word: wow. Toss in his still-damp-from-the-shower hair and two words were needed: double wow.

Two other words ran through her mind:
no fair
. He went from yucky to yummy in less time than it took most people to wash their face. Although she had to admit his yucky was still pretty damn yummy.

“Hi,” he said. “For you.” Her gaze dropped to the single wild pink rose he held out to her.

Raymond had frequently bought her flowers—expensive, artfully arranged bouquets. But none of them gave her the heart tug she experienced from this single bloom.

“Thank you. So your superpower is the ability to make flowers miraculously appear?”

He smiled. “Nope. Turns out there's a rose bush in my overgrown backyard.” He turned to her mom and held out an identical rose to her. “And one for you, Maggie.”

Her mother accepted the flower. “Thank you,” she murmured. Then promptly burst into tears.

Nick's smile instantly turned to alarm. “Crap. Shit. I'm sorry.” He looked at Jamie with a panicked “help me” expression.

Her mom wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, then gave a shaky laugh. “You didn't do anything wrong and I'm the one who's sorry. It's the hormones. I'll be right back.” She hurried into her bedroom, closing the door behind her.

Nick scraped a hand through his hair. “Hormones?”

Jamie nodded. “Mom's pregnant. She cries at everything. Yesterday she cried during a car insurance commercial.”

“Is she . . . okay?”

“Aside from all the drama associated with an unplanned pregnancy, she's fine.”

“I feel like I walked into the middle of a movie.”

“My mother frequently has that effect on people.”

He frowned at Jamie. “You're not going to cry, are you?”

“Nah. It's my mom who's knocked up, not me.” A short huff of laughter escaped her. “There's a sentence I never thought I'd say.”

“Or one I ever thought I'd hear.” His gaze flicked to the door through which her mom had disappeared. “You sure she's okay?”

“Health-wise she's good. Emotionally, however, she's pretty much a mess, but not because of anything you said or did.” She reached into the cabinet over the stove and pulled out a jelly jar. “Not much of a vase, but the best I can do.”

“Well, it's not much of a flower, but the best I could do on short notice.”

“It's beautiful. I love roses. And it was very thoughtful and gentlemanly of you.”

He leaned his butt against the counter and casually crossed his ankles. “Glad you think so. But here's a tip on compliments, princess—they're a helluva lot more complimentary if you don't sound shell-shocked when you give them.”

“I wasn't—” Her words cut off when she caught his look. “Okay, you surprised me. In a nice way.” She added water to the jar, then set the rose inside. “I hope you're hungry.”

“Starving. And it smells”—he closed his eyes and took a deep breath—“incredible in here.”

Jamie's mom reentered the kitchen. She set her flower in the jar with Jamie's, then sent Nick a sheepish smile. “I'm so embarrassed. Sorry.”

“No worries. Women take one look at me and cry all the time.”

“I bet,” Jamie said dryly. And she didn't doubt it for a minute. Any man who looked like him had to be a heartbreaker—something it would be really wise for her to remember. Because another heartbreak she did not need.

While her mom poured glasses of iced tea, Jamie served the plates and they all sat around the small snack bar area. She watched Nick take his first bite. His eyes slid closed and he made a sound in his throat that sounded more like sex than scampi and raised her temperature a good five degrees.

After he swallowed, he said, “Wow. Incredible. Makes me wish I was a poet so I could write something called Ode to Jamie's Shrimp Scampi.' ”

Pleasure washed through her at the compliment. “Glad you like it, although I don't think the benchmark was too high considering you've been eating peanut butter and jelly all week.”

“ ‘Like' doesn't really cover it, but I'm too happy to argue.”

“Okay,
now
I'm plotzing. Note to self: Scampi makes Nick agreeable.”

“Jamie, are you suggesting this hard-working, cat-feeding man who brought us roses is normally disagreeable?” Mom asked, her voice filled with mock horror.

Jamie snorted. “Suggesting it? No. Saying it flat-out? Yes.”

Nick stabbed a shrimp with his fork. “Now that I know you can cook like this, I'll be a perfect angel.”

“To quote the late, great Buddy Holly—that'll be the day.”

Nick smiled at Jamie's mom. “She's crazy about me.”

Jamie nearly spewed her iced tea. Before she could recover, her mother smiled back and said, “Just be careful with her. She's suffered enough recently. Bad breakup.”

“Hey, no need to go into all that,” Jamie said with a forced laugh. She shot The Look at her mother.

“She's not only a great cook,” continued her mother, blithely ignoring The Look, as well as obviously forgetting there was to be no matchmaking, “she's smart, funny, a whiz at planning parties, great at her job, unbeatable at Scrabble, an extremely loyal friend, and a truly wonderful daughter.” She batted her eyelashes. “Not that I'm biased.”

“Thanks, Mom, but hey—enough about me.” This time she shot her mother the evil eye. “How about those Yankees?”

“So this bad breakup—I guess that makes me the rebound guy?” Nick asked her mom.

“Hello, I'm sitting right here,” Jamie said, waving her hand.

“I'm not sure rebound is the right word,” Mom said, her brow puckered in thought. “I think for a rebound situation—”

“There's no situation,” Jamie broke in.

“She'd need to be heartbroken,” Mom continued as if she hadn't spoken. “And I believe she's more angry than hurt over the breakup.”

“Happens when you get cheated on.”

“She told you?” Mom asked.

“No, I didn't,” Jamie said, leveling a murderous look at her mother. Mom, who seemed to have developed Teflon skin, continued to ignore her.

“No, she didn't,” Nick agreed. “But I figured that's what went down. I know the signs.”

“Someone cheated on you?” Mom asked, her voice filled with sympathy.

“Yup,” Nick said, helping himself to another piece of garlic bread. “Do you live in New York, Maggie?”

Jamie chomped on her sautéed shrimp like she was chewing glass, and listened to them chatter on. After a few minutes, she realized a pattern had emerged in their conversation. Every time her mom asked Nick a question about himself, he'd answer with a noncommittal, short reply, then immediately change the subject by asking Mom something about herself. She recalled Jack Crawford saying that Nick didn't like to talk about himself, and clearly he was right.

Why not? And who had cheated on him? And when? Curiosity tugged at her, and although she tried to shove it aside, it remained right there, asking,
What's up with this guy?
What was he hiding? He didn't look like a hit man—or did he? What the hell did she know—she didn't know any hit men. Maybe he really was in the CIA. Or the witness-protection program.
Or maybe he's just a regular guy who doesn't like to talk about himself,
her inner voice whispered.

Maybe. But she wasn't used to that. Raymond had never been shy about regaling her with tales of his private school exploits, college days at Yale, skiing in Europe, beaching on St. Bart's. At first she'd been enthralled, but with the wisdom of hindsight, instead of interesting, he just seemed full of himself. Definitely not an attribute she could assign to Nick. But his closemouthed nature piqued her curiosity.

“Don't you think so, Jamie?”

Her mother's voice yanked her from her thoughts. “Huh?”

“That this would be a great evening for a walk on the beach.”

“Is there a bad night for a walk on the beach?”

“Never,” said Nick. He set his napkin beside his empty plate and patted his flat stomach. “Best scampi ever. Seriously. And I'm not just saying that because you saved me from another night of PB and J. If I knew how to cook, I'd be begging for the recipe.”

“Jamie can give you some beginner cooking pointers,” Mom said. “She's an excellent teacher. She gives lessons at the senior center twice a year. They were so disappointed when she canceled her session for August.” Her tone made it clear she'd better not cancel again or the entire senior world would collapse.

No pressure.

Good grief. Why had no one ever invented a Mom muzzle?

Nick's gaze fastened on Jamie. “Teacher, cook, restaurant manager . . . is there anything you can't do?”

Yes. Get my mother to stop talking.
“Yes—teach the dishes to clean themselves.”

“I'll help,” Nick said, rising. “It's the least I can do after that incredible meal.”

They'd just finished clearing the table when a knock sounded at the kitchen door. All three of them turned. Jamie's mother whispered, “Oh, God,” and grabbed Jamie's arm in a viselike grip.

Alex Wharton—her mother's baby daddy, aka Bringer of More Drama to Jamie's Supposed Sanctuary—stood on the other side of the screen door.

N
ick heaved a tennis ball toward the pier and Godiva took off like a rocket, kicking up sand behind her.

His shoulder bumped against Jamie's, sizzling an absolutely ridiculous bolt of heat through him. She walked next to him, her bare feet leaving prints in the wet sand in unison with his. He glanced down and inwardly shook his head. Damn, even her feet were cute—small and tipped with bright pink nail-polished toes. He really liked the way they looked strolling along next to his much larger feet. “You're unusually quiet,” he said. “You okay?”

She shot him an assessing sidelong look. “Is that just a polite question to which I should just as politely answer ‘I'm fine,' or do you really want to know?”

“I wouldn't want you to tell me you're fine if you're not.”

“In that case, no, I'm not okay.” She blew out a long, frustrated-sounding breath. “I came to Seaside Cove to get away from drama, yet it keeps showing up on my doorstep—first in the form of my preggers mom, who isn't shy about stating, and reiterating, her displeasure with my decision to stay here for the entire summer, and is pressuring me to make decisions for her that only she can make, and now in the form of her baby daddy. Twenty minutes ago I was eating scampi and now I feel as if I've been evicted from the place that was supposed to be my peaceful haven so my mom and Alex can talk. I know they have issues to work out, but jeez, can't they do it somewhere else? Like in New York? Where they belong?”

She raked her hands through her windblown hair. “And the fact that I'm thinking that way makes me feel rotten and guilty. Totally selfish and unsympathetic. But you know what? I have my own problems that I'm attempting to work through, and damn it, why
can't
I be selfish? Just this once? Where does it say that I always have to be responsible for everyone else and help solve their problems? Why can't I be allowed to just concentrate on
me
?”

She shot him a sheepish look. “Bet you're thinking, ‘Sorry I asked.' ”

“Maybe a little.”

“And now you know what a selfish person I am.”