Authors: Lauren Christopher
“So you won’t be able to make it to the festival, either?” she asked. “Didn’t you have a booth and everything?”
Drew groaned. “Yes. I should be there. I wonder if Cora can sit at the booth for a while?”
“I’ll handle it,” she said.
“No, you’ve done enough already. Really. You’re the best, Lia. And it sounds like you need a few days off, too.”
“I’m fine. I’ll set up the booth and coordinate with Cora and Douglas—would they each be willing to work it for a few hours?”
“Absolutely. But let me set it up with them.”
“No.” Lia’s mind drifted back to her warning from Sharon again. “No, you rest.”
“Then I’ll at least call Evan.”
“No.”
Her response to that sounded a bit too emphatic. “It’s um . . . complicated,” she corrected. “Let me talk to him first.”
Drew paused. “Something tells me there’s more to this story.”
“There is. But I can handle it.”
“Lia, he’s my brother. Tell me what’s going on.”
Missy crawled up into Lia’s lap while she contemplated, for a second, what Sharon had said days ago, about leaving Drew alone. Letting him forget about business for a few days. Not causing undo stress . . .
“You two aren’t getting close, are you?” Drew added.
Lia petted Missy down her back. The fear in Drew’s voice didn’t seem warranted. “Why would that be so awful?”
“Oh my God, Lia. Tell me you two aren’t getting close.”
“Calm down. What’s the problem?”
“Just tell me you aren’t.”
She buried a kiss onto Missy’s head. Having Drew tell her what to say just made her not want to say it. Plus . . . well . . . it might not be true. At least on her end.
“You know that bossing me around gets you absolutely nowhere.”
“I know. It’s just . . . this is important to me. I don’t want you to get close to him.”
Missy dove off her lap to find food. Lia followed her into the kitchen. “It’s fine. Really. You don’t need to worry.”
“Promise?”
“You know I don’t promise. But I’ll tell you this—if I need you, I’ll call.”
“Promise?”
She laughed. “If Sharon doesn’t confiscate your phone, that is.”
“Go away.”
“You could have used those balls, you know.”
“I’m hanging up.”
“Okay. Get some rest.”
They hung up, and Lia stared at her phone.
What was this issue with Evan?
But she didn’t have time to dwell or decipher. There were more stitches to mend. She couldn’t let more things unravel.
She made one call to her mom. One to Giselle. She was able to leave messages, thankfully. Assurances she’d be at Giselle’s bridal-dress fitting. Assurances she’d find the right bridesmaid shoes . . . She hung up and stared at the stacks of shoe boxes. That part would have to wait, though.
She attempted to leave another message with Noelle, but Noelle snatched up the phone as soon as she heard Lia’s voice.
“Oh my God,
who was that man in your apartment
?” Noelle squealed into the phone. “
Please
tell me you’re sleeping with him.”
“What? No!”
“Oh, c’mon, Lia! Why not? He’s the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen cast a shadow across your doorway. Well, besides Fin, maybe.”
“Noelle! Fin is about to be your brother-in-law. And I have a boyfriend.”
“Oh, Forrest isn’t a boyfriend. He’s just someone you think fits inside the lines.”
“What?”
“Forrest just fits your long list of things you think you want in a husband. But sometimes you have to think with your heart, not your head.”
“Says the woman who’s been serial dating through her twenties?”
“Oh, you flatter me.”
“I didn’t mean it as a compliment.”
“I know. But I’m certainly more of an expert than you. And I say go with your heart, not your head. Or, you know, when that fails, your libido. Damn, tell me that guy doesn’t make your mouth go dry.”
“I’m hanging up.”
“Someone needs to speak truth to you, girl.”
“Hanging . . .”
“No, wait!”
“Up . . .”
Lia clicked off the phone. Noelle always called back if she didn’t get to say everything. But the phone didn’t ring back.
She shrugged off Noelle’s ridiculous words of wisdom and pulled a sweater over her head.
She still had some stitches to mend. And right now, she had the biggest stitch of all.
A visit to pay.
CHAPTER
A
s Evan pulled into the dock, she was still there.
He wasn’t 100 percent sure he was the reason for her impatient pacing, and he gave a halfhearted hope he wasn’t. But when she eventually caught sight of him, then beamed and tossed her hair like some kind of perfume model, she “yoo-hoo’d.” And waved. To him.
He groaned.
After all the passengers had disembarked, after he answered a few questions for the kids, after the chaos of the leaving passengers, Douglas came back for him.
“Pretty lady here to see you.” Douglas wriggled his white eyebrows.
Evan pulled his sunglasses off. “You can send her up, I guess.”
“I’d think you’d be a little more enthusiastic, considering what a looker she is.”
Evan tried to smile and hooked his shades to the front of his shirt. “Thanks, Douglas.”
Avery flounced up the last of the steps and gave a coy dip to her head when she saw Evan.
“Hello, Captain Betancourt. Are you still speaking to me?” Her curls fell across her left cheek.
“Why wouldn’t I be speaking to you?”
“I was a little flirty the other night, and don’t know if my behavior put me on the permanent ‘Banned’ list.”
“You’re not on the ‘Banned’ list.”
“Good to hear.” Her fingertip ran along the metal rail that rimmed the bridge, her eyes never leaving his face, and Evan wondered what the hell he’d just said. He wasn’t very good at this.
“Regardless,” Avery continued, “I just wanted to offer an apology. I don’t usually get that . . . tipsy. And flirty. Really.”
“It’s okay. It was a weird night for everyone.”
“I also just wanted to say thanks. For getting me home. You were a . . . a real
gentleman
.”
Evan nodded awkwardly. He hoped she’d go away now.
“I wondered if I could . . . Oh, what happened to your hand?” She scooped it up like a baby bird.
He pulled away. “It’s fine.”
Her eyes drifted back to his face. “Well, I wanted to repay you. By inviting you to dinner.”
“You don’t have to do that.”
“I know. I want to. I want to take you to a restaurant I love. Tomorrow night, maybe?”
“I really can’t.”
“Do you have another hot date?”
He made an attempt to match her smile. “I don’t really . . . date. Or go out much.”
“Well, maybe you should.”
“You may be right, but for now I’m not.”
Over Avery’s shoulder, he could hear another female voice talking to Douglas. He was surprised at the rush that went through his veins when he recognized it.
He peered over the rail. Cinderella looked great today—rosy color back in her face, strength back in her shoulders, her movements calculated and purposeful. She spoke to Douglas and gave him a grin that lit up her whole face.
Avery followed his gaze. “Well, there ya’ go,” she said quietly.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
Lia had on a loose sweater over bright, tangerine-colored pants. He couldn’t help but notice that the sweater came down too low to allow him any more glimpses of thongs or thong bands. He rubbed the bridge of his nose and forced himself to look away.
“Oh! Avery,” Lia said, climbing the stairs.
The captain’s bridge was small, and Evan never felt more trapped. Part of him wanted to bolt off the edge—maybe dive into the Pacific—while the other part wanted to simply stare at Cinderella and her long sunshine hair, and try to figure out how this pint-sized, overly perky, overly optimistic, too-talkative woman could have been the one to make his heart start beating again.
“I was just apologizing to Captain Betancourt here.” Avery moved to one side of the bridge to make room for Lia, blocking his view. Probably for the best. He needed to stop staring. He shoved his sunglasses back on and pretended to attend to the controls.
“I should extend the apology to you, too,” Avery gushed, touching Lia’s arm. “I don’t usually get that tipsy and act so brazen. I hope I didn’t embarrass anyone.”
“It was a weird night for everyone,” Lia said.
“That’s exactly what he said,” Avery said with a note of wonder. “Anyway, I’ll leave you two alone.”
Evan’s arm shot out toward her, maybe to help her down the stairs, maybe to stop her from leaving him alone with Cinderella—he couldn’t tell at this point.
But Lia helped Avery down the steep steps herself. At the bottom, she put Avery in Douglas’s care.
Evan watched all of this from the platform, knowing he should make his escape. But something made him hold his ground. Something made him want to stand there in this cramped space with this particular woman. He watched her climb back up the steps.
He was a mess.
* * *
“I’m here to offer an apology,” Lia said. She was out of breath and a little light-headed, maybe not quite well enough or
replenished enough to be out here climbing steps, but she knew she had to do this.
“Lots of that going around, it seems,” Evan mumbled.
“What?”
“Never mind.” He leaned against the rail. “What are you apologizing for?”
The boat pitched, and Lia gripped the opposite rail. She’d rehearsed this speech a million times on the way over, but she’d forgotten to factor in how sexy Evan was going to look, with his mirrored sunglasses staring down at her and the wind tossing his hair around.
“For, um . . . telling you to leave. Especially before I thanked you. And found out more about what happened.”
His eyebrow shot up over the glasses rim.
Dang. She didn’t mean to blurt out that part.
“But mostly the thanking part,” she said quickly. “I was just . . . overwhelmed. There were so many things to think about. It was a weird night.”
“It was.”
“And a weird couple of days. Especially for you. From what I could tell. How’s your hand?”
He lifted his bandaged fist slightly. “Almost healed.”
“Let me see.” Some strange instinct made her reach for it, even though it wasn’t in her nature at all. She was as far from Florence Nightingale as anyone could be, never knowing how to respond to broken bones, twisted ankles, or even scratches. But something made her want to soothe Evan.
Reluctantly, he ventured his hand out like a huge lion with a thorn in his paw. She took it gently. The bloody dots across the knuckles on the one side were gone from this morning, and he had a fresh bandage. “Who re-wrapped this for you?”
“Cora.”
His hand was huge and heavy in her own, his skin dark and weathered where the bandage ended. She stroked it lightly along the edge, knowing she wasn’t helping, but wanting to acknowledge this singular vulnerability she’d seen in him so far.
“I just wanted to thank you, really.” It was easier to talk to the bandage than to him. Lia had a long history of blurting out thoughts, but not when it came to emotions. Snarky responses? Check. Personal details no one needed to know? Check. But
when it came to being able to give sound to actual, real, need-to-be-heard feelings—whether to her sisters or friends or dates—she was embarrassingly silent.
She took a deep breath and tried again. “I appreciate your taking care of me.”
It wasn’t Wordsworth, but it would do.
Evan nodded awkwardly and took his hand back. He shifted against the rail and seemed to not want to look at her.
“As for finding out more about what happened, I do need to know some things,” she added, slipping back more comfortably into checklist mode. “But I . . . uh . . . I don’t know if I really want to know everything that happened.”
A small smile played around his lips. “Probably not.”
“Now, see? That makes me nervous. What do you mean by that?”
He shook his head.
Lia pressed her lips together. Dang, this was embarrassing.
Did she vomit all over him? Did she strip in front of him? Did she flirt with him? Did she flash him?
Any of those things seemed possible, unfortunately.
“Did I, um . . .” She tried to think of which answer she wanted first, and how to delicately phrase it. “What did you mean this morning, exactly, about us passing the modesty stage?”
“I don’t think we need to go there, Cinderella.”
“I just want to know how much to be embarrassed about.”
“Well, I’ll put it this way: You don’t need to be embarrassed about that.”
That wasn’t helping
.
“Did I . . . Did I reveal myself
willingly
?” she whispered.
“Is that what you’re worried about? No. You were just . . . flung openly when I came in one morning, and I didn’t mean to look, but—”
“Flung openly?”
“Spread-eagle.”
“I was sleeping
spread-eagle
?”
“Yeah. Is that a habit of yours?”
“So you could . . .
see things
?”
“Well, your skivvies were twisted, and I, uh, didn’t mean to look.”
“You shouldn’t have!”
“No, I shouldn’t have.” He seemed to be trying hard to come up with a contrite expression.
Lia took a deep breath. Okay. At least she wasn’t openly flirting. God, she was a mess.
What was happening to her?
Why was she so attracted to . . .
this
guy? Why
him
? This was Noelle’s type, not hers.
She toed the deck tape with her tennis shoe and tried to figure out how to proceed. She needed to get him to agree to the next part. She needed to play this cool. Then—and
right
then—she needed to knock this off. She had an almost-boyfriend, damn it. Who had a job and a future. She shouldn’t be getting all tongue-tied in front of Captain Betancourt.
“Well, I came to ask you a favor,” she said.
“This appears to be a habit of yours.”
Lia decided to ignore that. Her sales experience had developed her into someone who was really good at buttering up. Usually. But with this particular man, she knew she’d lost the meter to accurately gauge where appropriate compliments ended and drooling might begin.
“You look good,” she attempted anyway. “I like the shorter hair. Are you cutting it for the captain’s job? I’m sure Drew would appreciate that. I know you’re taking this job very seriously, and we really appreciate it. And you’re very good at it.”
His arms crossed tighter in front of his chest. “You can just cut to the favor if you’d like, Cinderella.”
She sighed. “The charter. Monday. We really need you. Kyle wants you to run it.”
A family of pelicans flew overhead and squawked. But Evan never took his shaded eyes off her. “I can’t believe you still want to work for that guy.”
She shook her head. “What I want is my job. And a promotion. And to get away from Elle. And I have to do this charter to get those things.”
Evan watched her carefully. The water slapped the sides of the catamaran hulls. “You really need this charter to get all those things?”
“I do.”
“How does that make sense?”
Lia slumped against the rail. She was so tired of fighting for her job, and worrying about it. But she felt like unloading.
“Elle is wooing J.P. Stevens, Kyle’s father. And she wants to make Kyle happy in every way. I’m the one who offered Drew’s boat for the charter, and she thought Drew and our ‘little Sandy Cove’ boat couldn’t pull it off. So now I have to make sure he does. She’s been holding a promotion over my head for years, and I think this could kick me into her good graces if I can do it. And I think it could get me fired if I don’t.”
The boat rolled gently beneath them. Evan stared at his shoes, crossed in front of him as he leaned against the rail. “What’s the promotion?”
“I’ll get to head up a campaign for one of her clients in Paris, and live there for a couple of years.”
“You want to live in Paris?”
“Yeah, who wouldn’t?”
He shrugged.
“Have you ever been there?”
“I docked there for a few months.”
“Was it wonderful?”
He smiled, maybe at her breathlessness. But he didn’t seem to be making fun. “It was what you make of it, I guess.”
“Were you too curmudgeonly to enjoy it?”
His grin widened. “I suppose. So you need to make the charter happen to get your Paris?”
“That’s what I’m told.”
“And all it takes to convince you Kyle’s on the level is a dozen white roses?”
“I think there were four dozen, actually.”
“I stand corrected.”
“But no. I can’t be bought off with forty-eight roses. I just don’t think he drugged me.”
He threw her a look of irritation. “I see we haven’t made any progress on the ‘too trusting’ front.”
“I just . . . I believe the best in people.”
“I’ve noticed.”
“He apologized profusely.”
“I’m sure he did.”
“And he said his bartender just switched our glasses.”
“Of course.”
“Evan! Why would he drug me?”
“To
get into your pants
, Lia.”
She snapped her head up at his raised voice.
“Sometimes people take advantage of you when you’re always trying to be nice,” he added.
“I’m not always trying to be nice! I’m doing my
job
.”
“But you come across as too nice. Too . . .”
“Gullible?”
“Trusting.”
“Oh, that’s right. Here’s where your caveman behavior comes back in.”
“Damn it, it’s not caveman behavior. I’m just aware of human nature. And I know what men are thinking. And men like that feel
entitled
. To do whatever they want, to whomever they want, however they can get it. They’re not used to hearing ‘no.’ They don’t know how to accept it. And those are dangerous men to
be around
, Lia.”
She blinked back his nearness, his anger, the passion in his voice, but she didn’t feel afraid of him in the slightest.
“You called me by my real name,” she marveled.
“That’s because I’m pissed.”
“So you’re going to use my real name whenever you’re yelling at me?”
“I suppose so.”
“I think I like it.”
His Adam’s apple worked a few times, and he stared at her for what seemed like ten minutes. His gaze dropped to her lips, and his head lowered slightly. She thought for a second he was going to kiss her, but then he dipped his head lower still and stepped away.